FOLLOWED, then, the long, leaden-gray days of midwinter. It was an extreme one of terrible cold, and even Mehitable, although she soon recovered from her adventures at Newark, was glad to hover over the fire which Squire Condit and Amos, the man of all work, kept roaring in the big kitchen fireplace.
But at last the girl could stand it no longer. "I cannot remain cooped up one hour more!" she burst out one afternoon. She looked at her mother, placidly spinning in the inglenook. "I think"—but here a blush stained Mehitable's cheeks—"I think I shall go down to Uncle Daniel Condit's. Poor Aunt Ruth needs a bit o' cheer since Jemima's death!"
Mistress Condit glanced up with a smile. "What said ye, Hitty?" she asked.
Mehitable raised her voice above the noise of the spinning-wheel, repeating herself. Mistress Condit thought idly, "How the fire's heat doth redden the child's cheeks!" and nodded her consent. And soon Mehitable, bustling about, was ready for departure.
"Farewell, Mother!" She stooped to drop a light kiss upon the fair, faded cheek her mother serenely held up. "Tell Cherry where I went. What a long nap she be taking!"
Then, scuffling out through the deep snow, Mehitable directed Amos to saddle Dulcie.
"But, indeed, I like not for Dulcie to go out wi' her lame knee!" protested Amos with the privilege of an old servant.
"Oh, Amos!" The girl looked at him laughingly. "How ye do baby the horse!" And later, deciding Amos was overly careful, Mehitable put her to a trot. But soon poor Dulcie showed serious strain, for she began to limp at once.
"La!" Mehitable spoke aloud vexedly. "'Tis just my fortune! Well, I will leave ye at Uncle Dan's, Dulcie, and return on foot!"
A little later, she entered her aunt's sad kitchen like a bit of animated sunshine.
"How now, my dear!" It was her Aunt Ruth who spoke shiveringly from her place beside the fire. Beside her, as she knit, was a cradle with a sleeping child in it. She kept the cradle in constant motion with her foot upon one of the rockers.
"Indeed, we be very well at our house, Auntie!" answered Mehitable brightly, slipping out of her cardinal and warming her hands as she looked down eagerly at the baby. "That is—all except Dulcie!" she added jokingly.
"Dulcie?" Her aunt drew down fretful brows.
"My horse," explained Mehitable, smiling. "Amos scarcely allowed me to ride her this afternoon; but forsooth, I guess he was right. She be quite lame. I fear I will have to leave her here and walk home."
"Mayhap your uncle will come before ye leave, Hitty. Then he can give ye a lift across the Valley," responded Mistress Condit.
There was a brief pause, during which the baby stirred. "Oh," begged Mehitable, "do let me take him! The sweet person!"
At her aunt's nod of permission, the girl bent over the cradle and carefully lifted the former's grandson, while Mistress Condit took her foot off the cradle rocker with a grimace of pain.
"It be all cramped," she explained. She studied the baby, a fine, sturdy little fellow of six months, with dispassionate eyes, as he crowed and laughed in the girl's arms.
"Aye, he be a good baby!" acknowledged the grandmother in her sad, crushed voice. "Mayhap, some day, I shall understand, though, why his mother had to give up her life for his, Hitty!"
"How proud Jemima would have been o' him!" exclaimed Mehitable, dancing around the kitchen with the baby. "See, Ira, that be your mother! Throw a kiss to the pretty lady, your mother! So young and so pretty!"
She stopped, as she spoke, before the silhouette of a young girl and held the baby up. The little, wandering eyes, however, did not focus upon the silhouette. Instead, they rolled toward a red apple upon a near-by table.
"That be all he cares!" exclaimed the grandmother bitterly.
"Ah, don't, Aunt Ruth!" protested Mehitable pitifully.
"Nay, Hitty, think me not hard!" Her aunt rose hastily and, coming close to the girl, took the baby out of her arms almost as though she were jealous. "I do love Ira for himself!" She crushed the infant against her, and Mehitable looked to see his mouth draw down in a whimper; but, instead, he laughed. His grandmother, at that, covered his soft round head with kisses and carried him off to be fed.
Presently, she returned with a thick leather portfolio beneath her arm. Replacing the babe in his cradle, where he lay gurgling contentedly after his milk, she swept a clear space upon the table and opened the case.
"I don't believe I ever showed ye the diary my Jemima kept for almost six years," said the bereaved mother softly. "She had written much o' these troublous times, Hitty, and I doubt not little Ira will value this greatly some day. It may even be of interest to others, years hence, who knows!"
Mehitable bent over the diary eagerly. It was contained in a handsome boxlike case and was written in a fine, slanting penmanship which did the country girl who had been her cousin great credit, for this was before the time of dame schools, and only boys were encouraged to seek education.
"Read it, Hitty!" said Mistress Condit. So, stooping lightly, the young girl read aloud an entry.
"'Monday, which was called Training Day. I rode with my Dear father Down to see them train, there Being Several Companyes met together. I thought It would Be a mournful Sight to See, if they had Been fighting in earnest and how Soon they will be Called forth to the field of war we cannot tell, for by. What we Can hear the Quarrels are not Like to be made up Without bloodshed. I have Jest Now heard Say that all hopes of conciliation between Briten and her Colonies are at an end, for Both the King and his Parliament have announced our Destruction; fleets and armies are Preparing with utmost diligence for that Purpose!'"
Mehitable looked up. "That was just before the war, wasn't it?" she asked.
Her aunt, who had been listening with the tears rolling down her cheeks, lifted a knuckly hand to wipe her eyes. "Aye, Hitty," she said simply.
"It brings Jemima back, reading her diary does!" said Mehitable in a hushed voice. "It makes her so real again, Aunt Ruth!"
"Aye," nodded Jemima's mother. "'Tis wonderful!" Her hand patted the diary lovingly.
But Mehitable looked very sober, for she knew, at that moment, that she must tell Aaron Harrison she could not consent to fill her dead cousin's place.
"Ah, no, no!" she cried out silently. "I cannot be second choice, after all!"
Aloud, she said, as she went to find her cape, "Then ye will ask Uncle Dan to bed Dulcie for me? I will come for her soon."
"Aye! Or mayhap Aaron will be here soon—he comes whene'er he can to see his baby," nodded her aunt. "Farewell, Hitty. Come again!"
"Good-bye, little Ira!" Feeling strangely remorseful, Mehitable bent over the cradle again before going out into the wintry dusk.
She found, to her disgust, trudging off down the Swinefield road that led to the settlement of the Mountain Society, that she was not to be alone, for Benjamin Williams, whom she knew to be a bitter partisan of the King, accompanied her willynilly until he turned off at the junction of the First Road with the Swinefield one. As soon as his back was turned, she made a naughty little face after him, and was caught full in the act by a pretty woman, who, followed by a Negro slave, was coming up the road from the direction of the settlement.
"Fie, fie, Hitty!" she laughed.
"Nay, would ye not like to do the same, Mistress Harrison?" demanded Mehitable boldly.
Mistress Katurah Harrison laughed and blushed at that, for it was well known that she was a lady of high spirit. "Mayhap, Hitty, mayhap!" she admitted, still laughing, passing the girl to go on to her home at the foot of the Mountain on the Northfield road.
How lonely we would have thought the girl's homeward way! Occasional farmhouses broke the monotony of field and forest; but always, upon her left, stretched the swamp, dark and mysterious even in winter. Mehitable plodded along uncomplainingly, however, her thoughts dwelling upon the sad fate of Jemima Condit, her cousin, who had found love and motherhood and death all in one short year.
At last, though, she came out of her reverie with a start to find that the dusk had deepened to darkness, that the candles from Master Ned Tomkins's inn at Freemantown shone out warningly. She hastened her steps a trifle, for she knew her mother would worry at a late return. Besides, she disliked passing any public inn, for there were apt to be loiterers who, seeing her alone, might attempt unpleasant gallantries. To her disagreeable urprise, then, as she drew abreast the inn, a party of horsemen issued forth and one of them accosted her.
She started to run, but the young man who had spoken to her ran after her.
"Hitty! Hitty! Are ye daft, then?" called a voice, and glancing over her shoulder, the girl saw that it was her brother, John Condit, who was pursuing her. She stopped abruptly and looked at him crossly.
"Eh, John—ye ought to commend me 'stead o' scolding me!" she protested sharply. She retraced her steps and her tone softened. "What are ye doing here, John?" she exclaimed, a broad smile dawning upon her face.
"I am with His Excellency's party. But why are ye walking alone this late, Hitty?" John kissed her. "His Excellency be looking your way, Hitty," he admonished her.
The girl swept a curtsey in the direction of a massive figure seated upon a horse before the inn. General Washington greeted her kindly and spoke to a slender, sandy-haired young man about to mount his horse near by. "General La Fayette," he said, "this is Mistress Condit, sister o' our aide, Captain Condit, sir."
To Mehitable's secret embarrassment, the young Frenchman bounded off from his horse and dashing over to her, seized and imprinted a kiss upon her hand.
"Mam'zelle, eet is a shame!" he exclaimed. "We have but now finished the so excellent dinner—cabbage and—and—flesh o' the pig. Pork? Ah, yes, cabbage and pork! Eet ees a pity you did not sooner arrive!"
"Master Tomkins did himself proud," remarked John Condit with a quiet smile.
"But why did ye not invite His Excellency to stop at our house, John?" asked Mehitable quickly and reproachfully.
"Nay, it be too much to ask o' any housewife, save in necessity," General Washington answered for John. "We might have gone on to the Widow Ball, whom I call my cousin," he added. "But 'twas better so. Master Tomkins was ready and able to serve us! But come, my child, an ye wish to ride wi' your brother, ye had best mount, for we start!"
"Is General Washington related to the Widow Ball, John—truly?" exclaimed Mehitable as, riding double, they trotted after the other horsemen. "Think o' one o' our own neighbors being his cousin!"
John laughed at the awe in her voice. "He calls her cousin—meeting her and comparing notes wi' her, they think themselves second cousins by marriage through his mother, Mary Ball, and her husband, Timothy Ball," he explained.
"'Tis strange Mary Ball hath not told me aught," remarked Mehitable. "I would ha' spread the news had he been my cousin!"
"Nay, not so!" returned Doctor Condit unsmilingly. "Any more than Mary hath done, for His Excellency's visits there, as everywhere about this Tory-infested country, have been more or less secret! 'Twould be a fine feather in a red-coat's cap to capture him, and rather hard," the young man finished ironically, "upon the Continental Army."
"True!" Mehitable nodded absently.
"But come, Hitty," her brother twisted himself in his saddle to peer into her face, "tell me why art walking?"
Mehitable explained her horse's lameness, and then, gazing over his shoulder at the Frenchman, La Fayette, who was riding directly ahead of them, she uttered a concerned exclamation.
"Why, John, what be the matter with that man?"
"General La Fayette?" He looked at the young Frenchman and suddenly, it seemed to him, too, that the other was riding doubled up in his saddle. John touched his spurs to his horse, and, drawing abreast the young man on the narrow road, asked what was the matter.
La Fayette turned a pallid face toward him. "M'sieu," he groaned, "I fear I have been given the poison!"
"Nay!" answered Doctor Condit reassuringly. "Who would want to poison ye, sir?"
"I have been given the poison, nevertheless!" insisted the Frenchman bitterly.
General Washington's attention now attracted, he turned and rode back to the others, while the rest of his aides immediately drew rein. He also, when informed by Doctor Condit what had happened, shook his head in disbelief at the sick man's conclusion.
"But let us stop here at this house and rest," he suggested kindly.
Mehitable, glancing up, was delighted to find that they had reached her own home. She slipped off from John's horse and flew up the snowy garden path.
"Mother! Cherry! Here be His Excellency!" She burst into the kitchen, startling the quiet family group around the supper table into smiling confusion.
Doctor Condit, supporting La Fayette upon his arm, entered at that moment, followed closely by General Washington.
"Rest here, sir!" commanded Mistress Condit, spreading a blanket upon the settle for the sufferer and "blazing" the fire in her capable way. "I will ha' a cup o' hot water for him, John, as soon as e'er it boils!"
In a moment or so, then, the young Frenchman was sipping the hot water, exclaiming, between groans, upon his hostess's kindness. Half an hour passed, then General La Fayette got to his feet and weakly saluted his chief.
"I have made ze recovery!" he announced. "It was but the indigestion—ees that what you say, madam?—aftair all." He looked around the group of smiling, friendly faces and his eyes met Mehitable's whimsically. "I was not given ze poison! I send my apologies to ze good host!" And he blew lightly upon his fingers and waved them in the direction of Freemantown and Master Ned Tomkins.