W. H. Shelton

“ By accident or through a singular exhibition of affection, she had lain down to die on the hard snow which was banked high above the grave, and as this melted the head of the cow had lodged in this remarkable position.
"Well," said Philip, with a sigh for his pet theory, "whoever he was and however he came here, his name was Hezekiah Wallstow, and there was no murder after all—unless a third man came to bury him."
"That's all settled," said Bromley, resignedly; "but how about the cow? Did she come here in a balloon?" ”

“ Philip looked brighter for the draft of water, but he only smiled in reply. The sun was warm outside, but the act of drinking, while it had greatly revived and encouraged Coleman and Bromley, had so chilled their starved bodies that they put on their overcoats and buttoned them up to the throat. They could do no more in the way of calling for help than they had already done. Men had died of starvation before, and it might be their fate to perish of hunger, but they had a strong faith that the fires they had built for two nights on this uninhabited mountain would bring some one to their relief. ”

“ As he grew warmer and stronger, he felt more courage. It was impossible to reach the hole in the snow through which he had come, for the broken sides separated in the wrong way from the perpendicular. He was not a fly to crawl on a ceiling.
A few yards to his right, as he stood facing the mountain, the bank through which his body had broken its way made a smooth curve to the ledge where the icicles began. As he looked at the great polished surface of the snow, the thought came to him that nothing in all the world but the soft moonlight could cling there. ”

“ When the three soldiers looked out on the morning of the 19th, they found their house coated with ice, and the mountain-top a scene of glittering enchantment. Every tree and bush was coated with a transparent armor of glass. The lithe limbs of the birches and young chestnuts were bent downward in graceful curves by the weight of the ice, which, under the rays of the rising sun, guttered and scintillated with all the colors of the rainbow. Every rock and stone had its separate casing, and every weed and blade of grass was stiffened with a tiny shining overcoat. ”

“ Stretching away to the seamed rock where the avalanche hung was a wide old field, broken by rocks and bristling with girdled trees, whose dead limbs wriggled upward and outward like the hundred hands of Briareus. The postmaster kept to the foot-worn trail, shuffling over the wet leaves, and glancing up now and then at the granite front of old Whiteside with great satisfaction, not only because the avalanche was safe for the night, but because he loved to think that whatever secrets the mountain held would be his when the dogwood-blossoms came in the spring. ”

“ The three soldiers ran off to a safe distance as soon as the tree began to fall, while Tumbler, after regarding their flight with a look of disgust, walked deliberately into the thick of the battle, and began to crunch the dripping comb as coolly as a pig eats corn. The brittle trunk of the old tree had split open as it fell, and for twenty feet of its length the mass of yellow honey lay exposed to the gaze of the men, while the infuriated bees darkened the air above it, and made a misty halo about the head of the happy bear. ”

“ This envelop, with the names of the three soldiers and their hiding-place written out in a fair, round hand, might have sailed along on the southwest wind until it fell at the door of the post-office in the Cove but for the queer way it had of navigating the air. It would turn over and over on its way, or shoot up, or dart to one side, or take some unexpected course; and so just as it was sailing smoothly above the house, its sharp edge turned in the wind, and with a backward dive it struck hard on the rock below Philip's leach. ”

“ Overhanging the boulder face of the mountain, just back of the ridge they had used for a signal-station, was a clump of black oaks, through which something like an old trail led down to a narrow tongue of land caught on a shelf of granite, which was dark with a tall growth of pines, and the earth beneath was covered with a thick, gray carpet of needles, clean and springy to the feet. Along the southern cliff, and to the west of the spring which welled out from under the rock, was a curtain of dogwoods and birches, and elsewhere the timber was chestnut. ”

“ Every mouthful of food helped to keep up their strength and courage, and now the slanting rays of the afternoon sun reminded them that they must repeat their signal, and that no time was to be lost in gathering wood for another fire. There was still hope that relief would come before dark, and Philip was left to watch with the bear, while Coleman and Bromley returned to the plateau. ”

“ We walked back across the mountain-top in the white light of the full moon, silently as we had come. After the resolve we had made, I began already to experience a sense of relief from the shame I felt at the failure of our numerous armies. The old government had fallen from its proud position among the nations of the earth. The flag we loved had been trampled under foot and despoiled of its stars—of how many we knew not. Our path lay through the plantation of young corn, whose broad, glistening leaves brushed our faces and filled the air with the sweet fragrance of the juicy stalks. ”

“ The cake and the rifle fell to the ground, and the postmaster's jaw dropped on its hinges. Cold chills ran up his back and blew like a wind through his hair, while the blood seemed to throb in his ears. He was powerless to speak. He could only gaze with his bulging eyes at the small figure which rose slowly from the roots of the great icicles and then stood motionless and black against the snow. It looked to be a figure, so small and far away in the uncertain moonlight, and yet it stood where no living man could possibly be. ”

“ Three years have come and gone since the forge was built, and the three misguided patriots, still loyal to their vow and to the thirty-three stars on their dear old flag, are sitting together in the fair sunlight of a Sabbath morning on the steps of the golden mill. Tumbler the bear, very shaggy and faded as to his mangy coat, is sleeping comfortably on the dusty path that winds away to the house. ”

“ A blotch of shadows to the right assumes the ghostly form of spreading trees, the naked branches blending softly in the blanket of the fog. The gnarled chestnuts, that looked like berry-bushes while they waited at the deserted cabin on that first night for the moon to go down, give no voice of warning, and Philip comes steadily on, with the telescope strapped to his back and the load in his heart. ”

“ He had only broken her big, shaggy shoulder, and as he came near to the wounded brute she rose suddenly on her hind feet and dealt him such a whack with her sound paw as nearly broke his ribs and sent him rolling over and over on the ground. Bear and man were so mixed in the air that even Coleman feared to risk a shot. Poor Bromley, crippled and bleeding at the nose, lay almost helpless on his back under the tree, and in this state the maddened bear charged furiously on him, her foaming and bloody jaws extended. ”

“ When nature prompts a hen to cackle, do you think we are expected to look the other way? Why, Philip, you will be going back on honey next because bees make it. We are vegetarians because we no longer think it right to destroy animal life. We not only think it wrong to destroy, but we believe it to be our duty to preserve it wherever we find it. Don't we spread corn on the snow in the winter for the coons and squirrels? Come, now! We are not vegetarians at all. We are simply unwilling to take life, which leaves us to choose between vegetable diet and starvation. ”

“ Tumbler lay rolled up in his favorite corner, blinking his small eyes at the unusual light, and from time to time he passed his furry paw over his sharp nose and gave forth a low grunt of satisfaction. Philip sat against the chimney opposite Tumbler, stirring chestnuts in the ashes with a ramrod, while Bromley put away the last of the supper things, and Lieutenant Coleman gazed out of the open window into the slanting rain, which beat a merry tattoo on the shingles, and tossed at intervals a sturdy drop on the hissing fire. ”

“ Philip sits a little apart from the others, with the telescope in its leathern case strapped on his back, and there is a look of sadness in his face and in his wandering, downcast eyes.
Three years have wrought great changes in the plateau. The harvests have been abundant, and at a little distance from where the men sit purple grapes hang in great clusters from the vines which have been grown from cuttings of that solitary plant which overhung the branch on the July day when they first came down its bank with the captain of the troopers and Andy the guide. ”

“ The major only grunted as if the matter were of no consequence, and then both relapse into silence as the creaking wheels jolt over the rocks and grind down the mountain behind the bracing cattle. The form of the steer grows whiter in the gathering darkness. The men are evidently familiar with the country, for presently they turn off the big road into a cart-track, the sides of the wagon brushing against the dripping bushes as they push through the darkness with the fewest possible words. ”

“ He might have grown weary at last of lugging casks up the mountain by moonlight, and getting the old man's gold by slow doles. He must have had some knowledge of the treasure for which he dug so persistently afterward, and in his greed to possess it he might have deliberately starved the old abolitionist. They thought of Hezekiah Wallstow burning beacon-fires in his extremity, when there was a good bridge to connect the mountain-top with the valley, and yet he was left to die alone. ”

“ Philip stopped behind to run up the old flag on the pole; for, whatever effect that emblem might have on their neighbors, they were determined to stand by their colors. They found a few chestnuts and dried berries in the old field, which they devoured with wolfish hunger as they crept along toward the gorge.
They hoped to see human faces on the opposite bank when they arrived; but there was no one there to meet them. They were not greatly disappointed, for it was still early in the day, and the people had a much longer journey to make from the valley. ”

“ When Philip awoke, after having swooned at the feet of his comrades when his rescue was accomplished, he lay in the delicious warmth of his bunk. The late afternoon sun streamed in at the window over his head, and Coleman sat watching at his side. Bromley was stirring the fire, which was burning briskly on the hearth, and the smell of gruel was in the room. The station flags and the crossed sabers brightened the space above the chimneypiece. ”

“ He shouted so lustily for the telescope that both Philip and Coleman joined him with all haste.
What they saw through the glass was a straggling column of mountaineers advancing in single file along the winding road, their steel rifle-barrels catching the last rays of the setting sun. There were thirteen men in the party, of whom about half wore some part of a Confederate uniform; but neither Shifless nor the Cove postmaster was with them. ”

“ As Bromley, who was in front, came to a point where the ceiling hung so low as to be within reach, he swept the flame of his torch across one of these brown patches, and straightway the stifling air was filled with a squeaking, unearthly chorus, and with the beating of innumerable wings. Scorched by the flame and blinded by the light, many of these disabled creatures, which proved to be a colony of bats, fluttered to the floor, and dashed against the bare feet of the soldiers with a clammy touch that made the cold chills rise in their hair. ”

“ It was suspected that Philip was repenting of the agreement he had made to remain on the mountain, and both Coleman and Bromley lectured him roundly for his carelessness. While Philip was still chafing under the suspicions of his comrades, all the more that he was conscious of his perfect loyalty to the old flag and to the compact they had made together for its sake, the bear was growing stronger every day and more mischievous. Although he had the whole plateau to roam over, nothing seemed to please Tumbler so much as to nose about and dig into the grave of the old man of the mountain. ”

“ When the last kernels began to dance on the old cavalry boot-leg in the bottom of the hopper, the miller shut off the water, and in the silence that followed the three soldiers looked ruefully at the small heap of yellow meal on the floor of the dusty bin. It was not more than enough to keep themselves and the paralyzed old rooster alive for a week. If they relied upon the meal alone, in nine weeks they would be out of bread, and the golden mill would be a useless possession.
Discovery was their only hope of further subsistence. ”

“ To men who had seen it bent forward under the eagles of the old republic, gray in the stifling powder-clouds, falling and rising in the storm of battle, a pale ghost of a flag, fluttering colorless on the plain or climbing the stubborn mountain, human lives falling like leaves for its upholding—this was the burning question. ”

“ What fools we have been! We must leave the mountain to-morrow—to-night."
"We have been the victims of an infamous deception," exclaimed Lieutenant Coleman. "Let us go back to the house at once, and determine what is to be done."
Against this undue haste Bromley remonstrated feebly, for he himself was laboring under unusual excitement. His eyes were so dimmed by a suffusion of something very like tears—tears of anger—that he could read no further for the moment, and he put the paper carefully into his pocket, and picked up his torch and followed his comrades sulkily into the cavern. ”

“ The discovery of the house and its contents was so startling that the soldiers forgot all about the bee-tree they had come in search of. The absence of everything in the nature of food forced itself upon their minds, as they felt the coins in their pockets. There might be corn in one of the tumbledown outhouses. Both were sadly decayed and broken by the winds and storms to which the strong walls and good roof of the house had not yet yielded. The first shed contained a small heap of wood and a rusty ax, and the other appeared to have been used as a cow-stall. ”