Read Ebook: The King Of Beaver and Beaver Lights From Mackinac And Lake Stories 1899 by Catherwood Mary Hartwell

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Ebook has 331 lines and 13958 words, and 7 pages

"How many evil stories you have heard about us! My dear young lady, I could rejoin with truths about our persecutions. Is your uncle Cheeseman a malefactor?"

"My uncle Cheeseman is a good man."

"So are all my people. The island, like all young communities, is infested with a class of camp-follow-ers, and every depredation of these fellows is charged to us. But we shall make it a garden--we shall make it a garden."

"Let me train vines over the whipping-post in your garden," suggested Emeline, turning back the crimson edge of her lip.

"You have heard that a man was publicly whipped on Beaver Island--and he deserved it. Have you heard also that I myself have been imprisoned by outsiders, and my life attempted more than once? Don't you know that in war a leader must be stern if he would save his people from destruction? Have you never heard a good thing of me, my child?"

Emeline, facing her adversary, was enraged at the conviction which the moderation and gentleness of a martyr was able to work in her.

"Oh yes, indeed, I have heard one good thing of you--your undertaking the salvation of eight or nine wives."

"Not yet nine," he responded, humorously. "And I am glad you mentioned that. It is one of our mysteries that you will learn later. You have helped me greatly by such a candid unburdening of your mind. For you must know that you and I are to be more to each other than strangers. The revelation was given to you when it was given to me in the Tabernacle. I saw that."

The air was thickening with dusky motes. Emeline fancied that living dark atoms were pressing down upon her from infinity.

"You must know," she said, with determination, "that I came to Beaver Island because I hated men, and expected to see nothing but Mormons here--"

"Not counting them men at all," indulgently supplemented the King of Beaver, conscious that she was struggling in the most masculine presence she had ever encountered. He dropped his voice. "My child, you touch me as no one has touched me yet. There is scarcely need of words between us. I know what I am to you. You shall not stay on the island if you do not wish it. Oh, you are going to make me do my best!"

"I wish you would go away!"

"Some Gentile has hurt you, and you are beating your bruised strength on me."

"Please go away! I don't like you. I am bound to another man."

"You are bound to nobody but me. I have waited a lifetime for you."

"How dare you talk so to me when you have eight wives already!"

"Solomon had a thousand. He was a man of God, though never in his life was there a moment when he took to his breast a mate. I shall fare better."

"Did you talk to them all like this?"

"Ask them. They have their little circles beyond which they cannot go. Have you thoughts in common with your cousin Roxy?"

"Yes, very many," asserted Emeline, doggedly. "I am just like Cousin Roxy."

"You have no mind beyond the milking and churning, the sewing and weaving?"

"No, I have no mind beyond them."

"I kiss your hands--these little hands that were made to the finest uses of life, and that I shall fill with honors."

"Don't touch me," warned Emeline. "They can scratch!"

The King of Beaver laughed aloud. With continued gentleness he explained to her: "You will come to me. Gentile brutes may chase women like savages, and maltreat them afterwards; but it is different with you and me." He brought his hands forward and folded them upright on his breast.

"I have always prayed this prayer alone and as a solitary soul at twilight. For the first time I shall speak it aloud in the presence of one who has often thought the same prayer: O God, since Thou hast shut me up in this world, I will do the best I can, without fear or favor. When my task is done, let me out!"

He turned and left her, as if this had been a benediction on their meeting, and went from the garden as he usually went from the Tabernacle. Emeline's heart and eyes seemed to overflow without any volition of her own. It was a kind of spiritual effervescence which she could not control. She sobbed two or three times aloud, and immediately ground her teeth at his back as it passed out of sight. Billy and Roxy were so free from the baleful power that selected her. They could chat in peace under the growing darkness, they who had home and families, while she, without a relative except those on Beaver Island, or a friend whose duty it was to shelter her, must bear the shock of that ruinous force.

The instinct that no one could help her but herself kept her silent when she retired with Roxy to the loft-chamber. Primitive life on Beaver Island settled to its rest soon after the birds, and there was not a sound outside of nature's stirrings till morning, unless some drunken fishermen trailed down the Galilee road to see what might be inflicted on the property of sleeping Mormons.

The northern air blew fresh through gable windows of the attic, yet Emeline turned restlessly on her straw bed, and counted the dim rafters while Roxy slept. Finally she could not lie still, and slipped cautiously out of bed, feeling dire need to be abroad, running or riding with all her might. She leaned out of a gable window, courting the moist chill of the starless night. While the hidden landscape seemed strangely dear to her, she was full of unspeakable homesickness and longing for she knew not what--a life she had not known and could not imagine, some perfect friend who called her silently through space and was able to lift her out of the entanglements of existence.

The regular throbbing of a horse's feet approaching along the road at a brisk walk became quite distinct. Emeline's sensations were suspended while she listened. From the direction of St. James she saw a figure on horseback coming between the dusky parallel fence rows. The sound of walking ceased in front of the house, and presently another sound crept barely as high as the attic window. It was the cry of a violin, sweet and piercing, like some celestial voice. It took her unawares. She fled from it to her place beside Roxy and covered her ears with the bedclothes.

Roxy turned with a yawn and aroused from sleep. She rose to her elbow and drew in her breath, giggling. The violin courted like an angel, finding secret approaches to the girl who lay rigid with her ears stopped.

"Cousin Emeline!" whispered Roxy, "do you hear that?"

"What is it?" inquired Emeline, revealing no emotion.

"It's Brother Strang serenading."

"How do you know?"

"Because he is the only man on Beaver who can play the fiddle like that." Roxy gave herself over to unrestrained giggling. "A man fifty years old!"

"I don't believe it," responded Emeline, sharply.

"Don't believe he is nearly fifty? He told his age to the elders."

"I haven't a word of praise for him, but he isn't an old man. He doesn't look more than thirty-five."

"To hear that fiddle you'd think he wasn't twenty," chuckled Roxy. "It's the first time Brother Strang ever came serenading down this road."

He did not stay long, but went, trailing music deliciously into the distance. Emeline knew how he rode, with the bridle looped over his bow arm. She was quieted and lay in peace, sinking to sleep almost before the faint, far notes could no longer be heard.

From that night her uncle Cheeseman's family changed their attitude towards her. She felt it as a withdrawal of intimacy, though it expressed reverential awe. Especially did her Mormon aunt Mahala take little tasks out of her hands and wait upon her, while her legal aunt looked at her curiously. It was natural for Roxy to talk to Billy Wentworth across the fence, but it was not natural for them to share so much furtive laughter, which ceased when Emeline approached. Uncle Cheese-man himself paid more attention to his niece and spent much time at the table explaining to her the Mormon situation on Beaver Island, tracing the colony back to its secession from Brigham Young's party in Illinois.

"Brother Strang was too large for them," said her uncle. "He can do anything he undertakes to do."

The next Saturday Emeline refused to go to the Tabernacle. She gave no reason and the family asked for none. Her caprices were as the gambols of the paschal lamb, to be indulged and overlooked. Roxy offered to stay with her, but she rejected companionship, promising her uncle and aunts to lock herself within the cabin and hide if she saw men approaching from any direction. The day was sultry for that climate, and of a vivid clearness, and the sky dazzled. Emeline had never met any terrifying Gentiles during her stay on the island, and she felt quite secure in crossing the pasture and taking to the farm woods beyond. Her uncle's cows had worn a path which descended to a run with partially grass-lined channel. Beaver Island was full of brooks and springs. The children had placed stepping-stones across this one. She was vaguely happy, seeing the water swirl below her feet, hearing the cattle breathe at their grazing; though in the path or on the log which she found at the edge of the woods her face kept turning towards the town of St. James, as the faces of the faithful turn towards Mecca. It was childish to think of escaping the King of Beaver by merely staying away from his exhortations. Emeline knew she was only parleying.

The green silence should have helped her to think, but she found herself waiting--and doing nothing but waiting--for what might happen next. She likened herself to a hunted rabbit palpitating in cover, unable to reach any place of safety yet grateful for a moment's breathing. Wheels rolled southward along the Galilee road. Meeting was out. She had the caprice to remain where she was when the family wagon arrived, for it had been too warm to walk to the Tabernacle. Roxy's voice called her, and as she answered, Roxy skipped across the brook and ran to her.

"Cousin Emeline," the breathless girl announced, "here comes Mary French to see you!"

Emeline stiffened upon the log.

"Where?"

Roxy glanced behind at a figure following her across the meadow.

"What does she want of me?" inquired Emeline. "If she came home with the family, it was not necessary to call me."

"She drove by herself. She says Brother Strang sent her to you."

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