a brown-faced pedlar, his heavy leathern pack sagging wearily from his shoulders, took his shambling way down the winding streets of hopewell and, knocking at every door, offered for sale his stock of needles, thread, bobbins and silk laces. although at other times such a trade was apt to be brisk and few housewives generally failed to bring forth their pennies and sixpences, now he was met with frowning looks and peremptory shakes of the head, wherever he stopped.
“we have no business with your like,” said one old woman, scarcely pausing in her spinning as his stooped shadow fell across her threshold, “we know your real errand and will have none of it.”
he next made a detour across the fields and came to samuel skerry’s little cottage where clotilde still used the loom and kept her spinning-wheels and where she and mother jeanne were at work that morning. if he had any doubts as to the reason of his cold reception at the other houses, all such were swept away when the old frenchwoman stood up in the doorway and spoke her mind.
“begone from here,” she cried, “think you that there is one of us who has not heard of the business that you are about, that you, a skulking tory, and a dozen like you are marching over the whole countryside, telling people that the cause of america is lost and warning them against enlisting in general washington’s army? you can go back and tell your master, andrew shadwell, that our general could go forth alone with his sword in his hand and drive all the redcoat armies and german hirelings and tory loyalists from the country. but he shall have no need so to do, for his army is growing every day, thanks to the recruits new england is sending him. it will not be long before they and our brave general will force you and your like to flee beyond our borders. so, good sir, go ply your trade elsewhere.”
the man made no attempt to stem this tide of eloquence, spoken half in english and half in french, but apparently entirely understood by the object at which it was directed. he stole away without attempting any reply, his shifty little black eyes first taking in every detail of the cottage and all that was to be seen within it. his look, clotilde thought, was one of most evil threatening. she drew a breath of relief when at last his bent form and great pack disappeared at the turn of the lane.
“do you think it was quite wise to anger the man so, mère jeanne?” she questioned, as the older woman, very red in the face, came back to her seat by the loom.
“it is time that some one told those rascals that we understand their evil work and will have none of it,” replied mère jeanne heatedly. “new england is full of them, spreading false reports of lost battles, disaster to our armies and the hopelessness of further effort. that andrew shadwell is at the bottom of all, yet no one can prove his part in it. yes, i did right to speak just so to him.”
“i am not so sure,” returned clotilde gravely. “i liked not the look he gave us before he turned away, and do you know, mère jeanne, i think he was of our race.”
“i thought of that too,” said the old woman, “and i blushed for our kind, although we need not call him a fellow-countryman. he is one of those renegades who are half french, half indian and wholly the evil one’s. the english have been trying to make use of them, but little good will come of it. that poor-spirited animal can never do us harm!”
“i trust not,” said clotilde with a sigh, and went back to her work. there was so much to be done, it was scarcely worth while wasting time in dread of what might happen. too much was already happening every moment.
it was true that, whatever highways and byways the tory pedlars travelled in new england, their efforts against the cause of liberty were of little avail. no matter where they went, stephen sheffield had either been before them or came after to undo their work. people listened to him eagerly wherever he went; he stopped at cottage doors, he spoke in market places, he held meetings at country crossroads and convinced men everywhere that now, if ever, they must throw all they had into the struggle for freedom. and everywhere men heard him, they turned away to say good-bye to their wives, to shoulder their old muskets and set forth to join general washington.
“alack that i am too old to go,” said one richly dressed and elderly gentleman who stood listening to stephen’s speech before the door of an inn. “i would indeed that i were a young man again!”
“if you can not go, you can give,” responded stephen quickly. “how can these lads go to the war unless we at home promise to see that their wives and children do not starve?”
the old gentleman looked at stephen’s shabby coat, the one over which mother jeanne had wrung her hands even last year, and at his threadbare ruffles and said nothing, but went home to do his part. he remembered that before the war the sheffield estate had been called the wealthiest in massachusetts.
“i verily believe that stephen sheffield would melt the head off his cane if he thought it would help,” he chuckled as he unlocked his money box.
people who knew stephen and were aware of how frail he was at the outset of his campaign, could now see that he was worn to little more than the ghost of a man, fired and kept alive only by the passion of one purpose. even strangers and the rough-mannered country folk could see how he was spending his last strength in this mighty effort for the success of the war.
“you may think,” he said in one of his speeches to a gathering of men before a blacksmith’s shop, “that it scarce seems right that i should ask you to go into danger when i stay behind myself.”
“nay,” returned one of the men bluntly, “it is not hidden from our eyes, master sheffield, that you too are laying down your life in the cause.”
stephen answered him with a happy smile.
“it is the least that any of us can do,” he said, “but i am hoping that heaven will grant it me to see the end of the war.”
to clotilde, stephen, when he went away, had left a heavy task.
“once we had a few poor people in hopewell to care for,” he told her, “now all are in want and you must do your best to see that they do not suffer.”
so clotilde, young as she was, took up the burden and carried it well. master simon’s empty garden was ploughed from end to end and planted with cabbages, turnips, beets, potatoes, anything that would give food to the hungry and could be stored away for the winter. wheat and barley and rye now grew where once a smooth strip of greensward had extended down to the harbour’s edge, while the sturdy women and growing boys of hopewell were taught to turn their bits of land to similar account.
“we will let the men see that we can bring in as good a harvest as they,” clotilde told the women, whereupon nature seemed to bend herself to helping their efforts by giving them a fair and prosperous season.
all through the summer and autumn, stephen’s time, for the most part, was spent in his journeyings throughout new england. prospects began to brighten as washington’s army gathered strength. in october came the wonderful news of burgoyne’s surrender back in the wilderness of the hudson valley, where he had been harried and driven up and down the whole summer long. stephen chanced to be at home when the tidings came.
“yes,” he said with a smile, as he and clotilde sat in the porch talking of the good news. “washington made the victory possible by holding back the british troops that were to have aided burgoyne, benedict arnold brought about the surrender by his gallant fight in the forest, and now general gates receives the british commander’s sword with a bow, and apparently all the credit is his. that is the way of war.”
“will this mean the end of the fighting, do you think?” asked clotilde. “they are saying in the village that king george will see now that there is no hope for him.”
“bless you, my child,” answered stephen, “this is the first time, probably, that his majesty, king george the third has fully realised that the war has begun.”
they sat there for some time in the falling darkness, both busy with their own thoughts. finally stephen, with a visible effort, spoke again.
“there is a rich merchant in boston, clotilde, who desires to—to buy the lower half of our garden, that strip of land that goes down to the water’s edge.”
“oh, no,” exclaimed the startled girl. “surely you would never sell it! is it not enough that the trees and flowers are gone, must we also lose the land itself? what can a man in far-off boston want with our garden? oh, how can you speak of such a thing?”
“he offers what he calls a good price,” pursued stephen steadily. “he does not know, poor stupid fellow, that all the wealth in the world could never repay us for the loss of what once belonged to master simon.”
“then you will not part with it?” she asked hopefully.
stephen paused before he spoke again.
“there are times,” he said at last; “times like these, when even that which one would not sell for all the gold on earth must be freely given. what master simon left to us seems well-nigh sacred, but the welfare of our neighbours, is not that sacred too? people are suffering, some are starving, and with every year that the war drags on the poverty grows worse. my own fortune has been swept away by the hazards of the time; a moment is very close when people will come to me for help and i will have naught to give them. shall a strip of meadow land, a blossoming hedge and a memory of master simon be more to us than our love for our people?”
“no,” agreed clotilde, but with a sob; “no, you are right and he would never have wished us to keep it. but oh, the very thought of it breaks my heart!”
on stephen’s next journey to boston the transfer was made and a good half of master simon’s garden passed into the hands of ephraim paddock, the wealthiest and most close-fisted man in all of massachusetts. having in view the building of docks and warehouses at the water’s edge, a plan that could not well be carried out at once, he graciously granted, as part of the terms of sale, permission that stephen sheffield make use of the land until building should begin. therefore the meadow still yielded its harvest for the feeding of the poor, while its purchase price was spread broadcast to give clothing and shelter to those who were in need.
november came, and with it began that season of bitter and piercing cold, to be known, as long as history books tell the tale, as the valley forge winter, the most severe that america had known in nearly a hundred years. the snow fell early and lay so deep and so long that people began to wonder if spring were ever to come again. never before had such black and destroying frosts been known, so that, had not the women and children brought in an abundant harvest, had not the wheat sheaves been full and golden and the shocks of corn piled high in the barns, the time would have been a desperate one indeed.
yet none of those at home had leisure for complaint; the thoughts of all were centered upon the little dauntless american army, those gaunt determined soldiers shivering among the hills and ravines of valley forge. would they come through the winter with strength enough left ever to fight again? would the warm, comfortable, well-fed british army leave its safe shelter in philadelphia and sally forth to destroy them at one blow? time only could tell and time dragged, oh, so slowly, as the winter months went by.
the roads of new england were so deep in snow, the cold so intense and so terrible that, through the midwinter, stephen was forced to forego his journeyings. at the end of january, however, a difficulty arose that haled him forth again. andrew shadwell, the wealthy and influential tory who dwelt in the next town, had gathered about him a considerable company of his own kind, the number beginning to grow so great that their presence was a threat against the peace of the community. people said that the nest of loyalists was plotting all sorts of evil, and demanded that the enemy be driven out. the tories, in turn, loudly complained that they were persecuted and had done no wrong. each party was afraid of the other and neither dared to move first. it was to confer with the authorities in boston in this matter, and to try for some peaceable settlement of the trouble, that stephen set out one cold, glittering january morning, when the dry snow creaked under the horses’ hoofs, and their breath rose in twin columns of steam as they pawed and snorted before the door.
“i have no reluctance in leaving matters in your hands,” he said to clotilde, as he bade her good-bye in the hall.
“i will do what i can,” she answered, “although the best thing that i could accomplish would be to keep you at home.”
“no, no, child, there is no danger in this journey,” he said, “but, should this brewing trouble break out while i am gone—well, well, there is small use in such misgivings! i will be back again in four days and little can happen in that time.”
clotilde watched him ride away through the clear, keen, frosty air and wished, for the hundredth time, that she were a man and could go with him.
“what are spinning and weaving,” she sighed aloud, “and sewing and baking, beside what men can do?”
but spinning and weaving and baking must be accomplished if the war were to go on and the patriot soldiers be clothed and fed, so she ran quickly into the house, tucked up her sleeves, put on her big apron and began the labours of the day.
two evenings later, just as the early winter dark had begun, there came marching up the long driveway to the house, a little band of blue-coated soldiers. their young lieutenant bore a letter from stephen, explaining that these men, stationed at salem, had been sent forward at once, but if there were no immediate disturbance near andrew shadwell’s, they were to await the coming of a larger body of troops from boston. he begged that clotilde would see to it that the men supped well before they went on to the empty farm-house a mile or two from hopewell, where it had been arranged that they camp for the night.
there was much hurrying and scurrying, you may be sure, in the getting ready of an abundant meal for so many hungry fighting-men, a great clattering of dishes and stirring of pots. huge fires roared up every chimney in the house while the men gathered close about the hearths to warm their cold hands and half frozen feet.
“men say there is surely trouble to come over these rascal tories,” said the lieutenant, as he sat in stephen’s chair at the head of the table and eyed joyfully the smoking platter that clotilde set down before him. “it is even rumoured that andrew shadwell has been petitioning the british commander to send a company of redcoats to escort him and his friends out of the country. he knows that, as it is, if he tries to escape the whole neighbourhood will be upon him like a nest of hornets. but the english soldiers have too much to do elsewhere, and, influential as our friend andrew is, i doubt much if they will listen to his plea. certainly no such measures can be taken for some time.”
when at last the grateful guests, warmed, dry, well fed and greatly cheered in heart, had marched away and the remains of the supper had been cleared from the board, clotilde bethought her of a task that had been nearly forgotten in the hurry and excitement of the soldiers’ coming. a great bale of woollen cloth, for the making of army coats, was to be sent from hopewell next day, but her share of the weaving had, in the press of other things, been left unfinished on the loom in samuel skerry’s cottage. only a yard remained to be woven, therefore, she decided, she could slip over to the little house and finish the work that it might be carried to the town hall in the morning. leaving word for mère jeanne, who was used to her labouring late in the weaving-room and would not lie awake for her, she wrapped herself in her old cloak and slipped out into the white, silent night.
old jason heard the door creak, came hurrying out to remonstrate against her going alone and finally insisted on following her across the fields to the shoemaker’s house. here he built a great fire on the hearth in the workroom, drew the curtains close and sat down to wait, while clotilde climbed to the high bench before the loom and presently filled the whole cottage with the monotonous sound of the swinging heddle.
“jason,” she said at last, seeing that the old man was worn out by the unwonted business of the day and was drowsy and nodding in his chair, “there is no need of your waiting here. i have worked in this place at night a score of times and have come to no harm. go home and to bed: i have the key of the little side door and will come just so soon as this web is done.”
“yes, mistress,” answered jason, rising obediently, too sleepy either to reason or object. he stumbled out, closing the door behind him, and left clotilde alone to a silence broken only by the crackling of the fire, the whirring of the shuttle and the creaking of the loom.
“i suppose i should get down and lock the door after him,” she reflected; but just at that moment a knotted thread caught her attention and held it until, presently, she forgot all about the big iron key sticking, unturned, in the lock.
she worked on busily, so absorbed in the finishing of her task that she had no thought of time. she was singing a little song to herself as she pressed the treadle and flung the shuttle back and forth, she was thinking of stephen who must be already on his way back from boston, she was thinking of miles in his little wind-swept, bark-roofed hut at valley forge.
at last she brought her weaving to an end, cut off the length of cloth that she needed and was climbing down from her seat holding the great roll in her arms. she was still singing her little song when, she scarcely knew why, she stopped in the middle of a word with a sudden catching at her throat.
“it is nothing. it is nothing. why should i be afraid?” she said to herself over and over again.
none the less her heart was beating so loud that it almost drowned the slight noise of footsteps in the snow outside the door, and the sound of a hand fumbling at the latch.
