登陆注册
5383200000028

第28章 THE NOLLICHUCKY TRACE(1)

Some to endure, and many to quail, Some to conquer, and many to fail, Toiling over the Wilderness Trail.

As long as I live I shall never forget the morning we started on our journey across the Blue Wall.Before the sun chased away the filmy veil of mist from the brooks in the valley, the McChesneys, father, mother, and children, were gathered to see us depart.And as they helped us to tighten the packsaddles Tom himself had made from chosen tree-forks, they did not cease lamenting that we were going to certain death.Our scrawny horses splashed across the stream, and we turned to see a gaunt and lonely figure standing apart against the sun, stern and sorrowful.We waved our hands, and set our faces towards Kaintuckee.

Tom walked ahead, rifle on shoulder, then Polly Ann;and lastly I drove the two shaggy ponies, the instruments of husbandry we had been able to gather awry on their packs,--a scythe, a spade, and a hoe.I triumphantly carried the axe.

It was not long before we were in the wilderness, shut in by mountain crags, and presently Polly Ann forgot her sorrows in the perils of the trace.Choked by briers and grapevines, blocked by sliding stones and earth, it rose and rose through the heat and burden of the day until it lost itself in the open heights.As the sun was wearing down to the western ridges the mischievous sorrel mare turned her pack on a sapling, and one of the precious bags burst.In an instant we were on our knees gathering the golden meal in our hands.Polly Ann baked journeycakes on a hot stone from what we saved under the shiny ivy leaves, and scarce had I spancelled the horses ere Tom returned with a fat turkey he had shot.

``Was there ever sech a wedding journey!'' said Polly Ann, as we sat about the fire, for the mountain air was chill.``And Tom and Davy as grave as parsons.Ye'd guess one of you was Rutherford himself, and the other Mr.Boone.''

No wonder he was grave.I little realized then the task he had set himself, to pilot a woman and a lad into a country haunted by frenzied savages, when single men feared to go this season.But now he smiled, and patted Polly Ann's brown hand.

``It's one of yer own choosing, lass,'' said he.

``Of my own choosing!'' cried she.``Come, Davy, we'll go back to Grandpa.''

Tom grinned.

``I reckon the redskins won't bother us till we git by the Nollichucky and Watauga settlements,'' he said.

``The redskins!'' said Polly Ann, indignant; ``I reckon if one of 'em did git me he'd kiss me once in a while.''

Whereupon Tom, looking more sheepish still, tried to kiss her, and failed ignominiously, for she vanished into the dark woods.

``If a redskin got you here,'' said Tom, when she had slipped back, ``he'd fetch you to Nick-a-jack Cave.''

``What's that?'' she demanded.

``Where all the red and white and yellow scalawags over the mountains is gathered,'' he answered.And he told of a deep gorge between towering mountains where a great river cried angrily, of a black cave out of which a black stream ran, where a man could paddle a dugout for miles into the rock.The river was the Tennessee, and the place the resort of the Chickamauga bandits, pirates of the mountains, outcasts of all nations.And Dragging Canoe was their chief.

It was on the whole a merry journey, the first part of it, if a rough one.Often Polly Ann would draw me to her and whisper: ``We'll hold out, Davy.He'll never now.'' When the truth was that the big fellow was going at half his pace on our account.He told us there was no fear of redskins here, yet, when the scream of a painter or the hoot of an owl stirred me from my exhausted slumber, I caught sight of him with his back to a tree, staring into the forest, his rifle at his side.The day was dawning.

``Turn about's fair,'' I expostulated.

``Ye'll need yere sleep, Davy,'' said he, ``or ye'll never grow any bigger.

``I thought Kaintuckee was to the west,'' I said, ``and you're making north.'' For I had observed him day after day.We had left the trails.Sometimes he climbed tree, and again he sent me to the upper branches, whence I surveyed a sea of tree-tops waving in the wind, and looked onward to where a green velvet hollow lay nestling on the western side of a saddle-backed ridge.

``North!'' said Tom to Polly Ann, laughing.``The little devil will beat me at woodcraft soon.Ay, north, Davy.I'm hunting for the Nollichucky Trace that leads to the Watauga settlement.''

It was wonderful to me how he chose his way through the mountains.Once in a while we caught sight of a yellow blaze in a tree, made by himself scarce a month gone, when he came southward alone to fetch Polly Ann.

Again, the tired roan shied back from the bleached bones of a traveller, picked clean by wolves.At sundown, when we loosed our exhausted horses to graze on the wet grass by the streams, Tom would go off to look for a deer or turkey, and often not come back to us until long after darkness had fallen.

``Davy'll take care of you, Polly Ann,'' he would say as he left us.

And she would smile at him bravely and say, ``I reckon I kin look out for Davy awhile yet.''

But when he was gone, and the crooning stillness set in broken only by the many sounds of the night, we would sit huddled together by the fire.It was dread for him she felt, not for herself.And in both our minds rose red images of hideous foes skulking behind his brave form as he trod the forest floor.Polly Ann was not the woman to whimper.

And yet I have but dim recollections of this journey.

It was no hardship to a lad brought up in woodcraft.Fear of the Indians, like a dog shivering with the cold, was a deadened pain on the border.

Strangely enough it was I who chanced upon the Nollichucky Trace, which follows the meanderings of that river northward through the great Smoky Mountains.

同类推荐
  • 华严融会一乘义章明宗记

    华严融会一乘义章明宗记

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 金刚顶瑜伽护摩仪轨

    金刚顶瑜伽护摩仪轨

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 走马急疳真方

    走马急疳真方

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 律宗新学名句

    律宗新学名句

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 摄大乘义章卷第四

    摄大乘义章卷第四

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 扎克伯格送给男孩最好的礼物

    扎克伯格送给男孩最好的礼物

    《扎克伯格送给男孩的最好礼物》全面揭示了扎克伯格成功的秘诀,深度剖析了扎克伯格式的智慧精髓和人生哲学。领悟扎克伯格给男孩的忠告,你将会发现一个全新的自我。就让我们追随扎克伯格的脚步,去寻找属于自己的那条成功之路吧!
  • 齐世篇

    齐世篇

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 牌局心理学

    牌局心理学

    本书从牌局玩家的心理角度入手进行分析,教会读者打牌的心理技巧,如通过牌友的性格、面部表情和姿势的细微变化来推测对方的底牌,从而提高战胜对手的概率。
  • 余生与你同眠

    余生与你同眠

    【指路古言新书《娘娘她太狂了》】深夜,男人带着保镖闯进她家,俯身让她做出选择:“第一,主动跟我走,第二,我拎着你走!”之后,他甩给她一张雇佣协议,告诉她:“你敢喜欢我,就把这条命留下!”后来……人前,他是阴鸷狠辣的帝国总裁,人后,他是腹黑毒舌的傲娇大佬,对她宠得上天入地无人能及。“此生,我有三个愿望。你出现在我的配偶栏上,我们变成一家三口,生同衾死同穴。”
  • 阳光灿烂的日子(保持学生良好心态的故事全集)

    阳光灿烂的日子(保持学生良好心态的故事全集)

    走进如歌的生命,走过诗意的青春。曾几何时,我们叹息时光的飞逝,叹惋落日的凄美,却任凭美好从身边转瞬即逝。不是青春短暂、岁月苍白,而是我们不曾将它涂上丰富的色彩。何不于喧闹中体会宁静,于繁杂中感受简约,以平静的心情看待得失,以良好的心态面对功利,“不以物喜,不以己悲”才是人生之大境界。
  • 游傀

    游傀

    世人都说天上好,殊不知天上的细枝末节细思极恐,谁说女子不如男,仅凭一己之力,也要来一场天翻地覆...
  • Lorna Doonel

    Lorna Doonel

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 邪魅撒旦的恶魔游戏

    邪魅撒旦的恶魔游戏

    “这是一个恶魔游戏,所有天使禁止参与……”撒旦的歌声在午夜回荡,唤醒了沉睡的夜之魔王,也将恶魔们召集在了一起。“……残垣断壁,乌烟瘴气,所到之处没有生机,黑暗永远笼罩,这是撒旦的权利。”蛊惑人心的歌声再次响起,黑暗肆虐,光明步步失守,天使危已……————此游戏为虚幻的现实。
  • 鸾鸟寻音终相错

    鸾鸟寻音终相错

    彼岸花,花开一千年,花落一千年,花开叶落,叶展花败,花叶生生相错,终不得见。祭音、青鸾的竹马青梅;蓝澈、无期的无瑕璧心;白染、安皓轩的碧落黄泉......你们可都曾记得当初,真的拥有了未来......
  • 爱在摩氏7点8度

    爱在摩氏7点8度

    本书为一部浪漫爱情小说,以玛瑙石头为文眼,描述一段值得纪念的情感。正如作者所言,大漠上,有一种东西,带着千万年的讯息存在,沉睡着,却又等待着被唤起,蠢蠢欲动。距离让我们越发无瑕剔透,“刚好来不及”让我们在回忆中尤其璀璨。遗憾永久存活在最初动人的悸动里,彼此的心里。我将继续爱着大漠的玛瑙石块,犹如爱着你一样。在你永恒的闪闪发亮中,折射出最蠢蠢欲动的挂念。本书为第一届海峡两岸网络原创文学大赛入围作品。