User:SnowyCinema/P/Nattie Nesmith

/conf//

f=Nattie Nesmith (1870).pdf
com=Category:Nattie Nesmith
ver=Q125534569
base=Q125534564
ht=005928209
progress=projectfiles_folders_archived
y=1870
loc=Boston
pub=Q125534325
au=Sophia Homespun
sub=or, The Bad Girl
alt=The Bad Girl
ty=novel
gen=children's/captivity
ser=Q125534564

htt=mdp.39015082511208
dl=ht

beg=dii
ch=rom

//conf/

/chform//
<nowiki>
{{ph|class=chapter num|/cpre/ /cnum/.}}
{{ph|class=chapter title|/cnam/.|level=2}}
</nowiki>
//chform/

/tocform//
<nowiki>
{{c|{{sc|/cpre/ /cnum/.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|/cnam/}}|/pnum/||positionoffset=20}}
</nowiki>
//tocform/

-cov

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) front cover.png
| width = 300px
}}

—

-fro

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) frontispiece.png
| caption = Nettie sank down on the cold stones by the spring. [[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 14#180|Page 180]].
| width = 300px
}}

—

-1

{{c|
{{xx-larger|{{uc|Nattie Nesmith;}}}}<br />{{asc|Or,}}<br />{{xx-larger|{{uc|'''The Bad Girl.'''}}}}

{{sm|{{sc|By}} {{uc|[[Author:Sophia Homespun|Sophia Homespun]]}}.}}
{{dhr|5}}
{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 1.png
| width = 75px
}}

''{{x-larger|Boston:<br />Published by D. Lothrop & Co.}}<br />Dover N H: G. T. Day & Co.<br />1870.''
}}

—2

-3

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 2.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{c|{{larger|{{uc|Contents.}}}}}}
{{dhr}}
{{hr|3em}}
{{dhr}}
<div class="toc-block">
{{TOC page listing||{{asc|Page}}||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER I.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 1|Disobedience]]}}|5||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER II.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 2|Flight]]}}|21||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER III.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 3|Lost]]}}|35||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER IV.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 4|Search]]}}|44||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER V.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 5|Not Found]]}}|54||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER VI.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 6|Caught]]}}|67||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER VII.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 7|Travel]]}}|78||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER VIII.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 8|Work]]}}|93||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER IX.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 9|Weariness]]}}|109||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER X.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 10|Return]]}}|117||positionoffset=20}}

/foot//
</div>
//foot/

-4

/head//
<div class="toc-block">
//head/

{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XI.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 11|Torch Eye]]}}|129||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XII.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 12|Flagging]]}}|143||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XIII.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 13|Despotism]]}}|155||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XIV.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 14|Disaster]]}}|169||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XV.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 15|Alarm]]}}|182||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XVI.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 16|Desolation]]}}|200||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XVII.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 17|Sheltered]]}}|212||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XVIII.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 18|Sorrowing]]}}|223||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XIX.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 19|Disclosures]]}}|237||positionoffset=20}}
{{c|{{sc|CHAPTER XX.}}}}
{{TOC page listing|{{sc|[[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 20|Home Again]]}}|256||positionoffset=20}}
</div>

-5

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 3.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|I|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter I.png}} CAN'T, I sha'n't, and I won't!"

Three very bad sounding words, certainly. Do any of the little girls who have sat down to the reading of this book ever use any of them? I hope not; yet, it would be strange if they didn't, sometimes. I know more than a few grown-up people, who, if they do not say the words, exemplify the spirit of them in their lives./begin/

When trouble comes, if, instead of evincing a

-6

courageous heart, we tamely sink under its weight, then we virtually say, "I can't;" when things go contrary to our wishes, if, instead of quietly submitting and making the best of it, our turbulent passions are stirred up in revolt, we say, "I sha'n't;" and when the blessed Saviour whispers, "Give me thy heart," and our inclinations rise in opposition, we virtually say, "I won't", to the winning call, which, if listened to and obeyed, would secure for us God's special care while here and a life of blessedness hereafter.

These words were spoken by a girl of thirteen years to her invalid mother; and now that you know this, children, they sound more ungracious than ever, do they not? To think that a child would speak thus to a sick parent seems doubly unkind and undutiful. But Nattie Nesmith had seen her mother in feeble health for a long while, and did not think much of it, save that it was "stupid and hateful to have a complaining old woman around all the time."
{{nop}}

-7

Think of her speaking thus of the kind mother who had cared for her from infancy. True, Nattie was but a child, and could not be expected to have the wisdom and discretion of maturer years; but she was more thoughtless, wayward and selfish than many children are, and than any children ought to be; because self and pride, unduly indulged, bring trouble and calamity to all who thus surrender themselves to the sway of passions which should be kept under the control of reason.

Nattie Nesmith was a girl of rather more than average natural abilities. Her parents were well to do in the world. She had one brother and one sister married, and a little sister at home, several years younger than herself.

The lines of family government were not very steadily held in the home of the Nesmiths. This was unfortunate, and the bad effects were most visible in Nattie's case She was her father's favorite, and knew it quite too well. Her ready perceptions and lively humor acted on him as a

-8

pleasant relaxation from the toil and care of everyday life. The quick interest which she evinced in whatever interested him, her wit, and even her sauciness, afforded him not a little amusement. Thus, if the mother complained of her idleness, or corrected her pertness, the father too often sided with the daughter. This course could not fail to injure the child, rendering her careless and disobedient to her mother. Mr. Nesmith did not intend to bring about this state of things. He thought Nattie bright, and did not like to see her angry. He knew that she had considerable temper and will, but said that, when she was older, she would know how to manage herself, and would, he believed, make the smartest one of the family.

Thus started, Nattie ran rapidly in her own ways. Mr. Nesmith was absent from home a great deal, and thus the invalid mother was left quite to the caprices of her wayward, willful girl.
{{nop}}

-9

Nattie thought her lot the hardest that any girl of her age and tastes ever had to endure,—being obliged to sit in a close room from morning till night, and to hear the complaints and attend to the wants of an invalid; though that invalid was her own tender, loving mother, who never thought any hardship or privation too great to be endured for her child.

On this particular morning, Mrs. Nesmith wished to send a glass of currant jelly to a neighbor who had a little daughter ill of throat distemper. She wished Nattie to go on the errand; and it was in response to this request of her sick mother, that the girl had made use of the ungracious words at the head of this chapter. Her father, as he was leaving home, had filled her pocket with candy and nuts. She had got settled in her mother's cushioned chair, to eat them and to read a story book; consequently, her ease and comfort were much disturbed by this little request.
{{nop}}

-10

"I never saw anybody who loved to make trouble as well as you do!" she exclaimed, pettishly. "I never tried to have a good time, in my life, but you wanted to spoil it in some way. Father likes to see me enjoy myself, but you don't; you want to be driving me around all the time, to wait upon you. I am determined that I won't bear it any longer. Send Bridget with the jelly, or go yourself, for all I care."

"Why, Nattie!" said the mother, gently, "you know that it is impossible for me to go. I can not walk across my room without help."

"It is impossible for me to go, too," responded Nattie, cracking the nuts, sharply, with her sound, white teeth.

"Don't crack those hard filberts thus," said the mother; "how many times have I told you that you would ruin your teeth? What is the reason that you can't do this errand for me?"

"Because I can't,—I sha'n't,—and I won't!"

Nattie crunched the very biggest filbert which

-11

she could find in her pocket, as she spoke these words. Then, emptying her shells on the carpet, she drew forth a long stick of candy, and resettled herself to reading the story book.

The mother observed all these movements, her heart writhing with more cruel pain than her poor, spent body, even; and then, uttering a low, distressed groan, she turned, her face to the wall, silently praying for her disobedient child.

In the course of an hour, Bridget came in from the kitchen. Her honest Irish face flushed when she saw the litter around Nattie's chair. She cried, in a loud voice, which caused Mrs. Nesmith to turn toward her:

"Shure, and what is the use for the likes o' me to swape? when no better than an hour agone, Idid the room up illegant, and now it looks more like a pig-sty than a sick lady's parlor, where she resaves her docther and all her fine visitors. Shurely, Mrs. Nasmith, ye won't be afther thinking that poor Biddy will stay along wid yees,

-12

to be sarved like this. I couldn't do it, no, not at all, Mrs. Nasmith."

Nattie's black eyes looked saucily at the enraged Irish girl, while Mrs. Nesmith's pale cheek grew still paler, as she faintly responded:

"Biddy, we have to put up with a good many trying things, in this world."

"I should say as much," added Nattie, scowling.

"Shure, an' its meself that would say the same, ma'am," responded Bridget; "but if ye'd allow it, I'd add that I don't see the use o' bein thried and disthressed for nothing; and when I swapes and dusts yer room of a morning, and comes back in an hour to find it worse than before I touched it, that is what I calls labor in vain, ma'am; which same Biddy never was made for to do, ma'am; I think I'll be looking for new quarters, and wish you a long good day, ma'am, and as much better a maid as Biddy Wales as you may find, to swape and work in vain, ma'am."

Mrs. Nesmith groaned, and looked toward Nat-

-13

tie. The little girl was somewhat alarmed at the prospect of Biddy's leaving, for she thought that her hardships would be increased if the maid went away. It was not Bridget's first threat of the kind, however, but her usual resort when things got wrong, to restore them to better courses again. Nattie laid down her book, crossly, and began to pick up the shells scattered on the carpet.

"Can't I eat a few filberts without having such a noise as this?" she said. "What a house this is for flurries! and, Bridget Wales, you had better go back to your work in the kitchen. As to your going away from here, I don't believe that we could drive you off, if we tried. Who, but we, would sing Irish songs with you, Saturday nights? or stay at home to do your work and let you go to Mass as often as you choose?"

"There, Miss Nattie, many's the good times we has, singing of ould Ireland; and, if ye'd be a bit more careful, like, wid yer dirt and litter, I might stay wid yer till the day o' my doom."
{{nop}}

-14

"That will be as long as we shall want you, Biddy," said Nattie, langhing, and throwing the last of the shells into the grate.

"Would there be anything you'd be afther wanting me to do for ye now, Misthress {{SIC|Nasmlth|Nasmith}}?" Biddy asked, going to the bed.

"I would like to send this cup of jelly to Hattie Hartwell; the doctor told me yesterday how much the poor child was suffering with her throat, and could not swallow her food."

"Poor childer!" said Biddy. "Shure, an I'll do your bidding; but couldn't I do anything for your own self, to aise your pains? such as to bathe your head, or put up your pillows?"

The sick woman sighed, as she thought how much more kindness the Irish girl showed than her own daughter.

"I'd rather you would carry the jelly," she answered. "I told the doctor that it should be sent, and fear that the sick child will needlessly fret about it. I know that when one is sick, one

-15

thinks much of having any little relish sent in by a friend."

"That is thrue, Misthress; an' I'll go with the cup before I brings dinner to the table; though Miss Nattie, here, must plase to look to the mate and praties whilst I'm gone."

"That I can easily do," said Nattie, from her cushioned chdir.

"An' I'll be much obleeged," returned Biddy, taking the glass of jelly and retiring.

The little time-piece on the mantel ticked away till fifteen minutes were told. The mother then reminded Nattie of the articles of food in process of cooking, which required looking to.

"Pretty soon," was the response; "Biddy has but just gone out, now."

"She has been gone a quarter of an hour," said Mrs. Nesmith; "I'm sure the potatoes must need to have the water poured off, and the kettle set back on the stove."

"Oh, dear! I never can have a minute's peace,"

-16

cried Nattie, angrily; "but I'm determined that I won't stir till I have a mind to."

"If you had carried the jelly, you needn't have been troubled with going to the kitchen," said Mrs. Nesmith.

"Well, I didn't carry the jelly; and, what's more, I didn't intend to. The truth is, I don't care if Hat Hartwell is sick."

"Nathalie!" said the mother, reproachfully, "what if you should be ill, yourself? Would you like to have any one speak of you so unfeelingly?"

"I don't intend to be sick. Hat wouldn't have been if she hadn't wet her feet in the slush, going to school, and then been afraid to ask to go to the fire and dry them."

"Hattie is very timid, and a good girl, I believe, generally."

"Oh, yes, she is too good. She don't know enough to stand her own ground. Anybody can push her around and impose upon her as much as

-17

is agreeable. She has no spirit at all, and never stands up for her rights.

"Whoever takes advantage of her timidity to wrong her, does a cruel, unjust thing, and will be punished accordingly."

"I'd rather make Hat Hartwell cry, any time, than eat when I'm hungry."

"Nattie, you distress me, exceedingly," said the mother; "unless you control these perverse propensities of yours, I fear the worst for your future."

"Don't be scared, Marm Nesmith," drawled Nattie; "you are always in a fret about something."

A smell of burning victuals now came from the kitchen. Nattie dropped her book and rushed out, leaving the door open behind her; so her mother's apartment was quickly filled with the stifling smoke and sickening odors. The water had boiled out of the potatoes, and they were burning on the bottom of the pot. She caught

-18

hold of the bail to lift it from the stove, when the cover came off, letting the hot steam up in her face. She screamed, and let go the kettle, which fell to the floor, and the hot potatoes went rolling in all directions. Just then Bridget came in, and her face put on its reddest tinge when she saw the state of things in the kitchen. The stifling smoke which filled the sick-room, and, indeed, the whole house, had brought upon Mrs. Nesmith a severe fit of coughing, while Nattie was driving about in a wild manner, complaining of the smart which the hot steam had given her face and hands.

"What shall I do, Biddy?" she cried. "I am afraid the skin will all come off from my face; and my eyes are running out of my head."

"If ye had minded my words, the pain wouldn't have come to ye," said Biddy, with a hardness rather unusual to her. "As for me, I shall go at once to your poor mother, as has got one of her coughings on her, all owing to your misdoings; and you had better be afther claning

-19

up the spot o' work you've made on my kitchen floor, that I washed the last thing before I went abroad, this blessed day."

"My face smarts so that I can't," said Nattie, in tears.

"It won't smart none the worse, nor quite so bad, when you're to work," responded Bridget, flinging out of the kitchen with an indignant air.

Nattie had a little awe of Biddy when she was vexed; so, with her smarting face and fingers, she set about gathering the broken potatoes together, and wiping the smeared hearth. The kettle she put away under the sink, without cleaning.

The coughing fit of Mrs. Nesmith brought on bleeding, and the doctor had to be sent for in haste. Nattie was driven forth on this errand; for Biddy's wrath was up, and she declared that she would not trust het with the house "a blessed minute, again." The cold air made the smarting face feel better, while she was exposed to it, though the pain seemed doubled when she returned

-20

to the warm atmosphere of the house. Nattie well knew that her own willfulness had brought the pain upon her, and this seemed to aggravate its intensity. Bridget would not pity her a bit, but cast the most scathing, disapproving eyes upon her all the afternoon, as she sat in a corner of the kitchen, holding a cloth, moistened with alcohol, to her face.

-21

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 4.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|W|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter W.png}}HEN father gets home I shall have somebody to pity me, and care for me," Nattie kept thinking, as the long, slow hours wore away, and even ing approached.

It filled her with anger and jealousy to see the care and attention bestowed on 'mother's room,' while she sat, quite unnoticed, in her corner. She began to feel herself to be the most abused person in the house. No doubt, her face smarted; but that was a trifle, compared with the serious effects of the fit of coughing upon her invalid mother. The poor woman was quite prostrated

-22

from the loss of blood. She was slowly failing from consumption, and the doctor did not know but this might prove the last blow.

While Nattie watched the window, anxious for her father's coming, her married sister drove up to the door, with her husband. This was not a sight that afforded Nattie much pleasure, for she was not a favorite with her sister; and as for Mr. Stone, the husband, he had once given Nattie a severe whipping for refusing to obey him, when she was visiting at his house. This Nattie never forgot, and both feared and disliked him ever afterwards.

"I don't see what they are here for," she thought, as they alighted and entered the front door.

Pretty soon her sister came into the kitchen, looking very sad, and approached the corner where Nattie sat. She looked at her in silence for a while. This vexed Nattie, for she read reproach in the eyes.
{{nop}}

-23

"I wish you would go away, Susan, and let me alone," she said, fretfully; "for I hate to have anybody stand and stare at me, as you do, and not say a word."

"How do you do, Nathalie?" asked Mrs. Stone.

"I am scalded almost to death; but nobody cares, or does anything for me; though father will when he comes."

"Father is not coming to-night, so the doctor called and told us to hasten to mother, and remain till his return," said Mrs. Stone.

"Oh, dear! but father will come to-morrow, won't he!"

"No; not unless mother is worse, and we send for him. He has gone to a distant place to buy some lumber."

"I shall die, if he don't get back soon," said Nattie, groaning.

"How do you feel?" asked her sister, not knowing but her burns were deeper than Bridget

-24

had stated. The woeful look of the flushed face suggested severe injuries.

"I feel mad enough to bite your head off," was the quick, spiteful answer; "and I tell you again that I wish you would go away and let me alone."

Susan looked at the flashing eyes that were now turned up to her face, and said, sorrowfully:

"Nathalie, did you know that mother had had another bleeding spell?"

"Yes; what of it? She has them every little while, and always gets well again. What is it to spit up a little blood?—not half as bad as to have a scalded face, aching and smarting; but nobody minds anything about me."

"I am sorry that your face smarts, Nattie; but am more sorry that your disobedient conduct should have brought this very serious illness upon mother. I fear that she will never be as well as she was before."

"What do you say that I made her sick for?" demanded Nattie, sharply. "It was Biddy, who

-25

went off and didn't attend to the dinner, and it boiled over and filled mother's room with smoke, which set her to coughing; and in trying to stop the steam, I dropped the great, heavy potato kettle, and scalded me so dreadfully."

"Ah, Nattie, I know the whole story from a safer tongue than yours," responded the sister, sadly. "It grieves me much to think of the harm which your willful disobedience has occasioned. I hope that this will be a warning to you, and that, henceforth, as long as mother lives, you will do her bidding. If you mind no one else, Nattie, do mind your dying mother, so that when she is gone you may not have to regret your unkindness to her."

Nattie put on a most sullen, angry look, and turned spitefully away from her sister. Susan returned to the sick-room, leaving Nattie to nurse her wrath alone. No sooner was the little girl thus left, than she rose from her seat and ran out of doors. Bridget, entering the kitchen a moment

-26

after, missed her, but supposed that she was somewhere in the house, and would be ready to join the family at the evening meal, which she now busied herself in preparing.

When Mr. Stone and his wife were called to supper, no Nattie was to be found.

"Shure, an' what shall we be afther doin'?" said Biddy. "The child must be gone clane daft, to clear out when she knew I was goin' to bake waffles for tay; for she is more fond o' them nor nothin' else."

"Leave her alone," said Susan. "She is angry because I reproved her for disobeying mother, and thus causing her sickness. No doubt she has hid away, thinking that we shall be alarmed, and search for her. I know Nattie's ways pretty well. She will come back when she sees that no notice is taken of her absence. But don't let it come to mother's knowledge that she is missing; it might cause her unnecessary worry."

"It is meself that will be careful that it don't

-27

reach your poor mother's ears, Misthress Susan," said Biddy, officiously placing her nicely browned waffles and shining tea-urn on the table.

The young husband and wife commenced eating their supper, thinking it quite likely that Nattie would come in and take her usual place before the meal was over. But she did not come. Supper was cleared away, the doctor made the evening call, the clock pointed to the hour of nine; still, no Nattie. The house, barn and grounds were carefully searched. She was nowhere about the premises. Biddy was wild. It was necessary to keep her out of the sick-room, for the fright and terror of her honest face would be marked by the faintest eye.

"She must be sperited away," said the ignorant, superstitious girl; "for she never could have put herself out o' sight and hearin' so quick, without help. I'm sore afraid we never shall lay eyes on Miss Nattie again. Bad she was, at times, for shure, but then, a bright, gay creathur, afther all, and

-28

her poor father's joy. What will that jintleman say when he knows it all?"

Mr. Stone and his wife consulted together. They both believed that Nattie had hidden herself away, in a spirit of anger and jealousy, for the sake of making them trouble; but, as she was a little girl, they knew not into what difficulty and danger her own rashness might bring her, and felt it incumbent upon them to make search for her without delay. Susan accordingly asked Bridget if Nattie had any particular friend of her own age, on whom she would be likely to make an evening call. Biddy could think of none, nor did she ever know Miss Nattie to be out of an evening by herself before.

"Hasn't she gone into Mr. Hartwell's to see Hattie?" asked Susan.

"I can't think she has, Miss," said Biddy; "for she and Miss Hattie was niver friendly, and to-day she wouldn't even go to carry the cup of jelly to the poor, sick childer; but, if ye thinks best,

-29

I'll run over this minute and ask if she is there."

"Perhaps my husband had better go, and you and I will remain with mother," said Susan, looking at Biddy's wild face.

"You are right, Miss," answered the girl; "for I'm that scared and flustered, I hardly know what I'm about."

"There is no great cause for alarm," said Susan, calmly; "Nattie is probably safe in some neighbor's house, feeling not a little elated at the thought of the trouble which she is giving us. I am sorry that such is her disposition; but you know it, as well as I do, Biddy."

"Yes, Misthress Stone, 't is thrue; Miss Nattie is a pretty high, naughty girl," said Biddy; "but I should be woful sorry to have harm come to her, for I hope she will get over her bad ways one o' these days, and make a smart {{SIC|woman." Now|woman. Now}} till this minute, I haven't thought to be askin' ye for a word about her little sister that ye keeps with ye, at your house,—Tiny, as we calls her

-30

here at home. Has she been thrivin' wid ye these many blessed days?"

"Tiny is well, and growing fast. We thought it best not to bring her with us to-day; she is an active, restless child, and makes a good deal of noise. I thought that she and Nattie might annoy mother; but my husband will go home to-morrow, and, probably, bring Tiny back with him, as I shall remain here till father's return, or till mother is better,—if she ever is any better."

These last words were uttered in a low, sad voice.

"Shure, an' ye don't think but that the misthress is going to get up again!" asked Biddy, in fresh alarm.

"I hope she may; though she seems very low, at present," was the answer. "Perhaps you had better remain here, Biddy, while I go in and see her. She may think strange of our long absence from the room."

Biddy nodded her head affirmatively, and sat

-31

down near the stove, bowing her face on her hands.

When Susan returned to the apartment, the invalid's eyes were roaming from one object to another, in a strange, bewildered manner. She did not seem to notice her daughter at first, nor did she make any response until her name had been spoken several times.

"What is the matter, mother?" said the daughter, anxiously; "you see me, don't you, and hear my voice?"

"Nattie, don't crack filberts with your teeth," said the invalid. "I've told you not to do it, many times."

Susan thought best to humor this fancy, and responded, in a voice as like Nattie's as she could assume:

"Well, I won't, mother."

But this answer was so unlike any that Nattie would have made, that the sick woman looked up quickly, and recognized her eldest daughter.
{{nop}}

-32

"I have been wandering and dreaming," she said. "I thought Nattie was cracking nuts here, as she often does. Where is she?"

"She is not here now."

"Oh, gone to bed, I suppose. I should have liked to say good-night to her before she went. Poor, wayward child! I fear that she is strewing her own path with thorns. What time is it, Susan?"

"It is not very late in the evening, yet," was the rather evasive answer.

"Did Nattie get hurt to-day, when she dropped the kettle?"

"Not much; the steam made her face and hands smart a little."

"I wish you had brought Tiny with you. Sometimes I think that Nattie would be better if her younger sister was at home with her."

"You know that you sent Tiny away because Nattie teased and vexed her so much," said Susan.

"Yes; but Nattie is older now; she has felt

-33

the sorrow of being alone, too. I think she would better appreciate Tiny's company."

"Austin will bring her to-morrow, if you wish, and let her stay as long as I remain; then we can see how the two get along together."

"Yes, that will be a good way to do. I think Nattie needs some company near her own age. I feel very anxious about her. It would be harder to die and leave her than all the rest of my family, for she is the least fitted to be left without a mother."

"We hope you will be spared to us all for some years, yet, mother," said Susan, turning away to conceal a tear.

The feeble woman only sighed. There was the sound of an opening door. Susan started rather abruptly.

"Who is coming?" asked the invalid.

"It is Austin, my husband; he has been out a little while, and has just come in. I will go into the kitchen and tell him to be more quiet, lest his

-34

noise should disturb you. I see you look sleepy, and hope you will get some rest."

Susan went out. There stood her husband alone, looking at her with wide, staring eyes.

"I have called at a dozen places, but can't find her," he said.

-35

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 5.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|T|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter T.png}}HE dark night is stealing on; the beat of the heavy March rain sounds dreary against the windows of the sick-room, where the mother lies in a transient, fitful slumber, watched over by the elder daughter and her husband. The sick woman knows not as yet but Nattie sleeps, as usual, in her little bed-room that opens out of the kitchen; but the sleeper there to-night is a heavier one than Nattie. Her loud, long-drawn breathing greets the ears of the watchers. It is Irish Bridget, who was too timid to go to her usual sleepng

-36

chamber, aloft, "with the poor childer lost abroad, nobody knew where," as she said; and yet, she no sooner touched Nattie's little cot than she forgot her fright in slumber.

When, about midnight, the sleep of Mrs. Nesmith seemed deepest, the watchers drew back toward the grate, and spoke in soft whispers concerning the fugitive.

"What a driving storm!" said the young wife, with a shudder; "and how do we know but that poor, misguided child is abroad in it? So young, so ignorant of the world! what course will she take, and what will become of her?"

"I hardly think that she is out in this storm," returned the husband; "Nattie is willful, and rash enough, when her temper is up; but she is precious tender of her own little body, after all. Don't you know what an ado she made, to-day, over her slight scald? and how wrathful she was because there was not more done for her relief? She thought her case much worse than poor

-37

mother's. It was this jealousy, combined with your reproof of her disobedience, that started her off, I suppose. She found that her father was not coming home for a few days, and that we were to be here till he arrived. The prospect was not agreeable, so she concluded to take herself out of the way, give us as much extra trouble as possible, and return when she might feel disposed."

"But, Austin, where can she have gone? you have called at about all the places where she is ever known to go."

"Yes; and I inquired of people on the street, who know her well, if they had seen her. It was daylight when she left; yet no one saw her, as near as I can learn. My notion is that she secreted herself somewhere, till darkness came on, and then went directly to some place which she had in mind,—most likely a solitary one,—where she intends to remain till it is her pleasure to return. If there be any untenanted houses

-38

about town, I intend to search them to-morrow."

"Nathalie would never dare stay in an unoccupied house, alone, all night," said Susan. "I am sure that I should not have had the courage at her age."

"But you never had her temper to back your courage," returned the husband. "You must remember that Nattie is angry, and, when that is the case, she dares do almost anything."

"I guess that this dreary midnight in a lone house will take her temper down pretty low," said the young wife. "And she wore nothing away but a light blanket. She will suffer bitterly, and, perhaps, get cold and die from the effects of this rashness."

"Believe me, Nattie will manage in some way to keep her precious little body comfortable," said Mr. Stone.

"She can't possibly do that, if she is out of doors now, or in a cold house," returned the wife. "But I am thinking what we shall do, if

-39

she is not found to-morrow. We can not keep it from mother, and we ought not; yet I fear the effect of such tidings, in her present condition."

"If to-morrow's search does not result in Nattie's discovery, I shall telegraph for father to come home; and he will take whatever course he sees fit; although, as far as I am concerned, I should not be afraid to wait patiently a week or two, and trust to Nattie's coming back of her own accord, when she got over her freak, and considered that we were all sufficiently punished for our lack of care and attention to' her important little self; but I shall not dictate a course for her nearer relatives to pursue."

"Father would go frantic at any such proposal," said Susan. "I believe he thinks more of Nattie than of all the rest of us."

"No doubt he will make great efforts to discover her at once," said Mr. Stone; "yet he may have to wait the little lady's own time, after all. Nattie has both cunning and willfulness."
{{nop}}

-40

"I should as soon have thought of running away, myself, as that she would attempt anything of the kind," said Susan, going softly toward her mother's couch.

The invalid moaned in her slumber, as if from pain or disturbing dreams. The daughter thought that she might need to have her position changed, and they turned her, as gently as possible, over to her left side; but the movement caused her to awake.

"I am sorry that we have aroused you, mother," said the daughter, "but you were breathing rather heavily, and we thought that changing your position would bring you ease."

"I am glad that you awoke me," the invalid said, "for I was having a troubled dream; and it seemed to me like a reality. Hasn't something very distressing happened?"

"Your sudden illness is so to us," Susan answered.

"That is not what I meant," said the mother.
{{nop}}

-41

"Nothing else as distressing as this has occurred," said Mr. Stone.

"I am glad of it, then," said the sufferer, "and think I will go to sleep again."

There was a pause, during which the young husband and wife glanced at each other; then Susan drew very near and whispered:

"If anything trying does occur, mother, would you want us to tell it to you, weak as you are now?"

The sick woman opened her eyes, and regarded her daughter earnestly.

"What makes you ask that?" she questioned.

"What you have just been saying helped to put it into my head, I presume; but you need not answer the question, or think more of it, if it troubles you."

"If anything happens to my husband or family, I shall want to know it," the sick woman said, decidedly. "It would be better for me to know the exact truth than to suffer from uncer-

-42

tainty or suspense." Let nothing important be kept from me.

"I will regard what you say, mother," said the daughter; "so now try and get another good nap before morning."

When the invalid slept, the two again retired to the grate, and Susan said, in a tone of anxiety:

"I really hope that Nattie may be found to-morrow; so that mother may be saved the shock of hearing of her flight."

"I hope so, too," returned the husband; "yet I think she will bear it with more fortitude than you anticipate."

"At all events, Tiny shall be brought home to-morrow; that will afford her some diversion," said Susan.

"One can hardly think that Nattie and Tiny are sisters," remarked Mr. Stone. "One all storm, and the other all sunshine. Was Nattie always so tempery?"

"Yes; from the cradle. Her baby anger was

-43

quite terrible to look upon. Poor Nattie! I don't know what will become of her. Much suffering must certainly be hers before that fierce will is broken. Mother has truly said that Nattie causes her more anxiety than all the rest of the family. Father thinks that she will outgrow her temper, but I fear not, easily. Poor child! I feel as if every dash of this cold, searching rain was beating on her little, unsheltered form. It is imagination I suppose; still, I can't get rid of the feeling."

"You had better lie down on the lounge, here by the fire, and get a nap," said the husband. "You are quite worn out with the fatigue and excitement of the day. I will watch."

The young wife was glad to comply with this request, and, contrary to her expectations, fell into a refreshing slumber, from which she did not awake till daylight had appeared.

-44

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 6.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|B|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter B.png}}RIDGET had breakfast on the table at an early hour, and Mr. Stone was abroad in the rain-washed streets before many of the village people were stirring. He looked into all the nooks and corners where a little girl might have found shelter for the night, and carefully searched such untenanted buildings as might have afforded a more permanent hiding-place. But he nowhere discovered the faintest trace of Nattie, and turned homeward with a sorrowful countenance.

As he was passing a small cottage not far from Mrs. Nesmith's residence, a lady came to the door

-45

and regarded him earnestly. He paused and bowed. The lady then descended the steps, and advanced toward the gate, saying:

"You will excuse me, I trust, sir, but I thought that you were Mr. Stone, Mrs. Nesmith's son-in-law."

"You are right, madam," was the response, "and this, I believe, is Mr. Hartwell's place."

"Yes, sir, and I am his wife. My husband told me that you called here last night, to inquire if Nattie, your wife's little sister, was with us, or if we knew any place where she would be likely to make an evening visit."

Mrs. Hartwell paused a moment, and then added: "I suppose you found her somewhere in the neighborhood."

"No, madam," was the answer; "I did not find her last evening, nor has she yet returned. The object of this early morning walk was to continue my search for her."

The lady looked surprised and alarmed.
{{nop}}

-46

"I judged, from your appearance, that all was not right," she said. "Won't you come in a few moments? I have a little daughter, ill of throat disease, but more comfortable this morning, who is pretty well acquainted with Nattie's ways. She might think of some place that she would be likely to visit, which would not occur to older minds."

"Thank you, madam," said Mr. Stone? "I will come in with pleasure."

Mrs. Hartwell conducted the gentleman into a small, tidy apartment, where a little girl of mild, pleasant face was half sitting, half reclining in a commodious rocking-chair, made comfortable with blankets and pillows.

"This is Nattie Nesmith's brother-in-law, Hattie," said the mother. "He tells me that Nattie has not got home yet. I didn't know but you could think of some place where she might like to go and stay several days. Whom, among her young companions, does Nattie like

-47

best? And are there any of them with whom she would be likely to spend the night?"

The little sick girl seemed to hesitate, and colored slightly as she answered:

"I really could not say, mother. Nattie is older than I am, and I don't know a great deal about her. I have heard her say, though, that she didn't care much about any of the girls; and I don't think there is a single one whom she would go to spend a day and night with."

"Nattie is rather cross, sometimes, isn't she?" asked Mr. Stone, fixing a pleasant smile on the little girl's face.

Hattie colored again, and looked toward her mother.

"You may tell the gentleman all that he asks, to the best of your ability," said the mother. "He knows Nattie better than we do, and would not ask anything from a bad motive, or mere curiosity."

Thus encouraged, Hattie answered, after a

-48

moment's delay, in a soft voice and with downcast eyes:

"Nattie is not as good-natured as some girls, and perhaps that is the reason why a good many girls don't like her. Most of us are rather afraid of Nattie."

"Why atraid?" asked Mr. Stone.

"Oh, she is pretty strong, and pretty sharp."

"Does she ever strike then?"

"Sometimes; or else she laughs at us in a way that makes us feel as bad, nearly."

"Well, suppose that she had got angry with her folks at home, from some cause, and wanted to hide away from them for a few days, where do you think she would be most likely to go?"

Hattie thought a few moments, and then looking up, said:

"To the top of the house."

"But we have faithfully searched the house, from garret to cellar; she can not be anywhere concealed in it," said Mr. Stone. "Think again."
{{nop}}

-49

"I mean the roof," said Hattie.

"The outside roof of the house!" exclaimed the gentleman. "How could a child like her reach it? Such a steep roof as ours, too! She could hardly cling to it."

"I know that it is steep," said Hattie; "but there is a place on the back side, which comes down pretty low and joins on to the shed. An apple-tree stands so close that anybody could jump from it into the hollow of the two roofs; and it is a real cosy, shady place in summer time. I know that Nattie stays up there ever so much then, for I have seen her there reading story books and eating apples. She asked me to come up, two or three times, but I hadn't courage. Then she called me a coward, and pelted me with apple cores till I ran away."

Mr. Stone thought a moment.

"I remember having seen an apple-tree at the corner of the house and shed," he said, at length; "but I never should have thought of a little girl's

-50

using it as a means of climbing the roofs. So you think Nattie may be hiding there now?"

"Why, I don't know," said Hattie. "I never should have thought that she would dare to stay up there all night, alone."

"And there was such a driving storm last night, too," said Mrs. Hartwell; "it is not likely that she would sit on a roof during a pouring rain."

"She does in the summer, sometimes," said Hattie, "though not in the night. You see the house roof shelves out over the shed, so she can crawl under and keep quite dry."

"The roof is quite a resort with Nattie, then," said Mr. Stone.

"Oh, yes, sir; she goes there to read and to sleep."

Hattie paused suddenly.

"Well," said Mr. Stone, "go on, please."

"And when she is angry, she says that she always goes and tries to tear the shingles off."

Mr Stone laughed. "Nattie must visit the roof pretty often if she goes every time she is angry.

-51

I think I must go home and take a look in that direction, though I hardly expect to find her there now."

"No, I don't think she is there now," said Hattie; "for she would have been afraid to stay there all night, alone."

"Is she afraid to stay alone, then?"

"Oh, yes, in the dark, she is; for Biddy Wales has told her so many ghost stories that she is afraid that she shall see one."

"Then you think Nattie didn't stay alone last night?"

"No, I don't believe she did, sir."

"I don't see what company she could have had, as I can not trace her to the homes of any of her acquaintances in the village. But I will now return and go over the premises again, from the roof downwards. If anything new comes to light, you shall know it. I hope that you will soon get quite well, my little friend."

"Thank you, sir," said Hattie; "and I hope

-52

that you will soon find Nattie, and that no harm has come to her."

"How is Mrs. Nesmith?" Mrs. Hartwell now inquired.

"As comfortable as could be expected, after her bleeding spell of yesterday morning," Mr. Stone answered.

"How docs she bear Nattie's strange disappearance?"

"She is not yet aware of it; but unless the child is discovered and returned before to-morrow, we shall, of course, have to let it come to her knowledge. It would not be wise or prudent longer to conceal it. After one more search at home, the town-crier will be sent abroad. If he has no success, Mr. Nesmith will be summoned home, to conduct the matter as he sees fit. I shall not wish to assume further responsibility."

"I do not blame you," said Mrs. Hartwell, "but I really hope that Nattie will come home to-day."
{{nop}}

-53

"I hope the same," said Mr. Stone. "Good morning."

"Mother," cried Hattie, earnestly, as soon as the door had closed on the retiring gentleman, "why did you not send thanks to Mrs. Nesmith for the nice jelly which Biddy brought from her yesterday. I really believe that it has helped my throat more than all the doctor's medicine?"

"I thought of it, child, but didn't know as he would wish to mention his visit to Mrs. Nesmith, just now, as it might lead her to make inquiries which he would not find quite easy to answer at present. If possible to avoid it, they do not wish to let the sick mother know of her child's absence."

"Nattie must have been pretty angry to run away and stay all night," said Hattie; "and I don't believe she will come back very soon. She is strange, and scarely a bit like any other little girl that I know."

-54

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 7.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|M|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter M.png}}R. STONE was met at the door by his wife, who looked at him with an eager, inquiring gaze.

"You have had no success," she said.

"I have not yet found Nattie," he returned; "but have received one or two suggestions from a little friend of hers, Hattie Hartwell. She says that Nattie has a spot on the roof of the house, which she haunts."

"That is quite absurd, I think," said Susan; "and, of course, you don't expect to find her there after such a night as the last. If so, I would not give much for her life. She must have caught her death, in that pouring rain."
{{nop}}

-55

"I {{SIC|do'nt|don't}} expect to find Nattie there," said Mr. Stone; "yet, I am just going to look at the place; it may afford some trace of her. How is mother now?"

"She has taken a light breakfast, but seems weak, and not inclined to conversation."

"That is better for us. After dinner, I shall find opportunity to go for Tiny, if she still wishes it. I wonder how I can most easily reach the rear of the house."

"You had better ask Biddy," said his wife.

Bridget was called, and the question put to her.

"Shure, an' there's a door just here in the shed, as goes right out there; but it has been banked up with snow iver so long, an' I think ye'd better be afther goin' round by the front street, sir."

"Show me the door of which you speak, Biddy," said Mr. Stone.

"That I will," said the Irish girl; "but I can tell you, it hasn't been opened this whole long winter."
{{nop}}

-56

Bridget led the way to the shed, and soon exclaimed, in surprise:

"Oh! shure as I draw my breath, here's the door unhasped, a swingin' wide, and the snow bank quite melted away!"

Mr. Stone hurried on.

"Don't step out, Biddy," he said; {{" '}}tis true, the snow has's unk away very much, but it is still deep. You will get your feet wet if you go out."

"Somebody has been out here," said Biddy. "I can see the tracks all along close to the house. Really, Mr. Stone, I'm afraid we've had thieves aboot us, when we were asleep."

"I trust, not, Biddy," said the gentleman, stepping out, and carefully following the tracks till he came to the apple-tree, which stood near where the shed joined the house. They were the tracks of a child's heeled boot, and Nattie's, beyond a doubt. At the base of the tree, the snow was trodden considerably, as if the child had made several attempts to mount to the tree

-57

limbs before she was successful. Mr. Stone ascended to the roof. As he did so, a small bright fragment of shawl fringe, clinging between the projecting shingles, attracted his notice. He carefully disengaged it, and then looked about him. It must, indeed, have been quite a cozy spot in summer, when the great apple-tree spread over it a grateful shade. He found nut shells, apple cores, and the mildewed remains of a story book, beneath the projecting eaves; but no Nattie,—only evidences that she had been there, and that lately, as well as in more remote times. He got down and followed the steps, but they gained the street.

Nattie, had, then, when she left the house, made her way through the back shed door, climbed to her old resort, the roof, where she, no doubt, waited the fall of evening, and then descended to hasten on her way; who could tell whither? Hattie Hartwell had's aid that she would not dare pass a night alone. Yet she was

-58

evidently alone when she set forth on her journey.

Mr. Stone started to walk back by the way he came, and encountered his wife at the apple-tree.

"Nattie really went this way, it seems," she said; "these are her tracks; I should know them anywhere, for she had a peculiar way of treading her boots. Have you traced her to the street."

"Yes, but no farther."

"Could you tell which way she turned when she got there?"

"Her little feet seem to have been undecided, at first; there are tracks in both directions, though, at last, she seems to have taken the way which leads soonest from the village to the country."

"Have you been up to the roof?" said the wife.

"I have."

"Do you think that Nattie was there last night?"

"Yes; and I will show you the evidence."

He drew the shawl fringe from his pocket. His wife caught it, eagerly.
{{nop}}

-59

"This is a shred of the blanket which we supposed that she had worn away, over her shoulders," she said.

"I found it hanging to a shingle on the roof," said Mr. Stone. "I think that she climbed up here, stayed till it got dark, and then came down to hurry on her way."

"Where can the poor, misguided girl have gone?"

"Well, that is a mystery; and things begin to look serious, Susan. It is my belief that she is not within the limits of the village."

"Perhaps she has made way with herself," suggested the wife, shuddering, as she spoke.

"I do not think that," was the response. "Nattie would not, lightly, harm herself. I wish I could feel as well assured that she has not come to harm."

Mr. Stone spoke these words in a troubled voice.

"What are you going to do next?" asked his

-60

wife. She was beginning to feel not only perplexed, but anxious.

"I had thought to send out the town-crier, and wait the result, but amin doubt whether it is not best to telegraph to father, without more delay."

"I think that I would do so, Austin," answered the wife, "and also send out the crier. Though father's business is important, his family is first in his estimation; and I think that he would blame us, if we failed to send him carly intelligence of an occurrence like this."

"I will go at once to the telegraph office, and also call on the town-crier. You had better return to mother, and keep her as quiet as possible."

"I will do so. And, husband, remember to tell the crier when he goes his rounds, to avoid this street, else mother might hear his call, and thus learn of Nattie's loss."

"True," said Mr. Stone. "I will recollect the

-61

caution, and try to have him avoid anything that would be likely to bring disquiet to her."

He hastened away, and Susaa returned to her mother's bed-side. The invalid seemed rather restless, and looking up at her daughter, inquiringly, said:

"Things seem very strange to me to-day, Susan; I can't account for it."

"How do they seem, mother?" asked Susan, with a misgiving at her heart, and averting her eyes as she spoke.

"That is what I can't describe. I seem to want to talk, yet I don't."

"Because you fear that it will tire you, I suppose."

"No; rather because I have a feeling that you don't wish to hear me."

The sick woman again lifted her eyes to her daughter's face, and found it suffused with a blush.

"Why, mother," she hastened to say, at the

-62

same time trying to laugh away her confusion, "you know that we always like to hear you talk; but now we think that you are very low, and wish to spare you the least worriment."

"I am not aware that I am any weaker than I have been before," she answered; "though I may be deceived in regard to myself. It is possible that I may even drop away soon; if I thought that, I should wish to see all my family together once more, before I left them. Your father is, I suppose, two hundred miles away; but he could soon reach home. All the children, save Robert, are near at hand. I don't know why he ever went to that distant wilderness in the Indian country. I fear that I shall never see him again."

"Mother, the doctor assured us that he does not consider you in imminent danger, or we should have sent for father, and brother's family ere this," responded Susan; "still, if you feel a strong desire for their presence, I will tell Austin, and he shall send for them without more delay."
{{nop}}

-63

"I hardly think it best," the invalid answered.

"I presume that my strange feelings are only sick fancies. Hark! what is that?"

It was the voice of the town-crier, as he passed the windows. Either Mr. Stone had forgotten to give the caution, or the man had mistaken the street. Susan was ready to sink to the floor. The crier was shouting at the top of his voice:

''"Strayed from home yesterday evening, about six o'clock—"''

At this point, the poor, startled daughter gained the window, and, by a slight tap, attracted the man's attention. She then made an imploring gesture, and shook her head at him. He seemed to understand, and stopped his cry.

"Why! what are you doing, Susan?" asked the sick one, who saw the movements of her daughter from the bed. "Why did you stop the crier? I wanted to hear who was lost; perhaps it is somebody whom I know."

"I thought that his terrible voice would disturb

-64

you, mother," said the daughter. "I don't see why they have such persons."

"Why, they are very useful sometimes. I hope he will come back this way again, for I want to hear what he says."

Susan now went into the kitchen to assist Biddy in preparing dinner.

"Ah, Miss Susan," said the girl, "it is not for the likes o' me to be spakin' to my betters, but I fears it is ill with Miss Nattie, for I was dhramin' fearsome dhrames of her all the blessed night through. One time she was hangin' on a tree, another, she was drownin' in a pond, and then agin the evil spirit was runnin' away with her as fast as iver he could. Shure, an' I've aboot made up my miad that I'll never lay eyes on the darlint agin."

"I wouldn't talk about it thus, Biddy," said Susan; "it only makes you feel worse. While all is uncertainty, we are apt to imagine many dreadful things not likely to be true. I trust that

-65

Nattie is safe and well, and will before long return to us.

"I hope you are right, Miss Susan," said Biddy, lifting off the potato kettle; "but to think it was only yesterday that she was here with the same blessed dinner-pot in her two little hands! Shure, it seems a wake since then. Throuble makes long days, don't it, Miss Susan?"

Mr. Stone now came in, and his wife took him aside to tell him that the crier had been on their street, and her mother had heard enough to understand that some person was lost.

"You had better not go into her room while the incident is fresh in her mind," said the wife, "for I fear that she will ask you directly if you know who is missing? I have had to evade her questions as best I could, and am getting tired of their concealment. I hope father will arrive before another evening, for I would rather that he should break the tidings to her than to perform the task myself."
{{nop}}

-66

"I shall expect father Nesmith by noon to-morrow," Mr. Stone responded. "I have some advertisements to post, as Idrive out this afternoon."

"I don't know whether you had better go for Tiny or not," said Susan; "mother has not mentioned her in particular to-day. The sight of Tiny might lead her to call at once for Nattie."

"I will do as you think best, wife," said Mr. Stone.

Susan prepared a light meal for her mother, and sent Biddy to the sick-room with it, telling her not to stop a moment, so fearful was she that the unguarded girl might, in some way, make the dreaded disclosure.

-67

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 4.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|W|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter W.png}}HEN Nattie fled out of the kitchen, she had no definite aim beyond secluding herself for a time, so as to stir up anxiety at home, and give those against whom her anger was hot, the trouble of searching for her.

Her chief desire was to inflict pain on her sister, for having reproved her for the disobedient conduct which brought renewed illness to her mother. Her sister's husband also was an object of dislike, because he always frowned on and corrected her outbursts of temper and selfish propensities. She

-68

did not like the prospect of spending several days under the same roof with him; and she learned that her father would not be at home for a week.

Thus, all things considered, Nattie concluded that the only way for her to create a sensation was to leave; and, on the spur of the moment, the little girl started. She threw a shawl over her head as she ran through the back entry, burst open the shed dvor, and, bounding fleetly over the melting snow, soon reached the old apple-tree, and, by its aid, gained her summer resort on the shelving roof. Here she looked around and above her. Clouds were lowering over the sky, and the wind soughed dismally through the leafless branches of the tall, spreading tree. She crept under the hanging caves, and thought at first that she would spend the night there, but the searching wind soon caused her flesh to creep with cold. As Mr. Stone had said, Nattie was inclined to be very tender of herself; so she soon came to the conclusion that she must

-69

seek a shelter; and where should she go? She felt no inclination to return to the warm room which she had just left. Her passions were yet fiercely stirred by the reprimands and slights which, as she considered, had been heaped upon her. Jealousy still raged within her breast, as she thought of the attention which her sister and Biddy had lavished upon her mother all the afternoon, while her scalded face and hands received scarcely any notice.

Darkness at length began to settle around her, and then, without having fully determined whither to direct her steps, she descended from the roof, and turned toward the street. Here she paused, and looked first up, then down the street. It was the hour when the village people took their evening meal, and there were no foot passengers abroad. Nattie was at a loss which way to go. At length she saw a great, uncouth-looking figure coming toward her at a striding pace. She was afraid to go and meet it, so she thought that she

-70

would see if she couldn't run away from it; but the faster she ran, the mightier strides the monster made; und soon she felt herself swooped up from the earth by a powerful arm, and borne away under the folds of a heavy hanging blanket. She tried to scream, but fright had rendered her voiceless. Then she tried to kick and twist, and wriggle herself away. All in vain. She was held as in an iron clutch, while the huge man who thus held her, pressed on with such heavy strides that the earth seemed almost to jar beneath his feet. All was darkness, and poor Nattie, held tight in an uncomfortable position, began to fear that,—as Biddy had often said might happen unless she was a better girl,—the evil one was really carrying her off. As this terror grew upon her, her senses swam, and she lapsed into partial insensibility. She was at last released from the rough clutch, and laid upon a pile of mats in an Indian wigwam, where a number of dusky faces soon gathered around and gazed on the apparent-

-71

ly sleeping girl with much eagerness and curiosity.

The man who had carried Nattie off was a strolling Indian, and this was the temporary abode of his family. They had been several days camping below the village; and on this afternoon the man had been around town selling moccasins, baskets, and other articles, intending to strike tent on the morrow and start for their far-off haunts in the wilderness of the frontier. They had been hovering around towns and villages all winter, and, by their little sales, had collected a sum of money sufficient to supply their simple wants till cold weather should again return, and were now ready to rejoin their Indian friends, and lead the wild life of the woods again.

The old squaw got close to Nattie, who was still unconscious, and remained in the same position in which the man had placed her on the pile of skins. The little papooses, also, gathered near to look with wondering eyes on the pale{{peh}}

-72

face thus suddenly introduced to their wigwam.

"What for you bring her here?" the womin asked of the great man in the swinging blanket, who was her husband.

"Me got her to be wife to my son, Torch Eye. He had white mother. Great Spirit send white wife to him. Pale-face girl make smart young squaw."

"Where you find her?" asked the woman.

"Me catch her in street," he answered, looking at the insensible girl in haughty triumph.

"Pale-faces be after Indian and catch him," said the old squaw.

"Before Great Spirit smile on the east to-morrow morning, Indian be far on his way toward his father's camping grounds, carrying with him the white bride of his son, Torch {{SIC|Eye.|Eye."}}

All the Indians looked up at him as he thus spoke, and made answer by throwing their brawny arms aloft and giving a low, peculiar cry. {{hws|s=Nat|e=tie}}

-i

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) 1.png
| caption = "What for you bring her here?" [[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 6#72|Page 72]].
| width = 300px
}}

—

-73

{{hwe|s=Nat|e=tie}} now moved uneasily and partially opened her eyes.

"See, she awakes!" said one of the little papooses. "Will her eyes be the color of the sky when she opens them?"

"The color of her eyes you must not know till this moon has grown round; nor must the white maiden look on the faces of her Indian friends till we have reached our forest camping grounds."

Thus saying, the man took a bottle from his pocket, and placed it to the mouth of the half-conscious girl, nor did he take it away till it was drained.

"Pale-face never wake again," said the old squaw.

"Wake in three days," said the man; "then me give her another dose, perhaps. When that is gone, me not want her to sleep so much no more. Then Torch Eye will come to look upon the white bride sent him by the Great Spirit. Now we all lie down a short time, and then we rise to make

-74

ready for our march. We have a long journey before us."

"Papooses get cold marching in this foul, east storm," said the squaw.

"Indian has looked at the North, and the Great Spirit tells him the storm will be over by the dawning," was the answer.

The huge man wrapped his blanket closer about him and lay down on a mat in the center of the wigwam. The squaw placed the children near him, and then, with a last look toward Nattie, left quite alone on the pile of skins, dropped down beside her youngest papoose, and sleep soon held all the strange, wild group in its embrace.

Such was Nattie's shelter the first night after her flight, while Mr. and Mrs. Stone watched over the sick mother's couch, wondering where the little girl could be, and fearing that harm might befall her. All their conjectures and imaginings were far from the truth. It never once entered their minds that Nattie had been stolen by

-75

an Indian, was now an unconscious prisoner in his rude wigwam, and soon to be borne away toward the wilderness. How could they think of anything so dreadful as this?

They knew that there were a few strolling Indians about town. It was no unusual thing. They were remnants of a once large tribe, and had never been known to do anything worse than petty thieving. Even this offense was rather unusual; and the village people were more pleased than otherwise at the yearly visits of these denizens of the forest. Their variegated bead-work and tasteful baskets found a ready sale at the stores, and adorned the center tables of many of the first families.

There was no cause for suspecting the Indians of any grave offenses. Their manners had always been simple and conciliatory. They in no way meddled with the white people, but peaceably sold their wares, and, after a few weeks tarrying, struck their cone-like tent and moved on.
{{nop}}

-76

Thus, this first crime was the more easily perpetrated and better escaped detection. Nor did a thought of doing such a deed enter the head of the old Indian, till he saw this girl fleeing wildly before him in the gathering darkness. The sight of her flight roused the wild love of pursuit in his savage nature, and almost before he was aware, he had swooped her up, and was bearing her rapidly away to his wigwam. Possessing the prize, he was determined to retain it, at all hazards; and he soon formed the resolution to make the pale-face girl the wife of his eldest and favorite son, Torch Eye, a brave young warrior, whose mother had been a white, and from the section of country in which the strolling Indians were now camping.

Thus poor, little, bad, foolish Nattie, running away from home to cause pain and trouble to her best friends, at once involved herself in trouble much greater than that which now pierced the hearts of those who were seeking her, sorrowing.

-77

What she did in a foolish freak of temper was likely to bring her years, perhaps a life-time, of sorrow.

After the Indians had slept about two hours, they rose and made their preparations for departure. The youngest papoose was slung over the mother's back. The skins and mats were put on a rough sledge, and drawn by two boys of eight and ten years. The few cooking utensils were packed in a bag and given to a girl somewhat older than Nattie. The tent was struck, made into a bundle with divers bows and arrows peeping from its folds, and hung to the arm of the great man. Over his other shoulder he soon slung the sleeping Nattie, and thus she was traveling wilderness-ward, in her unconscious state, all the long day during which her friends were seeking for her, in her native village.

-78

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 8.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|T|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter T.png}}HE Indians struck a straight line for their home in the wilderness, avoiding villages, and traveling with as few halts as possible. The distance was nearly three hundred miles. This they accomplished in six days.

Nattie was kept drugged, and either borne on the old Indian's back, or dragged on the sledge by the two boys, the whole distance. She was kept in this unconscious state lest she should retain some remembrance of the route, and make an at tempt to find her way back to her friends. But

-79

for this, they would have compelled her to walk, and bear her share of the burdens. The old squaw got rather jealous, seeing the pale-face so favored, and declared that she should do double work, to pay for this present ease, when they reached their own wigwam.

Nattie was unconscious of the fate in store for her, and unaware of the changes which she had undergone since she fell into the hands of her captors. The night of the Indians' arrival home, as they had no longer any reason for wishing to keep her asleep, the drug was not administered, and Nattie awoke. But so utterly wild and strange was the scene around her, that the poor child could not believe that she was really awake and in possession of her reason. She almost feared, for a moment, that she had passed through death and had awoke in the world of bad spirits, where, she had heard Biddy say, wicked children go when they die. That circle of swarthy figures, sitting on the dirt floor, around a smoking fire, laughing

-80

and jabbering over what seemed bowls of bread and milk, might be a company of fiends, for all Nattie knew. They were so intently occupied with each other that nonce of them so much as glanced in her direction; so the bewildered child thought that she might look about her, and, perhaps, hear what was being said, without attracting attention.

Such a low, black, smoky hut as she was in! There were raccoon skins stretched on the walls, stags' horns piled in the corners, no floor, and no windows but rough unshapely holes, cut in the timbers here and there, through which Nattie could feel a cold wind blowing. She was suddenly seized with a fit of sneczing. This caused the swarthy faces at the fire to be turned toward her, and directly the whole group were standing around the rude lounge on which she was lying.

"Then the daughter of the pale-face has awoke from sleep at last," said the old Indian, who was known at home as the chief, North Wind.
{{nop}}

-81

Nattie scanned the man with her quick, sharp eyes, and a vague recollection of the tremendous shape that seized her in its iron grasp on the night in which she ran away from home, passed through her mind. The tall Indian girl looked closely in her face, and, flaunting her red scarf disdainfully, said:

"The eyes of the pale daughter are not sky color; they are as black as my own. Torch Eye wants blue-eyed maiden. He no like this squaw you bring him, pappy."

"Hush, babbler," said the old Indian, sternly. "The better that the maiden's eyes be not blue; then might some foe exclaim, 'She is not of your {{SIC|race; now,|race;' now}} with the dark stainings on her skin, she will seem to be, as I proclaim, a neighboring chieftain's daughter, that I have brought for my son."

Nattie, as she listened, began to grow alarmed. She lifted her hand,—it was of a brown color. She rubbed the palm on her face, and looked at it. The tall Indian girl laughed derisively.
{{nop}}

-82

"Ha, ha!" she said, "did you think that you could rub the brown off from your face and make it white again? No, you can't. You are just my color, from head to foot, a real little Indian papoose."

Nattie felt her temper rise at this insult, but she dared not show it.

"Why don't you get up?" continued the girl, giving the settle a rude kick with her moccasined foot; "you have slept enough to last a moon, and you have got to work the tougher now, to pay for it,—so mammy says. I mean that you shall milk the old, long-horned cow this summer, while I sit on my mat at the wigwam door and plait straw."

"Cease, Black-bird," said the old Indian, authoritatively. "Vex not too much the daughter of the pale-face whilst she is as a stranger amongst us, and understands not our ways. Before many moons have waned, she will become as one of us. She will see how much better is our

-83

mode of life than that of the white people that she once knew, and become a true child of the forest, fit for a warrior's bride."

Nattie, in her half bewildered state, but imperfectly comprehended the meaning of the old Indian's words, as he sat on the ground, near the fire, to which he had returned, muffled in his huge blanket, and puffing smoke from along, black pipe. The old squaw was asleep near him, her head drooping on her breast, and her straight, black hair hanging down over her swarthy face. The youngest papoose was lying across her lap. The two little boys sat beside her, on the dirt floor, laughing and chatting merrily together. Black-bird, the tall girl, had disappeared at the reprimand from her father.

Nattie looked toward the group at the fire.

"They are happy, while I am wretched," she said to herself. Then thought bore her away to her own home. How far away from her present abode that home now lay, she knew not. She

-84

seemed to see herself in her father's lap, telling him some merry tale, or making him laugh with her quaint humor. Then she saw her invalid mother lying on her couch, watching Tiny's baby enjoyment with her playthings, on the floor. Then honest Biddy passed before her, bustling around, broom in hand, "to swape up and sect things to rights," in her usual style.

Alas! the contrast between this picture and Nattie's present state was too painful. She be gan to cry, in her dismal, dark, cold corner. The two little boys looked around, but the old Indian seemed to have followed his wife to dreamland. His pipe had fallen to the ground, and he was snoring loudly from the depths of his blanket.

The larger of the two boys got up and went toward Nattie.

"What makes you snuff and cry?" he asked.

"Because I want to go home and see my father," Nattie said, sobbing away most bitterly.
{{nop}}

-85

"This is your home now, and my pappy, there in the corner, is going to be your pappy."

"This is not my home, and I won't have an Indian for my father," said Nattie, hotly.

It was well for her that the two old heads were nodding now.

The boy stared at her in silence for a moment, and then said:

"My mammy, there, will maul you, if you talk like that. What used to be your name when you was a white girl?"

"I am a white girl now," said Nattie.

"No, you is no such thing," said the boy; "you is just my color."

"As soon as I can get some water I shall wash that off, and go away from this horrid place, to my own home."

"You can't wash it off; my pappy has painted you clear through, so it won't never fade out, and you can't never go home. It is so far you couldn't walk, and if you could walk, you could

-86

not find the way. So you'll have to stay here as long as we want you."

"Why, how far is it?" asked Nattie, beginning to be alarmed by the boy's words, for she had not supposed that she was a very long distance from her native village. Having slept during all her journey, she was not aware of its length.

"Oh, it is farther than I can tell," he answered. "We traveled six days and nights to get here, but you was asleep, and rode on pa's back, or else on our little sled, so you didn't know what a ways it was."

"Oh, dear!" said Nattie, feeling hopeless; "I wish I could see my own father."

"He would think you was an Indian Squaw," said the boy, "if he should see you, with your dark brown face, long gown, and leather moccasins."

As Nattie viewed herself, she felt a misgiving lest it would be even as the Indian boy said. She turned her head and went on with her crying, resolving, in her old spirit of desperation, that

-87

she would neither eat, drink, nor sleep, but just lie there, in the smoke and filth of that disgusting Indian wigwam, and cry herself to death.

Instead of this, she only cried herself to sleep. Poor Nattie! your sorrows are only just begun.

The old squaw started up from her nap, after a while, and began to make preparations for retiring, by spreading mats and blankets un the ground around the fire. The old Indian got up and went to Nattie's corner.

"Arise, Tulip," he said;—"this is the name which I give you, because of your red lips; arise, and come into the midst of your new brethren. The squaw shall bring you a bowl of broth, and then you shall lie down after the fashion of our people, and sleep."

The first sound of his deep voice above her head, caused Nattie to awake. She stared in his dark face, and, though dreading to approach the circle by the fire, dared not disobey his command. There was an iron pot in the corner, into

-88

which the squaw dipped a ladle, and handed a wooden bowl of the smoking contents to Nattie. The little girl took it, because she feared to do otherwise. It seemed to be corn boiled in the broth of meat. It had a savory smell, which made Nattie wish to taste it, but she waited to see if any of her companions were to be served with a similar dish.

"Come, eat your mess," said the squaw, scowling at the girl. "We all supped while you was asleep, yonder; and I sha'n't keep the pot hot another time."

"Yes, drink your broth," said the old Indian, North Wind. "It will keep your cheek full, your eye keen and your heart strong. No better is made in any of our wigwams."

Still, Nattie hesitated. There was no spoon in her bowl, and she didn't see how she could eat without one.

"Why don't you eat your supper?" asked the squaw.
{{nop}}

-89

"I have nothing to eat it with," was the answer.

"You have got a mouth, and teeth in it?"

"Yes."

"What hinders you from using them?"

This was said in such a savage manner that Nattie, with trembling hands, lifted the bowl to her lips and took a mouthful of its contents. All eyes were watching her movements, and, after a few more trials on her part, one of the little boys came up, and plunging his hand in the bowl, brought it out full of the yellow corn, with which he quickly filled his mouth.

"Fox Heart will show you how to eat yom supper," said the old squaw, looking admiringly on the dirty, little papoose who stood munching the corn filched from Nattie's bowl.

"Now do as you saw him do."

"I don't want any more," said Nattie, who was both indignant and sickened, by seeing that dirty, little Indian paw in her dish.
{{nop}}

-90

"So the haughty pale-face disdains to eat after the red child's hand," cried the squaw, in a loud, shrill tone; "but no well-made broth, like that, is to be wasted here. Let her drain the bottom of the bowl before I look in her eyes again."

The squaw turned toward the fire, and Nattie sat trembling, but still the bowl was not raised to her lips. The old Indian now arose, and, lifting a glistening tomahawk which lay on the ground by his side, he swung it wildly in the air above his head, and sent it flying in Nattie's direction. It did not hit her, nor did he wish it to do so; but it struck, with a ringing sound, on the beams in the rear of the wigwam, and fell to the ground.

"Tulip," he cried, in a tone of thunder, "drink your broth, and bring that hatchet to me."

Almost beside herself with terror, the poor girl obeyed, expecting, as she stood before the fear ful savage, with the dread weapon in her hand,

-91

that her last hour had come. She trembled from head to foot.

"Indian treats well those that treat him well," said the man, taking the tomahawk. "White girl belong to Indian now, she got to mind him, mind equaw, mind papoose, then all well; but if she no mind, then Indian take her scalp and hang it in the door of the wigwam."

He then grasped her tightly by the arm and said:

"Lie down."

Nattie tumbled on to the mat at his feet.

"Put blanket on her," he said to the squaw, who approached to do his bidding.

"White squaw knows her place now," he said; "no more trouble."

The two little Indian boys were put by Nattie's side; and all, save the wretched girl, were soon locked in slumber. She was thinking of her sad condition, and whether there might be any means of escape. As yet, she did not know how far

-92

she might be from her old home, but feared, from what the little Indian boy had said, that the distance was very great. She knew not what direction to take, either; but she thought that anything,—death from starvation, oc wild beasts,—would be preferable to life among these barbarous Indians. She did not know that she would be too closely watched to find any opportunity of making her escape from the clutches of her captors.

Nattie had fallen among fues whose cunning excceded her own. But at last she drew some comfort from the thought:

"My father will surely find me and take me home."

-93

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 3.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|N|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter N.png}}ATTIE awoke next morning in a miserable condition. Indeed, so forlorn and wretched was her appearance that OS even the savage faces around her assumed some dull expressions of pity and sympathy. The old squaw alone remained sullen. She had, from the first, looked rather unfavorably upon Nattie, and told her husband that the Great Spirit would make the pale-face prove a curse to him, because he had coveted her as a bride for his son, Torch Eye, when there were enough young squaws of their tribe, smarter and handsomer than this

-94

daughter of the white man. But the old chief, North Wind, responded that the Great Spirit had cast this girl into his path on purpose to meet the wish of his heart, which was a wife for his son, from his mother's race.

"Tulip, as I have named her, and as she is henceforth to be called, has a bold, fierce beauty, and when we have trained her to our ways, she will be a daughter worthy of our people," said the old Indian, proudly.

Nattie, or Tulip, as the Indians styled her, was soon set to her tasks. She was made to milk the cow, to help at planting the corn and potatoes, and was sent into the forest with the little Indian boys, to gather fuel. All the rougher kinds of work were put upon her, because her fingers were unskilled in straw-plaiting, willow-weaving, and the ornamental art of bead embroidery. Black-bird and her mother sat on their mats in the wigwam, engaged in such light and pleasing occupations as these, and drove Nattie about to do the

-95

cooking, or take care of the little papooses. Whenever she made awkward blunders, or exhibited an unwillingness in the performance of her tasks, she received a sharp cut about the head and ears, from a green hide which the old squaw kept bung on a deer's horn, near where she sat. The poor girl used to wish, so much, that they would show her how to make baskets; but they pretended that she was too stupid to learn, and that she would only bend up and waste their nice material. They also said it was proper that Nattie should first learn to do housework. When she had learned to do that perfectly, it would be time to think of something else.

Thus time wore on till summer came, and all the great forest was clad in the richest green. Birds' songs, rich and sweet, but unfamiliar to Nattie's ears, rang around the wigwam. The old chief made ready to go on a hunting expedition. When he returned, Torch Eye, his son, would come with him. The youth was now sojourning

-96

with his uncle, a great warrior, who taught him to use most skillfully the bow and arrow.

Nattie was rather sorry to have the old Indian depart; though she stood very much in awe of him, still she preferred him to the squaw, his wife, and instinctively felt, that when he was gone, her condition would be worse than at present. She was glad, therefore, to hear him tell his wife, on the eve of his departure, that it was now time to teach Tulip the art of bead-work and willow-weaving. During his absence, he wished Black-bird to do a share of the housework, and give Tulip a chance to learn the finer arts of Indian life. Nattie knew the old squaw would not dare wholly to disregard her husband's commands.

Accordingly, after the Indian left, she was one day given the odd bits and ends of willow, and told to make a basket. Nattie had watched Black-bird's fingers closely when she had been about her daily tasks in the cabin; so she took what was given and went away by herself. She wrought at her

-97

task as patiently and skillfully as she could, and in an hour had made, what seemed in her eyes, a very pretty little basket. It had a bail and a fanciful edge which looked like a looped scarlet ribbon, though it was all done with colored willow. Nattie was proud of her success, and when she held it up, the three papooses, who had come into the wigwam and gathered round her, clapped their hands and sent forth shouts of laughter.

"Tulip has made the pootiest basket," said Fox Heart, the oldest boy.

"So she do," said Light-foot, the second one.

"Do, do," chimed in little Sweet Fern, the baby of the group.

"Let me see," cried Black-bird, tossing her red scarf proudly.

Nattie carried the basket to the Indian maid, whose black eyes flashed with jealousy, as she said:

"You use too much red willow, it is expensive, you will be a poor hand to bring profits on work."
{{nop}}

-98

"I used what you gave me," said Nattie.

"Stupid," was the response; "were you obliged to put it all into one basket? There was red enough to put into three, and bring three sixpences instead of one. Go away."

Black-bird gave the basket an angry toss. Nattie picked it up, disheartened. She had felt so proud and pleased with her success a few moments before.

"You didn't show me how," she said; "you only gave me the willows and told me to make a basket. I did as well as I could."

"Who said you didn't?" was the response.

"Can't I do anything more?"

"Yes," answered the old squaw; "you can come here and string beads for my moccasin work, if you wish."

Nattie was glad of the task. She had often longed to be employed with the bright beads, but had never dared to touch them. The old squaw gave her three long, black horse-hairs,

-99

and told her to fill them with red, blue and yellow beads. Nattie was delighted, and set about the task with alacrity. She soon had them filled. The squaw then fashioned them into a flower, on a piece of dark broad-cloth. Nattie watched her, and exclaimed when it was done:

"Oh, how beautiful!"

The old Indian woman seemed rather pleased with the child's admiration of her skill.

"Do you know how to make letters?" she asked.

"What kind of letters?" Nattie inquired.

"Such letters as there are in great books," said the squaw. Black-bird darted a quick glance at Nattie, who responded:

"Oh, printing, you mean. No, I can't print,—that is, I don't think I can, only, perhaps, the letters of my own name."

"Could you make those, with beads, on a piece of cloth?" asked the squaw.

"As you did the flower just now?" asked Nat-

-100

tie; "yes, I think I could. I would try very hard."

"She will only waste the beads," said Black-bird, spitefully, seeing that her mother was sorting out some to give to Nattie.

"No I won't," the child ventured to say; "if I can't make the letters, I'll bring back the beads all safe."

{{SIC|"The|The}} old squaw handed her some white ones, and a strip of red cloth. Nattie wanted some other colors, but she didn't say anything. Only too glad to get these, she returned to her corner, strung them on the horse-hair, and set her little brown hands to the task of shaping the letters. Now, Nattie had three names,—"Nathalie Norton Nesmith;" but she found that the strip of cloth was only long enough to hold two of them. The beads, also, were likely to fall short. So, when she got the letters all shaped as well as she could, the name stood, "Nathalie Norton."

Fox Heart cried:
{{nop}}

-101

"Tulip makes writing flowers."

The squaw looked up. Nattie carried her strip of red cloth and held it before her, waiting for some approving word.

"Well, what is it?" she asked.

"My name," said Nattie.

"Read it," said the squaw.

Black-bird was bending over her basket and did not glance towards the letters.

"Nathalie Norton," said Nattie.

"What a homely name!" said Black-bird.

Nattie was just ready to say that she had another name, but her words were cut short by the squaw's saying:

"And that is all the writing you can do?"

"I don't know but I could make a few short words, or names," answered Nattie.

"Could you make something to put on a pin-cushion?" asked the squaw.

"What would you want?" asked Nattie, feeling a new hope springing in her breast.
{{nop}}

-102

If she could be useful to the squaw, perhaps she would be treated more kindly, and allowed to do work more congenial than the rough tasks hitherto allotted her.

"Perhaps some name common among the pale-faces," said the woman; "or some words, as, 'A Gift.{{' "}}

"Oh, yes," said Nattie; "I know many pretty names, and pretty mottoes,—that is what we call them,—to put on fancy things that are intended for presents. There is, 'A Gift,' 'Token of Love,' 'Friendship's Offering,' 'From your Friend,{{' "}}—

"But can you make all these?" asked the Indian woman.

"I should have to begin with very simple ones, certainly," said Nattie. "There is the name of 'Mary,'—none so common. It is short and easy; I would try that first. I will take a coal and make it on a piece of birch now."

Nattie ran to the fire-place, and then out of

-103

doors. She could find no birch, but saw a barked tree, gleaming white, a little distance from her, in the forest. This answered her purpose quite as well. She soon made the names, Mary, Susan, Sarah; also the words, Gift, Offering, Present; so the tree, as high as she could reach, was quite covered with the results of her ambitious efforts at printing.

She went back and said that she thought she could make the name, Mary, on a pin-cushion; but she felt somewhat alarmed when the old squaw gave her the piece of dark broad-cloth on which she had just shaped the beautiful great flower, out of red, blue and yellow beads, and told her to put the name under it. However, she said nothing, but went away to begin the task. Black-bird looked around and frowned, which made Nattie more determined to succeed.

It did not take long to make the four letters of the name. The raised, white-bead work showed richly on the dark ground, so that the old squaw

-104

made an exclamation of delight when it was presented to her gaze.

"See, Black-bird!" she said; but the girl would not look up at first.

"Are you foolish and mad because Tulip is going to be of some use to us?" the squaw continued. "I bid ye look here at her work, and your own fingers may soon learn it, so our pin-cushions will have new fashions to please the whites the next time we journey abroad."

Black-bird now looked around with a sullen fave.

"Read it to her," said the squaw.

"M-a-r-y," said Nattie, pronouncing each letter slowly. "Would you like to make it, Black-bird? It is very easy."

"No, I'd rather make baskets," was the answer.

Nattie was now convinced that the Indians could not read. She wished that she had just one of her many pretty books at home, so that she she could teach the little ones the alphabet, if no

-105

more. She did not suppose that Black-bird, who was so tall and queenly, would consent to be taught by her; but she thought that the younger children might find it real amusement to learn to read.

Fox Heart and Light-foot very readily learned the letters which she fashioned in the pin-cushions. They were constantly spelling the name, Mary; and even little Sweet Fern, the baby of two years, tried to lisp it after them.

"How many letters are there, Tulip?" Fox Heart asked; "and can you make them all?"

"Nattie said that there were twenty-six, and that she could make them all, after a fashion."

"I will get you a great piece of birch," the boy said, "if you will put them down, and tell all their names to Light-foot and me."

Nattie said that she would; and in the course of a few weeks the two boys learned the alphabet. Black-bird, also, though she would not suffer Nattie to teach her, learned it, through the aid of

-106

her brothers. While unwilling to receive a favor from Nattie, she had a true Indian's curiosity.

"Now we know as much as white folks," said Fox Heart, proudly.

"Why, you can't read," said Nattie.

"Can't we?" said the boy; "don't we know all the letters."

"But you don't know the words which these letters make."

"Oh, then, there is more to learn, is there?" asked the boy. "I will get you another piece of birch, if you will make us the words."

"I couldn't make for you one half of the words, if I had all the birch in your forest," said Nattie; "nor do I know how to spell them, or call them, myself."

Fox Heart wondered, and said:

"Then it seems that you don't know much, after all."

"I can read in easy books," said Nattie; "but I am not old enough to know much of all there is

-107

to know. It takes a long time to learn all there is in books."

"How long does it take to know all the words?" the boy asked.

"Why, I don't know as anybody ever knew them all, unless,"—Nattie paused, and thought a moment,—"unless the man that makes the dictionaries does."

"But couldn't you make me a few words on a piece of birch?" the boy persisted.

"I could make your name; or, if I could have time and the things to work with, I might make all your names on pieces of cloth, so that you could keep them always."

"Make me, make me, Tulip," said Light-foot, gleefully. "I don't want my name," said Black-bird.

"Then I won't make it," said Nattie; "though I think it would be very pretty, with a bright bird on a green branch just above it."

"No more was said for many days; but the old

-108

squaw gave Nattie pieces of cloth of divers colors, and a pint of white beads. She worked Fox Heart's name on crimson, Light-foot's on green, and Sweet Fern's on blue. Then there was a strip of beautiful purple, on which she wanted to put Black-bird, but hardly dared, as the girl had said that she did not wish her name. So she asked Fox Heart to tell her his mother's name, and put that on the purple strip. It was Red Rose. Nattie thought there never was a name more inapplicable, but she wisely kept such thoughts to herself.

The names were pinned upon a blackened beam of the cabin, and the boys were highly pleased to spell them over many times each day. Black-bird at length presented a bird which she had worked secretly, and said that Tulip might write her name under it, if she pleased.

Nattie did her best, and no other name made quite so fine an appearance as Black-bird's.

-109

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 6.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|T|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter T.png}}HREE months passed less heavily than Nattie had anticipated. It gratified her to feel that she was, in some sense, superior to her captors; and the occupation of her hands relieved the sadness of her heart. Shebecame gradually more accustomed to Indian habits and usages. She was less shocked by their uncivilized manners, and even found some amusement intheir rough mode of life. But the hope, which at first buoyed her up, lost some of its strength as time passed by and she saw that it was not realized. This strong

-110

hope had been, "—Father will find me and take me home."

But months had passed since she was brought to the wigwam in the forest, and still her father had not found her. Would he ever do so? She began to fear not.

The old chief was expected home now. His coming was talked of daily. He was to bring Torch Eye with him; and Nattie was given to understand that she must look upon the youth as her future husband. The prospect caused her much uneasiness. She could not give up the hope of being restored to her friends. Latterly, there had been distressing pains in her forehead, and often, when she was bending over her bead-work, there would come a sudden dazzle, followed by a confusion in which all sight was for a moment suspended. Then sickness and nausea would follow, and the work would have to be put by for the day, while she went forth with the papooses to gather fuel in the woods, or help dig a row of

-111

potatoes for the evening meal, or prepare wood for the fire.

One day, when she was working a long piece of lettering on black cloth, with white beads, she suddenly sprang to her feet, and pressing her hands against her eye lids, cried out:

"My work looks like a sheet of fire. Send me to the forest, mammy, where I can dip my head in the cool spring."

Nattie was never permitted to go anywhere alone, not even to the hovel, to milk the long-horned cow. So the squaw turned to Fox Heart and Light-foot, and said:

"Go with Tulip to the spring down by the beech tree, and bring her back safely when she has bathed her head."

The two lads led out the girl, who staggered as she went.

When they were gone, Black-bird said to her mother:

"The white beads are doing their work on

-112

Tulip, aren't they? She won't stand it very much longer."

The old squaw nodded, and answered:

"I didn't think that she would hold out so long. We shall have to put by the bead-work a spell, and go to basketing. If there is anything that will bring craze and death, it is white beads and colored broad-cloth. I have seen more than one fine, handsome young squaw killed with the work. But we have got a nice pile of cushions made. Tulip has done all the white beading. The other colors are easy enough handled, so my eyes have stood it twice as lung as they could without her help."

"Why don't you keep her at it?" said Black-bird, spitefully; "she don't mistrust what is the matter with her, and you might as well work on."

"It would spoil her," was the answer, "so that she could never be any help to us again, and your father will be angry, if he finds her hurt."
{{nop}}

-113

"Well, I wish she had never come here," said Black-bird.

"Be not foolish in regard to the pale-face," said the old squaw. "Though the poor creature can help us some, what is she for beauty or wit when set beside my handsome Black-bird."

"I don't like her," said the Indian maid.

"Nor does the Red Rose love the pale-face," returned the squaw; "but we do not want her to get back to her own people. They might ther come down upon us, and destroy our wigwams, or bear off our chief to a prison for having stolen one of their race. Sorry was the day to me when I saw the girl under your father's blanket; but he will believe that the Great Spirit sent her into his path to be taken as a bride for his son, Torch Eye, whose mother was of the white race."

The boys now came in, leading Nattie, or Tulip, as they called her.

"She is half blind," said Fox Heart; "for

-114

when she looks at me, she says that she can see just one half of me."

Black-bird and her mother exchanged significant glances, at these words.

"The dazzle of the beads is on her," whispered the squaw, rising to lay a mat near the open door, to place the girl upon.

Little Sweet Fern and the boys gathered around the couch.

"I am holding up my hand," said Light-foot; "look, Tulip, and tell me if you can see more than half of it."

"I can see just half of it," Nattie answered; "and I can see just half of a great tree, in the edge of the woods, and the shape of the lower limbs makes me think of an apple tree at home, into which I used to climb, and jump from it to the roof of our house."

"What made you want to do so" asked Light-foot.

"Oh, I used to like to sit on the roof under the

-115

branches of the tree, and read story books, and eat apples, and look over the country."

"That wasn't half so nice as running in the woods, I am sure," said Light-foot.

"Nor as shooting arrows at a board," added Fox Heart. "Did you have any brothers, when you was a white girl?"

Nattie winced at this question, spoken in a tone as if she had forever taken leave of her former self; but she had learned to be cautious in betraying her resentful feelings, so she answered simply, as she clasped her hands over her eyes again:

"No, not any little ones; but I have a little sister."

"Perhaps you haven't now," said Fox Heart; "and if you have, you won't see her any more, because you are Indian now, just like us. When pappy comes home, he will bring Torch Eye. Oh! he is a great tall boy, and his eyes are like fire; he will be your husband. Pappy got you on

-116

purpose for him. Perhaps, sometime, pappy will go again the long march to the white folks' land, and get your little sister for me."

Fox Heart laughed at what he considered a bright idea of his own, but Nattie felt her heart quiver with pain, and she thought it better for Tiny to die than be reserved for a fate like hers. She was very weary of suffering from the effects of sin, while she had no real sorrow for the sins themselves. There was no true repentance in her case, and if restored to her friends, in her present state of mind, she would, probably, relapse into her former habits, and be the same imperious, willful, bad girl as ever. God knew best when to withdraw the chastening hand, and the time was not yet.

-117

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 7.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|C|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter C.png}}ONSTANT looking upon white beads, in glittering contrast with their dark ground, had affected Nattie's brain. Her head was unsteady and full of rushing sounds, and her eyes saw double, or saw all things in a confused glimmer. She wandered about, pressing her hand to her forehead, rubbing her eyes, or plucking at her ears.

"How strange I feel!" she said, one day. "Black-bird, I wish that you would let me take that little piece of a looking-glass which you carry in your pocket, and are so much afraid that some-

-118

body will get a sight of, so that I can look at myself, and see if I can't tell what is the matter with my head. It must be that it looks very queer."

The Indian girl started at these words. Nattie had never addressed her so boldly since the first night of her coming among them, and she thought that the girl's mind must be getting unsettled, so she answered:

"Your head looks just as it always does, Tulip; but if you want to look in my little glass, you can."

She held it out. Nattie had had no view of herself since the discoloring of her skin by the hand of the old Indian, save the very imperfect one which she could obtain by looking in the spring at the foot of the beech tree, where she went each day to draw water. When she took the glass, she screamed aloud, at the first glance, and said:

"Oh, how could you say that I looked as I always did? I knew I must look strange, to feel

-119

so bad, but I never once dreamed that I looked half as frightful as I do."

The old squaw glanced toward her daughter, and murmured:

"She has forgotten."

Black-bird nodded.

"What do you see about yourself that looks so frightful?" asked the squaw.

"My skin," answered Nattie; "it used to be fair and white; now it is almost black. My blood must be turning to ink."

Black-bird laughed, and said

"Why, have you forgotten that pappy painted you so as to have you the true Indian color? Do you think that we would have a white girl around in our cabin so long? Somebody might have asked whence she came."

Nattie had indeed forgotten, in the first surprise and dismay at her appearance, that her skin had been stained to a swarthy hue; nor had she ever supposed that the tinge was so deep, or that it

-120

could be so lasting. She had hoped to see it gradually and finally disappear.

"Won't it ever wear off?" she said, in a broken voice.

"No," answered Black-bird; "and why should you wish it to? I think that Torch Eye would not fancy a white face."

Nattie was looking at the names which she had worked on crimson, green and purple strips of cloth, which were still pinned to a white beam. She dropped the bit of looking-glass hastily, and ran toward the door.

"Take them down!" she cried. "I can see white beads everywhere, my eyes are full of them; so is my head. I shall turn into a pile of white beads, directly. Can't anything save me from turning into white beads?"

Black-bird picked up her looking-glass rather angrily, but Nattie's wild words turned her thoughts in her direction.

"Put away the pieces of cloth with the names

-121

worked on them," said the squaw, "and see to Tulip while I go out in the forest and gather some herbs that will calm her brain. I wish that she had not worked quite so long on the beads; though I think she will be better when she has taken some of my cooling drink. I would not like to have your father see her as she is now."

Nattie was sitting on her mat, slowly swaying to and fro. Black-bird took a seat near. The old squaw tied a wampum on her head and went forth.

After a short silence, Nattie asked:

"Aren't there any Indians living near here?"

"There are some families on the other side of the forest," was the answer.

"Why don't they come to visit you?"

"They do, when their chiefs are at home; but now, I suppose, the women and children are alone, and have been bidden to stay at home and work, as we have."
{{nop}}

-122

"Don't your father want you to go abroad when he is away?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Something might happen, without a chief to protect us. There are animals in the forest that nuight kill women and children."

"Gh!" said Nattie, "that would be dreadful. But don't any white folks live near here?"

"No," answered Black-bird, quickly; "not any."

"Yes, there is, Black-bird," said Fox Heart, starting up from the bowl of broth which he was eating by the fire; "ever so many at Sibley's Corner. They are building houses there, and are going to cut the woods down, one of these days."

"Where did you hear so many lies as that?" asked Black-bird.

"My pappy knew it before he went off, and said that perhaps we should have to move to new hunting grounds before many moons."
{{nop}}

-123

Nattie could hardly refrain from smiling at what she now heard. Black-bird saw it, and said:

"You needn't smile at this news, Tulip; these white folks are Canada Frenchmen, as much worse than Indians as one can tell. You had better turn into white beads than fall into their hands."

"Why should they touch me?" said Nattie.

"I thought that you was thinking of going to them," responded Black-bird, with a sharp glance, "and only wanted to tell you that you had better stay where you are."

The squaw now came in, bringing the herbs. As she stripped them into the earthern pot, a sweet odor was diffused through the cabin, which quieted Nattie so much that she fell asleep.

While she slept, a horn rang loudly through the neighboring forest, followed by a succession of warlike whoops. All the family flew to the door. The old chief, his son, and several other

-124

Indians were just emerging from the woods. They soon filled the wigwam with their tall, dark forms.

"Where is Tulip, that she comes not to meet Torch Eye?" demanded the old Indian, gazing around.

"The pale-face daughter is ill to-night," said the squaw. "She has a troubled brain, and I am boiling herbs, to ease it."

"She is not going to be a sickly weed, I hope," said the chief. "She seemed likely to make a smart, active squaw, when I left her. If any of you have done her harm, woe be on you," he said, raising his arm, {{SIC|fiercely. She|fiercely. "She}} was a gift to me from the Great Spirit, for my brave son, as I have told you before. Torch Eye, be not cast down because the Tulip is pale and sorry to-night. My skill shall make her blooming and fair before the moon shall wane."

The young man thus addressed, who was standing by Black-bird, looking at her basket-work,

-125

made a courtly bow, but gave no answer to his father. He was, perhaps, eighteen years old, tall, straight as an arrow, with a smooth, olive skin, thick, black locks, and eyes of the same hue. His dress was better than that of the savages in his company, and he wore it with the air of a gentleman. In truth, his looks plainly showed that he was no more than a half brother to Black-bird and the young papooses. The old chicf, North Wind, was his father, but he had had a white mother. The squaw had a jealousy of him, because she thought that the Indian preferred him to her children. This was true. North Wind doted on the child of his white wife, and coveted for him a companion from the same race.

When they sat down on the ground around the fire, to eat their bowls of succotash, Torch Eye looked about for a stool. He would not sit on the floor, nor did he eat with his fingers, but made use of a broad-bladed knife, which he drew from his side pocket.
{{nop}}

-126

My son has lived among the whites, and got some of their fashions," said the old Indian, seeing that these movements were watched, with no very approving eyes, by the group of savages on the floor; "but he is a brave, true warrior, and few can shoot the arrow with him."

After supper, pipes were produced, but Torch Eye did not smoke. He walked back to the stand where Black-bird was at her basket-making again. Fox Heart came along with the strips of cloth on which Nattie had wrought their names with beads.

"Here is writing," said the boy, holding them forth.

Touch Eye took them in his hand.

"I know all the letters," said Light-foot.

"They is our names," lisped little Sweet Fern.

Torch Eye read them. The last that he came to was "Nathalie Norton."

"Who is that?" he asked.

"That is Tulip," said Fox Heart. "It was her

-127

white name. She made the letters; but now her head is wrong, and she thinks that it is full of white beads."

"Don't talk more than you know, Fox Heart," said the old squaw, sharply.

Torch Eye looked toward his step mother, and she turned her head away.

When the Indians who were visitors had withdrawn to their tent, which they had pitched close by, and Torch Eye had gone with them, the old Indian went up to Nattie, who was still sleeping on her mat, and looked at her attentively. He then took a vial from his pocket, poured half its contents into a basin of water, and laved her face, neck and arms several times. She grew whiter at each laving. The old squaw brought the herbs which she had cooked. He told her to drink the dose herself, for he had a draught of his own choosing for Tulip.

"Why don't you give it to her, then?" she said, looking sullen.
{{nop}}

-128

"I shall wait till she can talk to me and tell me her ills," he said.

Then, taking some fresh water, he poured into it the remaining contents of the vial, and bathed Nattie's face three times.

-129

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 9.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|A|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter A.png}}T an early hour on the following morning, Nattie awoke. The first sight which met her gaze was the garments which she had worn on the night in which she was seized by the Indian, hanging on a stick close to her head. She started up with surprise and delight. There were the brown delaine dress, the white apron, the balmoral hose, and the boots. She had never expected to sec them again, or to know their fate. They were taken from her during her unconscious journeying into the wilderness, and her dress had since been

-130

the coarse, cotton fabric of the Indian children. She had often wished to ask for her clothes, but dared not venture to do so. Now here they were, at her side, looking just as she had last seen them. Nattie silently thanked God for the sight, and there was genuine gratitude in her heart.

It seemed to be the intention that she should put on the garments. The company were all sleeping around her when she rose and commenced the task. In a few moments she felt and looked quite like her former self.

"If I could find Black-bird's looking-glass," she whispered, stepping softly toward the spot where the Indian girl's cast off garments lay, "I would just like to take a peep at myself this morning; though I suppose my black face will scare me so much that I sha'n't take much comfort in seeing my clothes. But I'll look, though, if I can find the glass."

She searched Black-bird's pocket, and was suc-

-131

cessful. Then, stepping as lightly as she could toward one of the openings which served as windows, she held up the fragment of mirror and looked in. Her surprise was great when she saw that her face was quite restored to its original color.

What had occurred since last night? She almost thought that her prayers were answered,—that her father had come, and delivered her from captivity.

But she looked toward the sleeping forms, and now noticed that the old chief's place was occupied. A chill struck to her heart as she thought that her appearance had been improved that she might be presented, in a more favorable aspect, to the dreaded Torch Eye. She had been many times told that the boy would return with his father, and that she was destined to be his wife. Nattie looked toward the sleepers again, but counted only the mats of the old chief, his squaw, the three papooses, and Black-bird. "Perhaps, then.

-132

Torch Eye has not come;" this thought was a relief. She stepped toward the door, but, ere she gained it, a shadow darkened the opening, and a young man stood before her astonished eyes. He gazed at her with a slight smile, and stood aside, as if to let her pass out. But while she looked, her sight was dazzled, so she saw but half of his figure, and in trying to run by him, she came in contact with that half which her imperfect vision had rendered invisible. He put out his arm to save her from falling, and when she was fairly beyond him, she turned and said:

"Excuse me. I could see but half of you my head has got strange, and sometimes my sight serves me a bad turn."

"I am sure you don't look as if you were blind," said the young man, gazing at the trim figure before him.

"I'm not blind," was the answer; "only the beads have got in my head, and make me see wrong, sometimes."
{{nop}}

-133

"Do you, then, work with beads so much?" asked the stranger.

"Oh, all summer,—every long, long day," Nattie answered; "and always with white ones. I don't believe that any others would be as bad; but they dazzle so! I often see white beads everywhere."

"You don't see any about me, do you?" asked the youth, smiling.

"No," answered Nattie, regarding him. "I see you just as you are now; but, perhaps, in a minute, I shall see but half of you, or see flowers and letters in white beads, all over your clothes."

"Well, while you can see me as I really am, won't you please tell me what you think of me, and whom you take me to be?"

Nattie looked at her new acquaintance again, and said:

"I think that you are quite like white people."

Then some recollections of what Black-bird had told her, yesterday, in regard to a company

-134

of Canadian Frenchmen that had come into that region, and of their great wickedness, passed through her mind, and she added:

"I'm sure, I don't know who you are, but I hope that you are not a Canada man."

Nattie made a move as if she would re enter the wigwam, but the youth seemed to wish to detain her yet a while longer.

"Why do you hope that I am not a Canada man?" he asked.

"Because they are enemies to us," Nattie answered.

"To you and me?"

"No; to Indians."

"Then you and I are not Indians?"

"I am not," she said.

"So I see," he answered; "yet you live with them."

"I was brought here," she said, looking uneasily toward the cabin.

"Your name is Nathalie," he said.
{{nop}}

-135

"I am called Tulip," she answered.

"But I read the name, 'Nathalie Norton,' in the cabin, last night, and was told by Fox Heart that it was yours," he said.

"Then, you know our folks?" she remarked, quickly.

"I do," he returned. "There were visitors with you last night, but you were wearied out and sleeping, so you were not called to join the company."

"The chief has got home," said Nattie; "I saw him sleeping on his mat this morning, when I awoke."

"Yes; are you glad?"

"I{{bar|2}}don't know. Could you tell me whether his son came with him or not?"

{{SIC|"Nattie|Nattie}} asked this question with averted eyes.

"He did," was the answer.

"Do you know him?"

"Yes; I may say that I have some acquaintance with Torch Eye."
{{nop}}

-136

"What is he like?"

"I would not want to say much in his favor," was the response.

"Well, you had better not say anything against him, for his father is just within, and may be awake. He thinks very highly of his son."

"I have reason to believe it," was the answer. "I called to bid the old chief good morning, as my companions and I must be gone on a hunting expedition, full soon; but he is sleeping, so I will call on my return."

"Do you wish me to tell him who called?" asked Nattie, feeling some desire to learn the name of the dark-eyed young man, who had something Indian in his dress, but whose manners were like those of white people.

"You may tell him that Augustus Reid called, and had a pleasant interview with his little adopted daughter, Nathalie."

Nattie bowed, and the young man took his leave. Suddenly, while the little girl's eyes were

-137

bent thoughtfully on the damp, dark ground in front of the wigwam, she saw that name, "Augustus Reid,"—stretched out in great, white bead letters, at her feet. But, strange to tell, the next moment she saw another name, and one which she dreaded ever to think of, written directly below the first one. The second one was, "Torch Eye."

Nattie put her hands to her eyes, and returned to the interior of the wigwam. The old chief was sitting up, looking about him, in all directions. He soon discovered Nattie, and called out:

"Ho, my gay Tulip! has she been abroad already, to brighten the morning with her beauty? The eyes of old North Wind are gladdened by the sight of her, looking even as when the Great Spirit sent her forth from the white man's door, to become a child of the forest, the bold red man's bride. They tell me that some dimness has come to the bright eyes of the Tulip. She must make

-138

known to the old chief the tale of its coming, that he may drive it away by using the arts which the medicine-man of a great tribe taught him, when his years were few and his feet nimble as the deer on the mountains."

These, words roused the old squaw and her papooses. Black-bird sat up and stared blankly at Nattie, till a dark frown clouded her brow and flashes of anger shot from her murky, black eyes. She had noticed the hue of Nattie's skin and the garb which she wore. The sight filled her with wrath and jealousy. Fox Heart exclaimed:

"Tulip has turned white since yesterday; is it because she is Torch Eye's bride, pappy?"

The old chief laughed aloud, and said:

"Who knows but it may be because she is soon to behold her future chief? though some moons must wax and wane before their marriage morning. Tulip must grow to woman's hight, and Torch Eye must learn the warrior's life, before he takes the bride to his own wigwam."
{{nop}}

-139

The old squaw looked scowlingly toward Nattie, who stood leaning on a bench not far from the chieftain.

"Get you to the spring by the beech-tree, and draw water for filling the pot," she said; "we want no white idlers in our cabin. If your sick face is put on to get you ease, it will he best cured by work and the green hide."

Nattie droopingly took the two heavy buckets and started for the door. As she went down the well-trodden path, her head was full of strange sounds. She thought, at first, that it was the murmuring of the rivulet which supplied the spring, but the sounds grew louder and more confusing. She erred in her steps, and reeled against a great tree. She would have fallen heavily to the earth had not the arm of the old chief saved her.

"The brain of the pale-face is hurt," he said. "I must search for the remedies of the red medicine-man, before the sun reaches his half-way house this day. The gift of the Great Spirit to

-140

the Indian shall be treated as the future bride of his son."

North Wind took Nattie up in his blanket, and carried her back to the wigwam.

"What matter now?" asked the old squaw, when he entered with his burden.

He did not answer, but, placing Nattie on the settee, went to the fire, where the pot of herbs still simmered.

"What herbs have you got in the pot?" he at length asked, turning to the old squaw.

"Such as are good for dizzy, two-sighted heads," she answered. "But you spurned my hand. You would not let the white squaw drink the healing balm of the woods, that I toiled to make for her good. See what better health you can pour from the vials of the red medicine-man."

The old Indian tasted the contents of the pot, then dipped up a small quantity in a cup, added to it some drops from a vial, and carried the dose to Nattie.
{{nop}}

-141

"Drink and be healed, child of the pale-face," he said.

Nattie regarded him earnestly, as he spoke, and said, slowly:

"I can see half of a cup in your hand."

"Take hold of the half that you can see," he answered, "and you will find that it is a whole cup, Tulip."

She did as directed, passing her fingers around the brim.

"Why, so it is," she said, looking pleased to find it thus.

"Drink," he said.

She raised the cup to her lips, and after it was drained, looked steadfastly in the bottom of it, for some moments.

"What is there?" asked the chief.

"Augustus Reid's eyes," said Nattie, still gazing intently.

"Ho! What! Have you seen Augustus Reid, then?" asked the old Indian, eagerly.
{{nop}}

-142

"He came this morning, while you slept, to bid you good-bye before he went to the hunt; and he told me to tell you that he would call on his return."

"And what did you think of Augustus Reid, my Tulip of the woods?" asked old North Wind, looking closely in the young girl's face as he put the question.

"I thought well of him," answered Nattie.

The chief seemed pleased and satisfied.

-143

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 10.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|F|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter F.png}}OR several weeks Nattie remained in her half-dazed state. Some days she was quite herself, and could assist in the house work, or join the group in the lighter work of basket-making. Bead embroidery was, by command of the old chief, entirely put aside; for Nattie could not even behold others at work on it without directly seeing white beads everywhere, and imagining her eyes to be full of them.

But she gained, visibly, as cool weather came on, more through rest and recreation, probably,

-144

than from the remedies administered by the hand of the old chief, who had not much skill, though a strong desire to heal the young Tulip,—the Great Spirit's gift, as he invariably styled her.

Old North Wind stayed at home now, week after week. He made new bows, pointed his arrows, and patched the wigwam. He was gloomy and taciturn much of the time. Something seemed to weigh heavily on his mind. But Nat tie had never felt so bright and cheery since her capture as she did for weeks after her interview with Augustus Reid. She marveled that he did not come again to the wigwam, as he had said that he would do, and wondered if he had not called, on some of the days when her head had been dazed, so that she had forgotten his visit, or, perhaps, not been aware of it. She at length concluded to see what information Fox Heart could give her, and began to question him one night, when Black-bird and her mother were abroad in the forest, gathering nuts, and the old chief sleeping on his mat.
{{nop}}

-145

"We don't have much company, do we, Fox Heart?" she asked.

"You know as well as I that we don't," said the boy, who was trimming a little basket which he had just made, by cutting off, with a pair of dull shears, the projecting sticks around the rim.

"Black-bird said once, that, when the chiefs got home to their families there would be visiting," said Nattie, trying to help Fox Heart at his work.

Light-foot and little Sweet Fern were near by, to pick up the sticks as they fell, and form of them what they called trees, wigwams, animals and men. This was a favorite amusement with the two young papooses.

"I wish that somebody would come," continued Nattie, "for I get lonesome."

"Pappy is troubled," said Fox Heart, "and the sight of folks makes him worse, so they don't come to see him."

"What is the matter with him?" asked Nattie, in a whisper, and with a cautious glance toward

-146

the sleeping chief. She had still a very decided fear of the stern-faced man.

"He mourns for Torch Eye," answered Fox Heart; "but mammy don't, nor Black-bird. I guess they are glad."

"Is his son dead?" asked Nattie, experiencing, in spite of herself, a feeling of relief.

"Not so," said Fox Heart; "but he has gone afar."

"Will he not return?"

"That pappy doesn't know; nor can he tell where the youth has fled. When he came home, some moons ago, Torch Eye and a band of warriors were with him, but they soon left, and Torch Eye has been here but once since."

"Did he see me?" asked Nattie, quickly.

"Yes; but your head was wrong that day, and you didn't seem to mind him at all. Pappy tried to have you, but it was no use; your eyes were shut up and wouldn't open. Black-bird laughed, and so did mammy. Then pappy scowled, and

-147

they laughed no more. I can't tell why he scowled."

"Do you like Torch Eye?" asked Nattie.

"Yes; but not so much, because mammy don't want me to. He isn't but half her boy, so she says that he don't like us, and we needn't mind about him."

"How does he look?"

"Most as tall as pappy, and he wears black clothes."

"And a blanket?"

"Yes, sometimes; and feathers in his cap."

"Is his face like Black-bird's?"

"No."

"Like yours?"

"No."

"Like his father's?"

"Not much."

"Like whose, then?"

"I don't know, perhaps like his white mother's was; and she has been dead more moons than I

-148

know. I can not count so many on all my fingers, if I try."

"Has anybody else been here when I was sick and stupid?" asked Nattie.

"No," said Fox Heart; "not anybody. Torch Eye looked at you that day, very sober. Then he and pappy went off in the woods and talked ever so long. When they came back, Torch Eye said good-bye to us all, and told us that he was going along journey; but we didn't care much about that. Pappy has been as you see him ever since."

Nattie looked again toward the old Indian. His head was bowed on his broad breast, and his whole attitude was one of dejection and grief. It made Nattie feel sad to see him thus, for he was kinder to her than any of the rest of the wild people by whom she was surrounded, and she thought within herself:

"I'll remember poor old North Wind when I pray."
{{nop}}

-149

Nattie had, also, of late, mentioned Augustus Reid in her prayers. She asked that he might return and free her from her wearisome captivity. She had become discouraged in praying for her father's coming; but this brave-looking youth had inspired her with a fresh faith, so she had formed the habit of naming him in her nightly prayers.

As the winter drew near, the Indians began to speak of leaving their home in the forest, to journey into the land of the whites, after their usual custom. But what was to be done with Nattie? She was not able to take the journey, nor could she be left behind, alone. There were many consultations; and at last they concluded to take her to the wigwam of a neighboring Indian, who was obliged to tarry at home, owing to his age and infirmities. His hut was on the borders of the forest, a few miles distant. Poor Nattie wished to go the journey, for she thought that the Indians might take their former route, and that

-150

she could gain her native village once more. But Black-bird said that they would never again go that way. They would travel north this time, over the Canada border, perhaps.

Many days were spent in making preparations. The old squaw scrubbed and packed in a bag the little stock of utensils necessary for cooking. The tasteful willow baskets, in many varieties of form and finish, were put in as compact form as possible. The beaded moccasins and pin-cushions, on which Nattie had wrought so patiently and so much to her own detriment, were brought forth, carefully wrapped, and packed in leathern portmanteaus.

Nattie watched the process in sadness. It had been the wish of her heart, when her fingers were making those names and mottoes, that some of them might reach her mother's hand, and find a place on the work-table at which she was accustomed to sit, when not too feeble, and sew for her family. She almost thought, too, that some in-

-151

stinct might reveal to her mother's heart that the pin-cushion was the work of her little, lost daughter's hand, or that some familiar turn of the letters might arrest her attention, and cause her to exclaim:

"Thus Nattie used to write."

But the Indians were not going in the direction of Nattie's old home; and, even had they been, how could Nattie know that she still had a mother there? This was hardly likely, as the poor woman was so low at the time of her little girl's loss.

"We shall have rare, good times," said Fox Heart, when things were nearly ready for a start; "we shall see all the pale-faces. It is most too bad that you can't go; but white girls aren't fit to march. Pappy had to bring you on his back all the way here, and you was dreadful tired, and slept, and slept. White squaws are not much worth. I guess pappy will bring you home a bright handkerchief, and, perhaps, a red gown,

-152

because you worked at the beads so well. I shall have some money, too, when I sell my little baskets, and what shall Fox Heart buy for the Tulip?"

"If you could get a spelling book," answered Nattie, "I might teach you to read."

"I know all the letters that you do, now," said Fox Heart, "and what is the use for me to learn any more? No, I think I shall get you a long wampum, or a red feather for your head."

"I don't want either of those," said Nattie; "for why should I look like a wild Indian?"

"Then, what shall I buy for you?" asked Fox Heart, getting discouraged.

"If you could find a pair of thick, woolen mittens or gloves, to save my hands when I pick fuel in the forest on cold days, I would like them well," returned Nattie; "though, if they cost very much, it is no matter."

"What sick hands the pale-faces have!" said the boy, contemptuously. "I would not have

-153

such things on me; though, if you want them, I'll try and not forget."

The day on which the company were intending to set out on their journey, Nattie's head had a turn, and the old chief concluded to bring the Indian family, in whose charge's he was to be left, tohis own wigwam. Accordingly, this was done.

"Be wary and careful of this young maiden," said the old chief, "my Tulip, the gift of the Great Spirit for my son Torch Eye, when he shall come to be of his father's mind, and return to claim her. Youth hath not the wisdom of the head that many moons have shone upon, but the Great Spirit is overall. Farewell, Tulip. When the sun comes again from his winter house, and brings the buds and birds with him, the old chief hopes to greet thee at his cabin door; and he will bring in his hand an offering from thy former people, the pale-faces."

All the little papooses shouted good-bye; and even the old squaw and Black-bird, who had

-154

shown least regard for Nattie, turned a regretful look toward her as they went out from the wigwam, equipped for their long journey into the land of the whites.

It was the last of November when they went away, andthe ground was already covered with snow.

-155

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 8.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|I|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter I.png}}T was rather dull for a while, after the aN old chief and his family left. Nattie was sullen and unsocial, not inclined to make the acquaintance of her new keepers.

The three squaws were stupid and idle. They smoked or slept nearly all the time. The old Indian,—Cat-head, was his name,—sat on his mat, fretting over his pains, and complaining because his children did not take better care of him in his age. The boy stayed in the forest, hunting weasels, or, when in the hut, roasted nuts in the coals, and ate them all himeelf.

It was not long before Nattie discovered that

-156

these new house-keepers were not as tidy as the old squaw had been. They did not scrape and scour the kettle after the succotash was boiled; and, at length, the broth cooked in it became bitter, and Nattie could not eat it. They did not wash the wooden bowls after using them, but merely rinsed them with cold water, so they became greasy and slimy with the thick broth.

These things stirred Nattie's wrath; and, one day, when the succotash was unsalted, burnt, and altogether unrelishable, she flamed out:

"You are nasty squaws, and you make such mean broth that I can't eat it."

"Then let the pale-face make the broth herself," said the youngest, with a sullen frown.

"I will," returned Nattie; "or, I will teach you to make it as the old chief's wife made hers."

"We can cook broth good enough for ourselves now," said the oldest; "let them that want better, make it, if they can."

"I know that I can make better," answered

-157

Nattie; "but you shall clean the kettle for me."

"Clean it, yourself," said the youngest.

"I won't clean it myself," retorted Nattie, with flashing eyes. "You have been burning the broth on it, day after day, without once scraping or scouring it, and the ones that fouled it shall clean it."

The squaws looked at each other, and the old man wheezed and coughed. Nattie turned to the oldest squaw, and said, with an air of authority:

"Pink Ear, scrape the dinner-pot; soak it, and wash it till it is as clean and smooth as glass; for that is as it was when you began your house work here."

The squaw gave an insolent grunt, and sat still. Nattie went to the table, and, from a small drawer, drew forth a sheet of paper, on which she began to write with a pencil made of coal. The squaws soon commenced to whisper together, and the youngest approached the place where Nattie was seated.
{{nop}}

-158

"What white squaw doing?" she asked.

"She is writing a letter," said Nattie, without looking up.

"Who she write letter to?"

"To the great chief, North Wind, her friend."

"What she say to the old chief?"

"She is telling him that the people whom he got to take care of his Tulip, are lazy, saucy, dirty creatures, who smoke and sleep, and burn the kettle, make bad broth, and foul the wigwam by their filthy habits."

The three squaws looked at each other, and whispered again. They were quite overawed by Nattie's determined air, while their stupidity and ignorance prevented them from considering the unlikelihood of Nattie's letter ever reaching the strolling company of Indians, and coming into the chieftain's hands; and soon the girl had the satisfaction of hearing an old fire-iron rasping away at the bottom of the dinner-pot.

Her plan succeeded, and she put by her writ-

-159

ing for the time. Blue Top, the second squaw, now came, and asked quite humbly what it was in the keeping of the cabin that she complained of?

"You don't shake the mats, or air the blankets and fold them, or sweep the floor, or dust the table and place it; and you let cobwebs hang all around on the beams, which is a scandalous sight, and let the dinner bowls be as filthy as a pig's trough."

Nattie paused to take breath. The youngest squaw had now joined her sister, and both stood gazing with as much surprise as their stupid faces were capable of wearing.

"All these things I shall write down to send to the chief, North Wind; he will be very angry, for he likes to have good care taken of his cabin; and he also wished me to be spared from much work, because my head is yet bad."

Nattie paused again, and looked at her auditors. The old man was speaking in a low tone to Pink Ear, who still toiled at the huge {{hinc|dinner pot}},

-160

on the ground, near the fire. His face and tones indicated his interest.

"You had better mind the white squaw," he said; "for the old chief thinks much of her. She may tell him a tale that will displease him, on his return; for I see that she hath a fiery spirit. If the old chief should get angered, he might do us much harm."

Pink Ear bowed her head in silence. Nattie now began to show Blue Top how to shake the mats, how to fold the blankets and arrange them in a pile, while Brown Wren, the youngest of the three, was set to scalding the begrimed water-buckets and wooden bowls.

It took several days to get things arranged to Nettie's mind. She sent the boy to the forest for hemlock twigs of which to make brooms; and even the poor old man was driven out to cut some long, smooth poles on which to tie the hemlock. With these, she set the squaws sweeping down the festoonery of cobwebs which {{hinc|over-spread}} the

-161

beams of the wigwam, and carrying out the litter and rubbish.

Nattie made herself reigning queen. She had been a humble subject for many months, and now the more keenly enjoyed bending others to her will. Her domineering disposition showed itself in full deformity. It was not dead or subdued, and only wanted opportunity to make itself felt.

Nattie now quite forgot her prayers. Had she prayed and been honest, she would have said:

"Thank God that I've got the upper hands of these lazy, stupid Indians, and that I have the power to make them do my bidding. May it be long continued to me."

Nattie was an unlimited despot. She used her power in the most unscrupulous manner. Sha set unnecessary tasks, from the mere love of seeing them performed. She found her pleasure in the toil and disquietude of her subjects. She would not suffer the poor, old, sick Indian, Cat-head, to draw a mat or blanket from the pile, by

-162

day, but he must sit, or lie, on the ground, wrapping himself, as best he could, in his thread bare plaid. This was nothing short of cruelty; for the poor creature's rheumatism and pains were aggravated by the deprivation. It angered Nattie to hear him cough and wheeze as he often did, for hours together, but she would not suffer the squaws to brew herbs, which they said would heal him, because of the smoke and steam which it would occasion in the wigwam.

She set the boy sewing weasel skins together to make her a cap and muff; and the squaws she kept at basket-making, early and late, when they were not doing anything else, because she had heard that a French peddler was coming that way, to whom she hoped to sell the baskets, and obtain some finery to deck her own person.

Nattie was now so absorbed in her own selfishness that she thought of naught else. Her lost home was no longer mourned over as it had been; for there, she was subject to others; here, she was first.

-163

Power was very sweet to her little heart. If her subjects showed any signs of revolt, she applied the spur, by threatening to report their short comings to old North Wind, without delay.

The poor squaws had few opportunities to lounge, smoke and take their ease.

When Nattie had been reigning queen of the wigwam about two months, there came a visitor. It was Augustus Reid. He looked rather melancholy, and asked for the old chief. Nattie said that he had gone a journey with his family.

"And left you to the care of strangers?"

"I am very well provided for," said Nattie; "and they will all get home again, in the spring."

"I think that your head was troubled when I saw you last," said the youth, looking at her kindly; "has it now got well?"

"It is almost well," answered Nattie; "I do not see white beads now, nor hear a rushing like loud waters, as I did."

"Do you make pin-cushions now, or write let-

-164

ters on {{hinc|broadcloth}}, as you did when I first saw you?"

"No; but I work on willow a little. It has been a long time since you were here last. Have you been hunting ever since then?"

"The young man hesitated and smiled, but finally answered, Yes."

"Did you see any white folks where you went?"

"I saw many," he returned. "They used to be your people, I infer, from the color of your skin. Why are you living among Indians now?"

Nattie colored. She dared not tell her questioner that she had been stolen from her home and brought to the forest, so she said, evasively:

"I have been here what seems to me a long time, and am pretty well contented."

"That is strange," said the young man, thoughtfully.

"Why, you associate with red men, and enjoy it, though you are not of their race any more than I am," said Nattie.
{{nop}}

-165

"Ah, yes, I a man Indian," returned the youth, in a regretful tone; "that is, my father is a red man, and my mother was a pale-face."

"Is your mother dead?"

He bowed.

"And your father?"

"Is living, I suppose; though I may never behold his face again."

The young man looked around the wigwam, and drew a heavy sigh, as he spoke thus.

Nattie pitied him.

"Why may you not see your father?" she asked.

"He is angry with me," was the response.

"He may not always be so."

"Ah, the Indian is slow to forgive. He has laid his commands upon me. I am to obey them, or see him no more."

"Does he wish you to do any bad or wicked thing, then?" asked Nattie.

"He wishes me to do that which I think would

-166

be wrong," answered the youth, looking at the little girl with a steady gaze.

Nattie was silent. She did not like to ask the young man what it was that his father wished him to do, which he considered so wrong, though she hoped that he would tell her; but he did not seem thus inclined; so, after a while, she said:

"Surely, your father does not wish you to kill or steal?"

"Not exactly," was the response; "though, I believe, he wishes me to receive and retain as my own, stolen goods."

"That would certainly be wrong," said Nattie.

"So I think," said the young man, rising. "But we will not talk more of it now. You seem to be a nice house-keeper. I have not, in all my travels, seen so nice a cabin as this. Is it your work? It seems too much for your small hands."

"I have three squaws," answered Nattie, proudly. "They are in the woods now, gathering

-167

nuts. The old chief, North Wind, left them to help me, so I tell them how, and they do most of the work. That old man, complaining in the corner, is their father. He is a trying old creature, and I wish that I could be rid of him."

"He seems to be sick," said the youth.

"I suppose he is; but he is, also, very dirty and disagreeable."

Nattie said this with a proud toss of her head, and added: "But you will tarry and take a bowl of broth with us, for I have some on the fire, of my own making, which, I think, will be very good."

The youth assented, and Nattie laid mats on the clean ground, brought the smooth, white, wooden bowls, which the squaws' hands now scoured and scalded each day, and dished out the steaming contents of the soup kettle.

Augustus Reid ate with a hearty relish, and said that the succotash was the best that he ever tasted. Nattie was much gratified by this com-

-168

pliment, and insisted on filling his bowl a second time.

After dispatching this, he went to the table and examined the willow-work. Then he asked if she would not show him the names which he once saw lettered with white beads on {{SIC|broad-cloth."|broad-cloth.}}

She opened a drawer and drew them out. He looked them over and selected hers at once.

"I would like to keep this," he said.

She was silent.

"May I?" he added.

"It is but a trifle," she answered; "I don't suppose they will care."

"When you work in beads again," he said, "I hope that you will make my name."

"I think I shall," answered Nattie.

{{SIC|"He|He}} looked at her with a pleased smile, held out his hand, and said:

"Good-bye, Nathalie."

How strange, and yet how grateful that name sounded in her ears!

-169

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 11.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|W|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter W.png}}HILE the three squaws were abroad in the forest, searching for nuts in places where the snow had drifted away, they talked together concerning the hardships of their lives at the wigwam.

"Woe was the day we left our own cabin and came to this side of the forest," said Pink Ear. "At home we could smoke, and eat, and take our ease, but here we are driven about by the white papoose, so that there is no rest for the poor squaw by day nor night, for when she lies down to sleep, she thinks of the toils of the morrow, and

-170

her dreams are made bitter, and she wakes in the morning scared and weary."

"When I think of the buckets of water which I bear, each day, from the spring at the foot of the beech-tree," said Brown Wren, "for the scalding of the wooden bowls and the washings of the towels, I am like to wish the sun had never risen that saw me leave my own hut for the wigwam of the great chief, and I pray that the Great Spirit may soon relieve us all from this wretched way of life."

"I would not cry so bitterly," said Blue Top, "at the toils of sweeping, and the lifting of the heavy mats and blankets each morning and night, if our father, the poor, old, bowed-down Cat-head, were well treated. But he is hooted at, and his pains are doubled by his privations; for he can not have his mat or blankets by day, but he must sit or lie on the damp earth; nor can he have a bath of herbs for his cough, because the smell does not happen to please the nose of the

-171

proud, white squaw. Sisters, it is often in my mind that we take our insulted father, and return to our own cabin beyond the wilderness."

"He can not walk," said Brown Wren; "how could we get him there?"

"We could make a small sledge and draw him," said Blue Top; "our brother, the young Cat—head, would help us with his brave arm."

Brown Wren looked toward Pink Ear, who had found a handful of nuts under the leaves, and sat down on a fallen tree to eat them. But the old squaw shook her head, slowly.

"The young white squaw would not suffer us to depart in peace," she said.

"We will go in the night, when she is asleep," said Brown Wren; "and she does not know the way that we go, so she can not follow our path."

"Yes, we will steal away under cover of darkness," said Blue Top, her dark, stupid face brightening at the prospect of escaping from her present life of toil and servitude.
{{nop}}

-172

"We can not get away without the pale-face's knowledge; she hath sharp eyes and quick ears," said Pink Ear; "besides, if we left her alone, and she came to harm, then the old chief, who bade us stay by her, saying that he would reward us on his return, will be very angry, and we shall all perish by his tomahawk. Nay, sisters, there is no way for us to do but bide patiently the old chief's coming. The time of his absence is half expired already, so let us take courage."

"I don't see how old North Wind can think so high of the hateful, young white squaw," said Brown Wren.

"No more do I," added Blue Top; "she seems to me the Bad Spirit's own papoose."

"If I could see her brought down to bite dust, I would not fret for the water I now carry to scald the wooden bowl from which she eats," said Brown Wren; and a lowering vengeance gleamed in her murky eye.

A ringing sound, as of an ax laid stoutly to

-173

the root of a tree, was now heard. The three squaws gathered close together and listened. Similar sounds soon followed, and human voices also were heard, at intervals, in the distance.

"The ax of the white man!" said Brown Wren.

"The voices of the Frenchmen!" said Blue Top.

"Woe! woe! we are lost," cried Pink Ear, starting hastily toward the wigwam. "The Canaders have come to cut down the forest; they will burn our cabins, and kill or banish us from the hunting grounds of our fathers."

While the three frighted women tried to make good their escape, the crash of falling trees resounded through the forest, followed by shouts of exultation from what seemed a score of rough throats. They were, indeed, those Canadian French that Black-bird had once told Nattie were settling at Sibley's corner, a small town six or eight miles

-174

distant, and were, so the Indian girl had represented, much more to be dreaded than the red man. The surrounding forest had come into the possession of a company of Yankee pioneers, who were moving in these French to cut it down, and help transport the lumber to market.

Before the squaws could escape from the woods, they were seen by a scout of French, sent out to make a circuit in that direction. The men at once set up a cry of:

"Indian squaws! Indian squaws! Come on, boys; there is a wigwam somewhere not far off. Let us give them a call, and get some hot succotash to go with our cold lunch."

The party of Canadians rushed on, at the top of their speed, and gained the opening before the cabin just as the squaws were disappearing within the doors. Nattie was sitting at the table where Augustus Reid had left her half an hour before. She had taken from a drawer some strips of cloth, and was thinking which color to

-175

select for the printing of the young man's name. A skein of {{hinc|horse hair}} and a bowl of white beads were placed near. She was just smoothing a strip of rich, purple cloth on her knee, being the color chosen, while her dark eyes wore an expression of pleasure, when the terrified shrieks of the three squaws, bursting rudely into the enclosure, caused her to start to her feet, and face them with an angry aspect.

"What do you mean by this uproar? What uncivilized savages you are!" she cried.

Before she had finished speaking, the face of a white man showed itself at the door.

"The French have come to burn and murder us," cried Pink Ear, while she and her sisters began to pull down the pile of mats with which to hide themselves from the eyes of their enemies.

The old Indian, Cat-head, cast a glance behind him, and seeing three white men entering, dropped his head on his breast, and commenced a dismal howl.
{{nop}}

-176

Nattie alone seemed undismayed. To her, the sight of a white face was cheering. She eame forward to greet them, but their manners soon convinced her that they had not come as friends. They winked at each other, and talked in a language which Nattie could not understand. Only now and then a few words were intelligible, and from these Nattie gathered that they were profane, reckless men, who would delight in lawlessness and cruelty.

Pretty soon one of them swaggered up to the fire, and gave the old Indian a rude kick, at which he cried out with fear and pain. Next he grabbed the kettle of succotash, and jerked it from its place, spilling a part of the contents on the ground. He made signs to Nattie to bring him some dishes, which she either did not understand or did not choose to heed; so the man seized the {{hinc|water buckets}}, dashed their contents on the floor, turned the broth into them, and then, calling his companions, they drew some large

-177

spoons from their vests, and commenced eating, jabbering in their strange dialect, and laughing in loud, hoarse voices.

Nattie began to tremble with apprehension of coming evil. She went softly back to the table, and put in her pocket the purple cloth and white beads on which she was about to commence work when so rudely interrupted. She had hardly done this when one of the three intruders approached her, and said, in imperfect English:

"Is you Indian gal?"

Nattie knew not what response to make.

"You'd best tell," the man continued.

"Do I look like one?" Nattie asked.

"I has seen most as white squaws as you," returned the man. "What say? Indian, or no Indian?"

Nattie was silent from fear.

"Oh, well," he answered, turning away, "no matter; all be alike to-morrow."

Then he and his companions drank from a

-178

great, black bottle which he produced from his pocket, and soon they became like furious fiends, tearing and rending through the wigwam. The squaws were dragged from their hiding places, the old man and boy were pelted with huge, hard snow-balls, the mats and blankets were thrown on the fire, the willow baskets and the moccasins with which Nattie had purposed to buy herself finery, soon followed, and when she screamed and ran forward as if to rescue them from the flames, she received a blow which sent her reeling to the ground.

They kept up their work of destruction till night came on; and then, firing the wigwam in a dozen different places, they fled away by the light of it. In five minutes it was all in a glow. The poor Indians, stupefied with terror, made no efforts to escape, and perished miserably in the flames.

When the great moon came up above the eastern horizon, it shone on the blackened ruins

-179

of the wigwam, and on a lone, hapless, disfigured girl, who dipped her smarting hands in the cold spring at the foot of the beech tree, and with them bathed her fiery lips and eyelids. This was Nattie. Her clothing was more than half consumed. The anguish of the burns was maddening; and the dreadful scenes through which she had passed had almost frozen her soul with terror. It seemed as if the poor child had fled from the fire to perish from cold and hunger in the forest, even if the unfeeling foes did not return tg devote her to a fate yet more hapless and cruel. Winter and wilderness surrounded her; not a friend to help, and the Frenchmen sure to return to their work of felling trees on the morrow.

"They will finish me then," thought Nattie; "and it would have been better for me to stay in the fire, as the poor squaws did."

These words caused her to remember the hardness which she had exercised toward the ignorant savages. The pain of her burns, which were

-180

deep and severe, brought to mind the light scald which she had received from the steaming potato kettle at home, over which she had made such unnecessary ado, and in jealous anger fled away to give her friends trouble, because her slight hurts did not receive the largest share of attention, although the illness occasioned by her disobedient conduct was threatening her mother's life. Conscience had never spoken so loudly to Nattie as on this woful night, when she seemed bereft of all human help.

"I am an awful wretch," she said to herself; "and it isno wonder that God has not answered my prayers. I wonder now that I ever dared to pray to him, when I have been so wicked. I don't think I shall any more. It is likely that I shall starve and freeze here alone, and never see home, or the old chief, or Augustus Reid again."

Nattie sank down on the cold stones by the spring, and tried to bear the pain of the burns as

-181

patiently as she could. But the sharp, wintry atmosphere seemed to pierce her through and through. She was burning and freezing at the same moment. It soon became intolerable; she rose to her feet, and ran wildly down the path which the squaws had taken that afternoon, when they were sent out by her to gather nuts to roast for the evening meal.

Nattie thought how Biddy had often told her that the ghosts of the dead would haunt the spot which they last knew on earth; and at every strange object that she saw, she increased her speed, lest it should prove the unquiet spirit of poor Pink Ear, or one of her sisters, come to haunt the one who made their last days so heavy and toilsome.

-182

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 4.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|S|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter S.png}}IBLEY'S Corner was a place that had grown up in a night, as it were. There were, perhaps, half adozen frame houses, a store, a blacksmith's shop, and an immense saw-mill. This last was what had made the place. The several families had moved there and put, up dwellings, for the purpose of boarding the hands who were employed in felling the forest, drawing logs, and converting them into marketable lumber. The wild, brawling river, broken into unnumbered foamy waterfalls by rugged rocks, and its banks, here and there, studded with groups of tall, majestic pines, gave

-183

to the place, in spite of its utilitarian air, something of the romantic and picturesque. The mad, leaping waters seemed to be trying to drown the noise of the men with their logging teams, the whirr of the mill wheels, and the sharp toothings of the glistening saws, which, day and night, kept up their unceasing play.

Most of the men were French Canadians; but the families that took boarders were chiefly Yankees. There was one house standing near the saw-mill, though on the opposite side of the river, which was rather neater in appearance than the rest. This was the abode of the contractor, the man who managed the business. A foot-bridge with high railings led across the wild little river from his house to the mill. There was a road in the rear of the cottage, and a group of tall pines on the hill above. These trees made a mournful sighing in the long, winter nights.

Within this dwelling, on the present evening, were four persons,—a man, his wife, their baby

-184

in the cradle, and a visitor. The last named we have met before. It was Augustus Reid. The other three were the contractor, his wife and child. He was a comparatively young man, not much above thirty, and had a familiar face. His wife was small and fair, devoted to the baby in the crib, over which she was constantly hanging, and calling her husband's attention to some fresh charm or beauty which her doting eyes had discovered.

There was business in the looks of the two men.

"Reid," said the contractor, at length, "I think that I can employ you, if you will accept the place which I have to offer."

"What is it?" asked the young man.

"It is to take charge of the gang that go to the forest. Some of these Canadians are quite rough and savage; they need a hand to keep them under. You are young, but have a natural gift for commanding. I think that you would do admi-

-185

rably. Will you undertake this part of the work for us?"

"The Canadians would prefer one of your race," was the answer.

"Nonsense! they will never know but you are a full-blooded white unless you tell them," returned the contractor; "put you in the uniform of our logging men, and the difference would never be known."

The young wife looked quickly toward the visitor, and said: "You are foreign, then; perhaps Spanish!"

"I am American," he answered, with a half smile.

"The real, aboriginal American," the husband added; "but has been so much among the whites that the wild woods look is quite wiped away."

Augustus Reid colored; while the wife said:

"I don't think that I would ever have guessed it. What a mixed population we live among!"

"That is so, Dimple," said the husband; "but

-186

it suits me. It is novel, exciting, and shows us human nature in a variety of phases. I don't know what would induce me to return to the tame old country from which we emigrated, where things go on in such a plodding, hum drum style that one day is a true type of all the rest. I like to see things move on. I like novelty, change, and a spice of danger, too, perhaps,—at least, Dimple says that I do."

Here he glanced toward his wife, who answered, while she rearranged the soft blankets around the sleeping babe:

"It is true enough, Robert. How the great pines, back here on the hill, are moaning and complaining! I shall fancy that I hear distressed cries, as of some poor creature that needs shelter, to-night."

"It is asign of storm," remarked Augustus Reid,—"or thus I have often heard my father say,—when the winds moan as they do to-night."
{{nop}}

-187

"Is your father"{{bar|2}} the wife paused abruptly.

"My father is an Indian," the young man {{SIC|answered; his|answered; "his}} name is North Wind, and he is now journeying among the whites."

"I wonder that he did not give you his name, or some other one characteristic of his race."

"My father gave me an Indian name, and by it he still calls me, as do the red men generally," was the answer; "but my mother was a white woman, and when dying, she called me by a name as nearly like what her own had been as possible. She wished me to carry it among her people, and said that some day it might find me a friend among them. Hers was Augusta Reid."

"Where did she live?"

"I do not know; she never spoke of her early life, or how it came about that she married an Indian."

"Was she content with their rude mode of living?"
{{nop}}

-188

The young man bent his eyes to the floor, as he answered:

"I was a mere child when she left me, and could not well judge; but she was always delicate and pining. My father was wild with grief when she died."

"Has he no other child?" asked the young wife, looking tenderly toward her sleeping babe.

"He has an Indian wife now, and several little children."

"Does he like the red children as well as he does you?"

The young man smiled, and answered:

"He is not indifferent in his feelings toward the son of the pale-face,—Torch Eye, as he calls him,—but the Indian has a strong will. My father marks out a course for me; if I follow it, he is ready to lay down his life for me; but of late, my inclinations, or perhaps what the whites term conscience, have led me contrary to his wishes; therefore he has turned from me."
{{nop}}

-189

"He wants you to lead a life like his own, I suppose," said the wife; "to be skilled in hunting, in the use of the tomahawk, and become, at length, a brave leader among the wild race."

"All this he desires," was the answer.

"And what more?" the young woman asked, not from mere idle curiosity. Her countenance evinced an interest in the young man before her; but the question caused him embarrassment.

He rose, and walked toward the window. The husband exchanged glances with his wife, and hastened to turn the conversation into another channel.

"When I was a boy at home, a dozen or more years ago," the contractor said, "a squad of Indians used to come to our village every fall, put up their tents, and remain till spring. They made baskets and sold them, and I don't know that they did any harm; they seemed to be peaceable and inoffensive, and almost all the villagers traded with them. I suppose now that they must

-190

have come from this region, and perhaps our young friend may have been of their number sometimes."

"No," answered Augustus Reid, again resuming his chair by the stove; "my father did not go onsuch journeys while my mother lived. It was only after he had an Indian wife and some young papooses, that he took up these roaming habits."

"Then you have never been far into the land of the whites," the contractor said.

"Much of my life has been passed with my father's uncle, who lives on the western boundary of the forest, near a large town. I have worked in the shops of white people for two years past. My inclinations lead me as much to such employments as to the use of the bow and arrow. The wild and the civilized parts of my nature are, perhaps, about equal."

He said the last with a half smile in which was some bitterness, and at once added, as the moan

-191

of the pines on the hill above at that moment came more distinctly to the ears of the group around the stove, and seemed to fill the whole room with wailing:

"The storm comes nearer, and there will be rain. I must leave you now; but if it seems expedient to accept the post which you have offered me, I will let you know before many days. It hardly seems to me that I am a proper person to be set over a gang of Canadians; many of them are strongly prejudiced against our race."

"Is that so?" asked the contractor. "Still, I think that you would find no difficulty in the place which I have in view, nor do I believe that they would suspect your nationality. But it seems to me that you are wrong in fancying that a rain storm is at hand; the air was very cold when I came in to-night. I really hope that our fine sledding is not going to be broken up at present."

"I think that there is a thaw at hand," was

-192

the answer; "though it will not, probably, carry off all the snow."

As he spoke, a few sharp clicks on the window-pane gave evidence that the storm had already begun.

"You had better tarry with us till morning," the young wife said.

"Thank you," he returned; "there is a point which I wish to visit to-night."

"Do any of your people live near?" she continued.

"There are a few scattered wigwams in this forest," he answered.

"But miles from here, I should suppose," she said.

"A few miles are not much to one of our race," he returned; and, with a bow of adieu, he closed the door behind him, and stepped out into the darkness.

The moon was wading through heavy clouds, and great, occasional drops of rain, mingled with

-193

whirling sleet, fell on the blanket of the young Indian. The sounds from the saw-mill were abroad on the night air, and the mad river roared and seethed on its course. He could see the white, tossing foam of its waves as he stepped upon the little foot-bridge, which trembled and shook with the force of the impetuous currents beating against its timbered supports.

When he was about {{hinc|half way}} across, something met him,—a small body, which shrank away, and swiftly passed. The moon was just then under a thick cloud, so it was too dark to see the figure; but, as he turned around in the direction in which it went, a faint odor, as of burning cotton, was borne back on the breeze. It was poor Nattie, in her fire-eaten garments. She had fled thus far, through the wilderness, towards the abode of white men. But Augustus Reid had no suspicion of this, and Nattie did not even glance at the person whom she met. She imagined afoe in every living object that she

-194

encountered, and only sought to elude them, if possible.

She bent her steps directly to the house which the young man had just left, and peeped into the window. It looked so cheery and comfortable to poor Nattie, as she stood there, hungry, tired, her clothes half burned and hanging loosely about her, and the smart of the burns stinging most cruelly! There seemed to be an air of her old home about the apartment, but perhaps this was because her eyes had been so long unused to the comforts and appliances of civilized life. Possibly, any home of the whites would have worn the same grateful aspect, in her eyes.

"Will it do for me to rap?" thought Nattie. "What a sight I am, to enter such a nice place as this! It would be better for me to find the shed, and lie down there. I am so sick, and faint, and miserable, that perhaps I shall die before morning. I guess that these are people of my own race, so they will bury me, and I sha'n't

-195

have to lie above ground after I'm dead. If I had been a good girl, I might now be in a home just as pretty and warm as this. I might have my mother, or, at least, Biddy, to put oil on my burns, fix me nicely in my little bed, and get me some good supper. Then, after a while, the aches would ease off, perhaps, so that I could go to sleep and get rested. Oh, dear! I wonder if God sees me now, or am I cast out, a prey for evil spirits forever?"

As Nattie was about to turn away, acry of surprise and terror arose within. The young wife had seen the wild, scarred face at the window, and was clinging to her husband in great alarm.

"Who could it have been?" she cried;—"the most fearful face pressed close against the window-pane, glaring upon us with its distressed, staring eyes!"

"It must have been imagination," returned the husband; "but, to satisfy you, I will open the window, and see if anything is there."
{{nop}}

-196

"Don't! {{SIC|don't!' she|don't!" she}} cried; "it may be some of the wild people around, come to rob and murder us."

"I have no such fears," said the husband, throwing up the sash.

The roar of the pines and the rising storm came floating into the apartment, mingled with the wail of a dark object that lay on the ground beneath the window.

"There is something here, living and in distress," said the husband. "Hold the lamp, Dimple, while I see what itis."

The wife tremblingly obeyed. A prostrate human form was soon discovered. The sash was lowered, and the man took the lamp in his own hand, and went to the outer door. His wife clung to him in terror.

"Don't be alarmed," he said; "it is some person who is sick, or hurt, and I think it is a woman, or child."

He stepped along the path, to the spot where

-197

the form lay. An odor of burned clothing pervaded the immediate atmosphere. He put out his hand; it touched what scemed to be a raw, bleeding arm. A faint cry of pain followed.

"Who are you?" the man asked. "Are you wounded? Do you want to come in?"

No answer. He stooped again over the figure, and stretched out his hands. This time they encountered burned rags.

"Have you been in a fire?" he asked. "Do you live in this village?"

Still no answer.

"Wife, bring the light," he said. "You need not fear; it is a child, a girl; and she is helpless, badly hurt in some way. We must take her in, and see what is the matter."

The little woman came cautiously toward her husband. He lifted the figure, and carried it in to the warm, bright sitting-room. Such a sight! such a sight! And what was to be done? No doctor in the settlement,—only an old French

-198

woman who could mumble a little English, and pretended to have some knowledge of the healing art.

There was a hurried consultation between husband and wife, the little woman declaring that she could not do a thing,—not even stay in the house when those bleeding burns were dressed.

While they talked, Nattie recovered sense sufficient to hear, and partly comprehend, the dismay of the kind people who had taken her in.

"I don't want any French one to come," she said, evincing a strong dread as she spoke the words. "If you would give me a drink of broth, and put me away into some back room, where I could be safe, with a little oil for my burns, I think I could go to sleep and get rested."

"Sleep!" cried the poor, frightened woman; "why, girl, you are burned half to death; your clothes are almost consumed, your hair is singed, and your arms are all bloody! You must have been through a dreadful fire. Where do you

-199

live? and have all your friends perished in the flames? How dreadful, Robert," she added, turning to her husband, "that, while we have been sitting here so comfortable, some of our neighbors' houses have been destroyed and their lives, perhaps, lost!"

"No house in the settlement can have been burned to-night," he said; "for we should have heard the alarm."

The old unsteadiness now returned to Nattie's brain, and she said, looking about the room:

"I've I see white beads everywhere."

"White beads!" repeated the wife; "there are none in the house. She is wandering."

"Bowls of white beads, and moccasins, and pin-cushions, and red willow baskets."

The couple exchanged glances, and whispered:

"Indian."

"Indian; not Frenchman," said Nattie, in a faint whisper, and with a visible shudder at the name last uttered.

-200

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 12.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|T|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter T.png}}EMPORARY huts had been erected for the accommodation of the men employed in the forest.

It was toward these that Augustus Reid directed his steps, after leaving the house of the contractor. He knew the Frenchmen's habits of drinking and carousing to a late hour of the night, and intended, by lurking about their dwellings while they were ignorant of his proximity, to form some estimate of the degree of lawlessness that he might be called upon to restrain, should he accept the position offered to him by the con tractor.
{{nop}}

-201

He had gone scarcely a mile before his quick scent detected a smokiness in the atmosphere. He thought, at first, that it might be occasioned by the fires of the loggers. He was very fleet of foot, and an hour's walk carried him into the midst of the forest, a distance of three and a half miles from Sibley's Corner. Here he came upon three small, rough huts, standing near each other. They were thickly surrounded by tall trees, mostly pine and hemlock, which afforded him excellent shelter from the falling rain, and also allowed him to approach very near the huts without fear of being discovered.

Lights gleamed through the loosely boarded walls, and sounds of loud laughter, interspersed with foul oaths and doggerel songs, rang out on the still, night air. The youth approached so near one of the huts as to observe the movements of the inmates, and hear their conversation. They spoke in French, but the young man under stood this as well as he did his own tongue.
{{nop}}

-202

There were six men, dressed in suits of coarse, gray kersey. Three of them were sitting on a bench, smoking; the other three lay on a bunk by the stove, while a dirty, tough-looking woman, of perhaps forty-five years, sat at a rough board table, mending socks by a dim candle. She seemed to be listening to the conversation of the three men on the mat, who spoke in rather low tones, yet distinctly audible to the quick ear which was laid close to a gap between the boards of the hut.

At last the woman said, in a cross, disapproving tone:

"I don't see what you wanted to do it for. Why can't you let Indian folks alone, when they are doing you no harm?"

"I hate the varmints," answered one of the three men on the floor, "and so do you, Mother Minotte. These were the poorest, meanest pack that you ever did see,—a lot of women and one sick old man."
{{nop}}

-203

"You ought to have pitied their helplessness, and let them alone."

"We didn't do anything only stir them up a bit, and make a good dinner from their kettle of broth," said the next man. "That was capital broth, Jacques. I don't believe that the greasy squaws made it. 'T was the white gal, I fancy."

The young man at the opening drew back at these words, while the breath came hot and quick through his closed teeth, but he resumed his former position.

"What!" exclaimed the woman, looking up quickly, "was there a white one among them?"

"One whiter than the rest," answered the third man; "but she wouldn't tell whether she was squaw or not, so we served her the same as the rest."

"How was that?" asked the woman.

The three men looked at each other, and the one who had first spoken, and who seemed a bold-

-204

er rascal than his fellows, and rather gloried in recounting his deeds of lawlessness, answered, with an evil leer:

"Oh, we built them a rousing fire, and bid them good-night."

"Miserable wretch!" cried the woman; "you have burned them up, then."

"Not so fast, Mother Minotte," said the man; "that is not so easy a thing to do. I'll warrant you that they have crawled out, with nothing more than a good singeing. How tender you are of the red-skins, all at once!"

"I have no love for the race," she answered, with a dark look; "but if you have done this violence, it will soon be noised abroad, and the result will be that we shall have to quit our camp here in the woods, and tramp."

"Oh, not so bad as that, mother," the three men said, in a breath. "It is not much to light an Indian wigwam; the red-skins will crawl off to another one, somewhere; there are half a score

-205

round in these woods, most of them empty in winter."

"But what if they are burned to death in the flames?" demanded the old woman.

"Nonsense! they will take care of that," said the bold villain. "Though, admitting that they were burned, what would follow? They have no tribe to avenge them, and the Yankees wouldn't meddle; it is against their interests to mad us Frenchers; so nothing would be done if the red-skins did stay in their hut, and eat their fill of fire."

"I am not so sure of that," returned the woman, discontentedly; "and I wish that you had kept away, and let the creatures alone. At any rate, I hope you will keep close mouths now, and not let the tale go outside of this cabin."

The woman tossed the socks, which she held in her lap, on the table, and rose from her seat. As she did so, a sound like the crack of aboard was heard distinctly by the whole party.
{{nop}}

-206

"What was that?" asked one of the men.

"I should say that somebody had been leaning against the boards in that direction, and then suddenly removed the weight," the woman answered, pointing toward the place from which the sound had seemed to issue. "Who knows but our whole conversation may have been overheard?"

"And who cares?" was the response of the boldest villain. "We'll have a drink, a game of cards, and then to bed. I'll risk to-morrow."

Augustus Reid did not hear these closing words. He had withdrawn at the moment in which the creaking sound was heard in the hut, and was now rushing through the forest at the top of his speed. He heeded not the increasing storm, or the impediments of the way. The wigwam of the old chief, his father, which he had so lately seen in a tidy, cheerful state,—was that no more? Were the inmates burned? or still living, and writhing in tortures, exposed to the pitiless storm?
{{nop}}

-207

These thoughts, and others even more cruel, passed through the mind of the youth, as he flew along the forest path. When he had gained the spring at the foot of the beech tree, he paused a moment, drew his breath, and took a draught of the cold water. The moon showed herself through rifted clouds, and, turning his gaze to the hill above him, he missed the cone like summit of the wigwam. All looked blank and desolate, while a foul stench of burning pervaded the air around. He went up the hill with slackened steps, dreading the sight which must soon meet his gaze.

A heap of black, smoking ruins, in which the rain had not entirely quenched the flames, was all that he found. It was vain to search there with the expectation of finding a living creature, brute or human. Life must have long since departed from whatever lay buried there. Nor could the young man at present search for the dead amid the fire, the smoke and the suffocating odors.

-208

After the first heat of indignation toward the ruthless perpetrators had passed away, a despairing gloom seemed not only to paint itself on his face, but to envelop his whole person as in a shroud. He sat down on the great, flat rock which had lain at the entrance of the wigwam, and, with his eyes bent on the smoldering mass, rocked his lithe body to and fro, after the manner of Indians, and wailed in an undertone.

But his first words were not of sorrow for the fallen roof of his nativity and early years, nor pity for his father, the old gray-haired chieftain, who would return to find the home which he loved a blackened ruin. The first low cry that escaped the youth was:

"Oh, Nathalie, what a fate has been thine! Would it not have been better, had I obeyed my father's command to make thee my bride? Then mightest thou have escaped this horrid death. Yet, how know I but thou wouldst have preferred it to being an Indian's mate, the wife of Torch

-209

Eye, whose very name seemed hateful to thine ear? But, had my father heeded my entreaties, and taken thee back to the home from which he conveyed thee away, thou mightst now have been well and happy. What will he think when he returns? He bade me come beneath his wigwam no more till I could do his bidding, and take as my own the Great Spirit's gift which he brought to me. When he finds that the French have burned his home, and death has claimed the bride, will he not conclude that the Great Spirit, in anger at his sin of stealing the white child, has come to lay desolate his hearth and hunting grounds?"

The youth took from his vest the slip of cloth containing the lettered name, "Nathalie Norton," and looked on it in the fitful moonlight.

"Is this name all that is left of her whose lithe little form sat near me but a few hours ago? Are the bright black eyes, that changed and lighted as she talked to me in her easy, flowing English,

-210

now closed and sightless, beneath these smoking ruins? Are the slender hands, which stirred the succotash and placed a well-filled bowl in mine, charred and shapeless? Ah, Nathalie, had I been a white man's son, how proud and happy I might have been one day to call thee mine! and how did I hope, by hovering near and keeping thee in view, that I might at length be able to restore thee to thy bereaved friends! How have I pictured the look of gratitude which I might see in thine eyes, could I be so fortunate as thus to return thee to thy family! One thought may cheer me even now; thou hast never known me in my true character. As Augustus Reid, I was not disagreeable. Even though a part-blooded Indian, thou wast still friendly and turned not away from me. But as {{hinc|Torch-Eye}}, the wild Indian boy, thou hast not known me. How wouldst thou have shrunk away, could I have stood thus before thy sight! Have I not seen the loathing with which thou didst hear the

-211

name pronounced? No wonder! How could a fair, white girl look otherwise upon a savage?

"But thou didst know me, to the last, only as Augustus Reid. Perhaps the latest work of thy hands was to wreathe my name in beautiful, bright letters on a crimson band; for thus I left thee at thy embroidery stand, wondering within myself when we should next meet, nor dreaming that we might meet no more. I will keep thy name near my heart, Nathalie; and may mine be resting thus with thee, beneath these ruins. Once more I'll come here, and all that is left of thee, and thy Indian companions, shall be gathered, and laid in the greenest dell of the forest that my eye can trace. Then let me go afar, where I shall see the spot no more,—no more,—no more."

He rose, thrice waved his arm aloft, drew his blanket about him, and turned away. The rain was still heavy and the path tedious; but he thought not of these things. His heart writhed in grief; his eyes took no note of outer things.

-212

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 9.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|T|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter T.png}}HOUGH Nattie was thus being wailed as dead, she lay in the house of the young contractor, sensible of not much else than that she suffered pain. Till the burns were dressed, she held out admirably, exhibiting more calmness and fortitude than those who stood by her, merely witnessing her sad condition. She manifested a decided opposition to the coming of the old French doctress, insisting that she could, herself, dress the burns, if they would furnish materials.

"But they are all raw, and peppered with dirt

-213

and ashes," said the contractor's wife, shuddering at the sight; "surely they need to be cleansed before they are bound up in oil."

Nattie looked at her stomach and arms, without quailing.

"I can sop out the dirt, if you will give me some warm water and a sponge," she said.

The wife looked at her husband.

"Let her try," he said; "she has more nerve than both of us, I believe."

The water was brought, and Nattie went to work. It was a severe task, and several times she pressed her lips together, to prevent crying out with the pain which she was obliged to inflict on herself in the operation. She could not but remember how careful she used to be of her little body,—how much more precious than fine gold it was in her sight. A slight cut or scratch was lamented over, its anguish dwelt on pathetically, and the most assiduous care and attention demanded till it was healed. Here she sat to{{peh}}

-214

night, in deep and dreadful pain, covered with cruel burns, and only her own hands to dress them yet, thankful for the shelter, and the oil and bandages to swathe the wounds. She had expected, a few hours before, to perish of cold and hunger in the wilderness, if she escaped falling again into the hands of those who had brought death and desolation to the humble spot which was her home. She silently thanked God that he had directed her wild, flying feet toward the abode of some of her own race.

Before she had finished her painful task, strength began to fail. The sudden change from the out-of-door atmosphere to the heated apartment: brought on giddiness, and she fell backward on the bed several times while swathing the last arm.

"You can do that for her," said the husband to his wife.

"Oh! I'd rather you would," she answered; "and I will bring her a cup of tea and a slice of

-215

toast, for I think that the poor thing must need something of the kind by this time."

Nattie looked up at these words, and moved a hand toward her mouth. The action was expressive. The little woman went out, and soon returned with a dish of tea and some nicely browned toast.

Nattie's eyes gleamed with eagerness at the sight, but soon the tears began to roll in great drops down her cheeks. She drank a part of the tea and ate a few mouthfuls.

"Take it away!" she then exclaimed; "take it away! I used to have such at home, long ago, the thought is too much."

"Poor child! I am afraid that your home is burned," said the young wife, kindly; "but do not cry about it now, you are so hurt and sick; perhaps you will have another as good, sometime. Often, when our trouble seems deepest, God is close at hand, to lead us safely through."

"I know that God is good, or I should have

-216

been dead now," said Nattie. "I thank him, every minute, that I am spared; for surely I was not fit to die."

Tears started again.

"I would not try to talk much to-night," said the young woman. "I will give you a soothing drink, which, I hope, will enable you to sleep, and thus get refreshed. When you are better, you shall tell us about your late misfortunes, if you choose,'and we will render you all the assistance that we can."

"I must not stay here, in your nice house, to make you work and trouble," said Nattie; "but you are very good, to do so much for me as you have done already."

"You must stay here till you get well, unless some of your friends call for you before that time," said the husband; "and we shall not think it any trouble to take care of you. I once had a young sister who got lost, and when I see little girls of her age, I think of her, and wonder

-217

where she may be now, and what her fate. For her sake, I wish to be kind to them."

"What became of your sister?" asked Nattie, opening wide her dark eyes, and looking up into the face of the man who stood above her couch.

"That I do not know," he answered.

A loud cry from the cradle now called the young wife in that direction.

"Is it a baby?" asked Nattie, her eyes following the little woman.

"Yes," the man answered. "Are you fond of children?"

"I have not seen one for so long, that is, a white one. Oh, how pretty!" she exclaimed, as the rosy child was brought to the {{hinc|bedside}}, his chubby hands rubbing vigorously at his sleepy, half-open, great black eyes.

"Do you think that he is?" said the fond mother. "He shall sit on your bed when you are better, and make you smile at his merry ways."
{{nop}}

-218

While Nattie gazed her head wandered.

"I can see white beads," she said, "all over the baby's red dress,—Tiny! Tiny!"

"Tiny white beads, you mean," said the young mother. "But I don't see them, and I hope that you won't to-morrow."

But Nattie did see beads, Frenchmen burning wigwams and ghostly squaws, for many days and nights after this. Hardship, exposure and pain, brought on delirium and fever, so she was unconscious of surrounding objects, and knew not where she was or who attended to her wants. The old doctress came and went without opposition from Nattie now, and she passively swallowed the doses prescribed, however nauseous and bitter they proved to her taste. She was very gentle, and thanked her attendants with the most touching humility for every little kindness. They could not gather much from her disconnected, delirious murmuring, and forbore all questions until she was fully restored to consciousness. But

-219

as no one called for her, and no inquiries were made, they judged that she was without friends in that vicinity. The husband was very busy at his saw-mill during the day, and his wife was quite as busy at home, with her baby and the added care of the sick girl. But nothing suited the little woman better,—for she was a genuine Yankee,—than "to have her hands full," as she expressed it. So, as soon as Nattie began to mend, she at once set about fashioning a loose wrapper out of one of her old dresses, for the use of the sick girl when she could sit up a while each day.

Nattie dressed her burns, even when partly delirious. The young wife, her nurse, often shuddered to see her strip down the plasters, so regardless of inflicting pain on herself, for frequently the skin would peel off, and blood start from the half healed surfaces.

"If you were more careful, it would hurt less," the kind woman would say, looking pityingly on

-220

the bleeding sores, and observing their slightly improved condition.

"It is no matter," would be Nattie's answer; "I don't mind these little hurts."

One evening the wife was recounting to her husband the incidents of the day.

"She has so much fortitude, and, at the same time, so much submission," she said, "that I wonder more and more the longer I have her in my care."

"Courage is a characteristic of her race," returned the husband.

"But mildness and patience are not," the wife added. "Surely she can not be an Indian girl, husband. Mark her language; she seems to have had good opportunities for education. Neither her looks nor manners are those of a wild race."

"Many Indians are as light colored as she is," said the husband; "and many of them mingle much in white society. They are imitative, and

-221

easily catch new forms and usages. This girl seems to understand all the arts of the wigwam,—{{hinc|basket making}}, bead moccasins"{{bar|2}}

"Oh, that she has lived among the red men is certain," interrupted the wife; "and possibly one parent was of that race, as in the case of Augustus Reid, or Torch Eye. By the way, where can that young man be? We have not heard from him since he left us, a week ago, and he then promised to soon return, and let you know if he would take the place which you offered him, among the forest men."

"Yes, that is so," answered the husband. "I guess that he has some of the vagrant habits of his race. He may have come across some roving band of Indians, and gone off on a hunting expedition in their company."

"Does he ever do this?"

"Oh, yes; I have heard that he excels most young men in the use of fire-arms, and is quite proud of displaying his skill; but he is a young

-222

man of superior talent, and I hope that he may, in time, conquer his love of this wild life and become an honored and useful man among our race."

"Have you learned the name of your sick charge yet, wife?" he added.

"She says that she is called Tulip," was her answer; "but farther I have not questioned, as it seems to be painful to her to speak of herself, and she is not quite rational at all times."

"That is an Indian name," said the husband.

"Yes; but I think that she has another, and that we shall learn it, in time."

-223

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 13.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|I|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter I.png}}T was the first purpose of Augus; tus Reid, when he left the ruins of his father's wigwam, to collect a company of his own race, recover what might remain of the hapless creatures who had met death there, and see them decently buried. He did not at once return to the house of his white friend, the young contractor, for two reasons; he felt that the old chief, North Wind, would prefer that some of his own people should assist in the last, sad offices about the ruins of his wigwam, and he shrank from making known to the whites

-224

the crime of his father in the abduction of one of their race. If Nattie had perished miserably with her Indian companions, he thought it as well to let her tragic history end there, and, by avoiding the inquiries which would naturally be made, in the excited state of feeling which the first knowledge of the affair would occasion, that distressing and useless revealings might be prevented. He had once entertained the hope that, through his efforts, the abducted girl might be restored to her friends, but what good could result to those friends from the knowledge that she had perished in the flames of an Indian wigwam? It would, rather, be a kindness, to conceal from them a fate so dreadful. This, Augustus Reid, or Torch Eye, thought that he might be able to do. The Frenchmen were not likely to do anything so averse to their own safety as the spreading abroad of the tale of their lawless work would prove, and, by taking but a few red men to the scene of desolation, to assist in the searching out and

-225

burial of the poor victims, the young Indian hoped that the turf of the forest might hide them and their histories, in undisturbed oblivion.

This was the first step; the next was to compass, in some way, the destruction, or banishment, of those reckless villains who had done the deed; for there was enough of the red man's nature in the youth to make the blood in his veins run hot with fierce thirst for revenge on the wretches who had wrought this wanton wickedness.

The third and last step was to leave these haunts, made dreadful to him by the scenes through which he was now passing.

The task of finding some men of his race proved more difficult than he had anticipated. On the third day, his strength failed, and he was compelled to rest for thirty-six hours in a wretched cabin, to recruit his powers so as to travel onward. The few wigwams that he found on the borders of the forest were deserted. Hither the inmates had traveled away, as many of them

-226

did at the approach of winter, to the white settlements, for the purpose of trade and traffic, or the resounding axes in the forest had led them to abandon their homes and journey toward the deeper wilderness of the east, for security. A week's search proved fruitless, and Augustus Reid returned, disheartened, to the scene of the conflagration.

It was night when he reached the spot. All was black and coldnow. No smoke, no stench, no eye of fire gleaming from the ruins. He pulled his blanket close about him, bent his head in its folds, and walked slowly around and around the desolate spot. While he was thus engaged, deeply absorbed in his own melancholy thoughts, the eyes of a man and woman who stood in the shadow of a pine-tree, not far off, were fixed upon him with terror in their gaze. His tall form, thus enveloped, looked almost spectral in the uncertain light.

The two persons under the tree soon drew near

-227

each other, while the woman whispered, with pale lips:

"It is a ghost,—the poor, old, lame Indian stalking around his own funeral-pile."

This was said in imperfect English, and the man answered in the same tongue:

"It is a fool, you are, Mother Minotte, to call yonder tall, straight figure the ghost of the doubled-down, old creature that once crouched in that cabin."

"Still, I am sure that it is he," was the response; "for though his old body was bent, why could not his ghost be tall and straight, fleet and vigorous, as in his youth? for thus, we hear, spirits are when they have left this earth for upper spheres."

"Much we hear, Mother Minotte, little we know of what is beyond us," returned the man.

"But I wish that I could believe that yonder striding figure is nothing worse, or more powerful, than the ghost of the old red-skin that died here."
{{nop}}

-228

"Why! what, then, do you think it is?" asked the woman, putting her eyes close to the man's face, so that she could the better read its expression.

"Do you know whose wigwam it was that we burned?" he asked.

"Wasn't it that of the old man and squaws that lived in it?"

He shook his head slowly, and said:

"As we have since learned, they were only placed here by the owner, to take care of a young white squaw whom he had sometime stolen from the whites, and was keeping with great care, to be the wife of his son, some day."

The woman made a slight exclamation, and asked:

"Who, then, was the owner of the wigwam?"

"Did you ever hear of an Indian chief by the name of North Wind?"

"That have I," she answered, almost aloud, in her excitement at these words from her com-

-229

panion; "a man fierce and terrible to his foes."

The wretch at her side suddenly grasped her by the arm and hissed in her ear:

"Hush! that is he walking yonder. I know his form. He is more slender than he was. It is because of his long, hurried march. He has heard of the fall of his wigwam, in the far land whither he had traveled, and has returned to take vengeance on the foes who have laid waste his home."

"What will he do?" asked the woman, gazing intently on the stalking figure; "he is alone, and can't do much against six men with good, stout weapons."

"Alone he seems to be now," was the answer; "but there is help near, you may be sure. North Wind has too long a head to come unprepared Tor the blow. He has a son, Torch Eye by name, half white, half red, a subtle, bold youth, popular with the Yankees at Sibley's Corner. It would not be strange if North Wind, through the

-230

influence of his son, had entered into alliance with these men to search out the destroyers of the wigwam, and bring them to justice."

"But, admitting all this, I don't see how they can fasten upon you as the guilty ones," said the woman, in a husky whisper; "for no witnesses escaped from the fire to tell of you, and know your faces if they saw you again; and the Yankees can't afford to make arow with all the French hands and drive them off, because they want their help. There," she added, striking the man's arm and pointing in the direction of the ruins, "he has sat down."

"Yes," whispered the man; "and his next move will be towards our huts in the forest. Let us hasten there and arouse our fellows. Depend upon it, he will have a company with him that will overpower us, burn our dwellings, and put us to slaughter. I know well what Indians are when their blood is up."

He started away in the darkness, pulling the

-231

woman after him, their guilty fears lending speed to their feet. The lone figure, which superstition and guilt had invested with such power and might, was left crouching on the broad, flat stone which had once been at the entrance to the wigwam. Alas, how weak and powerless this lonely being felt himself to be! Not one of his father's race in all the bordering wilderness, to lend him a helping hand in the task before him,—the task of searching that pile of ruins for the blackened bodies which he supposed lay buried there, and consigning them to a safe resting-place. He was pondering in his mind whether he should commence the work alone, or apply to the Yankee colony, six miles distant, for aid. He still had a shrinking from the disclosures which might follow the latter course; and he had an overpowering dread of taking Nattie's little, stiffened, lifeless form from the ruins, and, alone, bearing it to its burial. This stern conflict of feeling kept him alternately walking and crouching on the

-232

desolate door-stone till morning dawned. Then, summoning all his native nerve and fortitude, he set about the unwelcome task.

During three hours of hard work, the remains of five human bodies were drawn forth from the ruins; but he sought vainly and wildly for the sixth. The five discovered were the unfortunate Indian family,—the poor old man, the three squaws, and the young boy. The white girl was the slenderest, the slightest of the company; had she, then, been entirely consumed, or were the remains too few, or too deeply buried, to be discovered? He sought unremittingly for two hours more, but with no success. Then he cleaned out the pit which was beneath a portion of the wigwam, rolled the five bodies into it, and covered them with earth and ashes.

"But the white maiden sleeps not in the grave with them," he said, while a dark, hopeless sorrow {{hinc|overspread}} his face. "Her soft, fair little body is either burned to ashes, or"{{bar|2}}and a ray

-233

of hope, like a single stray gleam of sunlight, flashed suddenly through his mind,—"or she has escaped."

He sprang to his feet as he uttered the last word, and turned his face upward to the fair, blue sky above him, but the head drooped again as he thought:—

"If escaped, where is she? Whither could she have directed her steps from this burning wigwam? She may have been murdered by the wretches that fired her home, lest she might live as a witness against them, or she may have sunk down and died alone in the wilderness, from the agony of her own wounds, for she could hardly have escaped the fierce, raging flames without serious injury."

While Augustus Reid thus pondered, still walking around the ruins, he saw a glittering object among the rubbish which he had stirred up in his search for the burnt bodies, and going toward it, drew forth a partly melted metal box. It was of

-234

an oblong shape. The cover seemed to be tightly glued in its place, but by the use of his pocket knife he soon had it removed. The strips of bright broad-cloth, containing the names of "Red Rose," "Black-bird," "Fox Heart," "Light-foot" and "Sweet Fern", met his gaze. The box was of thick metal, so the heat of the fire had not penetrated, to shrivel the cloth, or mar the whiteness of the beads. It seemed like Nattie's very self speaking to the young man, as he gazed. A new thought and purpose took possession of him, as he closed the box and put it in his pocket.

"I will hesitate no longer," he said, "nor seek to hide a father's misdeeds. Nathalie may yet be living; or, at all events, I am persuaded that she did not perish 'neath these ruins; thus her fate is yet unknown. I will goto her own people, relate her story, and invite their aid in clearing up the still dread uncertainty which hangs about her."

"Night was again falling, when the young

-235

man left the ruins and struck into the forest. As he approached the vicinity of the French cabins, where he had listened, unobserved, to the rehearsal of their deed of darkness, he noticed that no lights gleamed from the crevices of the boards, nor were the sounds of revelry borne to his ears. All was gloom and silence around them.

"They can not be sleeping already," he thought, as he bent his steps to the door of the nearest hut.

It was standing open. He entered. No person was visible, but marks of disorder were apparent, as if the inmates had left their abode in haste. He visited the other two cabins. They presented the same appearance.

"What can it mean?" he thought. "Are they yet abroad in the woods, or is there any stir about the burning, which has led to their arrest, or caused them to flee away?"

These thoughts caused him to hasten towards the white settlement at Sibley's Corner. His

-236

progress was so rapid that by nine o'clock in the evening he heard the sharp rasping of the saws in the great mill on the mad river, and was soon striding across the trembling foot-bridge toward the house of the contractor. Lights gleamed from the windows as he stepped upon the door stone and gave a timid rap.

-237

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 10.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|N|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter N.png}}ATTIE had been a week sheltered and cared for by the humane young couple oa at Sibley's Corner, when one evening the husband came in from the saw-mill, with a beaming face. The baby was perched on the foot of the bed where the sick girl lay; and the young mother sat near, at her sewing.

"What is it, Robert?" she asked, looking up in her husband's face; "you seem to have some news of a pleasant character."

"I believe I have," he answered. "Read this letter, and then you can judge for yourself;

-238

though I don't know as I can wait for you to read it, but must tell you at once that father is coming to see us soon."

"Oh!" exclaimed the little wife, joyfully, as she took the proffered sheet, "how delighted we shall be! and I wonder what he will think of baby."

"No doubt he will think him a prodigy," the husband returned, while his wife tried to box him, playfully, with the open sheet which she held in her hand.

Nattie heard all this; and after the letter was read, said to the little woman who had been her kind nurse:

"If you are going to have company, I must go away. There will not be room for me; and I am afraid of strangers, too."

"Nonsense!" said the husband, who caught the low words; "father is one of the cleverest old chaps in the world; he used to make much of the little girl that he lost. I expect that we shall find him changed since that, Dimple, and mother

-239

gone, too. The little girl that was born after I left home, he talks of bringing with him."

"If so many are coming, I must certainly go," said Nattie, who shrank very much from the sight of strangers.

"Oh, no," said the wife, re-assuringly; "there is plenty of room in the cottage, and you are not fit to leave. Besides, where would you go?"

Nattie turned her face away at the question, and answered slowly, "To see if I could get work at some of the houses near."

"When you are fit to work, we will employ you," said the young woman. "But if you would like to be more retired than you can be in this room, I will have Robert move you to the little bed-room adjoining."

"Can I go to-night?" asked Nattie.

"You can," was the answer; "though our company may not be here for several days."

"When they do come, please don't let them know that I am here," said Nattie.
{{nop}}

-240

"Why not?" asked Mr. Robert. "Quite likely father and his little girl may wish to see you; for I've a notion that he will feel an interest in all unfortunate ones now, the same as I do."

"Oh, I don't think it does me good to see strangers," said Nattie. "It seems to bring the daze back to my head, and makes me see,—strange things all around me; and sometimes but half of things."

"Well, you sha'n't be troubled till you are better," said the wife; "we will put you in the little bed-room cot to-night, and warm it by day with a furnace of coals."

Nattie was pleased with this prospect.

"But sometimes the baby can sit with me in there, I hope," she said, watching the movements of the chubby hands among the playthings strewn over the foot of her bed.

"No doubt I shall be glad to let him make you frequent calls," was the response.

As Nattie's hands were now quite healed, she

-241

thought that, if she had something with which to employ them a while each day, time would drag less heavily. She remembered the last task to which she had sat down before the destroying wretches had entered the wigwam. It was to work the name of "Augustus Reid" in beads. She asked if the dress in which she had come to her present place of abode, was entirely burned away.

"Why, no, not quite," said the young woman; "but it was a hee of fragments. I put itamong my soiled rags."

"If you would look and see if the pocket is still there," said Nattie, "and bring anything it may contain, to me, I would be very giad."

The search was made, and the pocket, itself, placed in Nattie's hand. Her eyes shone with pleasure as she received it. There were the beads and cloth in a bit of paper, tied around with some threads of horse-hair. Her hands kept busy all that day, in the bed-room, fashioning the letters

-242

of the name "Augustus," and her head was quite disordered by night, and her eyes saw pin-cushions, with glittering figures, and mottoes in white beads, all over her little dark bed-spread. She did not speak of this to her friends, but concluded that she had worked too closely, and had better put by her work until the next day.

On this evening, just as the family were thinking of retiring, there was a knock on the outer door. It startled Nattie, in her nervous, exhausted state. She started up, and said:

"Please shut my door, and don't tell that I am here, for I know that it is somebody after me, just as well as can be."

The young people looked at each other, and then strove to calm the excited girl, by bidding her lie still, and promising that no harm should come to her.

"You go out," said the wife to her husband; "it is probably some man who wishes to see you on business, and I will close the door and sit

-243

here awhile. I prefer it to listening to talk in which I have no particular interest. Tulip will like mine and baby's company while I rock him to sleep, I know."

The door was closed, and the young lumberman went at once to usher in his guest. It proved to be Augustus Reid. His dress and person bore marks of toil and travel; his face was pale and anxious; his eyes red, and roaming fitfully around him.

"I am afraid that you have been ill, or encountered severe hardship since I saw you last," said the contractor, offering his guest a chair near the stove. "It is not long since my wife was wondering what had become of you, as, when you last left us, we expected to hear from you in a day or two from that time. It has been more than a week since then."

"No longer than that?" asked the young man, dreamily, as he passed his hand across his brow; "I could believe that it had been months, instead;

-244

but, as I think, I find that you are right. We were speaking then of a place which you were ready to give me. No doubt you have found another to fill it before now, as I did not return, according to agreement. But I did not intend to break my word; unexpected events prevented the keeping of the promise."

The young man bowed his face on his hands, and seemed to sink into deep thought. The contractor did not break the silence for some time, but waited for the visitor to speak his mind as he saw fit. Without looking up, the young Indian at length said:

"I suppose that you have found an overseer for the men whom you would have placed under my care."

"No," was the response; "and now I do not need one."

The young man looked quickly toward the speaker.

"They have gone," the contractor continued.
{{nop}}

-245

"Gone!" echoed Augustus Reid, feeling his heart throb faster, at these tidings.

"Fled,—cleared out,"—was the answer; "so I was told by some of the hands, when they came in to-night. Their camps in the forest are empty. I was not sorry to hear this, for I mistrust that they have done some deeds of violence in the vicinity, and their decamping saves me the trial and hindrance of looking them up. I do not wish to bring a lawless set of men into the country, and will not retain such in my employ if aware of their character. I have been suspicious of these fellows for a week past, and was glad to hear of their flight."

"Do you know of any evil which they have done?" asked the young man, looking at the floor.

"Not positively; but I mistrust that they have disturbed the peace of the wigwam of some Indian family."

"In what manner? by theft, or violence?"
{{nop}}

-246

"By fire," was the answer.

"Have you heard such tidings, or been abroad to search for yourself? or what proof have you?" the young man asked, still looking thoughtfully down upon the mat at his feet.

"I have not been abroad as yet," was the answer, "but have proof enough that mischief has been done."

"What proof have you?"

The words came falteringly. The lumberman noticed the suppressed emotions of his visitor, as he responded:

"I have seen one of the victims."

The young Indian sprang to his feet; bedds of perspiration stood on his brow; his eyes shot forth wild, startled glances, as he whispered, hoarsely:

"Where? where? Alive, or dead?"

The young contractor reached out and took the excited youth by the hand, and said, soothingly:

"Here, and living; so now be calm. Sit by

-247

me, and let me hear what you have met since I saw you last, for I feel certain it will have a bearing on the mystery that has come to us."

Thus soothed and encouraged, Augustus drew a chair near his friend, and related the adventures with which the reader is already acquainted. When he stated that it was the wigwam of his father, the brave chief, North Wind, that had been burned in his absence from home, a look of intelligence crossed the face of the young man, who listened, and he hastily inquired:

"Had you not an own sister, a girl of but half Indian blood, tarrying there?"

Augustus Reid shook his head, and said:

"Did I not tell you when I sat here by your fire, a few days ago, that I was the only child of my white mother, and bore her name?"

"Excuse me; I recollect now," said the contractor; "but,"—he hesitated.

The door of the little bed-room now opened, and the young wife came out, bearing her sleep-

-248

ing baby in her arms. She started, smiled and bowed, when she saw who was the visitor. Her husband rose and assisted in placing the child in the cradle. The little woman then advanced to shake hands with the guest, and inquire for his health. He made quite incoherent replies to her questions, and seemed disturbed by her presence. She at length said:

"I hope that you have concluded to accept employ of my husband, and remain with us."

"I am no longer wanted," he answered, hoarsely, rising from his seat to go to the window.

As he did so, something from his pocket fell to the floor, with rather a sharp sound. The eyes of the young contractor were at once riveted upon this object; the wife also gazed, with uplifted hands. Augustus Reid turned about, and saw what had so moved them. He stood motionless, gazing in their faces. There, on the floor, right before them all, lay the strip of scarlet broad-cloth, bearing, in glistening white bead letters, the

-249

name, "Nathalie Norton." In bold relief, in startling distinctness, there it lay!

The young contractor, with hurried breath, at length exclaimed: "Where did you get that name? How came you by it?"

Augustus Reid answered, in broken tones, as if he made a great effort to give utterance to the words:

"It is the name of the young white girl that was dwelling in my father's cabin. She wrought it, and gave it to me not long ago."

"Found! found!" cried the lumberman; and turning to his wife, he added: "Dimple, why did we never once dream that the Indians had carried off our Nattie?"

"But your name is not Norton," said Augustus Reid.

"No, it is Nesmith. My sister, who was a mere babe when I left my father's house, had our mother's maiden name, 'Nathalie Norton.' I am certain that it is the same. She may have had her own reasons for omitting her full name when

-250

she wrought this portion of it. But we can soon determine whether I am right or not."

"How?" asked Augustus Reid.

The young couple glanced at each other; the wife opened the bed-room door and peeped in; then, approaching her husband, she whispered:

"It is not best to waken her to-night; but may not our guest takea peep to see if he will recognize the face on the bed-room pillow?"

"You know she is very timid, and unwilling to see strangers," the husband remarked, aloud.

"If she is here," said the young man, approaching with an anxious air, "give me one look, and I will depart. Please do me the justice to believe that I had no hand in her abduction, and it has been the hope of my life to see her restored to her friends."

The young wife, at a glance from her husband, now swung open the bed-room door, and the youth looked in on the sleeper.

"It is Nathalie," he said, and at once drew

-251

back, lifting his blanket from the lounge.

"You certainly do not think of leaving us now," said Mr. Nesmith.

"It is better," he answered; "I should prefer it. One thing more I would ask, however. I think you can have no objection to following my wishes in this respect. Nathalie, your sister, has never known me as the son of my father, the old chief, North Wind; in the very few times we have met,—only three in all, I believe,—I have been to her Augustus Reid. Let me continue thus."

Mr. Nesmith bowed, and said:

"I have no objection to this, certainly. But you muet not think of leaving us at present. You have recognized Nattie; we wish to see her recognize you. My father will be here before many days; he will wish to thank you for having restored to him his lost child."

"But she will not be restored to him through my efforts," said the young man; "nor did I bring her to you."
{{nop}}

-252

"You have revealed her identity, which is the same," said the wife.

"That you could have discovered at any moment by simply asking her name," said the youth; "and she must soon have learned that your name is the same as hers, and would then have made herself known without any asking."

"I don't know about that; I doubt if she would," said Mr. Nesmith; "for you know, wife, how she has shrunk from being questioned as to her name, and seemed afraid that it might be known."

"It can not be that she does not long to be restored to her friends," said Augustus Reid.

"I am thinking of the delightful surprise which we have in store for father, when he shall arrive," said the young wife.

"True," responded the husband. "I recollect that he quite doted upon Nattie, when she was a little thing; and I have always heard, in later years, by letters from my married sister, who

-253

lives near the old place, that his regard for her seemed to increase with years. Indeed, it was so excessive as to threaten harm to the child. He humored and petted her so much, that she was likely to grow up willful and spoiled. I know that she had become a trial in the house; a disobedient, ill-natured girl, at the time of her disappearance. The baby, which I never saw, had to be kept away from home, owing to her rough usage. She was, also, unkind to mother, in her illness, and even the Irish girl complained loudly of Miss Nattie's general laziness and insubordination."

Augustus Reid seemed surprised to hear such words as these, and said that "he thought Nathalie very different from this description."

"So, indeed, this sick girl is," said the wife. "I never saw a child so gentle and patient, yet so brave in the midst of pain; and this I have often said to Robert."

"You speak truly," was the response. "If

-254

this proves lasting, Nattie's captivity will be a blessing in disguise. Now that mother is gone, father greatly needs some one to keep his house, and be company and solace for him in his lonely hours. All this Nattie can be, better than anybody else, if this experience has taught her to control her temper and submit patiently to trials."

"But it seems strange to me," Mr. Nesmith continued, turning toward Augustus Reid, "that your father should have taken Nattie off. I have known of him for years, and never heard aught of harm attributed to his character. He was always considered honest and honorable among our people."

The young man colored painfully, as he answered:

"The Indian nature is full of strange fancies and superstitions. My father has never been addicted to dishonest acts; indeed, I think this is the one great offense of his life."

"He must have had some strong motive, then,

-255

for committing it," said Mr. Nesmith. "No ordinary consideration would have swayed him thus."

"So it would seem," was the evasive answer, immediately followed by an inquiry as to how far distant the home of Mr. Nesmith's father lay?

The youth showed surprise when the answer was given:

"Three hundred miles."

-256

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) fleuron 12.png
| width = 300px
}}

{{di|W|image=Nattie Nesmith (1870) drop initial letter W.png}}HEN little Mrs. Robert Nesmith stepped quietly into the sick girl's room next morning, she heard a—low voice, often quite broken by tears, thanking God for his great goodness to such a wicked girl as she had been,—for having preserved her from a fearful death,—for guiding her to a friendly door,—for giving her the past night's grateful rest and sweet dreams of lost home, also for one who had been kind to her, and spoken pleasant words when she was among strange, wild people.
{{nop}}

-257

Mrs. Nesmith remained quiet while the little girl was engaged in her simple, earnest prayer. When it was ended, she approached and asked her how she found herself this morning?

"I had a very pleasant night's rest," was the answer, "and my head is much clearer than it was yesterday."

"I am glad to hear it," said the kind woman, "and hope that you will not work too hard to-day."

"Oh, no, I don't intend to do so," said Nattie. "I have a very little job that I wish to do; the rest of the time I shall be quiet, or play with baby. When I get well, I hope that I can work for you, to pay you, in part, for all your kindness to me."

"We shall be glad to have you stay with us as long as you can," was the answer, "but perhaps you may be called to go elsewhere."

Nattie looked rather alarmed at these words. She feared the old Indian chief had returned and was about to claim her. Perhaps the dreaded

-258

Torch Eye was with him, and she would soon be plunged into decper troubles than she had thus far experienced. Yet a voice in her heart seemed to say: "Cast thy burden on the Lord, and He will sustain thee:" and she answered, quietly:

"It is not likely that anybody that has any right to me will come to claim me, so I hope I shall be allowed to stay with you."

"Will any person who has no right be likely to lay claim to you?" asked Mrs. Nesmith.

Nattie stopped a moment, and said:

"They might."

She then drew forth her beads, and other articles, from under the pillow, and commenced work.

"I hope that you will let me see your embroidery when it is finished," said Mrs. Nesmith.

"It is not much," was the response, "only the name of a friend, which I am working in beads."

"But you will let me see it, won't you?"

"Oh, yes, if you wish," said Nattie, thread-

-259

ing the beads rapidly on the long horse-hairs.

"You seem to be well skilled in your work," remarked the little woman.

"Yes, I have done much of it,—too much. That is what ails my head sometimes, when I see things double, or see beads everywhere; so I can do but little of it now."

Robert Nesmith and Augustus Reid went out to the saw-mill, directly after breakfast. The husband and wife had not yet decided in what way they would tell Nattie that she was already among near relatives, and soon to meet her father. As she was still quite weak and feeble, they dreaded to give her too much of a shock.

The two men came in at noon. When Mrs. Nesmith carried Nattie's dinner to her room, the name on which she had been at work was finished, and lay on the spread before her.

"Ah," said the little woman, "you have been very expeditious. I see that your task is done.

-260

It is pretty, indeed, and a style of work which we do not often see; but I have a friend who has some very similar to it,—in truth, so very much like it that it would almost seem that one hand must have done it all. After a while, if you would like, I will bring it in and show it to you."

Nattie said that she would like to see it very much; so, when dinner was over, Mrs. Nesmith asked Augustus Reid for the name on the strip of cloth, which had so singularly, on the night previous, revealed to them Nattie's identity, and also for the metal box containing those other names, which he had already shown to them. They were placed inher hand, and, attended by her husband, she returned to Nattie's room. Approaching the bed, she placed beneath the purple strip containing the name "Augustus Reid," the scarlet one, bearing the name "Nathalie Norton."

Nattie's eyes grew wild, and flashed from one face to the other as she read these two names,

-i

{{FreedImg
| file = Nattie Nesmith (1870) 2.png
| caption = "Mine, for instance," he answered. [[Nattie Nesmith/Chapter 20#261|Page 261]].
| width = 300px
}}

—

-261

both wrought by her own hand, in the days which were now so interesting in memory.

"Do you know anybody by this name?" asked Mrs. Nesmith, touching the lower of the two on the coverlet.

Nattie nodded slightly.

"Is it your own?" asked the little woman.

"It is part of it," was the rather unwilling answer.

"Will you let me add another to it?" said Robert, with a merry twinkle in his black eye.

"What one?" asked Nattie, with a quick glance.

"Mine, for instance," he answered, taking from his notebook a card bearing his name in large print.

This he proceeded to shove under the beaded strip till only the name "Nesmith" remained visible. Nattie's color came and went rapidly, as she now saw before her cyes, her own name, full and complete, "Nathalie Norton Nesmith."

-262

She burst into tears. Robert laid his hand on her head and said, kindly:

"Don't cry, Nattie; I am your own brother Bobby; though I was a great boy when you were scarcely more than a baby, and left home before you can remember. It was not till last night that we knew this, for you were so feeble we did not like to trouble you with too many questions about your past experiences. Dimple, who will be a good sister, shall tell you how it all came about. She is better than I am at such things. But don't cry, and make yourself sick, because there will be some more surprises for you before long, and you must get ready for them by getting well as fast as you can."

As soon as her brother had withdrawn, Nattie turned toward his wife, her sister, and, lifting the name of "Augustus Reid" from its place, said:

"Did he tell you of me?"

The little woman bowed in assent.

"Where is he?" asked Nattie.
{{nop}}

-263

"He is here," was the answer. "I have, also, some other names, in a box which he gave me. You will recognize them, I think."

She produced it, blackened, scarred and partially melted, as it had been taken from the ruins of the fire. Nattie shuddered at the sight of it.

"I hope the dreadful fire has not burned him," she said.

"No."

"He must have been there if he found this box, I should think."

"Yes. Would you like to have hime come in and tell you about it?"

"I would," was the quick answer.

Mrs. Nesmith went into the sitting room, and informed the young man of Nattie's wish. He rose at once and followed her to the little room. The poor girl seemed far gladder at the sight of him than she had been when her brother disclosed himself to her; for his had been the one bright

-264

face which had beamed on her captivity, while the face of her brother was almost as that of a stranger. But the young man was much moved now that he saw her safe in the arms of her friends, svon to be fully restored to those who had, for nearly a year, mourned for her more deeply than they might have sorrowed for the dead. He felt that a vast distance was opening between them; that, perhaps, after to-day, he must not expect to see her more. And the past helplessness of her condition, a little, lone, white girl, stolen from her pleasant home and set among savages in a wilderness, had, from the first, drawn him strangely toward her. For him, in a sense, she suffered her hardships and wrongs. His father would not have laid a hand upon her had he not coveted for his son by a white woman, a partner from the same race. Thus, while he rejoiced over Nattie's restoration to her own people, he could scarcely help sorrowing for himself. Some thing of this showed in his eyes while he gazed

-265

on her. She noticed his manner and said:

"Why I thought you would be glad to see me."

"So I am," he answered, seeking to disperse the gathering gloom from his countenance; "but the last few days have been very trying, and perhaps their shadow is still on me."

"I would like to have you tell me about them, unless it would make you too sorry," said Nattie.

"It is a hard tale," he answered; "but it is better to know the truth than to have the mind left a prey to suspense and fearful imaginations."

Then Augustus Reid rehearsed briefly the events of the past week, touching as lightly as possible those incidents calculated to awaken grief and horror in the heart of his listener.

"Well," said Nattie, drawing a deep sigh when he had finished, "so they are all dead and gone,—those poor creatures to whom I was so hard and unkind. I shall never forgive myself because I did not let the poor old man have his mat by day, and his blanket to wrap around his cold, aching

-266

limbs. But I would have all those things piled up till night came, so as to have the cabin look nice, and how much water I made the squaws bring, to scald the wooden bowls and wash the succotash kettle. How I made them work on baskets, too, to buy me finery. But the baskets were all burned, and the bowls, the mats and blankets. I only escaped, and I wonder that God didn't let me burn, for my bad deeds."

"I don't think," said Augustus Reid, "that it was anything very bad for you to make those fat, lazy squaws do the work which they were so much better able to do than yourself; and as to the old man's sitting in his blanket all day, it hardly seems to me that it could have been necessary, when he was so close to a fire always."

"The spirit which led me to do those things was bad," said Nattie; "for I drove the squaws about and vexed the old man, to show my power; and the more I could afflict them the better I enjoyed myself. Oh, this was awfully wicked!

-267

and I shudder to think what a bad girl I have always been, and how I have thought it was so much for me to be hurt a very little, but nothing for others to endure ever so great pain. I don't believe I shall be so any more, for I think how great is God's goodness in sparing so guilty a wretch, and I pray to Him to forgive my sins, and keep me from doing wrong again."

Augustus Reid looked surprised to hear such words from the little girl, and thought that sickness and calamity had preyed deeply upon her mind.

"Do not think too meanly of yourself," he said. "You have suffered much wrong, but will soon be restored to all your friends."

"What has become of the Frenchmen that burned our home?" Nattie asked, quickly.

"They have fled," was the answer; "probably because they feared that their crime would be discovered, and they be brought to justice."

"When the old chief, North Wind, gets back

-268

and finds his cabin destroyed, what will he do?"

"He will be sad," answered Augustus, turning his eyes away, "and go with his family farther into the forest, to seek a new hunting ground."

"I shall never see him again," said. Nattie.

"Would you wish to?" the youth asked, quickly.

"The old chief would not have been so bad, if it had not been for his dreadful boy, Torch Eye."

"Did you ever see him?"

"No; but I knew that I was kept for him. You told me once, that you knew Torch Eye. Do you think he will be likely to follow me, if I ever get back to my home?"

The young man did not answer at once, and Nattie added:

"I mean, to try and steal me away again? because his father once told him that the white girl should be his."

"I do not think that Torch Eye will ever do anything to cause you trouble, Nathalie," the

-269

young man now said, in a low, dejected tone, with his eyes bent on the floor.

He then opened the box which he had taken from the fire, and laid the names out before her. Nattie repeated one after another, and spoke of her joy whea she first found that she could be useful to her captors in a way more congenial to her tastes than was drawing water, making broth, and tending the young papooses.

"I shall want to see them all, sometimes," she said; "even old Red Rose, and bright Black-bird, though they did not like me much; but Fox Heart was real good, and little Sweet Fern, too. As you are a friend of the old chief, perhaps you may see them some time. Gtve them the kindest regards of the pale-face girl, or Tulip, as the chieftain named me, and bid them good-bye for her. If they should ever come to my native village, perhaps, with my father, I may go and call on them. If I had not been a bad girl, running away from home alone in the dark evening,

-270

because I was angry with my sick mother and my kind sister, who had reproved me for some of my disobedient conduct, I would never have been caught by the Indian and borne away to the wilderness. Perhaps God sent him on purpose to teach me the bitter fruits of sin."

When Nattie spoke in this strain, her listener seemed not to know what answer to make. She now picked up the bead-work and replaced it in the box.

"I would like to keep this, to remind me of the old wigwam," she said. "And see, I have made your name, too, since I came here."

She held the purple cloth before his eyes.

"I am much obliged to you for taking the trouble," he said.

"It was no trouble, but a pleasure," she answered. "Shall you live around in this country, always?"

"I don't know," he answered, evasively.

"Perhaps you will some time come where

-271

I live; if you do, you must call and see me."

"My race are not thus given to approaching the abodes of the whites," he said.

"But you are not much Indian," she returned; "and, indeed, you might easily become one of us. I hope you will."

At these words, the young man turned away, and retraced his steps to the sitting-room. He saw the young lumber merchant approaching the door in company with a gentleman of middle age. The two entered. Little Mrs. Nesmith, with the baby in her arms, hastened forward to greet the new corner. Both husband and wife seemed delighted at sight of their guest.

After tossing and complimenting the baby a few moments, the gentleman looked toward Augustus Reid, and going up to him with extended hand, said:

"Why, how do you do?"

The youth seemed embarrassed and falteringly returned the salutation. The husband and wife

-272

stared at each other. The mutual acquaintance of these two surprised them.

"Did you think you knew this young man, father?" asked Robert; "you must be mistaken."

"Mistaken? oh, no," was the answer; "not at all, although I confess that I was surprised to see him here."

Augustus Reid now expected to hear himself addressed as Torch Eye, in full hearing of Nattie, who was wide awake, just within the adjoining {{hinc|bedroom}}.

"Why, whom do you take him to be?" asked Robert.

"Augustus Reid, to be sure, the son of a worthy merchant in our town; but he must have traveled with dispatch, for I saw him at the depot on the morning I left home, and he did not then seem to have a journey in view."

"Truly, you have the name of the young man," said Robert; "but he was never a sojourner in your section of country."
{{nop}}

-273

"Is it possible?" said the father. "Yet he is an exact likeness of our Augustus Reid, only, as I notice now, a {{SIC|litle|little}} taller, perhaps. Certainly, young man, you must be connected with the Reids of Bernardville?"

Augustus colored, as he answered that he supposed he had connections by the name of Reid, somewhere, and it now struck him that he had heard his deceased mother speak of a place called Bernardville.

"It must be so," Mr. Nesmith, senior, answered. "And you never saw your relatives in that direction? Then you should go there and make them a visit. I am certain that you would have no difficulty in satisfying them that you are of their kindred."

Nattie had listened to every tone of this new voice till she now lay trembling like an aspen. In the flush of glad excitement, Robert stepped to the door of her room. Nattie turned her eager eyes on his face. Without waiting to give his

-274

father any preparation for so great a surprise, but thinking it best to get through the first meeting as soon as possible, he said:

"Come, father, and see if you can guess a little closer to the truth than you did just now, by telling us whom we have here, on this cot bed?"

Mr. Nesmith hastened to the door of the bed-room, but had hardly glanced towards the couch, before two eager, imploring arms were stretched out toward him, while a voice, in a very agony of yearning and affection, cried:

"My father! my father!"

Then the little form began to crawl down from the bed, to reach his feet; but the father hastened toward her. If he could not, in a moment, recognize the thin, pale face, he knew the voice of his child, and the response which his own heart made to her anguished call. That call! It told of all her sufferings, her longings, her deep, deep joy and thankfulness for once more seeing his face.

"My heart is too full for words," said the

-275

father, brokenly, as he held his daughter to his breast; "and may I, henceforth, serve and adore the God who has so wonderfully restored my child to my arms."

"That is what I try to do," said Nattie, faintly; "for, indeed, my father, I have suffered much; and I think the good Lord let it be so, to heal me of sin; for when I had everything that heart could wish, I was a willful, bad girl; I did not thank God for a single blessing, but was angry because I had not more good things. But some way, though it is very strange, since I have lost everything, I have found so much to be thankful for."

There were not a few tears shed around the bed while Nattie told her little tale of sorrow and heard what her father had to relate in return. It caused her much grief to learn that her mother was no more, fur now she could never atone for past disobedience.

"Mother once told me," she said, "that I might live to be sorry for my conduct, and feel

-276

remorse. I know now what remorse means."

Nattie's father was not yet a Christian, so he could not soothe her with the soothing which she required. After a while, she said that Jesus would forgive her, she thought, because he had died for sinners.

Many questions were asked concerning sister Tiny and Irish Biddy. Tiny was well, only a cough, and this prevented her being the companion of the father in his journey. Biddy was married to a countryman of hers, and made a thrifty {{hinc|housekeeper}}.

"Then who takes care of you?" Nattie asked, looking wistfully in her father's face.

"Well, I don't have too much care, daughter," he answered. "I have got along with having a woman come twice a week to do some washing and cooking. I was expecting to sell, on my return, and take board for Tiny and me; but you seem to be pretty well grown; I almost think that I shall lay on you the responsibility of being my

-277

{{hinc|housekeeper}}. Do you really think you could be such a personage?"

"Oh, I want to be! that is, I'll try my best," said Nattie, gladly. "I can't do as well as a woman, but I will be learning every day, if you will only have patience. Mother was so very nice, always, and Biddy, too, that you will find a great difference, of course."

"I think I am not so particular, in many respects, as I was before my troubles," said Mr. Nesmith; "and if I can but have my daughter with me again, whom I had expected to see no more, I shall find abundant cause to be thankful and content."

After a week's tarrying with his son, Mr. Nesmith and Nattie set out for home. Augustus Reid was invited to bear them company, and make a visit to his mother's friends, who, it appeared evident, lived in the same village. But he excused himself, feeling too wild and untutored to go at once into the society of polished white

-278

people. He promised, however, at Nattie's urgent request, to go that way before a year should pass by. Mr. Nesmith, who learned the young man's parentage from his son, was anxious that he should be rescued from the Indian mode of life, and made a useful man in civilized society.

Nattie had some pretty clothes made for her journey. She was much surprised to find it, as she expressed it, "such a long way home." She found little Tiny much grown; and Irish Biddy was wild with delight when she found that Miss Nattie had returned home, all safe and sound.

"But shure, an' ye can niver kape this great house, an' be afther doin' all the work?" she cried in amaze.

"I am going to try," was Nattie's meek reply.

She did try. And don't you suppose she succeeded, children? Of course she did; for who ever said, "I'll try," with a brave, willing heart, and failed of accomplishing a high purpose? Truly, no one, if they also trusted in God, as did

-279

our Nattie. Such a spirit is sure of a noble victory.

It has been a number of years since the cvents herein chronicled, had their occurrence. The old Indian chief, North Wind, after many wanderings, and the loss of his second wife, with all the children, save Black-bird, haz now become quite reconciled to dwelling among the white man's race, and divides his time between the civilized home of his son and the wigwam of his daughter. His son is Augustus Reid; his wife's name was Nattie Nesmith, and there is a little Nattie, who is the delight both of her white and red grandpapa.

So, after all, Nattie did marry the dreaded Torch Eye; but he is not in the least "dreadful" to her now. On the contrary, she looks upon him as a model husband, and only hopes that her little Nattie may, without her hard experience, prove as fortunate in the choice of a companion, when her time shall come. She calls this little

-280

Nattie the "child of chastening," for she is a very meek, gentle thing, not a bit like her mother, who was once known as the "Bad Girl."/last/

—ad

—

—cov