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"There won't be any great amount of sewing done for the poor heathen," remarked one good old lady, with a lump of maple-sugar in one hand, and a kruller in the other. "What's more, all their appetites'll be spiled, and they won't enjoy eatin' any thing."
Some afterwards seemed really to have suffered that injury, but not the majority, by any means. The later arrivals, especially, came hungry. All the latter part of that afternoon seemed to be one pretty steady-going dinner or supper. The ladies of the society poured right out into the kitchen to help aunt Judith, till she begged that no more should come at once than could stand around the stove.
It was well that there should be a sugar-bush, or some sort of excitement, to keep a part of that gathering out of doors. The house was full enough at all times; and before sunset the knots of merry people scattered around among the maple-trees and kettles discovered why Vosh Stebbins had persisted in carrying his gun out there every day since the work began.
Vosh had dreamed of such a thing, and had been almost half afraid of it; but he had hoped in his heart that it might come, and the peaceful course of events had disappointed him. He was getting ready to start for the house that day, gun and all, when he heard somebody scream, away up near the farthest clump of sugar-trees, —
"Bear, bear, bear! There's a bear drinking sap!"
Ever so many voices were raised at once to announce to everybody the arrival of that ferocious wild animal, recently waked from his winter's nap. They told of the dreadful thing he was doing, and suggested other dreadful things that he might do. He might eat up the society.
"They generally come at night," said the deacon calmly, "but they are very apt to visit a sugar-bush. They're fond of sap."
"Where's Susie? Where's Pen?" exclaimed Vosh. Then he remembered that they and a whole party of village girls were up there near those very trees, and he ran as if his life depended on it.
"Steady, Vosh. Not so fast. I'm a-coming."
There was the deacon panting behind him, axe in hand; and behind him was the hired man with his axe, and away behind him were three or four sturdy farmers following with no better weapons than sled-stakes.
Port and Corry were with the girls, and it had been a wonder how quickly the last girl and boy to be seen had gotten behind a tree. They were all now peering out for a look at the bear, and Penelope declared of him, —
"He's the largest bear in the world. He's awful!"
Not all of them were where they could see him, and he was making no effort at all to see them, but his offence was that he had come. No doubt but he had been a little scared at first, when the girls began to scream; but he was hungry and thirsty, and he was fond of sap, and he took courage. There were all those troughs ready for him, and he could not think of going away without a good drink.
Besides, the bear could not see that any of those young ladies seemed disposed to come any nearer, and he had not been introduced to one of them. So he overcame any bashfulness, and put his nose into another sap-trough, and it was empty in a twinkling. He served another in the same way, and was going ahead quite contentedly, nearer and nearer the girls that were afraid to run. At least half a dozen were braver, and ran remarkably well towards the kettles. Port and Corry, behind their trees, were longing for all sorts of weapons, when they saw something well worth seeing.
The bear stood still suddenly; for a dark-eyed, plucky-looking boy, with something in his hands, stood right in the way.
"What are you loaded with, Vosh?" shouted the deacon. "Nothing but buckshot? It's risky."
"Buckshot, and two slugs in each barrel."
"That's better. He's turned a little. Take him in the shoulder."
"Bang, bang!" was the reply made by the gun. It was close work, and not many of the leaden missiles wandered from their broad black target.
The bear was mortally wounded, but he instantly gathered his remaining strength for a charge. The furiously angry growl he gave sent a thrill and chill through all the bones of the scattered spectators.
Right past Vosh at that moment sprang the deacon; and he met the bear halfway, like the brave old borderer that he was. He was a master-hand with an axe, and its keen edge fell with a thud squarely between the eyes of the ferocious animal. It sank in as if the bear's head had been the side of a hickory, and there was no need of any second blow.
The bear was dead; and all the sugar makers and eaters could cluster around and make remarks upon him, and praise Vosh Stebbins and the deacon.
"Pen!" exclaimed Susie, "what will his mother say of him now?"
"Why, they'll skin him, and it'll make the beautifullest kind of a buffalo-robe."
Pen was thinking of the bear only; and Vosh had at once reloaded and shouldered his gun, and walked away. He was ready for another bear, but felt pretty sure that none would come. Port and Corry gave up going to the house for guns and coming back again, and all the young ladies seemed to think it must be near supper-time. They carried the news to Mrs. Stebbins, and it was all but provoking that she should take it very much as a matter of course. If any bear came to be killed, it was as natural as life that her boy should kill him. He was a young fellow from whom uncommon things were to be commonly expected.
After the adventure with the bear, the sewing society was a greater success than before. It went right on until late into the evening, but the success of it was not in the sewing that was done. The only heathen for whom much was accomplished was probably the bear himself.
Susie Hudson said to her brother at last, "I don't care, Port, it beats a city party all to pieces. There's ever so much more real enjoyment. I want to live in the country."
"Oh, well, I like it in winter. It's well enough. You've been out here in summer too."
"It's twice as good then."
"No, Susie, it can't be. It must be all hard work in summer. But think of the fun we've had!"
She did; and late in the evening Vosh Stebbins stepped up to her, and whispered, —
"May I see you home? The cutter's waiting at the door. All the rest are getting ready to start."
"I've got to say good-by to them all, I suppose."
"Go round and say it now. I don't want to sleigh-ride anybody else. They've all got company."
That was the reason why, a little afterwards, Vosh Stebbins's mother could not find him. He and Susie were jingling over the snow behind the sorrel colt, and it was a long way home before they returned to the house.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE FLOOD AND THE END
It was well for all who were fond of sleighing, to make the best use of their time. A great many people had had enough, and were even eager to see the snow depart. There was a great deal of it to go, and the weather took an unexpected part in the matter. The sun came out with a power that had in it something peculiar, and made all human beings feel drowsy, heavy, listless, and disposed to take boneset-tea. The older they were, the more black and bitter was the boneset they called for; and aunt Judith manufactured some uncommonly good root-beer to go with it. So far as the young people were concerned, the root-beer went much more rapidly than the boneset.
Then arrived two whole days of warm and heavy rain; and, when the sun came out again, he had an altered landscape to look down upon. All the hillsides were streaming with torrents of water, and every hollow was a pond. The roads were channels of temporary rivulets, and the river in the valley had swollen until its fetters were breaking. The ice in the mill-pond cracked and lifted until the water broke out over the dam. That relieved the pressure for a few hours, until the huge cakes of ice got in a hurry, and began to climb upon each others' shoulders. They rapidly built up a dam of their own, right on top of the old one, and the water sent back up stream for more ice. As fast as the new supplies came down, they were heaped up, right and left and centre; and no engineer could have done the work better, so far as increasing the size of the mill-pond was concerned. It grew tremendously, and the sun toiled at the snow-banks on the hillsides, all along the banks of that river away up into the mountains, to send down more snow-water for the big spread in Benton Valley.
"Sarah," said Deacon Farnham at about the middle of the second forenoon, "if this thing keeps on, it'll drown out the village."
"Has the water got there yet?" she asked. "Is it rising?"
"Rising! Guess it is. I'll hitch up the team after dinner, and we'll go and take a look at it."
When Pen and Corry came home at noon, they reported that school was dismissed for the day; and Pen explained it, —
"She said the Flood was coming again, but I don't believe it is."
"Not Noah's Flood," said her father; "but enough might come to carry away the school-house. I can't say what they're going to do about it."
The story Vosh told at home brought Mrs. Stebbins over after dinner, and there was a full sleigh-load driven down to see the sights.
Susie and Port were to have one more experience of winter life in the country, and it was one they would not have missed for any thing. The mill-pond was away below the village, and there was another up towards Cobbleville that was said to be nearly as badly off. As the water had risen, it had set back and back, until now the low-lying lands were a great lake with houses and barns sticking up from it. Deacon Farnham drove on down towards the village, and all the tongues in the sleigh grew more and more silent. Aunt Judith had already told all there was to tell about the great flood when she was a girl, and when they had to live without flour or meal. The story sounded much more real now, for the first man they met said to them, —
"If the ice goes on packing up there at the dam, the mill and all will break away before midnight."
"Are they trying to do any thing to loosen the pack?" asked Vosh.
"They can't get at it to pick at it, and it's wuth any man's life to try. The water's in the main street now."
"What if the upper dam should give way?" asked the deacon.
"Well, if the ice there and the dam should give way all at once, and come down in a heap, there wouldn't be much left of Benton."
They drove on down the road to the right, towards what had been the lower level of the coasting-hill, where the sleds darted out upon the pond. They could see the whole thing now, and the long ridge of ice with the flood surging and rising against it, and filling up every lower place with fresh material. The water was still pouring over the pack at the upper dam, the deacon said, or no more ice and snow would be coming down.
"Mr. Farnham!" suddenly exclaimed Vosh Stebbins, "I wish I had money enough to pay for a keg of blasting-powder."
"What for, Vosh?"
"Don't you see? You can get to the second floor of the mill, right across those logs. If a keg of powder could be shoved out on the pack, and left there with a slow-match burning, I could get back before it went off."
"I'll pay for the powder," said the deacon as he turned his team towards the village, and Mrs. Stebbins gasped, —
"O Vosh! Lavawjer!"
She sat still, and looked a little white for a moment, and then the color came to her face, and there was a sort of flash in her eyes as she said slowly and steadily, —
"Just you try it on. Your father would have done it any day. Levi Stebbins was a soldier, and he never flinched any thing in all his life."
"Joshaway," said aunt Judith with a bit of a tremor in her voice, "I want to pay for that powder myself. He can buy two kegs if he needs 'em."
The water was nearly a foot deep in front of Rosenstein's store when the sleigh came splashing along. The whole village was boiling with excitement, in spite of the fact that the flood was all of ice-water.
"Powder? Going to blow up dot ice?" said Mr. Rosenstein doubtfully; but he hurried to bring out a keg of it, and a long line of fuze.
"Now, Vosh. No time to lose. You mustn't run any needless risk, but I believe you can do it. I'll go as far as into the mill with you."
"Joshua," said Mrs. Farnham, "will he need help? His weight's a good deal lighter than yours."
"We'll see about it when we get there. That pack has got to be broken: so has the one at the upper dam."
They were once more on the hill-road, and nearing the point of danger. Great piles of saw-logs, ready for the saw-mill, had accumulated on the slope between the mill and what was now the shore; and already quite a number of adventurers had crossed upon them to the building itself, and back again. Not a soul had cared to remain more than a minute, and none had ventured beyond.
"Go, Joshua," said Mrs. Farnham. "He'll need advice, if he doesn't need any thing else."
Corry took the reins, and his father and Vosh stepped out. There were thirty or forty men and boys standing around and watching the flood, and all were eager to know what was coming; but the answers given them had a short, gruff sound, as if uttered by somebody too much in earnest to talk.
"Right along, Vosh," said the deacon. "The logs are firm enough."
So they were, and it was easy to climb through an open window into the second story of the mill. Through all the lower floor the water was rushing and gurgling, and the building shook all over as if it were chilly.
An opposite window was reached, and there before them was the ice-pack. Only at one point, beyond the centre, was there any water going over it; and it seemed only too strong and solid.
"As far out as you can, Vosh," said the deacon. "Put it into a hole of some kind, if you can."
Without a word of comment or reply, the brave boy crept through the window, and let himself down upon the ice, and the keg was handed him.
"Use the whole length of the fuze," said the deacon. "You'll have time enough."
"Mr. Farnham," said Vosh, "you go back right away, now."
"I don't know but what it's my duty. Do yours quick, Vosh."
He was every way disposed to obey that suggestion. The roar of the waters, the strange sensation of the presence of great peril, and even the idea that so many people were looking at him, made the situation one from which he was in a hurry to get away. Nearly in the middle of the pack he came to a deep crevice between the heaps of glimmering ice, and into it he lowered his little barrel of explosive meal. He had made it all ready, fixing the end of the fuze in its proper place, and now he led the line back over comparatively dry ice.
"Nothing to put it out," he muttered; "and they said it was water-proof, anyhow."
A stream of people, on foot and in sleighs, had followed that undertaking from the moment when the news of it began to buzz around the village, and a full hundred had now gathered on the slope opposite the mill. They saw Vosh Stebbins scratch a match on his coat-sleeve, and stoop down; and then they saw him turn, and walk swiftly away towards the mill.
"It's all right, deacon!" he shouted. "She's a-burning!"
"Come on, Vosh. Hurry up. I just couldn't go ashore till you got back."
Vosh replied with a ringing laugh that had a world of excitement in it. He followed the deacon back through the mill, and across the perilous bridge of floating logs; and there on the shore stood Susie Hudson, and her aunts, and his mother, but Penelope was the only one who said any thing.
"Vosh," she asked, "did you lose all your powder and your string?"
"Guess I have," replied he; and then it was Adonijah Bunce who remarked, —
"Didn't quite do it, did ye?"
"Hold on a minute," said Mr. Farnham. "It was a long fuze."
It seemed as if everybody held their breaths till it must hurt them; but, just when they could not do it any longer, a great sheet of smoke and flame shot up from the middle of the ice-pack. It was followed by a dull, heavy report, and by flying fragments of ice.
Had it accomplished any thing? – that was the question in all minds; but it was only a moment before there was another crash, and another. The barrier had been blown away to such a thinness that the pressure from above was sufficient to break it through. The flood rushed forward into the widening channel with a surge and a plunge, and away went the river again, roaring down its half-deserted bed below. More of the cakes of ice to the right and left, now no longer wedged and self-supporting, were swiftly torn away, and the gap so opened could not be closed again.
"I just knew he'd do it," said Mrs. Stebbins proudly, as the round of cheers died away after the explosion and crash. "His father would ha' done it."
There were plenty to congratulate Vosh; but he and the rest got into the sleigh again, and drove back towards the village. Even before they reached it, the waters were manifestly receding a little, and, when they again stopped in front of Mr. Rosenstein's store, it was pretty well understood that the first peril was over.
"Now for the pack at the upper dam!" shouted the deacon. "It's safe to make a hole in it, now our pack is broken. – I want to pay for that powder, Mr. Rosenstein. I was in such a hurry, I forgot it."
"Dot's joost vot I did," replied the merchant. "You bays for no powder for dot boy. He safe de village. I deals not in pork."
There was a cheer for Mr. Rosenstein; and a dozen men set off towards the upper dam with more powder, and a new idea.
"We have done enough for one day," said Deacon Farnham after he had seen that squad set out. "We can afford to go home. – Mrs. Stebbins, you and Vosh can take dinner with us, and Susie and Port can read their letters."
All were entirely willing, and the team headed for home as if they were conscious of having done something for the public good. The village post-office was kept in Mr. Rosenstein's store, and that was one reason why the letters had been received in such an hour of excitement. They were not read until after the arrival at the farmhouse, for every one in that sleigh was looking back into the valley to see whether or not the flood was visibly subsiding. Even after they reached the house, Vosh said he felt as if he were about to hear the explosion at the upper dam. He did not hear it; but the ice there was blown open, nevertheless, and the river had a fair chance to carry all its surplus down stream, and melt it up instead of making dams of it.
Porter Hudson was the first to tear open an envelope.
"Susie!" he shouted almost instantly, "mother's got home."
Her fingers were busy with her own letter for a moment, and then she turned to Mrs. Farnham.
"Aunt Sarah!"
"O Susie! I know what you mean. They want you at home."
"Yes," said aunt Judith, "I suppose we've got to say good-by to 'em pretty soon."
"And there's no winter at all in the city," said Port. "No snow to be seen, and some of the buds are beginning to show."
The letters had a powerful effect upon all the gathering around that dinner-table; and Pen thought she had settled the difficulty, or nearly so, when she broke a long silence with, —
"They might just as well all come up here and live. There's room for 'em all, and it's ever so much better than the city is."
There was no immediate haste called for, but winter was over. Word came from the village in the morning, that the flood was going down fast, and the mill was entirely safe, and that everybody was talking about the feat performed by Vosh Stebbins. It looked as if Mr. Farnham's part of it was a little neglected, and Pen remarked with some jealousy, —
"Father got the powder, and all Vosh did was to touch it off."
Everybody seemed to feel blue that evening, for some reason; and the thaw carried away almost all the snow there was left, with hardly a remark being made about it. The fire in the sitting-room burned low, and no fresh logs were heaped upon it. Susie sat in front of it, and remembered a summer day when she had seen nothing there but polished andirons, and branches of fennel.
"Port," said Corry almost mournfully, "I do hope you've had a good time. We all want you to come again."
"Good time! Tell you what, Corry, I won't come up here unless you'll come and visit us in the city. I've been thinking over lots of things I could show you and Pen. I've had the biggest kind of a time."
"You must come up some time in summer," said aunt Judith. "The country is beautiful then. Better fishing, hunting – all sorts of fun."
"I guess there isn't any thing better than winter fun," said Susie thoughtfully. "I do like the country at any time of the year."
Vosh Stebbins and his mother also sat in front of their sitting-room fireplace, and were uncommonly still and sober.
"Mother," said he at last, "I've had the greatest winter I ever did have. There's been any amount of fun in it, but seems to me there's been a good deal more."
"Yes," said his mother, "they've been right good company, and I'm real sorry to hev 'em go; but it's time they went, and her mother's health's come back to her. She's one of the best of women, I haven't the least doubt in the world. I never seen a girl I took to more'n I hev to Susie Hudson, and I hope she and Port'll come up here again; and I've been a-findin' out how much it'll cost to hev you go to college, and you've got to jest study up and go."
"Mother!" That was all he could say; for his mind had been playing chess with that problem since he did not know exactly when, and he had not dared to speak of it.
One week later the Farnham and Stebbins farmhouses felt smaller and lonelier, and Penelope teased for a pen and ink, remarking, —
"If I write to Susie right away, it may get there almost as soon as she does, and she won't have to wait for it to come."
The rest of the family and their neighbors had their hands full of spring work, and had no time to think much of their recent visitors; but their visitors were thinking of them. A lady and gentleman in a city home were listening to prolonged and full accounts of their children's winter in the country, and every now and then the gentleman exclaimed, —
"Vosh Stebbins again!" At the end of it all, he said to his wife, —
"My dear, did you know that youngsters of that kind were scarce? I must keep an eye on him. Susie says he's to have an education. Got a good beginning for one now, I should say. If he should go straight, there's no telling what he might do. He can graduate from college into my office, if he wishes to. I knew his father, and his mother's as good as gold."
"Hurrah!" shouted Port. "Then Vosh can kill his bears in the city. How'd you like that, Susie? I'd like it."
Susie only turned to her mother, and asked, —
"What do you think, mother?"
"I? Oh, we will have plenty of time to think it over. We can go up there and visit, and we can have them down here."
Nevertheless Vosh did go to college, and he did pass from it to Mr. Hudson's law-office; and it is true, to this day, that nobody can tell what he will do, he is doing so much and so well.