Silver Lake. Robert Michael Ballantyne

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СКАЧАТЬ Hawk turned to Roy, and said something to him in the Indian tongue.

      Roy did not understand, and attempted to say so as well as he could by signs, and the use of the few words of the Cree language which his father had taught him. In the course of his speech (if we may use that term), he chanced to mention Wapaw’s name.

      “Ho! ho! ho!” said one and another of the Indians, while Hawk grinned horribly.

      A variety of questions were now put to poor Roy, who, not understanding, of course could not answer them. Hawk, however, repeated Wapaw’s name, and pointed towards the Fort with a look of inquiry, to which Roy replied by nodding his head and repeating “Wapaw” once or twice, also pointing to the Fort; for he began to suspect these must be Wapaw’s comrades, who had come to search for him. He therefore volunteered a little additional information by means of signs; rubbed his stomach, looked dreadfully rueful, rolled himself as if in agony on the ground, and then, getting up, pretended to eat and look happy! By all of which he meant to show how that Wapaw had been on the borders of starvation, but had been happily saved therefrom.

      Indians in council might teach a useful lesson to our members of parliament, for they witnessed this rather laughable species of pantomime with profound gravity and silence. When Roy concluded, they nodded their heads, and said, “Ho! ho!” which, no doubt, was equivalent to “Hear hear!”

      After a little more discussion they rose to depart, and made signs to the children to get up and follow. Roy then pointed out the broken state of his snow-shoe, but this difficulty was overcome by Hawk, who threw it away, and made him put on his sister’s snow-shoes. A stout young warrior was ordered to take Nelly on his back, which he did without delay, and the whole party left the encampment, headed by their chief.

      The children submitted cheerfully at first, under the impression that the Indians meant to convey them to the Fort. Great, however, was their horror when they were taken through the woods by a way which they knew to be quite in the opposite direction.

      When Roy saw this he stopped and looked back, but an Indian behind him gave him a poke with the butt of his gun which there was no resisting. For a moment the lad thought of trying to break away, run home, and tell his father of Nelly’s fate; but a second thought convinced him that this course was utterly impracticable. As for Nelly, she was too far from her brother in the procession to hold converse with him; and, as she knew not what to do, say, think, she was reduced to the miserable consolation of bedewing with her tears the shoulders of the young warrior who carried her.

      The storm which had commenced the day before still continued, so that, in the course of a few hours, traces of the track of the war-party were almost obliterated, and the chance of their being followed by Robin and his friends was rendered less and less likely as time ran on.

      All that day they travelled without halt, and when they stopped at night to encamp, Roy was nearly dead from exhaustion. “My poor Nell,” said he, drawing his sobbing sister close to him, as they sat near the camp fire, after having eaten the small quantity of dried venison that was thrown to them by their captors, “don’t despair; father will be sure to hunt us down, if it’s in the power of man to do it.”

      “I don’t despair,” sobbed Nelly; “but oh! what will darling mother do when she finds that we’re lost, and I’m so afraid they’ll kill us.”

      “No fear o’ that, Nell; it’s not worth their while. Remember, too, what mother often told us—that—that—what is it she used to read so often out of the Bible? I forget.”

      “I think it was, ‘Call upon Me in the time of trouble, and I will deliver thee.’ I’ve been thinkin’ of that, Roy, already.”

      “That’s right, Nell; now, come, cheer up! Have you had enough to eat?”

      “Yes,” said Nelly, with a loud yawn, which she did not attempt to check.

      Roy echoed it, as a matter of course, (who ever did see anyone yawn without following suit?) and then the two lay down together, spread over themselves an old blanket which one of the Indians had given them, and fell asleep at once.

      Day succeeded day, night followed night, and weeks came and went, yet the Indians continued their journey through the snow-clad wilderness. Roy’s snow-shoes had been picked up and repaired by one of the savages, and Nelly was made to walk a good deal on her own snowshoes; but it is justice to the Indians to say that they slackened their pace a little for the sake of the children, and when Nelly showed symptoms of being fatigued, the stout young warrior who originally carried her took her on his shoulders.

      At length the encampment of the tribe was reached, and Nelly was handed over to Hawk’s wife to be her slave. Soon after that the tents were struck, and the whole tribe went deeper into the northern wilds. Several gales arose and passed away, completely covering their footprints, so that no tracks were left behind them.

      Chapter Six.

      The Camp, the Attack, and the Escape

      It were vain to attempt a description of the varied condition of mind into which the brother and sister fell when they found themselves actually reduced to a state of slavery in an Indian camp, and separated from their parents, as they firmly believed, for ever.

      Nelly wept her eyes almost out of their sockets at first. Then she fell into a sort of apathetic state, in which, for several days, she went about her duties almost mechanically, feeling as if it were all a horrible dream, out of which she would soon awake, and find herself at home with her “darling mother” beside her. This passed, however, and she had another fit of heart-breaking sorrow, from which she found relief by recalling some of the passages in God’s Word, which her mother had taught her to repeat by heart; especially that verse in which it is said, “that Jesus is a friend who sticketh closer than a brother.” And this came to the poor child’s mind with peculiar power, because her own brother Roy was so kind, and took such pains to comfort her, and to enter into all her girlish feelings and sympathies, that she could scarcely imagine it possible for anyone to stick closer to her in all her distress than he did.

      As for Roy, he was not given to the melting mood. His nature was bold and manly. Whatever he felt, he kept it to himself, and he forgot more than half his own sorrow in his brotherly efforts to assuage that of Nelly.

      Both of them were active and willing to oblige, so that they did not allow their grief to interfere with their work, a circumstance which induced their captors to treat them with forbearance, and even kindness. Nelly sobbed and worked; gradually, the sobbing decreased, and the work was carried on with vigour, so that she soon became quite expert at skinning rabbits, boiling meat, embroidering mocassins, smoking deerskins, chopping firewood into small pieces, and many other details of Indian household economy; while Roy went out with the hunters, and became a very Nimrod, insomuch that he soon excelled all the lads of his own age, and many of those who were older, in the use of the bow, the snow-shoes, the spear, the axe, and the gun. But all this, and what they did and said in the Indian camp during that winter, and what was said and done to them, we do not mean to write about, having matter of deeper interest to tell.

      Winter passed away, and spring came. But little do those who dwell in England know of the enchantment of returning spring in the frozen wilderness of North America. The long, long winter, seems as though it would never pass away. The intense frost seals up all the sweet odours of the woods for so many months, that the nostrils become powerfully sensitive, and, as it were, yearn for something to smell. The skin gets so used to frost, that a balmy breeze is thought of as a thing of the past, or well-nigh forgotten.

      Spring in those regions comes suddenly. It came on our wanderers with a gush. One night the temperature rose high above the freezing point; next day all the СКАЧАТЬ