Read Ebook: Mevr. Warren's Bedrijf by Shaw Bernard Simons Mees J A Translator

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Ebook has 815 lines and 26754 words, and 17 pages

English Eliza's heart was full. "I'm sorry I said these scary things, marm. Let me go with him, marm. I ain't afraid of anything, marm, and I do not wonder that Obed is afraid after such stories as they tell in this new country, marm."

"Yes, 'Liza, you may go. I can trust you anywhere."

Obed's cords seemed to unloose, and his feet flew. In a few minutes Obed and English Eliza were mounted on the carriage seat, and were soon speeding away towards the doctor's, which was in the centre of the town.

"Now, Obed, you shall keep Halloween. Young people in England sometimes ride on this night by lonely places just to test their courage. Obed, I believe that you have only one fault, and that is what my poor mother would have called superstitious fear. I think it is wrong to tell such stories to children as they have told you in this country. It will unman you."

It was a still cool night. The wind after a changing day had gone down. The moon hung high in the heavens, now and then shadowed by a fragment of a broken cloud. The road was filled with fallen leaves, which deadened the sound of the wheels. The walnut-trees with their falling nuts sent forth a pleasant odor, and there was a cidery smell about the old orchards that here and there lined the way. They emerged at last from a wood, and came into full view of the old country grave-yard on the hill-side, when something really surprising met their view.

Obed dropped the reins, and Eliza caught them. His knees began to shake, and he chattered, "Prophets and apostles!"

The horse trotted on.

"Whoa! What is that?"

"Go long!" said English Eliza, in a firm voice.

"Turn round--quick," said Obed.

"I can't, Obed; the road is too narrow. And I am on an errand of duty to a sick woman, and I will not do it."

"Eliza, it is awful. I shall go mad if you go on. My brain is turning now."

The sight indeed was a wonder. As it appeared from the road under the hill, a white horse arose from the grave-yard on the hill-side, and stood on his hind legs with his forefeet in the air.

Eliza shook the reins, and said, firmly, "Go along!"

"Eliza, it must be that Halloween. My nerves are all shaken up. I've heard of white horses before. I tell you, stop! We'll get out of the back of the wagon, and run home."

"Never!" said Eliza.

"Well, I am going, anyway." Obed leaped from the wagon, exclaiming, "I'll give the alarm!"

"I am going for the doctor," said Eliza.

Obed flew. It was indeed a fearful tale that he had to tell when he reached the farm-house. We think that there seldom ever was heard a Halloween tale like that.

"It was a white horse, standing in the grave-yard, with his hind feet on the graves and his paws in the sky," said he, "and under him was a shadow like a cloud, and--"

"But where is Eliza?" asked Brister Miller.

"She rode right on after the doctor!"

"And you left her to meet such a sight as that!" said Mr. Miller.

Brister Miller called his hired people together, and they alarmed the neighborhood. At midnight a company of men had gathered before the house, who should go and see what this remarkable story could mean.

"I always thought that the girl was rather strange," said Mrs. Miller. "There may be some witchery or other about this Halloween."

Eliza, brave girl that she was, rode firmly towards the hill-side grave-yard. As she came nearer to it the white horse did not appear to be so large as when she first saw it. It was indeed a horse, a live one; it had its forefeet on the lower limbs of an old apple-tree, which limbs were bent downward toward the ground. It was eating apples off the high branches, reaching its long neck up to pick them.

Horses are very fond of apples, and try in every way to get into orchards when they have gained a taste for the fruit. They have been known to unhead apple barrels, and they will eat apples from the lower limbs of a tree, and reach high for the apple limbs after the fruit on the lower limbs are gone. They like sour apples, and in this way become cider drinkers.

Eliza stopped the wagon. She got out of it, and tied the horse to a tree by the roadside. It was midnight--Halloween. She thought of English merrymakings, of the games with apples, of the curious old stories and songs that she had heard on such nights as this in her girlhood. She hurried past the graves and came to the white horse, and said, "Jack! Jack!" The horse seemed alarmed, let his raised body down to the ground, snorted, and trotted away.

Eliza stood there all alone at that still midnight hour.

The moon rode clear in the heavens now; the woods were still, and around her were graves. Did she believe in spirits? Yes, in her mother's, and as soon as she thought of that she recalled that she had been sent for the doctor, and that it was her duty to hurry on. Her heart would have been light, but for her pity for Obed. He had indeed proved a coward, but he had been wrongly taught and trained.

She rode to the doctor's house, roused the doctor, and brought him back with her to the neighborhood, and left him at poor Mrs. Hopgood's, and then rode home.

She was surprised to see a crowd of men before the door. Obed stood among them. They awaited her coming in intense interest, but in silence.

She got down from the wagon, saying, "Some one will have to carry the doctor back again."

"Who will go?" asked Mr. Miller.

There was no response. No one wanted to meet a white horse with his body on a cloud and "his feet in the sky" on this mysterious night of Halloween.

"I will go," said Eliza, firmly.

"Yes, Eliza, you go," said Mr. Miller. "You are a brave girl."

Eliza mounted the wagon seat.

Obed stepped up to her, and whispered, "Say, Eliza, what was it?"

"I will never tell; remember, now remember once for all, for your sake, Obed, I will never tell. You played me a mean trick, Obed; but other people were to blame for it; you never had any one to teach you like my mother. For your sake, Obed, left, as you are, all alone in the world, I will never say another word. Now I have done my whole duty, Obed, and, although I cannot trust you, I will always be your friend."

Obed turned away.

"What did she say?" asked the people.

"She said that she would never tell what she saw," said Obed.

"I shall keep a close eye on that girl hereafter. There may be witches, and she may be one. This is a very strange night, this Halloween." So said Mrs. Miller.

Eliza was always very kind to him. She never spoke to him of the night that he had deserted her but once. It was on the eve before she united with the village church.

"Obed," she said, "I have something on my conscience. I owe it to you to say that what I saw on that Halloween night would never have harmed you or me."

This confession added to his depression of spirits. He had indeed been a coward, and forfeited the trust of the best and truest heart that he had ever known.

The Revolution came. A new flag leaped into the air. Obed had heard the cannon of Bunker Hill, and seen from afar the smoke of the battle as it arose on the afternoon of that fateful day.

There was a call for minute-men. A horseman came riding into Medfield, blowing a horn, and calling upon the farmers to volunteer.

Obed started up at the sound. He knew what was wanted.

He called Eliza out under the great elms.

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