Part 17 (1/2)
Having at length been a.s.sured beyond peradventure that his suspicions were true, a desire for vengeance upon Simon Halpen sprang to life in Enoch's heart. He forgot the momentous matter which had filled his mind before the appearance of Crow Wing the evening before. He thought only of his father's murderer, the man who had tried to injure them all, even to the point of destroying their home and attempting to shoot himself.
As he tramped back to the house with the haunch of venison on his shoulder, he determined to tell n.o.body there of the finding of the moose hoofs which explained the mystery of his father's death. The hoofs he saved to show Bolderwood, and for evidence against Simon Halpen if the opportunity ever arose to punish that villain. It was easy to see with this evidence before him, how the awful deed had been accomplished. With the moose hoofs strapped upon his feet the Yorker had crept through the forest on the trail of the unconscious Jonas Harding; had seen him shoot the doe; and then falling upon him suddenly had beaten him to the earth with his clubbed rifle and had bruised and mangled him so terribly that the neighbors, at first glance, p.r.o.nounced the poor man killed by a mad buck. Hurrying from the vicinity, dress and hands covered with blood as Crow Wing had seen him, Halpen had hidden the deer hoofs in the hollow of the tree, and escaped to Albany, his vengeance accomplished.
”But he shall suffer for this yet,” thought the youth, with compressed lips. ”G.o.d will punish him if the courts do not. And sometime he may be delivered into my hand, and if he is----”
The implied threat frightened him, and he did not follow it even in his thoughts, but by again turning his attention to the matter which Ethan Allen's visit the day before had suggested, he strove to bring his mind into better tone before meeting his mother. He feared that the expression on his features would betray something of his horror and determination to her sharp eyes. When he reached home, however, he found the family so greatly excited that n.o.body thought to either ask questions or to notice his behavior. A drill had been called at Bennington and Enoch was forced to saddle the horse and hurry away at once. Under the present conditions it was thought best for Bryce to remain at home, for if the Green Mountain Boys marched upon Ticonderoga the younger Harding could not be spared to accompany the expedition.
The Council was in session and the leaders of the Green Mountain Boys remained in Bennington for more than a week. Couriers had arrived from the south and east and it was known that the British were rapidly being shut up in Boston. The Ma.s.sachusetts Colony was afire with wrath because of the Lexington ma.s.sacre. The Grants people were quite as rebellious against the King's authority, with the sad affair at Westminster fresh in their minds. The proposal to capture the British strongholds on the lake met with favor everywhere. Small bodies of armed men began to come in and a camp was planned at Castleton. It was said that a large body of troops was to march from Western Ma.s.sachusetts and Connecticut to aid the expedition. When Ethan Allen returned and heard of these reinforcements he immediately desired to bring in more of his own people for the work proposed.
”This is our work,” he declared. ”We have planned to lead this campaign and lead it we shall. We must show the southerners that we are one in heart and intention and therefore every able-bodied man in the Grants must come in. It isn't enough for us to have some men; we must have the most men and thereby control the expedition. We want the honor of it!”
”You must lead us, Colonel!” exclaimed Warner, who, although he had no such following as did Allen, was sure of a goodly company of determined men to join the expedition. ”We'll follow you into Old Ti or anywhere else; but no stranger must command.”
”Then I must have more men to my following than anybody else,” declared Allen, vigorously. ”I have seen a great many myself, but there are districts I haven't been able to reach.”
”We must send out a cross of fire to rouse the clans,” Captain Warner said, with a smile. ”But who shall go? Bolderwood?”
”'Siah has reached his own land--where he's let the light in upon some acres, I understand--near Old Ti. And he's got his work cut out for him there. No; I have the chap in mind to send up along the Otter. There's only one thing I fear. I understand that a plaguey Yorker has been seen about Manchester for a week past. Just what he's so attentive to certain people for at this time bothers me, Seth.”
”But if he's only a surveyor, or speculator----”
”A Yorker means a King's man these times,” exclaimed Allen. ”I got a sight of him--a lean, hook-nosed fellow with a face puckered like a walnut; but we didn't pa.s.s the time o' day. I think he's spying on us.”
”If he is----” began Warner, wrathfully.
”I'm sorry for him, that's all,” declared the Green Mountain leader. ”If I catch him and it's proven against him, I'll hang him to the highest limb in this neck of woods.”
”But the person you will send out with the warning, Colonel?” cried Warner. ”Whom have you in your mind?”
”I see him coming now,” declared the leader, laughing. ”I sent word to him last evening. He should have been to Castleton ere this; but the widow----”
”It's young Harding!” cried Captain Warner. ”I recognize him. And, Colonel, from what I have seen of the young man, he'll bear out your confidence in him.”
Enoch had approached near enough to hear this last and he flushed deeply. ”I was told you wanted to see me, Colonel Allen,” he said, saluting awkwardly.
”I do indeed,” said Allen. ”You're ready for campaigning, I see. Leave your traps--even to your blanket and gun--with Master Fay here. You'll want to travel light where I send you,” and he proceeded to explain the mission he wished the youth to perform.
”I am ready, Colonel,” declared Enoch, throwing off his knapsack.
”Good! Away with you at once. Use yonder horse till you get to Manchester. Beyond that there will scarcely be bridle paths, so a horse will be in your way. Take the word around that the time has come to strike. And have them rendezvous at Castleton. Be off, my boy, and may success go with you!”
The horse in question was a fine steed that Allen had ridden into town that very morning. The youth sprang into the saddle and, understanding that haste and cautiousness were the two things most desired of him, trotted the animal easily out of the town and then put the spurs to him along the road to Manchester. He spared neither the horse nor himself until he reached the latter place and had left the steed in the keeping of a loyal man to be returned at the first opportunity to Colonel Allen.
Of course, all the men in this section of the Grants had been warned of the proposed expedition against the fortresses on Champlain; it was those who dwelt deeper in the wilderness to whom young Enoch Harding had been sent.
He knew what was expected of him. And he knew, too, how most of the Grants people would receive the news. Colonel Allen was beloved by them as were few leaders. This Connecticut giant who had given up his desire for a college education and a life among books because duty called him to the work of supporting his family, who had been by turn a farmer, an iron forger, had tried mining and other toilsome industries, but who nearly always worked with a book in his hand or beside him where he could read and study--this man with his free, jovial air and utterly reckless courage, was become as one of the heroes of old to the people of Vermont. The men on his side of the controversy in which Allen had taken such a deep interest, loved him devotedly; those who espoused the New York cause hated him quite as dearly, for they feared him.
So when Enoch set out from Manchester to go from farmstead to farmstead and from clearing to clearing, he was not in much doubt as to whom he should send to Castleton and whom he should pa.s.s by without speaking to regarding the proposed expedition. There would be no doubtful settlers.
The line between Tories and Whigs was drawn too sharply; and every Whig stood by Ethan Allen.