第97章

His still refuted quirks he still repeats;New-raised objections with new quibbles meets, Till sinking in the quicksand he defends, He dies disputing, and the contest ends.

COWPER.

As the soldier's wife was sick in her berth, Mabel Dun-ham was the only person in the outer cabin when Jasper returned to it; for, by an act of grace in the Sergeant, he had been permitted to resume his proper place in this part of the vessel.We should be ascribing too much simplicity of character to our heroine, if we said that she had felt no distrust of the young man in consequence of his arrest;but we should also be doing injustice to her warmth of feeling and generosity of disposition, if we did not add, that this distrust was insignificant and transient.As he now took his seat near her, his whole countenance clouded with the uneasiness he felt concerning the situation of the cutter, everything like suspicion was banished from her mind, and she saw in him only an injured man.

"You let this affair weigh too heavily on your mind, Jasper," said she eagerly, or with that forgetfuluess of self with which the youthful of her sex are wont to betray their feelings when a strong and generous interest has attained the ascendency; "no one who knows you can, or does, believe you guilty.Pathfinder says he will pledge his life for you.""Then you, Mabel," returned the youth, his eyes flashing fire, "do not look upon me as the traitor your father seems to believe me to be?""My dear father is a soldier, and is obliged to act as one.

My father's daughter is not, and will think of you as she ought to think of a man who has done so much to serve her already.""Mabel, I'm not used to talking with one like you, or saying all I think and feel with any.I never had a sister, and my mother died when I was a child, so that I know little what your sex most likes to hear -- "Mabel would have given the world to know what lay be-hind the teeming word at which Jasper hesitated; but the indefinable and controlliug sense of womanly diffidence made her suppress her curiosity.She waited in silence for him to explain his own meaning.

"I wish to say, Mabel," the young man continued, after a pause which he found sufficiently embarrassing, "that I am unused to the ways and opinions of one like you, and that you must imagine all I would add."Mabel had imagination enough to fancy anything, but there are ideas and feelings that her sex prefer to have ex-pressed before they yield them all their own sympathies, and she had a vague consciousness that these of Jasper might properly be enumerated in the class.With a readi-ness that belonged to her sex, therefore, she preferred changing the discourse to permitting it to proceed any further in a manner so awkward and so unsatisfactory.

"Tell me one thing, Jasper, and I shall be content," said she, speaking now with a firinness which denoted confi-dence, not only in herself, but in her companion: "you do not deserve this cruel suspicion which rests upon you?""I do not, Mabel!" answered Jasper, looking into her full blue eyes with an openness and simplicity that might have shaken stronger distrust."As I hope for mercy hereafter, I do not!""I knew it -- I could have sworn it!" returned the girl warmly."And yet my father means well; -- but do not let this matter disturb you, Jasper.""There is so much more to apprehend from another quarter just now, that I scarcely think of it.""Jasper!"

"I do not wish to alarm you, Mabel; but if your uncle could be persuaded to change his notions about handling the _Scud_: and yet he is so much more experienced than I am, that he ought, perhaps, to place more reliance on his own judgment than on mine.""Do you think the cutter in any danger?" demanded Mabel, quick as thought.

"I fear so; at least she would have been thought in great danger by us of the lake; perhaps an old seaman of the ocean may have means of his own to take care of her.""Jasper, all agree in giving you credit for skill in man-aging the _Scud_.You know the lake, you know the cut-ter; you _must_ be the best judge of our real situation.""My concern for you, Mabel, may make me more cow-ardly than common; but, to be frank, I see but one method of keeping the cutter from being wrecked in the course of the next two or three hours, and that your uncle refuses to take.After all, this may be my ignorance; for, as he says, Ontario is merely fresh water.""You cannot believe this will make any difference.

Think of my dear father, Jasper! Think of yourself; of all the lives that depend on a timely word from you to save them.""I think of you, Mabel, and that is more, much more, than all the rest put together!" returned the young man, with a strength of expression and an earnestness of look that uttered infinitely more than the words themselves.

Mabel's heart beat quickly, and a gleam of grateful sat-isfaction shot across her blushing features; but the alarm was too vivid and too serious to admit of much relief from happier thoughts.She did not attempt to repress a look of gratitude, and then she returned to the feeling which was naturally uppermost.