Part 22

“I am Joseph Ranger, my boy! And I have come here all the way from the farthest West. But sit down here on the edge of your bed, and tell me all about it.”

“You remember the Indian maiden, Le-Le, whom I purchased and ransomed?”

“Yes.”

“And you recall the fact that I left her with her brother, Siwash, at my Green River cave at the time I came to you?”

“I remember that you said so.”

“Can you recall the date of my visit to you at the trading-post?”

“No; but there must be memoranda somewhere that will settle that. Why?”

“Because nothing will save me, Joseph, from the hangman’s rope unless I can prove an alibi. I forwarded a letter to you at Oregon City—or tried to—after this mishap befell me; but a courier can be bribed sometimes, you know, and Henry Hankins, who failed to capture my bride, is bent upon revenge. His incarceration doesn’t keep him out of reach of pals. But how is my bonnie Jean?”

“I left home too hurriedly to get much information. But her father said she was strangely calm, and full of faith in you.”

“Then my darling is not ill?”

“I certainly did not leave her well, Ashleigh, but she is in good hands. Do you know the particulars of Le-Le’s death?”

“I only know that her body was found in an eddy in Green River about a fortnight after I last saw her. Just as I was on the eve of starting to Oregon to claim my bride, I was arrested, charged with murder, and brought to this villanous den.”

“Be of good cheer, Ashleigh; I will find Siwash. Say nothing to any one. The darkest hour of the night is just before the morning. Good-bye, and may God bless you!”

XLII

_TOO BUSY TO BE MISERABLE_

Jean met her father and his wife at the breakfast-table with a welcoming smile, though her head ached, and on her countenance there was a deathly pallor.

“The last night’s storm played havoc with the cherished plans of Mr. and Mrs. Burns,” said Mary’s husband, adroitly turning the conversation into a diverting channel. “They were intending to spend their honeymoon with their camping outfit in the open air among the spicy odors of the October woods.”

“They are old enough, and ought to be wise enough, by this time, to spend their honeymoon at home. No bridegroom ever dreamed of taking his bride away from home during the honeymoon in my younger days; that is, nobody did with whom my lot was cast,” said Captain Ranger, beaming tenderly upon his wife, who, being a sensible woman, was not displeased to note the far-away look in his eyes which betrayed his straying thoughts.

“You needn’t make any plans for a new teacher, for the present at least, daddie,” said Jean; “I shall resume my duties in the schoolroom next week. Will you post the required notices for me at the Four Corners, and at the sawmill, sometime during the day?”

“I wouldn’t be in a hurry about teaching, daughter. Your Uncle Joseph has gone by private pony express in quest—”

He paused, uncertain as to the propriety of speaking the name that was uppermost in all their thoughts.

“I know it, daddie. I knew all that was going on when I lay yesterday in what seemed to you as a stupor. I can’t explain it, but I seemed to have a double, or second, self that told me everything. Ashton is in trouble, but he is not in bodily danger, and he will not die. I do not understand it clearly, for I saw conditions only as through a glass, darkly. I would have remained in that state of seeming torpor for a whole month if it had been possible, for my mind and body were in different places. But in spite of myself I am again in a normal condition.”

“I shall be able to devote two weeks’ work to the erection of that combined schoolhouse and meeting-house,” said Mary’s husband. “Can’t you wait, sister, to begin your school till then?”

“No, Mr. Buckingham. You are very kind, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart, but I cannot wait. There will be time enough for you to take the reins when I am gone, Mr. Rogers.”

During the remainder of the week she performed prodigies of labor, but the work lagged at the mess-house. The new cook was not a success, and there was much dissatisfaction among the workingmen. But the Chinaman learned his lessons rapidly under the guidance of the Ranger sisters, and was soon able to load the long tables with plain but savory food.

The storm left the face of Nature fresh and green and joyous, and Mr. Burns and the Little Doctor repaired to the woods and foot-hills for their honeymoon, after all.

Jean’s complexion grew more delicately beautiful, her form more and more symmetrical, and her eyes sparkled like stars. But her girlish exuberance of spirit was gone, and in its place had come a womanly dignity, commanding, gracious, and sweet. The departure of Mary and her husband, with Marjorie, added heavily to Jean’s duties as superintendent of the Sunday-school. But her spirit craved work; so she opened a singing-school and a metrical geography class.

“Still no tidings!” she cried to herself, after an unusually strenuous day. “But I will not despair, and I will do my duty though the heavens fall. The whole of this month’s salary goes to Grandpa and Grandma Ranger. And for this opportunity to show my appreciation of their lives of self-denial in the service of others, I devoutly thank God.”

A shadow darkened the door of the deserted schoolroom.

“Who is it? And what is wanted?” asked Jean, with a start.

“It is I,—the Reverend Thomas Rogers,” said a voice, as, stepping out of the shadow, the preacher met her face to face.

“I have just completed my day’s work, and was about to shut up shop,” she said, moving toward the door.

“Very well. I will walk homeward with you, if I may.”

“No, you won’t!” piped a tremulous, complaining voice; and Mrs. Rogers stepped between them and the doorsill.

“I came to see Miss Jean about a change in the management of the Sunday-school,” said the preacher, meekly.

“And I’ve come to remind you that you must chop some stove-wood and milk the cow.”

The voice was not tremulous now, but commanding. “I’ll teach you to be running after the schoolma’am at unseemly hours!” she said with a vehemence that startled Jean, who had thought her the personification of submission and humility. “And I’ll teach you to be courting my husband, Miss Jean!”

“You can divest yourself of all anxiety on that score, Mrs. Rogers. I never saw the time when I would have dreamed of ‘courting’ the Reverend Thomas Rogers, even before he was married; and I wouldn’t ‘court’ any woman’s husband.”

“To be explicit,” said the preacher, in a submissive tone, “I think it is high time for the pastor of this church to manage his Sunday-school. Miss Jean’s methods are not strictly orthodox. I didn’t mean to speak of this to her in the presence of any third person, but since you have come upon the scene, Mrs. Rogers, we may as well settle it here and now.”

“What’s the trouble?” asked Jean, laughing irreverently.

“The hymns she teaches the children are not solemn enough. They are all about happy days and care-free birds and joyous children, whose chief duty lies in obeying their parents and loving one another. I’ve looked on during the proceedings, carefully and anxiously, for four consecutive Sundays now, and I haven’t heard one word about eternal punishment, nor has she exhorted anybody to flee from the wrath to come!”

“Aren’t you ashamed of your fit of jealousy in the light of this revelation, Mrs. Rogers?” asked Jean, laughing aloud.

“I know he was once in love with your sister Mary!” was the evasive but crestfallen reply.

“Well, Mr. Rogers,” said Jean, closing and locking the door, “we may as well be ending this interview. I founded the Sunday-school, and I will not abdicate till I get ready to leave the country. I never could be made to believe by your preaching or teaching that God wasn’t as good as my daddie, or even yourself. I am teaching the children to love and serve a beneficent God, and to love their neighbors as themselves. If that is heresy, make the most of it. Good-night! And, Mrs. Rogers, the next time you feel the unseemly pangs of jealousy, don’t make a fool of yourself before folks.”

XLIII

_JEAN IS HAPPY—AND ANOTHER PERSON_

December, gloomiest month in the year, had settled over the Ranch of the Whispering Firs. The steady mist of the rainy season was at its best, or worst, according to the point of view, mental and physical, of its beholder. The mighty colonnades of trees, that reared their pointed crests in the mist-enwrapped heavens, were busily engaged, at the foot of the Cascade Mountains, in storing away the moisture of the skies among the countless layers of vegetable mould and moss from which to draw their supplies for the next summer’s drouth.

The sawmill, planing-mill, and shingle-loom were running day and night. The skid roads, upon which the leviathans of the forest were dragged to their final doom, were sodden, slippery, and already badly worn. Relays of oxen tugged at the creaking chains and complaining logs. The mill-pond, a lake upon the mountain-side, very much enlarged by a dam, lay half asleep under a soft coating of ice; and higher up, at the snow line, lay the ice-clad creek that fed it, sheathed in a coat of mail which held in check the waters that were destined, when a thaw should come, to overflow their banks and send a flood into the valley below.

* * * * *

“Are you an angel from heaven, or are you Ashton Ashleigh?” cried Jean, as a tall man entered at the open door and stood before her with outstretched arms. The color faded from her cheeks, and her heart gave a violent thump and then stood still.

“Nothing angelic about me or near me this holy minute, unless it is Jean, my bonnie Jean!” exclaimed the intruder, as he clasped her tenderly in his arms. Jean was speechless for the moment with surprise and joy.

“Why don’t you ask for an explanation, little one?” he asked after an interval. “An explanation is due you, God knows!”

“I knew you would come,” she whispered timidly. “You have been forcibly detained, Ashton. Nothing else would, or could, have kept you away from your own.”

“Yes, darling; it was all the evil-doing of that man Hankins, to whom I intrusted my letter and my ring. Come in, Uncle Joseph. Tell the whole cruel story.”

“He was on his way to his wedding when he was arrested and thrown into prison!” exclaimed the uncle.

“You remember the slave girl Le-Le, my bonnie Jean? I was falsely accused of being her murderer; and they would surely have convicted me of the crime if your uncle had not appeared upon the scene, and after much delay and difficulty proved an alibi. Do you wonder that my hair has turned white?”

“Why, so it has, Ashton! I had not noticed it before; the light is dim. But you are all right. Your hair is beautiful. I like it best as it is.”

“I had a deuce of a time proving that alibi!” interrupted the uncle. “Our only witness was Siwash, who had left the scene of the tragedy and was nowhere to be found, though I sent scouts out for him in every direction. He had no idea that he was wanted, when he finally appeared upon the scene, but he came just in the nick of time.

“‘I saw my sister make the fatal leap into Green River,’” he deposed in excellent English. ‘She had been very despondent after Mr. Ashleigh left us, and I was often afraid she would take her life. But as the weeks passed, she apparently grew more reconciled; and I had ceased to worry about her, when one day, after getting my luncheon, she refused to wait upon the table, and left our cave in a manner that excited my alarm. So I followed her. I saw the fatal leap. She plunged into the rushing water through a hole in the ice, under which her body was imprisoned till last summer, when it was found three miles from the fatal scene. I never dreamed of anybody being accused of killing her,—least of all Mr. Ashleigh, our benefactor and friend.’

“‘Do the citizens of the village near the scene of the tragedy know of the suicide?’ asked the Court.

“‘They do, your Honor, a dozen of them!’ said the boy.

“No argument was offered on either side. Hankins was sent back to the penitentiary. Ashton was allowed to go forth a free man; and here, after a hard journey, are both of us to tell the tale!”

* * * * *

Sunday morning at the Ranch of the Whispering Firs. The skies, which have been humid and lowering for many days, are once more on their good behavior. The clouds have rolled away to the Northland, and the air and sunshine are as balmy as in springtime.

Once more there is a gathering,—this time at the combined schoolhouse and meeting-house; and Jean Ranger, handsomely attired in a well-made travelling suit of gray, with hat to match,—the handiwork of her stepmother and the Little Doctor,—is superintending for the last time (at least the last till after her return from abroad) her beloved Sunday-school. The tidings of the bridegroom’s arrival had spread from house to house, and everybody within a radius of a dozen miles had appeared upon the scene. The children of the district had decorated the room profusely with wild flowers, ferns, and evergreens.

Jean, in surrendering her school to the pastor, made a felicitous speech, exhorting her pupils to continue in the ways of well-doing. Then, bidding them a loving and hopeful good-bye, she formally resigned her post, and the Reverend Thomas Rogers assumed control.

At a given signal from Captain Ranger, a tall and handsome young Englishman, whose youthful face contrasted strangely with his snowy hair, stepped proudly down the aisle, where he was joined by his radiant bride, leaning on the arm of her father; and the preacher pronounced the words that legalized a union made in heaven. The tears that rose unbidden to the eyes of bronzed and bearded men and toilworn, plainly attired women were tears of joy and peace, good-will and gladness.

A bountiful basket-dinner, contributed, as by a common impulse, from the home of almost every family in the district, was served within the building.

“We leave to-morrow, by steamer from Portland, going by way of San Francisco, Acapulco, and the Isthmus, up the Atlantic coast to New York,” said the happy bridegroom, in his post-prandial speech, “whence we shall sail for Liverpool. I shall take my wife to London to visit my mother. Then, on our return to Oregon (for we will make this neighborhood of the Ranch of the Whispering Firs our permanent home), we shall stop over at Washington to see her sisters,—Mrs. Buckingham and Marjorie; and after that we can visit the home of her childhood.”

“But I prefer going first to the home of my grandparents, dearest,” said the bride. “We can get there easily by the way of the Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi River and the Illinois, if we’ll be on hand before the rivers are frozen over. We can then go on to Washington, and to England afterwards. Don’t you think this will be the more economical, convenient, and reasonable plan?”

“As this journey is to be in your honor, it shall be as you say, my bonnie Jean.”

The bride blushed and beamed bewitchingly, while the crowd laughed and applauded, and her husband bowed and smiled in approval.

All eyes then turned upon the father, who took the happy and exultant bridegroom by the hand and said in a voice tremulous with emotion: “Ashton Ashleigh, my son through marriage, you have taken to yourself the priceless jewel that I once fondly thought was mine! Value not lightly the radiant gem of womanhood you guard!” Then to the bride he said, embracing her tenderly, while the eyes of the multitude filled afresh with tears: “Beloved daughter of thy sainted mother, go thy way with the husband of thy choice. But do not forget to hold thyself always as his equal before God and man. Then shalt thou be his best counsellor, his real helpmate, and his wisest friend.” To both he added, as he folded their clasped hands between his own broad palms: “Keep step together, my children; and, whether your way shall lead you up the mountain-sides of difficulty, or through the quagmires of sorrow, or into the glad valleys of happiness and peace, always march side by side, in time and tune to the eternal harmonies of religion, liberty, equality, justice, and progression.”

And here, patient reader, with Life before them, and Love leading the way, these chronicles shall bid adieu to the happy pair while they take temporary leave of the remnant of the Ranger household and the Ranch of the Whispering Firs.

THE END

FOOTNOTES

[1] The writer has not been able to trace the date or origin of these stanzas. She learned them in her childhood of a Scotchwoman who recited them on a winter evening in her chimney corner, and who has long been dead. She herself has often recited the whole ballad at weddings within the past fifty years.

[2] Since called the Ogden Gateway.

BOOKS RELATING TO THE NORTHWEST

THE JOURNALS OF LEWIS AND CLARK GASS’S JOURNAL OF THE LEWIS AND CLARK EXPEDITION THE CONQUEST THE BRIDGE OF THE GODS McLOUGHLIN AND OLD OREGON LETTERS FROM AN OREGON RANCH FROM THE WEST TO THE WEST A SHORT HISTORY OF OREGON

(OVER)

These books are for sale by all booksellers, or will be sent by the publishers on receipt of price. An extra for postage will be made on “net” books.

A. C. McCLURG & CO., PUBLISHERS, CHICAGO

The Conquest

By EVA EMERY DYE. Being the True Story of Lewis and Clark. Third Edition, with frontispiece in full color by Charlotte Weber. 12mo, gilt top, 504 pages. $1.50.

No book published in recent years has more of tremendous import between its covers, and certainly no recent novel has in it more of the elements of a permanent success. A historical romance which tells with accuracy and inspiring style of the bravery of the pioneers in winning the western continent, should have a lasting place in the esteem of every American.

“No one who wishes to know the true story of the conquest of the greater part of this great nation can afford to pass by this book.”—_Cleveland Leader._

“A vivid picture of the Indian wars preceding the Louisiana purchase, of the expedition of Lewis and Clark, and of events following the occupation of Oregon.”—_The Congregationalist._

“It may not be the great American novel we have been waiting for so long, but it certainly looks as though it would be very near it.”—_Rochester Times._

“The characters that are assembled in ‘The Conquest’ belong to the history of the United States, their story is a national epic.”—_Detroit Free Press._

McLoughlin and Old Oregon

By EVA EMERY DYE. A Chronicle. Fifth Edition. 12mo, 381 pages. $1.50.

This is a most graphic and interesting chronicle of the movement which added to the United States that vast territory, previously a British possession, of which Oregon formed a part, and how Dr. John McLoughlin, then chief factor of the Hudson’s Bay Company for the Northwest, by his fatherly interest in the settlers, displeased the Hudson’s Bay Company and aided in bringing this about. The author has gathered her facts at first hand, and as a result the work is vivid and picturesque and reads like a romance.

“A spirited narrative of what life in the wilderness meant in the early days, a record of heroism, self-sacrifice, and dogged persistence; a graphic page of the story of the American pioneer.”—_New York Mail._

The Bridge of the Gods

By F. H. BALCH. A Romance of Indian Oregon. New (seventh) Edition, enlarged size. With eight full-page illustrations by Laurens Maynard Dixon. Cloth, 12mo, 280 pages, gilt top. $1.50. Paper edition, without illustrations. 50 cents.

Encouraged by the steady demand for this powerful story, since its publication twelve years ago, the publishers felt justified in issuing this attractive illustrated edition. The book has fairly earned its lasting popularity, not only by the intense interest of the story, but by its faithful delineation of Indian character. From the legends of the Columbia River and the mystical “bridge of the gods,” the author has derived a truthful and realistic picture of the powerful tribes that inhabited the Oregon country two centuries ago.

The _Syracuse Herald_ calls the author of “The Bridge of the Gods” “the best writer of Indian romance since the days of Fenimore Cooper.”

A Short History of Oregon

By SIDONA V. JOHNSON. With seventeen illustrations from photographs, and a map of the Lewis and Clark route. 16mo, 320 pages, indexed. $1.00 _net_.

FROM HENRY E. DOSCH, _Director of Exhibits at Lewis and Clark Exposition at Portland_.

“Every home in Oregon might well welcome this condensed, readable ‘History of Oregon,’ and, most important of all, the school children of the State are entitled to an opportunity to study it, to the end that the history of the State and the great and memorable achievement of Lewis and Clark may be intelligently understood and appreciated by every man, woman, and child in Oregon before the opening of the Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition.”

Letters from an Oregon Ranch

By “KATHARINE.” With twelve full-page illustrations from photographs. Square 8vo. $1.25 _net_.

The hours of delight, as well as those of trial, which fall to the lot of “Katharine,” in creating a home out of the raw materials of nature, are chronicled with naïve humor, and in a vein of hearty optimism which will make a universal appeal. This year the eyes of the entire country are on Oregon, and it is expected that a book of this kind, giving such an illuminating idea of the country, will be of great interest. The photographs which illustrate the volume are of remarkable beauty.

From the West to the West

Across the Plains to Oregon

By ABIGAIL SCOTT DUNIWAY. With frontispiece in color. 12mo. $1.50.

A chronicle and remarkable picture of a group of pioneers in their journeyings across the plains and their subsequent settling in Oregon. The characters are of the distinctive class of Western emigrant of fifty years ago, resourceful, independent, and progressive, and in their conversation and experiences give a vivid account of a phase of American social life that has passed, as well as foreshadowing the active and productive period that was to follow. Though a faithful account of an actual journey, the book is in the form of fiction, and brings the course of several romances to a successful end.

The Journals of Captains Lewis and Clark, 1804-5-6 (McClurg Library Reprints of Americana)

Reprinted from the Edition of 1814. With an Introduction by JAMES K. HOSMER, LL.D., an analytical Index, and photogravure portraits and maps. In two volumes, boxed, 1,083 pages, gilt top. $5.00 _net_. Large-paper edition, on Brown’s hand-made paper, illustrations on Japan vellum, limited to 150 copies, boxed. $18.00 _net_.

“The republication of the complete narrative is both timely and invaluable.... Dr. Hosmer is well known as an authority on Western history; hence to see his name on the title-page is to know that the work has been well done.”—_Portland Oregonian._

“The celebrated story of the expedition of Lewis and Clark has now been put in an easily accessible form.”—_N. Y. Times Saturday Review._

“Of the several new editions of this valuable narrative, this is by far the best and most complete.”—_Minneapolis Journal._

“We have nothing but praise for this clear and handsome reprint.”—_The Nation._

Gass’s Journal of the Lewis and Clark Expedition (McClurg Library Reprints of Americana)

Reprinted from the Edition of 1811. With an Introduction by DR. JAMES K. HOSMER, an analytical Index, facsimiles of the original illustrations, and a rare portrait of Patrick Gass. In one square octavo volume, boxed, 350 pages, gilt top. $3.50 _net_. Large-paper edition, on Brown’s hand-made paper, illustrations on Japan paper, limited to 75 copies, boxed. $9.00 _net_.