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The Shepherd of the Hills

H >> Harold Bell Wright >> The Shepherd of the Hills




Slowly the moon climbed over the ridge and lighted the scene. The
mountaineer returned to his chair. All at once he raised his head,
and, leaning forward, looked long and earnestly at the old
shepherd, where he sat crouching like a convict awaiting sentence.

From down the mill road came voices and the sound of horses' feet.
Old Matt started, turning his head a moment to listen. The horses
stopped at the lower gate.

"The children," said Aunt Mollie softly. "The children. Grant, Oh,
Grant! Sammy and our boy."

Then the shepherd felt a heavy hand on his shoulder, and a voice,
that had in it something new and strange, said, "Dad,--my
brother,--Daniel, I--I ain't got no education, an' I--don't know
rightly how to say it--but, Daniel, what these hills have been to
you, you--you have been to me. It's sure God's way, Daniel. Let's-
-let's go to the boy."





CHAPTER XLII.

THE WAY OF THE LOWER TRAIL.


Fix--the--light, as it was--please? That's--it. Thank you, Doctor.
How beautiful she is--how beautiful!" He seemed to gather
strength, and looked carefully into the face of each member of the
little group about the bed; the shepherd, Old Matt, Aunt Mollie,
Pete, and the physician. Then he turned his eyes back to the
painting. To the watchers, the girl in the picture, holding her
brimming cup, seemed to smile back again.

"I loved her--I loved--her. She was my natural mate--my other
self. I belonged to her--she to me. I--I can't tell you of that
summer--when we were together--alone in the hills--the beautiful
hills--away from the sham and the ugliness of the world that men
have made. The beauty and inspiration of it all I put into my
pictures, and I knew because of that they were good--I knew they
would win a place for me--and--they did. Most of all--I put it
there," (He pointed to the painting on the wall) "and the crowd
saw it and felt it, and did not know what it was. But I knew--I
knew--all the time, I knew. Oh!--if that short summer could have
been lengthened--into years, what might I not have done? Oh, God!
That men--can be--so blind--so blind!"

For a time he lay exhausted, his face still turned toward the
picture, but with eyes closed as though he dreamed. Then suddenly,
he started up again, raising himself on his elbows, his eyes
opened wide, and on his face a look of wondering gladness. They
drew near.

"Do--do--you--hear? She is calling--she is calling again. Yes--
sweetheart--yes, dear. I--I am--com--"

Then, Old Matt and Aunt Mollie led the shepherd from the room.

And this way runs the trail that follows the lower level, where
those who travel, as they go, look always over their shoulders
with eyes of dread, and the gloomy shadows gather long before the
day is done.





CHAPTER XLIII.

POOR PETE.


They buried the artist in the cave as he had directed, close under
the wall on the ledge above the canon, with no stone or
mark of any sort to fix the place. The old mine which he had
discovered was reached by one of the side passages far below in
the depth of the mountain. The grave would never be disturbed.

For two weeks longer, Dr. Coughlan staid with his friend; out on
the hills with him all day, helping to cook their meals at the
ranch, or sitting on the porch at the Matthews place when the day
was gone. When the time finally came that he must go, the little
physician said, as he grasped the shepherd's hand, "You're doing
just right, Daniel; just right. Always did; always did. Blast it
all! I would stay, too, but what would Sarah and the girls do?
I'll come again next spring, Daniel, sure, sure, if I'm alive.
Don't worry, no one will ever know. Blast it all! I don't like to
leave you, Daniel. Don't like it at all. But you are right, right,
Daniel."

The old scholar stood in the doorway of his cabin to watch the
wagon as it disappeared in the forest. He heard it rattle across
the creek bottom below the ruined cabin under the bluff. He waited
until from away up on Compton Ridge the sound of wheels came to
him on the breeze that slipped down the mountain side. Still he
waited, listening, listening, until there were only the voices of
the forest and the bleating of the sheep in the corral. Slipping a
book in his pocket, and taking a luncheon for himself and Pete he
opened the corral gate and followed his flock to the hills.

All that summer Pete was the shepherd's constant companion. At
first he seemed not to understand. Frequently he would start off
suddenly for the cave, only to return after a time, with that look
of trouble upon his delicate face. Mr. Howitt tried to help the
boy, and he appeared gradually to realize in part. Once he
startled his old friend by saying quietly, "When are you goin',
Dad?"

"Going where? Where does Pete think Dad is going?"

The boy was lying on his back on the grassy hillside watching the
clouds. He pointed upward, "There, where HE went; up there in the
white hills. Pete knows."

The other looked long at the lad before answering quietly, "Dad
does not know when he will go. But he is ready any time, now."

"Pete says better not wait long, Dad; 'cause Pete he's a goin' an'
course when he goes I've got to go 'long. Do you reckon Dad can
see Pete when he is up there in them white hills? Some folks used
to laugh at Pete when he told about the white hills, the flower
things, the sky things, an' the moonlight things that play in the
mists. An' once a fellow called Pete a fool, an' Young Matt he
whipped him awful. But folks wasn't really to blame, 'cause they
couldn't see 'em. That's what HE said. An' HE knew, 'cause he
could see 'em too. But Aunt Mollie, an' Uncle Matt, an' you all,
they don't never laugh. They just say, 'Pete knows.' But they
couldn't see the flower things, or the tree things neither. Only
HE could see."

The summer passed, and, when the blue gray haze took on the purple
touch and all the woods and hills were dressed with cloth of gold,
Pete went from the world in which he had never really belonged,
nor had been at home. Mr. Howitt, writing to Dr. Coughlan of the
boy's death, said:

"Here and there among men, there are those who pause in the
hurried rush to listen to the call of a life that is more real.
How often have we seen them, David, jostled and ridiculed by their
fellows, pushed aside and forgotten, as incompetent or unworthy.
He who sees and hears too much is cursed for a dreamer, a fanatic,
or a fool, by the mad mob, who, having eyes, see not, ears and
hear not, and refuse to understand.

"We build temples and churches, but will not worship in them; we
hire spiritual advisers, but refuse to heed them; we buy bibles,
but will not read them; believing in God, we do not fear Him;
acknowledging Christ, we neither follow nor obey Him. Only when we
can no longer strive in the battle for earthly honors or material
wealth, do we turn to the unseen but more enduring things of life;
and, with ears deafened by the din of selfish war and cruel
violence, and eyes blinded by the glare of passing pomp and folly,
we strive to hear and see the things we have so long refused to
consider.

"Pete knew a world unseen by us, and we, therefore, fancied
ourselves wiser than he. The wind in the pines, the rustle of the
leaves, the murmur of the brook, the growl of the thunder, and the
voices of the night were all understood and answered by him. The
flowers, the trees, the rocks, the hills, the clouds were to him,
not lifeless things, but living friends, who laughed and wept with
him as he was gay or sorrowful.

" 'Poor Pete,' we said. Was he in truth, David, poorer or richer
than we?"

They laid the boy beside his mother under the pines on the hills;
the pines that showed so dark against the sky when the sun was
down behind the ridge. And over his bed the wild vines lovingly
wove a coverlid of softest green, while all his woodland friends
gathered about his couch. Forest and hill and flower and cloud
sang the songs he loved. All day the sunlight laid its wealth in
bars of gold at his feet, and at night the moonlight things and
the shadow things came out to play.

Summer and autumn slipped away; the winter passed; spring came,
with all the wonder of the resurrection of flower and leaf and
blade. So peace and quiet came again into the shepherd's life.
When no answer to his letter was received, and the doctor did not
return as he had promised, the old man knew that the last link
connecting him with the world was broken.





CHAPTER XLIV.

THE TRAIL ON THE SUNLIT HILLS.


When Young Matt first knew that Sammy had sent Ollie back to the
city with no promise to follow, he took to the woods, and returned
only after miles of tramping over the wildest, roughest part of
the country. The big fellow said no word, but on his face was a
look that his father understood, and the old mountaineer felt his
own blood move more quickly at the sight.

But when Sammy with her books was fully established in the
Matthews home, and Young Matt seemed always, as the weeks went by,
to find her reading things that he could not understand, he was
made to realize more fully what her studies with the shepherd
meant. He came to feel that she had already crossed the threshold
into that world where Mr. Howitt lived. And, thinking that he
himself could never enter, he grew lonely and afraid.

With the quickness that was so marked in her character, Sammy
grasped the meaning of his trouble almost before Young Matt
himself knew fully what it was. Then the girl, with much care and
tact, set about helping him to see the truths which the shepherd
had revealed to her.

All through the summer and fall, when the day's work was done, or
on a Sunday afternoon, they were together, and gradually the woods
and the hills, with all the wild life that is in them, began to
have for the young man a new meaning; or, rather, he learned
little by little to read the message that lay on the open pages;
first a word here and there, then sentences, then paragraphs, and
soon he was reading alone, as he tramped the hills for stray
stock, or worked in the mountain field. The idle days of winter
and the long evenings were spent in reading aloud from the books
that had come to mean most to her.

So she led him on slowly, along the way that her teacher had
pointed out to her, but always as they went, he saw her going
before, far ahead, and he knew that in the things that men call
education, he could never hope to stand by her side. But he was
beginning to ask, are there not after all things that lie still
deeper in life than even these?

Often he would go to his old friend in the Hollow with some
thought, and the shepherd, seeing how it was, would smile as he
helped the lad on his way. The scholar looked forward with
confidence to the time when young Matt would discover for himself,
as Sammy had found for herself, that the only common ground
whereon men and women may meet in safety is the ground of their
manhood and womanhood.

And so it was, on that spring morning when the young giant felt
the red life throbbing strongly in his great limbs, as he followed
his team to and fro across the field. And in his voice, as he
shouted to his horses at the end of the furrow, there was
something under the words, something of a longing, something also
of a challenge.

Sammy was going to spend the day with her friends on Jake Creek.
She had not been to see Mandy since the night of her father's
death. As she went, she stopped at the lower end of the field to
shout a merry word to the man with the plow, and it was sometime
later when the big fellow again started his team. The challenge in
his tone had grown bolder.

Sammy returned that afternoon in time for the evening meal, and
Aunt Mollie thought, as the girl came up the walk, that the young
woman had never looked so beautiful. "Why, honey," she said,
"you're just a bubblin' over with life. Your cheeks are as rosy;
your eyes are as sparklin', you're fairly shinin' all over. Your
ride sure done you good."

The young woman replied with a hug that made her admirer gasp.
"Law, child; you're strong as a young panther. You walk like one
too; so kind of strong, easy like."

The girl laughed. "I hope I don't impress everybody that way, Aunt
Mollie. I don't believe I want to be like a panther. I'd rather be
like--like--"

"Like what, child?"

"Like you, just like you; the best, the very best woman in the
whole world, because you've got the best and biggest heart." She
looked back over her shoulder laughing, as she ran into the house.

When Young Matt came in from the field, Sammy went out to the
barn, while he unharnessed his team. "Are you very tired to-
night?" she asked.

The big fellow smiled, "Tired? Me tired? Where do you want to go?
Haven't you ridden enough to-day? I should think you'd be tired
yourself."

"Tired? Me tired?" said the girl. "I don't want to ride. I want to
walk. It's such a lovely evening, and there's going to be a moon.
I have been thinking all day that I would like to walk over home
after supper, if you cared to go."

That night the work within the house and the chores about the barn
were finished in a remarkably short time. The young man and woman
started down the Old Trail like two school children, while the
father and mother sat on the porch and heard their voices die away
on the mountain side below.

The girl went first along the little path, moving with that light,
sure step that belongs only to perfect health, the health of the
woods and hills. The man followed, walking with the same sure,
easy step; strength and power revealed in every movement of his
body. Two splendid creatures they were--masterpieces of the
Creator's handiwork; made by Him who created man, male and female,
and bade them have dominion "over every living thing that moveth
upon the earth;" kings by divine right.

In the belt of timber, where the trail to the ranch branches off,
they met the shepherd on his way to the house for an evening
visit. The old man paused only long enough to greet them, and
pushed on up the hill, for he saw by their faces that the time was
come.

Sammy had grown very quiet when they rounded the shoulder of
Dewey, and they went in silence down to the cabin on the southern
slope of the mountain. The girl asked Young Matt to wait for her
at the gate, and, going to the house, she entered alone.

A short time she remained in the familiar rooms, then, slipping
out through the rear door, ran through the woods to the little
glen back of the house. Dropping beside the mound she buried her
face in the cool grass, as she whispered, "Oh, Daddy, Daddy Jim! I
wish you were here to-night; this night that means so much to me.
Do you know how happy I am, Daddy? Do you know, I wonder?" The
twilight deepened, "I must go now, Daddy; I must go to him. You
told me you would trust me anywhere with him. He is waiting for
me, now; but I wish--oh, I wish that you were here to-night, Daddy
Jim!"

Quickly she made her way back to the cabin, passed through the
house, and rejoined Young Matt. The two returned silently up the
mountain side, to the higher levels, where the light still
lingered, though the sun was down. At the Lookout they stopped.

"We'll wait for the moon, here," she said; and so seated on a big
rock, they watched the last of the evening go out from the west.
From forest depth and mountain side came the myriad voices of
Nature's chorus, blending softly in the evening hymn; and, rising
clear above the low breathed tones, yet in perfect harmony, came a
whip-poor-will's plaintive call floating up from the darkness
below; the sweet cooing of a wood-dove in a tree on the ridge, and
the chirping of a cricket in a nearby crevice of the ledge. Like
shadowy spirits, the bats flitted here and there in the gathering
gloom. The two on the mountain's shoulder felt themselves alone
above it all; above it all, yet still a part of all.

Then the moon looked over the mountain behind them turning Mutton
Hollow into a wondrous sea of misty light out of which the higher
hills lifted their heads like fairy islands. The girl spoke,
"Come, Matt; we must go now. Help me down."

He slipped from his seat and stood beside the rock with uplifted
arms. Sammy leaned forward and placed her hands upon his
shoulders. He felt her breath upon his forehead. The next instant
he held her close.

So they went home along the trail that is nobody knows how old,
and the narrow path that was made by those who walked one before
the other, they found wide enough for two.

Dad Howitt, returning to the ranch, saw them coming so in the
moonlight, and slipped aside from the path into the deeper
shadows. As they passed, the old shepherd, scholar and poet stood
with bowed, uncovered head. When they were gone and their low
voices were no longer heard, he said aloud, "What God hath joined;
what God hath joined."

And this way runs the trail that lies along the higher, sunlit
hills where those who journey see afar and the light lingers even
when the day is done.





CHAPTER XLV.

SOME YEARS LATER.


A wandering artist, searching for new fields, found his way into
the Ozark country. One day, as he painted in the hills, a flock of
sheep came over the ridge through a low gap, and worked slowly
along the mountain side. A few moments later, the worker at the
easel lifted his eyes from the canvas to find himself regarded by
an old man in the dress of a native.

"Hello, uncle. Fine day," said the artist shortly, his eyes again
upon his picture.

"The God of these hills gives us many such, young sir, and all His
days are good."

The painter's hand paused between palette and canvas, and his face
was turned toward the speaker in wonder. Every word was perfect in
accent of the highest culture, and the deep musical tone of the
voice was remarkable in one with the speaker's snowy hair and
beard. The young man arose to his feet. "I beg your pardon, sir. I
thought--" He hesitated, as he again took in the rude dress of the
other. The brown eyes, under their white shaggy brows, lighted
with good nature. "You mean, young sir, that you did not think.
'Tis the privilege of youth; make the most of it. Very soon old
age will rob you of your freedom, and force you to think, whether
you will or no. Your greeting under the circumstance is surely
excusable. It is I who should beg pardon, for I have interrupted
your study, and I have no excuse; neither my youth nor my
occupation will plead for me."

The charm of his voice and manner were irresistible. The painter
stepped forward with outstretched hand, "Indeed, sir; I am
delighted to meet you. I am here for the summer from Chicago. My
camp is over there."

The other grasped the offered hand cordially, "I am Daniel Howitt,
young sir; from the sheep ranch in Mutton Hollow. Dad Howitt, the
people call me. So you see you were not far wrong when you hailed
me 'Uncle.' Uncle and Dad are 'sure close kin,' as Preachin' Bill
would say."

Both men laughed, and the painter offered his folding easel chair.
"Thank you, no. Here is a couch to which I am more accustomed. I
will rest here, if you please." The old man stretched himself upon
the grassy slope. "Do you like my hills?" he asked. "But I am sure
you do," he added, as his eye dwelt fondly upon the landscape.

"Ah, you are the owner of this land, then? I was wondering who--"

"No, no, young sir," the old man interrupted, laughing again.
"Others pay the taxes; these hills belong to me only as they
belong to all who have the grace to love them. They will give you
great treasure, that you may give again to others, who have not
your good strength to escape from the things that men make and do
in the restless world over there. One of your noble craft could
scarcely fail to find the good things God has written on this page
of His great book. Your brothers need the truths that you will
read here; unless the world has greatly changed."

"You are not then a native of this country?"

"I was a native of that world yonder, young sir. Before your day,
they knew me; but long since, they have forgotten. When I died
there, I was born again in these mountains. And so," he finished
with a smile, "I am, as you see, a native. It is long now since I
met one from beyond the ridges. I will not likely meet another."

"I wonder that others have not discovered the real beauty of the
Ozarks," remarked the painter.

The old shepherd answered softly, "One did." Then rising to his
feet and pointing to Roark valley, he said, "Before many years a
railroad will find its way yonder. Then many will come, and the
beautiful hills that have been my strength and peace will become
the haunt of careless idlers and a place of revelry. I am glad
that I shall not be here. But I must not keep you longer from your
duties."

"I shall see you again, shall I not?" The painter was loath to let
him go.

"More often than will be good for your picture, I fear. You must
work hard, young sir, while the book of God is still open, and
God's message is easily read. When the outside world comes, men
will turn the page, and you may lose the place."

After that they met often, and one day the old man led the artist
to where a big house looked down upon a ridge encircled valley.
Though built of logs without, the house within was finished and
furnished in excellent taste. To his surprise, the painter found
one room lined with shelves, and upon the shelves the best things
that men have written for their fellows. In another room was a
piano. The floors were covered with rugs. Draperies and hangings
softened the atmosphere; and the walls were hung with pictures;
not many, but good and true; pictures that had power over those
who looked upon them. The largest painting hung in the library and
was veiled.

"My daughter, Mrs. Matthews," said the old shepherd, as he
presented the stranger to the mistress of the house. In all his
search for beauty, never had the artist looked upon such a form
and such a face. It was a marvelous blending of the physical with
the intellectual and spiritual. A firm step was heard on the
porch. "My husband," said the lady. And the stranger rose to
greet--the woman's MATE. The children of this father and mother
were like them; or, as the visitor afterwards said in his
extravagant way, "like young gods for beauty and strength."

The next summer the painter went again to the Ozarks. Even as he
was greeted by the strong master of the hills and his charming
wife, there fell upon his ears a dull report as of distant cannon;
then another, and another. They led him across the yard, and there
to the north on the other side of Roark, men were tearing up the
mountain to make way for the railroad. As they looked, another
blast sent the rocks flying, while the sound rolled and echoed
through the peaceful hills.

The artist turned to his friends with questioning eyes; "Mr.
Howitt said it would come. Is he--is he well?"

Mrs. Matthews answered softly, "Dad left us while the surveyors
were at work. He sleeps yonder." She pointed to Dewey Bald.

Then they went into the library, where the large picture was
unveiled. When the artist saw it, he exclaimed, "Mad Howard's lost
masterpiece! How--where did you find it?"

"It was Father Howitt's request that I tell you the story," Sammy
replied.

And then she told the artist a part of that which I have set down
here.

THE END.

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