Chapter VI Guests
Meanwhile the travellers were approaching their destination. They had compared the Hudson River with the Thames and the Rhine, and were now watching the forest tracts and the streams choked with logs awaiting the elements.
“Uncle Nelson,” said Lord Canning, “this is the first time in my rememberance that I have visited people I did not know well, in a country I have never seen.”
Lord Stafford glanced sleepily at his nephew from under his tweed travelling cap. They were in the smoking car. “There’s a charm about everything fresh and new,” he murmured. “That’s what you’re always saying, Thurston.”
“There certainly is,” said the other, eagerly. “I realize it in this fresh, young, healthy country. It has given me many new sensations. I felt quite old when I first came here—”
“Old!” repeated Lord Stafford. “You?”
“Just turned forty, my hair commencing to grey.” Lord Canning laughed, and then sighed. “Yes,” he continued, smoking thoughtfully, “there is nothing like fresh scenes. They give new food for the mind—another impetus to life—a man like myself needs such a stimulus—if I should continue to rust in England, I would shortly become—antiquated. Do you notice that the trees are for the most part conical in shape, Uncle Nelson?”
“You always were a restless character, Thurston.”
“Nature designed me for an explorer.”
“You’ll never be satisfied until you undertake that expedition to the pole—”
“Never—unless—”
“Unless what?”
“A new interest should arise in my life—necessarily something very absorbing.”
“I know of nothing, except—perhaps—a woman. And as for that, every mamma in England has despaired of you.”
Lord Canning laughed heartily, and his uncle yawned and closed his eyes, considering he had satisfactorily disposed of the subject.
“We are strangers to our host,” recommenced Lord Canning, after a short survey of the vanishing prospect. “The invitation was necessarily off-hand, but very hearty.”
“They do everything in an off-hand way, over here,” said Lord Stafford, “at least, so it seems to me.”
“We have been travelling too much to judge very correctly of manners and customs,” answered his nephew. “And have we met the entire family?”
“I believe so.”
“Mrs. Bunker—”
“Mrs. Bunker!” exclaimed Lord Stafford, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. “Isn’t she a lively woman?”
“Mr. and Mrs. Stillwater and daughter.”
“The little girl,” said Lord Stafford, sinking back on the cushions, “the little, blonde girl, who had plenty to say for herself.”
“She did not really say so much,” returned Lord Canning, taking out another cigar. “It was how she said it.”
“Well, she conveyed the impression that she was not backward,” remarked Lord Stafford.
“By the way, Uncle,” the younger man lit his cigar, laughing amusedly. “Did I ever tell you of a peculiar dream I once had?”
“Dream?”
“About Miss Stillwater.”
“Have you been dreaming about that little girl?”
“Didn’t I tell you? I thought I had.”
“Ha, ha, ha! You’ve been dreaming about little Miss Stillwater—that’s rich.”
“Well, wait until you hear it. Then you’ll have good reason to laugh. It was quite too absurd.”
“Well.”
“The night before we started for the West—the night we met Mrs. Bunker at the Waldorf Hotel, in New York—”
“Mrs. Bunker—one never knows what that woman is going to say next—she is so—”
“She introduced us to the family, and Miss Stillwater and I had some conversation—not much, but quite enough, as you will see—about bears.”
“Bears?”
“She had been used to shooting them, in the Rocky Mountains.”
“The little girl—the blonde one?”
“The little blonde one,” repeated Lord Canning, with a softer intonation. “Well, I dreamt I saw her riding on the back of a grizzly, over the highest peak of the Rocky Mountains. She was in full evening dress, and on seeing me, she hilariously waved a bunch of hyacinths—she carried those flowers the night I met her.”
“Mrs. Bunker had carnations—I took one—ha, ha, ha!”
“I was on my knees examining strata. When I saw the lady riding towards me, I rose and bowed profoundly. But she returned my polite salute by throwing her bouquet directly in my face—I felt the blow, I smelt the hyacinths—then I awoke—before the lady apologized, allowing that she had that intention. It was all so absurd and incongruous, and yet so distinct. Miss Stillwater looked as natural as life, and sat the bear in such a graceful fashion—she might have been riding a finely bred horse in Hyde Park.”
Lord Stafford, listening with closed eyes, made an articulate noise. Whether it was expressive of wonder, disbelief, or ridicule, it was difficult to say.
“But what I consider most remarkable, is that I saw the Rockies very much as I saw them in reality, later on. I explain this on the score of—suggestion. Miss Stillwater has spent some time in the Rockies. Naturally, our conversation recalled them to her mind, and she, of course, unconsciously suggested them to me. It was quite—psychic.”
“Nightmare,” murmured Lord Stafford, sleepily, “what did you eat for supper?”
“I don’t know,” said Lord Canning, disgustedly. “Don’t attribute everything to what one eats.”
“You will, when you’re my age. Now it’s ‘suggestion’, and ‘quite psychic.’ If that little, dainty, yellow-haired Miss Assurance had been an unattractive, elderly person, she wouldn’t have suggested a pin’s worth to you—beyond the fact that she was ugly. I must say, I never heard you go on like that before, Thurston.”
“Go on like what?”
“Oh, about your dreams. Only old women tell their dreams. Ha, ha, ha!”
“You are quite mistaken, Uncle Nelson, dreams have been made the subject of scientific research.”
“Oh, poppycock! You’ll be telling fortunes in a tea cup next, ha, ha, ha!”
“I am glad you are amused, Uncle Nelson.”
“I am—it’s rich—ha, ha, ha, ha!—Ha, ha, ha, ha! Thurston, will you oblige me, and tell when there’s anything to look at beside these interminable forests? I’m going to nap a little.”
Lord Canning resumed his watch at the window. “Beautiful forests,” he thought, “for the most part untouched and untrammelled. We seem to be plunging deeper and deeper into a virgin region. I feel strangely expectant, as though something were awaiting me there. Something that I have hitherto missed in my life—my sober, colorless life—awaiting me there. If I should tell Uncle Nelson this, he would ask me what I had eaten for lunch.”
In a little while he became conscious that the train was slackening speed and felt the exhilaration, of most people, at the idea of being transported higher than the ordinary level.
“Uncle Nelson!”
“Yes.”
“There is something else.”
“What?”
“Clouds—ha, ha, ha, ha!”
Lord Stafford looked disgustedly out at the scurrying white masses.
“Do you want h’anything, your Lordship?”
“It’s about time you showed up, Flash. Unstrap that plaid—it’s beastly cold.”
“It h’is, your Lordship—compared to the ’eat in New York,” carefully tucking Lord Stafford into the plaid. Flash was a young fellow, of the ordinary English cockney type.
The train labored on painfully up into the heart of the mountains. Lord Stafford slept while his nephew smoked and mused, watching the clouds, barely perceptible now in the fading light.
They felt a jerk, the train stopped suddenly. Flash put his head in, “We’re a h’our and a ’alf late, your Lordship. We won’t h’arrive until h’eight o’clock.”
“What an infernal nuisance.”
“H’any h’orders, your Lordship?”
“Get out!”
When they finally arrived it was pitch black night, no moon nor stars. The rude little station was lit by torches flaming in the mist and wind. Beyond, impenetrable darkness. A storm was brewing over the mountains. Haller’s face, as he greeted the travellers with one of his contortions, looked weird in the torchlight. They followed him out to the wagon, in which they sank with a sigh of relief. The trip, with the delay, had been tedious. Haller whipped the ponies up briskly. The wagon careered recklessly from side to side as they drove, and the wind drove the mist into their faces.
“I suppose you know your road, my good man?” said Lord Stafford.
“There’s no risk of falling over a precipice or anything of that kind, is there? It’s so confoundedly black.”
Haller chuckled. “Them ponies know the’re way—the’ve been bred up in these parts. I’d trust them sooner’n myself.”
“Indeed!” said Lord Canning.
“Is this our destination?” asked Lord Stafford, as they stopped at the landing.
“Oh, we ain’t no ways near thar yet,” said Haller, with another chuckle. He raised a lantern and showed them “The Indiana” waiting at the dock, the lake lapping against her sides.
“Must we get in that?” said Stafford, peering out into the darkness of the lake.
“Waal, yes; if you want ter go to Camp Indiana. It’s at the far end of the lake.”
“Camp Indiana!” repeated Lord Canning to himself. “After her, of course. They have a curious faculty over here, of naming people after places and vice versa.”
“What sort of a boat is this ’ere, my man?” asked Flash, after they were installed and on their way.
“Naptha launch.”
“No danger of explosion?” he asked, cheerily.
“Waal, yer never can tell—yer never can tell.”
Lord Canning laughed heartily. As they puffed along, the wind commenced to wail dismally, echoed by the mountains, until it seemed as though a pack of wild beasts were howling in the night. At intervals a camp fire enlivened the prospect, blazing cheerily down on the shore. The shadow-dance of the flames on the water, together with the outlines of human forms feeding the fire, produced a fantastic effect on the travellers. At Camp Indiana an enormous fire had been kindled to welcome the guests. The boat-house was lit up with different colored lanterns. Haller shouted as they passed in the dock, and was answered by William, who hurried down and assisted the disembarking. Haller, holding the lantern, lit them up to the camp. A flood of light streamed from the open door, in which Mrs. Bunker stood.
“Well, here you are at last—so glad to see you.”
She shook hands with them vigorously.
“My man Flash,” said Lord Stafford.
“Kitty, show Mr. Flash the gentlemen’s rooms. What a nuisance the train was late. The world stops when one comes up here.”
Mrs. Stillwater met them in the hall. “I’m so pleased you have come,” she said in her soft gracious voice.
“Thank you, Mrs. Stillwater.”
“How do you do, Lord Canning?” said Indiana with a hearty shake of the hand. “Too bad the train was late. It’s what you must expect in these primitive parts.”
Lord Canning looked about him, receiving the impression of warmth, light and luxury, but no sign of primitiveness. Coming out of the darkness and the wind, into the brilliant hall, he was a little dazzled, and for the moment was at a loss for something to say to Indiana. He stared at the brilliant little figure standing near the fire, the flames reflecting red lights from her dress on her laughing face and her yellow hair, with the Persian rug for a background. “An Arabian night’s vision,” he thought.
“It’s a tedious trip,” said Indiana. “You must be starved to death.”
“I am so interested in my surroundings, that I can plead no sense of fatigue,” answered Lord Canning.
“This is a jolly fire,” said Lord Stafford. “It’s like a glimpse of heaven here, after that awful black night.”
Mrs. Bunker shortly led the way to the dining room, where a shaded red drop-light threw a rosy glow on the well-equipped table, upon which reposed a centrepiece of wild ferns. The easy, natural manner of the hostesses soon made their guests feel perfectly at home.
“Don’t hesitate to smoke, gentlemen!” exclaimed Mrs. Bunker, after dinner. “This is Liberty Hall.”
“We didn’t expect this, Mrs. Bunker,” said Lord Stafford, as they walked through the rooms, “when you invited us to ’rough it’ with you in the woods.”
“I assure you, Lord Stafford, that we consider this camping out,” laughed Mrs. Bunker. “Now which chair are you going to take? This one is comfortable. Place it near the fire.”
“Very artistic and most original,” said Lord Canning, surveying his surroundings. “I have never seen anything like it.”
There was a note of simplicity in all this luxury, even to the dress of the ladies, which struck him agreeably. Indiana sat in the midst of the group, talking and laughing unreservedly. Lord Canning, leaning back in a large armchair smoking his cigar, listened attentively, trying to find some clue to her character in the careless words. He finally realized this was foolish. She was evidently little more than a child, with no deep realization of life, as yet; a child with her own charm. There was no doubt of that. He gazed deeper and deeper into the fire.
“Lord Canning, you are so absorbed in the fire the rest of us might be jealous,” said Indiana.
“There is no occasion for jealousy,” he answered, looking directly at her. “But the fire is certainly fascinating—and productive of thought. I have a recollection of another, outside, which welcomed us very cheerfully, when we arrived. Is it still burning?”
“Oh yes,” said Indiana, “our camp fire is still burning.”
“I should like to see it, may I?”
“Certainly,” said Indiana rising, “Lord Stafford, are you also curious?”
“Oh Miss Stillwater, I’m so comfortable, don’t ask me to go out again! this is such a charming fire. Now Mrs. Bunker, let me poke it. This is the way we do it in England.”
“Run along, Indiana,” said Mrs. Bunker, sweetly.
Without, the night was still black, but the storm had not yet broken. The fire down on the shore lit up the lake and the boat-house. Haller and William were throwing on logs, and in the red glare Kitty could be seen standing, talking volubly to Flash, who listened with deferential interest.
“The boat-house looks very pretty in this light,” said Lord Canning.
“There’s such a cozy room in it with a fire,” asserted Indiana. “We’ve had rare, old times there. We go down nights, and make things in chafing dishes.”
“What a novel idea! And is there a fire burning there now?”
“Oh, yes! The guides keep the fires always going—when it’s cold.”
“I should like to see this cozy room, where you make things in chafing dishes. May I?”
“Certainly. Be careful, Lord Canning! It’s pitch dark, and you don’t know the way! There! I knew you’d stumble—you’d better take my hand.”
“I—I really think I had better,” said Lord Canning, helplessly.