第69章 IN THE DARK LAND(3)

"I've heerd of this Lovelle," he said."I've seed him too, I guess.A long man with black eyebrows and hollow eyes like as he was hungry.He used ter live near my folks in Palmer Country.What was he looking for in those travels of his?""Hunting maybe," said Boone."He was the skilfullest hunter, I reckon, between the Potomac and the Cherokee.He brought in mighty fine pelts, but he didn't seem to want money.Just so much as would buy him powder and shot and food for the next venture, ye understand....He wasn't looking for land to settle on, neighber, for one time he telled me he had had all the settling he wanted in this world....But he was looking for something else.He never talked about it, but he'd sit often with his knees hunched up and his eyes staring out at nothing like a bird's.I never know'd who he was or whar he come from.You say it was Virginny?""Aye, Palmer County.I mind his old dad, who farmed a bit of land by Nelson's Cross Roads, when he wasn't drunk in Nelson's tavern.The boys used to follow him to laugh at his queer clothes, and hear his fine London speech when he cursed us.By thunder, he was the one to swear.Jim Lovelle used to clear us off with a whip, and give the old man his arm into the shack.Jim too was a queer one, but it didn't do to make free with him, unless ye was lookin' for a broken head.They was come of high family, I've heerd.""Aye, Jim was a gentleman and no mistake, said Boone."The way he held his head and looked straight through the man that angered him.I reckon it was that air of his and them glowering eyes that made him powerful with the redskins.But he was mighty quiet always.I've seen Cap'n Evan Shelby roaring at him like a bull and Jim just staring back at him, as gentle as a girl, till the Cap'n began to stutter and dried up.But, Lordy, he had a pluck in a fight, for I've seen him with Montgomery....He was eddicated too, and could tell you things out of books.I've knowed him sit up all night talking law with Mr.Robertson....He was always thinking.Queer thoughts they was sometimes.""Whatten kind of thoughts, Dan'l?" his brother asked.

Boone rubbed his chin as if he found it hard to explain."About this country of Ameriky," he replied."He reckoned it would soon have to cut loose from England, and him knowing so much about England I used ter believe him.He allowed there 'ud be bloody battles before it happened, but he held that the country had grown up and couldn't be kept much longer in short clothes.He had a power of larning about things that happened to folks long ago called Creeks and Rewmans that pinted that way, he said.But he held that when we had fought our way quit of England, we was in for a bigger and bloodier fight among ourselves.I mind his very words.'Dan'l,'

he says, 'this is the biggest and best slice of the world which we Americans has struck, and for fifty years or more, maybe, we'll be that busy finding out what we've got that we'll have no time to quarrel.But there's going to come a day, if Ameriky s to be a great nation, when she'll have to sit down and think and make up her mind about one or two things.It won't be easy, for she won't have the eddication or patience to think deep, and there'll be plenty selfish and short-sighted folk that won't think at all.I reckon she'll have to set her house in order with a hickory stick.

But if she wins through that all right, she'll be a country for our children to be proud of and happy in.'""Children? Has he any belongings?" Squire Boone Daniel looked puzzled."I've heerd it said he had a wife, though he never telled nie of her.""I've seed her," Neely put in."She was one of Jake Early's daughters up to Walsing Springs.She didn't live no more than a couple of years after they was wed.She left a gal behind her, a mighty finelooking gal.They tell me she's married on young Abe Hanks, I did hear that Abe was thinking of coming west, but them as told me allowed that Abe hadn't got the right kinder wife for the Border.Polly Hanker they called her, along of her being Polly Hanks, and likewise wantin' more than other folks had to get along with.See?"This piece of news woke Daniel Boone to attention."Tell me about Jim's gal," he demanded.

"Pretty as a peach," said Neely "Small, not higher nor Abe's shoulder, and as light on her feet as a deer.She had a softish laughing look in her eyes that made the lads wild for her.But she wasn't for them and I reckon she wasn't for Abe neither.She was nicely eddicated, though she had jest had field-schooling like the rest, for her dad used to read books and tell her about 'em.One time he took her to Richmond for the better part of a winter, where she larned dancing and music.The neighbours allowed that turned her head.Ye couldn't please her with clothes, for she wouldn't look at the sun-bonnets and nettle-linen that other gals wore.She must have a neat little bonnet and send to town for pretty dresses....The women couldn't abide her, for she had a high way of looking at 'em and talking at 'em as if they was jest black trash.But the men 'ud walk miles to see her on a Sunday....I never could jest understand why she took Abe Hanks.

'Twasn't for lack of better offers."

"I reckon that's women's ways," said Boone meditatively."She must ha'

favoured Jim, though he wasn't partickler about his clothes.Discontented, ye say she was?""Aye.Discontented.She was meant for a fine lady, I reckon.I dunno what she wanted, but anyhow it was something that Abe Hanks ain't likely to give her.I can't jest picture her in Kaintuck'!"Squire Boone was asleep, and Daniel drew the flap of his buffalo robe over his head and prepared to follow suit.His last act was to sniff the air.