Yes, that at last is the truth at the bottom of my heart! I have searched it to the bottom, and I have found the truth. I glory in the truth that you have not come back to me. There—have I not said all that a woman could say to a man, living or dead?

Just as strongly as I have urged you to return, just as strongly I have hoped that you would not return! In my soul I wanted to see you go on in your own fashion, following your own dreams and caring not for mine. That was the Meriwether Lewis I had pictured to myself. I shall glory in my own undoing, if it has meant your success.

Holding to your own ambition, keeping your own loyalty, holding your own counsel and your own speech to the end—pushing on through everything to what you have set out to do—that is the man I could have loved! Deeds, deeds, high accomplishments—these in truth are the things which are to prevail. The selfish love of success as success—the love of ease, of money, of power—these are the things women covet from a man—yes, but they are not the things a woman loves in a man. No; it is the stiff-necked man, bound in his own ambition, whom women love, even as they swear they do not.

Therefore, do not come back to me, Meriwether Lewis! Do not come—forget all that I have said to you before—do not return until you have done your work! Do not come back to me until you can come content. Do not come to me with your splendid will broken. Let it triumph even over the will of a Burr, not used to yielding, not easily giving up anything desired.

This is almost the last letter I shall ever write to any man in all my life. I wonder who will read it—you, or all the world, perhaps! I wish it might rest with you at the last. Oh, let this thought lie with you as you sleep—you did not come back to me, and I rejoiced that you did not!

Tell me, why is it that I think of you lying where the wind is sweet in the trees? Why is it that I think of myself, too, lying at last, with all my doubts composed, all my restless ambitions ended, all my foolish dreams answered—in some place where the sound of the unceasing waters shall wash out from the memory of the world all my secrets and all my sins? Always I hear myself crying:

"I hope I shall not be unhappy, for I do not feel that I have been bad."

Adieu, Meriwether Lewis, adieu! I am glad you can never read this. I am glad that you have not come back. I am glad that I have failed!



CHAPTER XI

THE BEE

"Captain, dear," said honest Patrick Gass, putting an arm under his wounded commander's shoulders as he eased his position in the boat, "ye are not the man ye was when ye hit me that punch back yonder on the Ohio, three years ago. Since ye're so weak now, I have a good mind to return it to ye, with me compliments. 'Tis safer now!"

Gass chuckled at his own jest as his leader looked up at him.

The boiling current of the great Missouri, bend after bend, vista after vista, had carried them down until at length they had reached the mouth of the Yellowstone, and had seen on ahead the curl of blue smoke on the beach—the encampment of their companions, who were waiting for them here. These wonderful young men, these extraordinary wilderness travelers, had performed one more miracle. Separated by leagues of wild and unknown land, they met now casually, as though it were only what should be expected. Their feat would be difficult even today.

William Clark, walking up and down along the bank, looking ever upstream for some sign of his friend, hurried down to meet the boats, and gazed anxiously at the figure lifted in the arms of the men.

"What's wrong, Merne?" he exclaimed. "Tell me!"

Lewis waved a hand at him in reassurance, and smiled as his friend bent above him.

"Nothing at all, Will," said he. "Nothing at all—I was playing elk, and Cruzatte thought it very lifelike! It is just a bullet through the thigh; the bone is safe, and the wound will soon heal. It is lucky that we are not on horseback now."

By marvel, by miracle, the two friends were reunited once more; and surely around the camp fires there were stories for all to tell.

Sacajawea, the Indian girl, sat listening but briefly to all these tales of adventure—tales not new to one of her birth and education. Silently and without question, she took the place of nurse to the wounded commander. She had herbs of her own choosing, simple remedies which her people had found good for the treatment of wounds. As if the captain were her child—rather than the forsaken infant who lustily bemoaned his mother's absence from his tripod in the lodge—she took charge of the injured man, until at length he made protest that he was as well as ever, and that they must go on.

Again the paddles plied, again the bows of the canoes turned downstream. It seemed but a short distance thence to the Mandan villages, and once among the Mandans they felt almost as if they were at home.

The Mandans received them as beings back from the grave. The drums sounded, the feast-fires were lighted, and for a time the natives and their guests joined in rejoicing. But still Lewis's restless soul was dissatisfied with delay. He would not wait.

"We must get on!" said he. "We cannot delay."

The boats must start down the last stretch of the great river. Would any of the tribesmen like to go to the far East, to see the Great Father? Big White, chief of the Mandans, said his savage prayers.

"I will go," said he. "I will go and tell him of my people. We are poor and weak. I will ask him to take pity on us and protect us against the Sioux."

So it was arranged that Big White and his women, with Jussaume, his wife, and one or two others, should accompany the brigade down the river. Loud lamentations mingled with the preparations for the departure.

Sacajawea, what of her? Her husband lived among the Mandans. This was the end of the trail for her, and not the rudest man but was sad at the thought of going on without her. They knew well enough that in all likelihood, but for her, their expedition could never have attained success. Beyond that, each man of them held memory of some personal kindness received at her hands. She had been the life and comfort of the party, as well as its guide and inspiration.

"Sacajawea," said Meriwether Lewis, when the hour for departure came, "I am now going to finish my trail. Do you want to go part way with us? I can take you to the village where we started up this river—St. Louis. You can stay there for one snow, until Big White comes back from seeing the Great Father. We can take the baby, too, if you like."

Her face lighted up with a strange wistfulness.

"Yes, Capt'in," said she, "I go with Big White—and you."

He smiled as he shook his head.

"We go farther than that, many sleeps farther."

"Who shall make the fire? Who shall mend your moccasins? See, there is no other woman in your party. Who shall make tea? Who shall spread down the robes? Me—Mrs. Charbonneau!"

She drew herself up proudly with this title; but still Meriwether Lewis looked at her sadly, as he stood, lean, gaunt, full-bearded, clad in his leather costume of the plains, supporting himself on his crutch.

"Sacajawea," said he, "I cannot take your husband with me. All my goods are gone—I cannot pay him; and now we do not need him to teach us the language of other peoples. From here we can go alone."

"Aw right!" said Sacajawea, in paleface idiom. "Him stay—me go!"

Meriwether Lewis pondered for a time on what fashion of speech he must employ to make her understand.

"Bird Woman," said he at length, "you are a good girl. It would pain my heart to see you unhappy. But if you came with me to my villages, women would say, 'Who is that woman there? She has no lodge; she does not belong to any man.' They must not say that of Sacajawea—she is a good woman. Those are not the things your ears should hear. Now I shall tell the Great Father that, but for Sacajawea we should all have been lost; that we should never have come back again. His heart will be open to those words. He will send gifts to you. Sometime, I believe, the Great Father's sons will build a picture of you in iron, out yonder at the parting of the rivers. It will show you pointing on ahead to show the way to the white men. Sacajawea must never die—she has done too much to be forgotten. Some day the children of the Great Father will take your baby, if you wish, and bring him up in the way of the white men. What we can do for you we will do. Are my words good in your ears?"

"Your words are good," said Sacajawea. "But I go, too! No want to stay here now. No can stay!"

"But here is your village, Sacajawea—this is your home, where you must live. You will be happier here. See now, when I sleep safe at night, I shall say, 'It was Sacajawea showed me the way. We did not go astray—we went straight.' We will not forget who led us."

"But," she still expostulated, looking up at him, "how can you cook? How can you make the lodge? One woman—she must help all time."

A spasm of pain crossed Lewis's face.

"Sacajawea," said he, "I told you that I had made medicine—that I had promised my dream never to have a lodge of my own. Always I shall live upon the trail—no lodge fire in any village shall be the place for me. And I told you I had made a vow to my dream that no woman should light the lodge fire for me. You are a princess—the daughter of a chief, the sister of a chief, a great person; you know about a warrior's medicine. Surely, then, you know that no one is allowed to ask about the vows of a chief!

"By and by," he added gently, "a great many white men will come here, Sacajawea. They will find you here. They will bring you gifts. You will live here long, and your baby will grow to be a man, and his children will live here long. But now I must go to my people."

The unwonted tears of an Indian woman were in the eyes which looked up at him.

"Ah!" said she, in reproach. "I went with you. I cooked in the lodges. I showed the way. I was as one of your people. Now I say I go to your people, and you say no. You need me once—you no need me now! You say to me, your people are not my people—you not need Sacajawea any more!"

The Indian has no word for good-by. The faithful—nay, loving—girl simply turned away and passed from him; nor did he ever see her more.

Alone, apart from her people, she seated herself on the brink of the bluff, below which lay the boats, ready to depart. She drew her blanket over her head. When at length the voyage had begun, she did not look out once to watch them pass. They saw her motionless figure high on the bank above them. The Bird Woman was mourning.

The little Indian dog, Meriwether Lewis's constant companion, now, like Sacajawea, mercifully banished, sat at her side, as motionless as she. Both of them, mute and resigned, accepted their fate.

But as for those others, those hardy men, now homeward bound, they were rejoicing. Speed was the cry of all the lusty paddlers, who, hour after hour, kept the boats hurrying down, aided by the current and sometimes pushed forward by favorable winds. They were upon the last stretch of their wonderful journey. Speed, early and late, was all they asked. They were going home—back over the trail they had blazed for their fellows!

"Capitaine, Capitaine, look what I'll found!"

They were halting at noonday, far down the Missouri, for the boiling of the kettles. Lewis lay on his robes, still too lame to walk, watching his men as they scattered here and there after their fashion. It was Cruzatte who approached him, looking at something which the voyager held in his hand.

"What is it, Cruzatte?" smiled Lewis.

He was anxious always to be as kindly as possible to this unlucky follower, whose terrible mistake had well-nigh resulted in the death of the leader.

"Ouch, by gar! She'll bite me with his tail. She's hot!"

Cruzatte held out in his fingers a small but fateful object. It was a bee, an ordinary honey-bee. East of the Mississippi, in Illinois, Kentucky, the Virginias, it would have meant nothing. Here on the great plains it meant much.

Meriwether Lewis held the tiny creature in the palm of his hand.

"Why did you kill it, Cruzatte?" he asked. "It was on its errand."

He turned to his friend who sat near, at the other side.

"Will," he said, "our expedition has succeeded. Here is the proof of it. The bee is following our path. They are coming!"

Clark nodded. Woodsmen as they both were, they knew well enough the Indian tradition that the bee is the harbinger of the coming of the white man. When he comes, the plow soon follows, and weeds grow where lately have been the flowers of the forest or the prairie.

They sat for a time looking at the little insect, which bore so fateful a message into the West. Reverently Lewis placed it in his collector's case—the first bee of the plains.

"They are coming!" said he again to his friend.



CHAPTER XII

WHAT VOICE HAD CALLED?

They lay in camp far down the river whose flood had borne them on so rapidly. They had passed through the last of the dangerous country of the Sioux, defying the wild bands whose gantlet they had to run, but which they had run in safety. Ahead was only what might be called a pleasure journey, to the end of the river trail.

The men were happy as they lay about their fires, which glowed dully in the dusk. Each was telling what he presently was going to do, when he got his pay at old St. Louis, not far below.

William Clark, weary with the day's labor, had excused himself and gone to his blankets. Lewis, the responsible head of the expedition, alone, aloof, silent, sat moodily looking into his fire, the victim of one of his recurring moods of melancholy.

He stirred at length and raised himself restlessly. It was not unusual for him to be sleepless, and always, while awake, he had with him the problems of his many duties; but at this hour something unwontedly disturbing had come to Meriwether Lewis.

He turned once more and bent down, as if figuring out some puzzle of a baffling trail. Picking up a bit of stick, he traced here and there, in the ashes at his feet, points and lines, as if it were some problem in geometry. Uneasy, strange of look, now and again he muttered to himself.

"Hoh!" he exclaimed at length, almost like an Indian, as if in some definite conclusion.

He had run his trail to the end, had finished the problem in the ashes.

"Hoh!" his voice again rumbled in his chest.

And now he threw his tracing-stick away. He sat, his head on one side, as if looking at some distant star. It seemed that he heard a voice calling to him in the night, so faintly that he could not be sure. His face, thin, gaunt, looked set and hard in the light of his little fire. Something stern, something wistful, too, showed in his eyes, frowning under the deep brows. Was Meriwether Lewis indeed gone mad? Had the hardships of the wilderness at last taken their toll of him—as had sometimes happened to other men?

He rose, limping a little, for he still was weak and stiff from his wound, though disdaining staff or crotched bough to lean upon. He looked about him cautiously.

The camp was slumbering. Here and there, stirred by the passing breeze, the embers of a little fire glowed like an eye in the dark. The men slept, some under their rude shelters, others in the open under the stars, each rolled in his robe, his rifle under the flap to keep it from the dew.

Meriwether Lewis knew the place of every man in the encampment. Ordway, Pryor, Gass—each of the three sergeants slept by his own mess fire, his squad around him. McNeal, Bratton, Shields, Cruzatte, Reuben Fields, Goodrich, Whitehouse, Coalter, Shannon—the captain knew where each lay, rolled up like a mummy. He had marked each when he threw down his bed-roll that night; for Meriwether Lewis was a leader of men, and no detail escaped him.

He passed now, stealthy as an Indian, along the rows of sleeping forms. His moccasined foot made no sound. Save for his uniform coat, he was clad as a savage himself; and his alert eye, his noiseless foot, might have marked him one. He sought some one of these—and he knew where lay the man he wished to find.

He stood beside him silently at last, looking down at the sleeping figure. The man lay a little apart from the others, for he was to stand second watch that night, and the second guard usually slept where he would not disturb the others when awakened for his turn of duty.

This man—he was long and straight in his blankets, and filled them well—suddenly awoke, and lay staring up. He had not been called, no hand had touched him, it was not yet time for guard relief; but he had felt a presence, even as he slept.

He stared up at a tall and motionless figure looking down. With a swift movement he reached for his rifle; but the next instant, even as he lay, his hand went to his forehead in salute. He was looking up into the face of his commander!

"Shannon!" He heard a hoarse voice command him. "Get up!"

George Shannon, the youngest of the party, sprang out of his bed half clad.

"Captain!" He saluted again. "What is it, sir?" he half whispered, as if in apprehension.

"Put on your jacket, Shannon. Come with me!"

Shannon obeyed hurriedly. Half stripped, he stood a fine figure of young manhood himself, lithe, supple, yet developed into rugged strength by his years of labor on the trail.

"What is it, Captain?" he inquired once more.

They were apart from the others now, in the shadows beyond Lewis's fire. Shannon had caught sight of his leader's countenance, noting the wildness of its look, its drawn and haggard lines.

His commander's hand thrust in his face a clutch of papers, folded—letters, they seemed to be. Shannon could see the trembling of the hand that held them.

"You know what I want, Shannon! I want the rest of these—I want the last one of them! Give it to me now!"

The youth felt on his shoulder the grip of a hand hard as steel. He did not make any answer, but stood dumb, wondering what might be the next act of this man, who seemed half a madman.

"Five of them!" he heard the same hoarse voice go on. "There must be another—there must be one more, at least. You have done this—you brought these letters. Give me the last one of them! Why don't you answer?" With sudden and violent strength Lewis shook the boy as a dog might a rat. "Answer me!"

"Captain, I cannot!" broke out Shannon.

"What? Then there is another?"

"I'll not answer! I'll stand my trial before court martial, if you please."

Again the heavy hand on his shoulder.

"There will be no trial!" he heard the hoarse voice of his commander saying. "I cannot sleep. I must have the last one. There is another!"

Shannon laid a hand on the iron wrist.

"How do you know?" he faltered. "Why do you think——"

"Am I not your leader? Is it not my business to know? I am a woodsman. You thought you had covered your trail, but it was plain. I know you are the messenger who has been bringing these letters to me from her. I need not name her, and you shall not! For what reason you did this—by what plan—I do not know, but I know you did it. You were absent each time that I found one of these letters. That was too cunning to be cunning! You are young, Shannon, you have something to learn. You sing songs—love songs—you write letters—love letters, perhaps! You are Irish—you have sentiment. There is romance about you—you are the man she would choose to do what you have done. Being a woman, she knew, she chose well; but it is my business to read all these signs.

"Give me that letter! I am your officer."

"Captain, I will not!"

"I tell you I cannot sleep! Give it to me, boy, or, by Heaven, you yourself shall sleep the long sleep here and now! What? You still refuse?"

"Yes, I'll not be driven to it. You say I'm Irish. I am—I'll not give up a woman's secret—it's a question of honor, Captain. There is a woman concerned, as you know."

"Yes!"

"And I promised her, too. I swear I never planned any wrong to either of you. I would die at your order now, as you know; but you have no right to order this, and I'll not answer!"

The hand closed at his throat. The boy could not speak, but still Meriwether Lewis growled on at him.

"Shannon! Speak! Why have you kept secrets from your commanding officer? You have begun to tell me—tell me all!"

The boy's hand clutched at his leader's wrists. At length Lewis loosed him.

"Captain," began the victim, "what do you mean? What can I do?"

"I will tell you what I mean, Shannon. I promised to care for you and bring you back safe to your parents. You'll never see your parents again, save on one condition. I trusted you, thought you had special loyalty for me. Was I wrong?"

"On my honor, Captain," the boy broke out, "I'd have died for you any time, and I'd do it now! I've worked my very best. You're my officer, my chief!"

With one movement, Meriwether Lewis flung off the uniform coat that he wore. They stood now, man to man, stripped, and neither gave back from the other.

"Shannon," said Lewis, "I'm not your officer now. I'm going to choke the truth out of you. Will you fight me, or are you afraid?"

The last cruelty was too much. The boy began to gulp.

"I'm not afraid to fight, sir. I'd fight any man, but you—no, I'll not do it! Even stripped, you're my commander still."

"Is that the reason?"

"Not all of it. You're weak, Captain, your wound has you in a fever. 'Twould not be fair—I could do as I liked with you now. I'll not fight you. I couldn't!"

"What? You will not obey me as your officer, and will not fight me as a man? Do you want to be whipped? Do you want to be shot? Do you want to be drummed out of camp tomorrow morning? By Heaven, Private Shannon, one of these choices will be yours!"

But something of the icy silence of the youth who heard these terrible words gave pause even to the madman that was Meriwether Lewis now. He halted, his hooked hands extended for the spring upon his opponent.

"What is it, boy?" he whispered at last. "What have I done? What did I say?"

Shannon was sobbing now.

"Captain," he said, and thrust a hand into the bosom of his tunic—"Captain, for Heaven's sake, don't do that! Don't apologize to me. I understand. Leave me alone. Here's the letter. There were six—this is the last."

Lewis's strained muscles relaxed, his blazing eyes softened.

"Shannon!" he whispered once more. "What have I done?"

He took the letter in his hand, but did not look at it, although his fingers could feel the seal unbroken.

"Why do you give it to me now, boy?" he asked at length. "What changed you?"

"Because it's orders, sir. She ordered me—that is, she asked me—to give you these letters at times when you seemed to need them most—when you were sick or in trouble, when anything had gone wrong. We couldn't figure so far on ahead when I ought to give you each one. I had to do my best. I didn't know at first, but now I see that you're sick. You're not yourself—you're in trouble. She told me not to let you know who carried them," he added rather inconsequently. "She said that that might end it all. She thought that you might come back."

"Come back—when?"

"She didn't know—we couldn't any of us tell—it was all a guess. All this about the letters was left to me, to do my best. I couldn't ask you, Captain, or any one. I don't know what was in the letters, sir, and I don't ask you, for that's not my business; but I promised her."

"What did she promise you?"

"Nothing. She didn't promise me pay, because she knew I wouldn't have done it for pay. She only looked at me, and she seemed sad, I don't know why. I couldn't help but promise her. I gave her my word of honor, because she said her letters might be of use to you, but that no one else must know that she had written them."

"When was all this?"

"At St. Louis, just before we started. I reckon she picked me out because she thought I was especially close to you. You know I have been so."

"Yes, I know, Shannon."

"I thought I was doing something for you. You see, she told me that her name must not be mentioned, that no one must know about this, because it would hurt a woman's reputation. She thought the men might talk, and that would be bad for you. I could not refuse her. Do you blame me now?"

"No, Shannon. No! In all this there is but one to blame, and that is your officer, myself!"

"I did not think there was any harm in my getting the letters to you, Captain. I knew that lady was your friend. I know who she is. She was more beautiful than any woman in St. Louis when we were there—more a lady, somehow. Of course, I'm not an officer or a gentleman—I'm only a boy from the backwoods, and only a private soldier. I couldn't break my promise to her, and I couldn't very well obey your orders unless I did. If I've broken any of the regulations you can punish me. You see, I held back this letter—I gave it to you now because I had the feeling that I ought to—that she would want me to. It is the fever, sir!"

"Aye, the fever!"

Silence fell as they stood there in the night. The boy went on, half tremblingly:

"Please, please, Captain Lewis, don't call me a coward! I don't believe I am. I was trying to do something for you—for both of you. It was always on my mind about these letters. I did my best and now——"

And now it was the eye of Meriwether Lewis that suddenly was wet; it was his voice that trembled.

"Boy," said he, "I am your officer. Your officer asks your pardon. I have tried myself. I was guilty. Will you forget this?"

"Not a word to a soul in the world, Captain!" broke out Shannon. "About a woman, you see, we do not talk."

"No, Mr. Shannon, about a woman we gentlemen do not talk. But now tell me, boy, what can I do for you—what can I ever do for you?"

"Nothing in the world, Captain—but just one thing."

"What is it?"

"Please, sir, tell me that you don't think me a coward!"

"A coward? No, Shannon, you are the bravest fellow I ever met!"

The hand on the boy's shoulder was kindly now. The right hand of Captain Meriwether Lewis sought that of Private George Shannon. The madness of the trail, of the wilderness—the madness of absence and of remorse—had swept by, so that Lewis once more was officer, gentleman, just and generous man.

Shannon stooped and picked up the coat that his captain had cast from him. He held it up, and aided his commander again to don it. Then, saluting, he marched off to his bivouac bed.

From that day to the end of his life, no one ever heard George Shannon mention a word of this episode. Beyond the two leaders of the party, none of the expedition ever knew who had played the part of the mysterious messenger. Nor did any one know, later, whence came the funds which eventually carried George Shannon through his schooling in the East, through his studies for the bar, and into the successful practise which he later built up in Kentucky's largest city.

Meriwether Lewis, limp and lax now, shivering in the chill under the reaction from his excitement, turned away, stepped back to his own lodge, and contrived a little light, after the frontier fashion—a rag wick in a shallow vessel of grease. With this uncertain aid he bent down closer to read the finely written lines, which ran:

MY FRIEND:

This is my last letter to you. This is the one I have marked Number Six—the last one for my messenger.

Yes, since you have not returned, now I know you never can. Rest well, then, sir, and let me be strong to bear the news when at length it comes, if it ever shall come. Let the winds and the waters sound your requiem in that wilderness which you loved more than me—which you loved more than fame or fortune, honor or glory for yourself. The wilderness! It holds you. And for me—when at last I come to lay me down, I hope, too, some wilderness of wood or waters will be around me with its vast silences.

After all, what is life? Such a brief thing! Little in it but duty done well and faithfully. I know you did yours while you lived. I have tried to do mine. It has been hard for me to see what was duty. If I knew as absolute truth that conviction now in my heart—that you never can come back—how then could I go on?

Meriwether—Merne—Merne—I have been calling to you! Have you not heard me? Can you not hear me now, calling to you across all the distances to come back to me? I cannot give you up to the world, because I have loved you so much for myself. It was a cruel fate that parted us—more and more I know that, even as more and more I resolve to do what is my duty. But, oh, I miss you! Come back to me—to one who never was and never can be, but is——

Yours,

THEODOSIA.

It took him long to read this letter. At last his trembling hand dropped the creased and broken sheets. The guttering light went out. The men were silent, sleeping near their fires. The peace of the great plains lay all about.

She had said it—had said that last fated word. Now indeed he knew what voice had called to him across the deeps!

He reflected now that all these messages had been written to him before he left her; and that when he saw her last she was standing, tears in her eyes, outraged by the act of the man whom she had trusted—nay, whom she had loved!



CHAPTER XIII

THE NEWS

A horseman rode furiously over the new road from Fort Bellefontaine to St. Louis village. He carried news. The expedition of Lewis and Clark had returned!

Yes, these men so long thought lost, dead, were coming even now with their own story, with their proofs. The boats had passed Charette, had passed Bellefontaine, and presently would be pulling up the river to the water front of St. Louis itself.

"Run, boys!" cried Pierre Chouteau to his servants. "Call out the people! Tell them to ring the bells—tell them to fire the guns at the fort yonder. Captains Lewis and Clark have come back again—those who were dead!"

The little settlement was afire upon the instant. Laughing, talking, ejaculating, weeping in their joy, the people of St. Louis hurried out to meet the men whose voyage meant so much.

At last they saw them coming, the paddles flashing in unison in the horny hands which tirelessly drove the boats along the river. They could see them—men with long beards, clad in leggings of elk hide, moccasins of buffalo and deer; their head-dresses those of the Indians, their long hair braided. And see, in the prow of the foremost craft sat two men, side by side—Lewis and Clark, the two friends who had arisen as if from the grave!

"Present arms!" rang out a sharp command, as the boats lined up along the wharf.

The brown and scarred rifles came to place.

"Aim! Fire!"

The volley of salutation blazed out even with the chorus of the voyageurs' cheers. And cheers repeated and unceasing greeted them as they stepped from their boats to the wharf. In an instant they were half overpowered.

"Come with me!"

"No, with me!"

"With me!"

A score of eager voices of the first men of St. Louis claimed the privilege of hospitality for them. It was almost by force that Pierre Chouteau bore them away to his castle on the hill. And always questions, questions, came upon them—ejaculations, exclamations.

"Ma foi!" exclaimed more than one pretty French maiden. "Such men—such splendid men—savages, yet white! See! See!"

They had gone away as youths, these two captains; they had come back men. Four thousand miles out and back they had gone, over a country unmapped, unknown; and they brought back news—news of great, new lands. Was it any wonder that they stood now, grave and dignified, feeling almost for the first time the weight of what they had done?

They passed over the boat-landing and across the wharf, approaching the foot of the rocky bluff above which lay the long street of St. Louis. Silent, as was his wont, Meriwether Lewis had replied to most of the greetings only with the smile which so lighted up his face. But now, suddenly, he ceased even to smile. His eye rested not upon the faces of those acclaiming friends, but upon something else beyond them.

Yes, there it was—the old fur-shed, the storage-house of the traders here on the wharf, just as he had left it two years before! The door was closed. What lay beyond it?

Lewis shuddered, as if caught with chill, as he looked at yonder door. Just there she had stood, more than two years ago, when he started out on this long journey. There he had kissed that face which he had left in tears—he saw it now! All the glory of his safe return, all the wonderful results which it must mean, he would have given now, could he have had back that picture for a different making.

"My matches—my thermometers—my instruments—how did they perform?"

The speaker was Dr. Saugrain, eager to meet again his friends.

"Perfect, doctor, perfect! We have some of the matches yet. As to the thermometers, we broke the last one before we reached the sea."

"You found the sea? Mon Dieu!"

"We found the Pacific. We found the Columbia, the Yellowstone—many new rivers. We have found a new continent—made a new geography. We passed the head of the Missouri. We found three great mountain ranges."

"The beaver—did you find the beaver yonder?" demanded the voice of a swarthy man who had attended them.

It was Manuel Liza, fur-trader, his eyes glowing in his interest in that reply.

"Beaver?" William Clark waved a hand. "How many I could not tell you! Thousands and millions—more beaver than ever were known in the world before. Millions of buffalo—elk in droves—bears such as you never saw—antelope, great horned sheep, otters, muskrat, mink—the greatest fur country in all the world. We could not tell you half!"

"Your men, will they be free to make return up the river with trading parties?"

William Clark smiled at the keenness of the old French trader.

"You could not possibly have better men," said he.

The men themselves shook their heads in despair. Yes, they said, they had found a thousand miles of country ready to be plowed. They had found any quantity of hardwood forests and pine groves. They had seen rivers packed with fish until they were half solid—more fish than ever were in all the world before. They had found great rivers which led far back to the heart of the continent. They had seen trees larger than any man ever had seen—so large that they hardly could be felled by an ax.

They had found a country where in the winter men perished, and another where the winters were not cold, and where the bushes grew high as trees. They had found all manner of new animals never known before—in short, a new world. How could they tell of it?

"Captain," inquired Chouteau at length, "your luggage, your boxes—where are they?"

Meriwether Lewis pointed to a skin parfleche and a knotted bandanna handkerchief which George Shannon carried for him.

"That is all I have left," said he. "But the mail for the East—the mail, M. Chouteau—we must get word to the President!"

"The President has long ago been advised of your death," said Chouteau, laughing. "All the world has said good-by to you. No doubt you can read your own obituaries."

"We bring them better news than that. What news for us?" asked the two captains of their host.

"News!" The voluble Frenchman threw up his hands. "Nothing but news! The entire world is changed since you left. I could not tell you in a month. The Burr duel——"

"Yes, we did not know of it for two years," said William Clark. "We have just heard about it, up river."

"The killing of Mr. Hamilton ended the career of Colonel Burr," said Chouteau. "But for that we might have different times here in Mississippi. He had many friends. But you have heard the last news regarding him?"

It was the dark eye of Meriwether Lewis which now compelled his attention.

"No? Well, he came out here through this country once more. He was arrested last summer, on the Natchez Trace, and carried off to Washington. The charge is treason against his government. The country is full of it—his trial is to be at Richmond. Even now it may be going on."

He did not notice the sudden change in Meriwether Lewis's face.

"And all the world is swimming in blood across the sea," went on their garrulous informant. "Napoleon and Great Britain are at war again. Were it not so, one or the other of them would be at the gates of New Orleans, that is sure. This country is still discontented. There was much in the plan of Colonel Burr to separate this valley into a country of its own, independent—to force a secession from the republic, even though by war on the flag. Indeed, he was prepared for that; but now his conspiracy is done. Perhaps, however, you do not hold with the theory of Colonel Burr?"

"Hold with the theory of Colonel Burr, sir?" exclaimed the deep voice of Meriwether Lewis. "Hold with it? This is the first time I have known what it was. It was treason! If he had any join him, that was in treason! He sought to disrupt this country? Agree with him? What is this you tell me? I had never dreamed such a thing as possible of him!"

"He had many friends," went on Chouteau; "very many friends. They are scattered even now all up and down this country—men who will not give up their cause. All those men needed was a leader."

"But, M. Chouteau," rejoined Lewis, "I do not understand—I cannot! What Colonel Burr attempted was an actual treason to this republic. I find it difficult to believe that!"

Chouteau shrugged his shoulders.

"There may be two names for it," he said.

"And every one asked to join the cause was asked to join in treason to his country. Is it not so?" Lewis went on.

"There may be two names for it," smiled the other, still shrugging.

"He was my friend," said Meriwether Lewis. "I trusted him!"

"Always, I repeat, there are two names for treason. But what puzzles me is this," Chouteau continued. "What halted the cause of Colonel Burr here in the West? He seemed to be upon the point of success. His organization was complete—his men were in New Orleans—he had great lands purchased as a rendezvous below. He had understandings with foreign powers, that is sure. Well, then, here is Colonel Burr at St. Louis, all his plans arranged. He is ready to march, to commence his campaign, to form this valley into a great kingdom, with Mexico as part of it. He was a man able to make plans, believe me. But of all this there comes—nothing! Why? At the last point something failed—no one knew what. He waited for something—no one knew what. Something lacked—no one can tell what. And all the time—this is most curious to me—I learned it through others—Colonel Burr was eager to hear something of the expedition of Lewis and Clark into the West. Why? No one knows! Does no one know?"

The captain did not speak, and Chouteau presently went on.

"Why did Colonel Burr hesitate, why did he give up his plans here—why, indeed, did he fail? You ask me why these things were? I say, it was because of you—messieurs, you two young men, with your Lewis and Clark Expedition! It was you who broke the Burr Conspiracy—for so they call it in these days. Messieurs, that is your news!"



CHAPTER XIV

THE GUESTS OF A NATION

"Attention, men!"

The company of Volunteers for the Discovery of the West fell into line in front of the stone fortress of old St. Louis. A motley crew they looked in their half-savage garb. They were veterans, fit for any difficult undertaking in the wilderness. Shoulder to shoulder they had labored in the great enterprise. Now they were to disband.

Their leaders had laid aside the costume of the frontier and assumed the uniforms of officers in the army of the United States. Fresh from his barber and his tailor, Captain Lewis stood, tall, clean-limbed, immaculate, facing his men. His beard was gone, his face showed paler where it had been reaped. His hair, grown quite long, and done now in formal cue, hung low upon his shoulders. In every line a gentleman, an officer, and a thoroughbred, he no longer bore any trace of the wilderness. Love, confidence, admiration—these things showed in the faces of his men as their eyes turned to him.

"Men," said he, "you are to be mustered out today. There will be given to each of you a certificate of service in this expedition. It will entitle you to three hundred and twenty acres of land, to be selected where you like west of the Mississippi River. You will have double pay in gold as well; but it is not only in this way that we seek to show appreciation of your services.

"We have concluded a journey of considerable length and importance. Between you and your officers there have been such relations as only could have made successful a service so extraordinary as ours has been. In our reports to our own superior officers we shall have no words save those of praise for any of you. Our expedition has succeeded. To that success you have all contributed. Your officers thank you.

"Captain Clark will give you your last command, men. As I say farewell to you, I trust I may not be taken to mean that I separate myself from you in my thoughts or memories. If I can ever be of service to any of you, you will call upon me freely."

He turned and stepped aside. His place was taken by his associate, William Clark, likewise a soldier, an officer, properly attired, and all the figure of a proper man. Clark's voice rang sharp and clear.

"Attention! Aim—fire! Break ranks—march!"

The last volley of the gallant little company was fired. The last order had been given and received. With a sweep of his drawn sword, Captain Clark dismissed them. The expedition was done.

So now they went their way, most of them into oblivion, great though their services had been. For their officers much more remained to do.

The progress to Washington was a triumph. Everywhere their admiring countrymen were excited over their marvelous journey. They were feted and honored at every turn. The country was ringing with their praises from the Mississippi to the Atlantic as the news spread eastward just ahead of them.

When at last they finished their adieux to the kindly folk of St. Louis, who scarce would let them go, they took boat across the river to the old Kaskaskia trail, and crossed the Illinois country by horse to the Falls of the Ohio, where the family of William Clark awaited him. Here was much holiday, be sure; but not even here did they pause long, for they must be on their way to meet their chief at Washington.

Their little cavalcade, growing larger now, passed on across Kentucky, over the gap in the Cumberlands, down into the country of the Virginia gentry. Here again they were feted and dined and wined so long as they would tarry. It was specially difficult for them to leave Colonel Hancock, at Fincastle. Here they must pause and tell how they had named certain rivers in the West—the one for Maria Woods; another for Judith Hancock—the Maria's and Judith Rivers of our maps today.

Here William Clark delayed yet a time. He found in the charms of the fair Judith herself somewhat to give him pause. Soon he was to take her as his bride down the Ohio to yonder town of St. Louis, for whose fame he had done so much, and was to do so much more.

Toward none of the fair maids who now flocked about them could Meriwether Lewis be more than smiling gallant, though rumors ran that either he or William Clark might well-nigh take his pick. He was alike to all of them in his courtesy.

One thought of eager and unalloyed joy rested with him. He was soon to see his mother. In time he rode down from the hilltops of old Albemarle to the point beyond the Ivy Depot where rose the gentle eminence of Locust Hill, the plantation of the Lewis family.

Always in the afternoon, in all weathers, his mother sat looking down the long lane to the gate, as if she expected that one day a certain figure would appear. Sometimes, old as she was, she dozed and dreamed—just now she had done so. She awoke, and saw standing before her, as if pictured in her dream, the form of her son, in bodily presence, although at first she did not accept him as such.

"My son!" said she at length, half as much in terror as in joy. "Merne!"

He stooped down and took her grayed head in his hands as she looked up at him. She recalled other times when he had come from the forest, from the wilderness, bearing trophies in his hands. He bore now trophies greater, perhaps, than any man of his age ever had brought home with him. What Washington had defended was not so great as that which Lewis won. It required them both to make an America for us haggling and unworthy followers.

"My son!" was all she could say. "They told me that you never would come back, that you were dead. I thought the wilderness had claimed you at last, Merne!"

"I told you I should come back to you safe, mother. There was no danger at any time. From St. Louis I have come as fast as any messenger could have come. Next I must go to see Mr. Jefferson at Washington—then, back home again to talk with you, for long, long hours."

"And what have you found?"

"More than I can tell you in a year! We found the mysterious river, the Columbia—found where it runs into the ocean, where it starts in the mountains. We found the head of the Missouri—the Ohio is but a creek beside it. We crossed plains and mountains more wonderful than any we have ever dreamed of. We saw the most wonderful land in all the world, mother—and we made it ours!"

"And you did that? Merne, was that why the wilderness called to you? My boy has done all that? Your country will reward you. I should not complain of all these years of absence. You are happy now, are you not?"

"I should be the happiest of men. I can take to Mr. Jefferson, our best friend, the proof that he was right in his plans. His great dream has come true, and I in some part helped to make it true. Should I not now be happy?"

"You should be, Merne, but are you?"

"I am well, and I find you still well and strong. My friend, Will Clark, has come back with me hearty as a boy. Everything has been fortunate with us. Look at me," he demanded, turning and stretching out his mighty arms. "I am strong. My men all came through without loss or injury—the splendid fellows! It is wonderful that in risks such as ours we met with no ill fortune."

"Yes, but are you happy? Turn your face to me."

But he did not turn his face.

"I told my friend, William Clark," he said lightly, as he rose, "to join me here after an hour or so. I think I see his party coming now. York rides ahead, do you see? He is a free negro now—he will have stories enough to set all our blacks idle for a month. I must go down to meet Will and our other guests."

William Clark, bubbling over with his own joy of life, set all the household in a whirl. There was nothing but cooking, festivity, dancing, hilarity, so long as he remained at Locust Hill.

But the mother of Meriwether Lewis looked with jealous eye on William Clark. Success, glory, honor, fame, reward—these now belonged to Meriwether Lewis, to them both, his mother knew. But why did not his laugh sound high like that of his friend? Her eyes followed her son daily, hourly, until at last she surrendered him to his duty when he declared he could no longer delay his journey to Washington.

Spick and span, cap-a-pie, pictures of splendid young manhood, the two captains rode one afternoon up to the great gate before the mansion house of the nation. Lewis looked about him at scenes once familiar; but in the three years and a half since he had seen it last the raw town had changed rapidly.

Workmen had done somewhat upon the Capitol building yonder, certain improvements had been made about the Executive Mansion itself; but the old negro men at the gate and at the door of the house were just as he had left them. And when, running on ahead of his companion, he knocked at Mr. Jefferson's office door—flinging it open, as he did so, with the freedom of his old habit—he looked in upon a familiar sight.

Thomas Jefferson was sitting bent over his desk, as usual littered with a thousand papers. The long frame of his multigraph copying-machine was at one side. Folded documents lay before him, unfinished briefs upon the other side; a rack of goose quills and an open inkpot stood beyond. And on the top of the desk, spread out long and over all, lay a great map, whose identity these two young men easily could tell—the Lewis and Clark map sent back from the Mandan country! Thomas Jefferson had kept it at his desk every day since it had come to him, more than two years before.

He turned now toward the door, casually, for he was used to the interruptions of his servants. What he saw brought him to his feet. He spread out his arms impulsively—he shook the hand of each in turn, drew them to him before he motioned them to seats. Never had Meriwether Lewis seen such emotion displayed by his chief.

"I could hardly wait for you!" said Mr. Jefferson. He began to pace up and down. "I knew it, I knew it!" he exclaimed. "Now they will call us constitutional, perhaps, since we have added a new world to our country! My son, that was our vision. You have proved it. You have been both dreamer and doer!"

He came up and placed a half playful hand on Meriwether Lewis's shoulder.

"Did I know men, then?" he demanded.

"And did I, Mr. Jefferson? Captain Clark——"

"You do not say the title correctly! It is not Captain Clark, it is not Captain Lewis, that stand before me now. You are to have sixteen hundred acres of land, each of you. You, my son, will be Governor Lewis of the new Territory of Louisiana; and your friend is not Captain Clark but General Clark, agent of all the Indian tribes of the West!"

In silence the hand of each of the young men went out to the President. Then their own eyes met, and their hands. They were not to be separated after all—they were to work together yonder in St. Louis!

"Governor—General—I welcome you back! You will come back to your old rooms here in my family, Merne, and we will find a place for your friend. What we have here is at the service of both of you. You are the guests of the nation!"



CHAPTER XV

MR. JEFFERSON'S ADVICE

"Merne, my boy," said Thomas Jefferson, when at length they two were alone once more in the little office, "I cannot say what your return means to me. You come as one from the grave—you resurrect another from the grave."

"Meaning, Mr. Jefferson?——"

"You surely have heard that my administration is in sad disrepute? There is no man in the country hated so bitterly as myself. We are struggling on the very verge of war."

"I heard some talk in the West, Mr. Jefferson," hesitated Meriwether Lewis.

"Yes, they called this Louisiana Purchase, on which I had set my heart, nothing but extravagance. The machinations of Colonel Burr have added nothing to its reputation. General Jackson is with Burr, and many other strong friends. And meantime you know where Burr himself is—in the Richmond jail. I understand that his friend, Mr. Merry, has gone yonder to visit him. Our country is degenerated to be no more than a scheming-ground, a plotting-place, for other powers. You come back just in the nick of time. You have saved this administration! You bring back success with you. If the issue of your expedition were anything else, I scarce know what would be my own case here. For myself, that would have mattered little; but as to this country for which I have planned so much, your failure would have cost us all the Mississippi Valley, besides all the valley of the Missouri and the Columbia. Yes, had you not succeeded, Aaron Burr would have succeeded! Instead of a great republic reaching from ocean to ocean, we should have had a scattered coterie of States of no endurance, no continuity, no power. Thank God for the presence of one great, splendid thing gloriously done! You cannot, do not, begin to measure its importance."

"We are glad that you have been pleased, Mr. Jefferson," said Lewis simply.

"Pleased! Pleased! Say rather that I am saved! Say rather that this country is saved! Had you proved disloyal to me—had you for any cause turned back," he went on, "think what had been the result! What a load, although you knew it not, was placed on your shoulders! Suppose that you had turned back on the trail last year, or the summer before—suppose you had not gotten beyond the Mandans—can you measure the difference for this republic? Can you begin to see what responsibility rested on you? Had you failed, you would have dragged the flag of your country in the dust. Had you come back any time before you did, then you might have called yourself the man who ruined his President, his friend, his country!"

"And I nearly did, Mr. Jefferson!" broke out Meriwether Lewis. "Do not praise me too much. I was tempted——"

The old man turned toward him, his face grave.

"You are honest! I value that above all in you—you are punctilious to have no praise not honestly won. Listen, now!" He leaned toward the young man, who sat beside him. "I know—I knew all along—how you were tempted. She came here—Theodosia—the very day you left!"

Lewis nodded, mute.

"In some way, I knew, the conspirators fought against your success and mine. I knew what agencies they intended to use against you—it was this woman! Had you failed, I should have known why. I know many things, whether or not you do. I know the character of Aaron Burr well enough. He has been crazed, carried away by his own ambitions—God alone knows where he would have stopped. He has been a man not surpassed in duplicity. He would stop at nothing. Moreover, he could make black look white. He did so for his daughter. She believed in him absolutely. And knowing somewhat of his plans, I imagined that he would use the attraction of that young lady for you—the power which, all things considered, she might be supposed to possess with you. I knew the depth of your regard for her, the deeper for its hopelessness. And more than all, I knew the intentness and resolution of your character. It was one motive against the other! Which was the stronger? You were a young man—the hot blood of youth was yours, and I know its power. Had the woman not been married, I should have lost! You would have sold a crown for her. It was honor saved you—your personal honor—that was what brought us success. No country is bigger than the personal honor of its gentlemen."

The bowed head of Meriwether Lewis was his only answer. The keen-faced old man went on:

"I knew that before you had left the mouth of the Ohio River he would do his best to stop you—I knew it before you had left Harper's Ferry; but I placed the issue in the lap of the gods. I applied to you all the tests—the severest tests—that one man can to another. I let you alone! For a year, two years, three years, I did not know. But now I do know; and the answer is yonder flag which you have carried from one ocean to the other. The answer is in this map, all these hides scrawled in coal—all those new thousands of miles of land—our land. God keep it safe for us always! And may the people one day know who really secured it for them! It was not so much Thomas Jefferson as it was Meriwether Lewis.

"Each time I dreamed that my subtle enemies were tempting you, I prayed in my own soul that you would be strong; that you would go on; that you would be loyal to your duty, no matter what the cost. God answered those prayers, my boy! Whatever was your need, whatever price you paid, you did what I prayed you would do. When the months passed and you did not come back, I knew that not even the woman you loved could have called you back. I knew that you had learned the priceless lesson of renunciation, of sacrifice, through which alone the great deeds of the world always have been done."

Meriwether Lewis stood before his chief, cold and pale, unable to complete much speech. Thomas Jefferson looked at him for a moment before he went on.

"My boy, you are so simple that you will not understand. You do not understand how well I understand you! These things are not done without cost. If there was punishment for you, you took that punishment—or you will! You kept your oath as an officer and your unwritten oath as a gentleman. It is a great thing for a man to have his honor altogether unsullied."

"Mr. Jefferson!" The young man before him lifted a hand. His face was ghastly pale. "Do not," said he. "Do not, I beg of you!"

"What is it, Merne?" exclaimed the old man. "What have I done?"

"You speak of my honor. Do not! Indeed, you touch me deep."

Thomas Jefferson, wise old man, raised a hand.

"I shall never listen, my son," said he. "I will accord to you the right of hot blood to run hot—you would not be a man worth knowing were it not so. All I know or will know is that whatever the price, you have paid it—or will pay it! But tell me, Merne, can you not tear her from your soul? It will ruin you, this hopeless attachment which you cherish. Is it always to remain with you? I bid you find some other woman. The best in the land are waiting for you."

"Mr. Jefferson, I shall never marry."

The two sat looking into each other's eyes for just a moment. Said Thomas Jefferson at length, slowly:

"So! You have come back with all happiness, all success, for me and for others—but not for yourself! Such proving as you have had has fallen to the lot of but few men. I know now how great has been the cost—I see it in your face. The fifteen millions I paid for yonder lands was nothing. We have bought them with the happiness of a human soul! The transient gratitude of this republic—the honor of that little paper—bah, they are nothing! But perhaps it may be something for you to know that at least one friend understands."

Lewis did not speak.

"What is lost is lost," the President began again after a time. "What is broken is broken. But see how clearly I look into your soul. You are not thinking now of what you can do for yourself. You are not thinking of your new rank, your honors. You are asking now, at this moment, what you can do for her! Is it not so?"

The smile that came upon the young man's face was a beautiful, a wonderful thing to see. It made the wise old man sad to see it—but thoughtful, too.

"She is at Richmond, Merne?" said Mr. Jefferson a moment later.

The young man nodded.

"And the greatest boon she could ask would be her father's freedom—the freedom of the man who sought to ruin this country—the man whom I scarcely dare release."

The thin lips compressed for a moment. It was not in implacable, vengeful zeal—it was but in thought.

"Now, then," said Thomas Jefferson sharply, "there comes a veil, a curtain, between you and me and all the world. No record must show that either of us raised a hand against the full action of the law, or planned that Colonel Burr should not suffer the full penalty of the code. Yes, for him that is true—but not for his daughter!"

"Mr. Jefferson!" The face of Meriwether Lewis was strangely moved. "I see the actual greatness of your soul; but I ask nothing."

"Why, in my heart I feel like flinging open every prison door in the world. If you have gained an empire for your country, and paid for it as you have, could not a great and rich country afford to pay to the extent of a woman's happiness? When a king is crowned, he sets free the criminals. And this day I feel as proud and happy as if I were a king—and king of the greatest empire of all the world! I know well who assured that kingdom. Let me be, then"—he raised his long hand—"say nothing, do nothing. And let this end all talk between us of these matters. I know you can keep your own counsel."

Lewis bowed silently.

"Go to Richmond, Merne. You will find there a broken conspirator and his unhappy daughter. Both are ostracized. None is so poor as to do either of them reverence. She has no door opened to her now, though but lately she was daughter of the Vice-President, the rich Mrs. Alston, wife of the Governor of her State. Go to them now. Tell Colonel Burr that the President will not ask mercy for him. John Marshall is on the bench there; but before him is a jury—John Randolph is foreman of that jury. It is there that case will be tried—in the jury room; and politics will try it! Go to Theodosia, Merne, in her desperate need."

"But what can I do, Mr. Jefferson?" broke out his listener.

"Do precisely what I tell you. Go to that social outcast. Take her on your arm before all the world—and before that jury! Sit there, before all Richmond—and that jury. An hour or so will do. Do that, and then, as I did when I trusted you, ask no questions, but leave it on the knees of the gods. If you can call me chief in other matters," the President concluded, "and can call me chief in that fashion of thought which men call religion as well, let me give you unction and absolution, my son. It is all that I have to give to one whom I have always loved as if he were my own son. This is all I can do for you. It may fail; but I would rather trust that jury to be right than trust myself today; because, I repeat, I feel like flinging open every prison door in all the world, and telling every erring, stumbling man to try once more to do what his soul tells him he ought to do!"



CHAPTER XVI

THE QUALITY OF MERCY

In Richmond jail lay Aaron Burr, the great conspirator, the ruins of his ambition fallen about him. He had found a prison instead of a palace. He was eager no longer to gain a scepter, but only to escape a noose.

The great conspiracy was at an end. The only question was of the punishment the accused should have—for in the general belief he was certain of conviction. That he never was convicted has always been one of the most mysterious facts of a mysterious chapter in our national development.

So crowded were the hostelries of Richmond that a stranger would have had difficulty in finding lodging there during the six months of the Burr trial. Not so with Meriwether Lewis, now one of the country's famous men. A score of homes opened their doors to him. The town buzzed over his appearance. He had once been the friend of Burr, always the friend of Jefferson. To which side now would he lean.

Luther Martin, chief of Burr's counsel, was eager above all to have a word with Meriwether Lewis, so close to affairs in Washington, possibly so useful to himself. Washington Irving, too, assistant to Martin in the great trial, would gladly have had talk with him. All asked what his errand might be. What was the leaning of the Governor of the new Territory, a man closer to the administration at Washington than any other?

Meriwether Lewis kept his own counsel. He arranged first to see Burr himself. The meagerly furnished anteroom of the Federal prison in Richmond was the discredited adventurer's reception-hall in those days.

Burr advanced to meet his visitor with something of his own old haughtiness of mien, a little of the former brilliance of his eye.

"Governor, I am delighted to see you, back safe and sound from your journey. My congratulations, sir!"

Meriwether Lewis made no reply, but gazed at him steadily, well aware of the stinging sarcasm of his words.

"I have few friends now," said Aaron Burr. "You have many. You are on the flood tide—it ebbs for me. When one loses, what mercy is shown to him? That scoundrel Merry—he promised everything and gave nothing! Yrujo—he is worse yet in his treachery. Even the French minister, Turreau—who surely might listen to the wishes of the great French population of the Mississippi Valley—pays no attention to their petitions whatever, and none to mine. These were my former friends! I promised them a country."

"You promised them a country, Colonel Burr—from what?"

"From that great ownerless land yonder, the West. But they waited and waited, until your success was sure. Why, that scoundrel Merry is here this very day—the effrontery of him! He wants nothing more to do with me. No, he is here to undertake to recoup himself in his own losses by reasons of moneys he advanced to me some time ago. He is importuning my son-in-law, Mr. Alston, to pay him back those funds—which once he was so ready to furnish to us. But Mr. Alston is ruined—I am ruined—we are all ruined. No, they waited too long!"

"They waited until it was too late, yes," Lewis returned. "That country is American now, not British or Spanish or French. Our men are passing across the river in thousands. They will never loose their hold on the West. It was treason to the future that you planned—but it was hopeless from the first!"

"It would seem, sir," said Aaron Burr, a cynical smile twisting his thin lip, "that I may not count upon your friendship!"

"That is a hard speech, Colonel Burr. I was your friend."

"More than your chief ever was! I fancy Mr. Jefferson would like to see me pilloried, drawn and quartered, after the old way."

"You are unjust to him. You struck at the greatest ambition of his life—struck at his heart and the heart of his country—when you undertook to separate the West from this republic."

"I am a plain man, and a busy man," said Aaron Burr coldly. "I must employ my time now to the betterment of my situation. I have failed, and you have won. But let me throw the cloak aside, since I know you can be of no service to me. I care not what punishment you may have—what suffering—because I recognize in you the one great cause of my failure. It was you, sir, with your cursed expedition, that defeated Aaron Burr!"

He turned, proud and defiant even in his failure, and when Meriwether Lewis looked up he was gone.

Even as Burr passed, Meriwether Lewis heard a light step in the long corridor. Under guard of the turnkey, some one stood at the door. It was the figure of a woman—a figure which caused him to halt, caused his heart to leap!

She came toward him now, all in mourning black—hat, gown, and gloves. Her face was pale, her eyes deep, her mouth drooping. Theodosia Alston was always thus on her daily visit to her father's cell.

Herself the picture of failure and despair, she was used to avoiding the eyes of all; but she saw Meriwether Lewis standing before her, strong, tall, splendid in his manhood and vigor, in the full tide of his success. She was almost in touch of his hand when she raised her eyes to his.

These two had met at last, after what far wanderings apart! They had met as if each came from the Valley of the Shadows. Out of the vastness of the unknown, over all those long and devious trails, into what now seemed to him a world still more vast, more fraught with desperate peril, he had come back to her. And she—what had been her perils? What were her thoughts?

As his eye fell upon her, even as his keen ear had known her coming, the hand of Meriwether Lewis half unconsciously went to his breast. He felt under it the packet of faded letters which he had so long kept with him—which in some way he felt to be his talisman.

Yes, it was for this that he had had them! His love and hers—this had been his shield through all. What he saw in her grave face, her mournful eyes uplifted to his own—this was the solution of the riddle of his life, the reason for his moods of melancholy, the answer to a thousand unspoken prayers. He felt his heart thrill strong and full, felt his blood spring in strong current through his veins, until they strained, until he felt his nerves tingle as he stood, silent, endeavoring to still the tumult within him, now that he knew the great and satisfying truth of truths.

To her he was—what? A tall and handsome gentleman, immaculately clad, Governor of the newest of our Territories—the largest and richest realm ever laid under the rule of any viceroy. A bystander might have pondered on such things, but Meriwether Lewis had no thought of them, nor had the woman who looked up at him. No, to her eyes there stood only the man who made her blood leap, her soul cry out:

"Yea! Yea! Now I know!"

To her also, from the divine compassion, was given answer for her questionings. She knew that life for her, even though it ended now, had been no blind puzzle, after all, but was a glorious and perfect thing. She had called to him across the deep, and he had heard and come! From the very grave itself he had arisen and come again to her!

Even here under the shadow of the gallows—even if, as both knew in their supreme renunciation, they must part and never meet again—for them both there could be peaceful calm, with all life's questions answered, beautifully and surely answered, never again to rise for conquering.

"Sir—Captain—that is to say, Governor Lewis," she corrected herself, "I was not expecting you."

Her tone seemed icy, though her soul was in her eyes. She was all upon the defense, as Lewis instantly understood. He took her hand in both of his own, and looked into her face.

She gazed up at him, and swiftly, mercifully, the tears came. Gently, as if she had been a child, he dried them for her—as once when a boy, he had promised to do. They were alone now. The cold silence of the prison was about them; but their own long silence seemed a golden, glowing thing. Thus only—in their silence—could they speak. They did not know that they stood hand in hand.

"My husband is not here," said she at length, gently disengaging her hand from his. "No one knows me now, every one avoids me. You must not be seen with me—a pariah, an outcast! I am my father's only friend. Already they condemn him; yet he is as innocent as any man ever was."

"I shall say no word to change that belief," said Meriwether Lewis. "But your husband is not here? It is he whom I must see at once."

"Why must you see him?"

"You must know! It is my duty to go to him and to tell him that I am the man who—who made you weep. He must have his satisfaction. Nothing that he can do will punish me as my own conscience has already punished me. It is no use—I shall not ask you to forgive me—I will not be so cheap."

"But—suppose he does not know?"

He could only stand silent, regarding her fixedly.

"He must never know!" she went on. "It is no time for quixotism to make yet another suffer. We two must be strong enough to carry our own secret. It is better and kinder that it should be between two than among three. I thought you dead. Let the past remain past—let it bury its own dead!"

"It is our time of reckoning," said he, at length. "Guilty as I have been, sinning as I have sinned—tell me, was I alone in the wrong? Listen. Those who joined your father's cause were asked to join in treason to their country. What he purposed was treason. Tell me, did you know this when you came to me?"

He saw the quick pain upon her face, the flush that rose to her pale cheek. She drew herself up proudly.

"I shall not answer that!" said she.

"No!" he exclaimed, swiftly contrite. "Nor shall I ask it. Forgive me! You never knew—you were innocent. You do right not to answer such a question."

"I only wanted you to be happy—that was my one desire."

She looked aside, and a moment passed before she heard his deep voice reply.

"Happy! I am the most unhappy man in all the world. Happiness? No—rags, shreds, patches of happiness—that is all that is left of happiness for us, as men and women usually count it. But tell me, what would make you most happy now, of these things remaining? I have come back to pay my debts. Is there anything I can do? What would make you happiest?"

"My father's freedom!"

"I cannot promise that; but all that I can do I will."

"Were my father guilty, that would be the act of a noble mind. But how? You are Mr. Jefferson's friend, not the friend of Aaron Burr. All the world knows that."

"Precisely. All the world knows that, or thinks it does. It thinks it knows that Mr. Jefferson is implacable. But suppose all the world were set to wondering? I am just wondering myself if it would be right to suborn a juryman, like John Randolph of Roanoke!"[6]

[Footnote 6: The import of the visit of Governor Lewis and Mrs. Alston to the court-room during the Burr trial is better conveyed if there be held in mind the personality of that eccentric and extraordinary man, so prominent in the history of America and the traditions of Virginia—John Randolph of Roanoke. Irascible, high-voiced, high-headed, truculent, insolent, vitriolic—yet gallant, courteous, kind, just, and fair; the enemy and the friend in turn of almost every public man of his day; truckling to none, defiant of all, sure to do what could not be predicted of any other man—it was always certain that John Randolph of Roanoke would do what he liked, and do what—for that present time—he fancied to be just.

Now the ardent adherent, again the bitter caluminator of Jefferson, it would be held probable that John Randolph of Roanoke would do what he fancied Thomas Jefferson had not asked him to do, or had asked him not to do. But the shrewd old man at Washington spoke advisedly when he said that John Randolph of Roanoke would try the Burr case in the jury-room, and himself preside as judge, counsel, and jury all in one!]

"That is impossible. What do you mean?"

"I mean this. This afternoon you and I will go into the trial-room together. I have not yet attended a session of the court. Today I will hand you to your seat in full sight of the jury box."

"You—give your presence to one who is now a social pariah? The ladies of Richmond no longer speak to me. But to what purpose?"

"Perhaps to small purpose. I cannot tell. But let us suppose that I go with you, and that we sit there in sight of all. I am known to be the intimate friend of Mr. Jefferson. Ergo——"

"Ergo, Mr. Jefferson is not hostile to us! And you would do that—you would take that chance?"

"For you."

And he did—for her! That afternoon all the crowded court-room saw the beadle make way for two persons of importance. One was a tall, grave, distinguished-looking man, impassive, calm, a man whose face was known to all—the new Governor of Louisiana, viceroy of the country that Burr had lost. Upon his arm, pale, clad all in black, walked the daughter of the prisoner at the bar!

Was it in defiance or in compliance that this act was done? Was it by orders, or against orders, or without orders, that the President's best friend walked in public, before all the world, with the daughter of the President's worst enemy? It was the guess of anybody and the query of all.

There, in full view of all the attendants, in full view of the jury—and of John Randolph of Roanoke, its foreman—sat the two persons who had had most to do with this scene of which they now made a part. There sat the man who had explored the great West, and the woman who had done her best to prevent that exploration; Mr. Jefferson's friend, and the daughter of the great conspirator, Aaron Burr. Ergo, ergo, said many tongues swiftly—and leaned head to head to whisper it. Mind sometimes speaks to mind—even across the rail of a jury-box. Sympathy runs deep and swift sometimes. All the world loved Meriwether Lewis then, would favor him—or favor what he favored.

The issue of that great trial was not to come for weeks as yet; but when it came, and by whatever process, Aaron Burr was acquitted of the charges brought against him. The republic for whose downfall he had plotted set him free and bade him begone.

But now, at the close of this day, the two central figures of the tragic drama found themselves together once more. They could be alone nowhere but in the prison room; and it was there that they parted.

Between them, as they stood now at last, about to part, there stretched an abysmal gulf which might never personally be passed by either.

She faced him at length, trembling, pleading, helpless.

"How mighty a thing is a man's sense of honor!" she said slowly. "You have done what I never would have asked you to do, and I am glad that you did. I once asked you to do what you would not do, and I am glad that you did not. How can I repay you for what you have done today? I cannot tell how, but I feel that you have turned the tide for us. Ah, if ever you felt that you owed me anything, it is paid—all your debt to me and mine. See, I no longer weep. You have dried my tears!"

"We cannot balance debits and credits," he replied. "There is no way in the world in which you and I can cry quits. Only one thing is sure—I must go!"

"I cannot say good-by!" said she. "Ah, do not ask me that! We are but beginning now. Oh, see! see!"

He looked at her still, an unspeakable sadness in his gaze—at her hand, extended pleadingly toward him.

"Won't you take my hand, Merne?" said she. "Won't you?"

"I dare not," said he hoarsely. "No, I dare not!"

"Why? Do you wish to leave me still feeling that I am in your debt? You can afford so much now," she said brokenly, "for those who have not won!"

"Think you that I have won?" he broke out. "Theodosia—Theo—I shall call you by your old name just once—I do not take your hand—I dare not touch you—because I love you! I always shall. God help me, it is the truth!"

"Did you get my letters?" she said suddenly, and looked him fair in the face.

Meriwether Lewis stood searching her countenance with his own grave eyes.

"Letters?" said he at length. "What letters?"

Her eyes looked up at him luminously.

"You are glorious!" said she. "Yes, a woman's name would be safe with you. You are strong. How terrible a thing is a sense of honor! But you are glorious! Good-by!"



CHAPTER XVII

THE FRIENDS

Allied in fortunes as they had been in friendship, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark went on side by side in their new labors in the capital of that great land which they had won for the republic. Their offices in title were distinct, yet scarcely so in fact, for each helped the other, as they had always done.

To these two men the new Territory of Louisiana owed not only its discovery, but its early passing over to the day of law and order. No other men could have done what they did in that time of disorder and change, when, rolling to the West in countless waves, came the white men, following the bee, crossing the great river, striking out into the new lands, a headstrong, turbulent, and lawless population.

A thousand new and petty cares came to Governor Lewis. He passed from one duty to another, from one part of his vast province to another, traveling continually with the crude methods of transportation of that period, and busy night and day. Courts must be established. The compilation of the archives must be cared for. Records must be instituted to clear up the swarm of conflicts over land-titles. Scores of new duties arose, and scores of new remedies needed to be devised.

The first figure of the growing capital of St. Louis, the new Governor was also the central figure of all social activities, the cynosure of all eyes. But the laughing belles of St. Louis at length sighed and gave him up—they loved him as Governor, since they might not as man. Wise, firm, deliberate, kind, sad—he was an old man now, though still young in years.

Scattered up and down the great valley, above and below St. Louis, and harboring in that town, were many of the late adherents of Burr's broken conspiracy. These liked not the oncoming of the American government, enforced by so rigid an executive as the one who now held power. Threats came to the ears of Meriwether Lewis, who was hated by the Burr adherents as the cause of their discomfiture; but he, wholly devoid of the fear of any man, only laughed at them. Honest and blameless, it was difficult for any enemy to injure him, and no man cared to meet Meriwether Lewis in the open.

But at last one means of attack was found. Once more—the last time—the great heart of a noble man was pierced.

"Will," said he to his friend, as they met at William Clark's home, according to their frequent custom, "I am in trouble."

"Fancied trouble, Merne," said Clark. "You're always finding it!"

"Would I might call it fancied! But this is something in the way of facts, and very stubborn facts. See here"—he held out certain papers in his hand—"by this morning's mail I get back these bills protested—protested by the government at Washington! And they are bills that I have drawn to pay the expenses of administering my office here."

"Tut, tut!" said William Clark gravely. "Come, let us see."

"Look here, and here! Will, you know that I am a man of no great fortune. You also know that I have made certain enemies in this country. But now I am not supported by my own government. I am ruined—I am a broken man! Did you think that this country could do that for either of us?"

"But Merne, you, the soul of honor——"

"Some enemy has done this! What influences have been set to work, I cannot say; but here are the bills, and there are others out in other hands—also protested, I have no doubt. I am publicly discredited, disgraced. I know not what has been said of me at Washington."

"That is the trouble," said William Clark slowly. "Washington is so far. But now, you must not let this trouble you. 'Tis only some six-dollar-a-week clerk in Washington that has done it. You must not consider it to be the deliberate act of any responsible head of the government. You take things too hard, Merne. I will not have you brooding over this—it will never do. You have the megrims often enough, as it is. Come here and kiss the baby! He is named for you, Meriwether Lewis—and he has two teeth. Sit down and behave yourself. Judy will be here in a minute. You are among your friends. Do not grieve. 'Twill all come well!"

This was in the year 1809. Mr. Jefferson's embargo on foreign trade had paralyzed all Western commerce. Our ships lay idle; our crops rotted; there was no market. The name of Jefferson was now in general execration. In March, when his second term as President expired, he had retired to private life at Monticello. He had written his last message to Congress that very spring, in which he said of the people of his country:

I trust that in their steady character, unshaken by difficulties, in their love of liberty, obedience to law, and support of the public authorities, I see a sure guarantee of the permanence of our republic; and retiring from the charge of their affairs, I carry with me the consolation of a firm persuasion that Heaven has in store for our beloved country long ages to come of prosperity and happiness.

Whatever the veering self-interest of others led them to think or do regarding the memory of that great man, Meriwether Lewis trusted Thomas Jefferson absolutely, and relied wholly on his friendship and his counsel. Now, in the hour of trouble, he resolved to journey to Monticello to ask the advice of his old chief, as he had always done.

In this he was well supported by his friend Dr. Saugrain.

"You are ill, Governor—you have the fever of these lands," urged that worthy. "By all means leave this country and go back to the East. Go by way of New Orleans and the sea. The voyage will do you much good."

"Peria," said Meriwether Lewis to his French servant and attendant, "make ready my papers for my journey. Have a small case, such as can be carried on horseback. I must take with me all my journals, my maps, and certain of the records of my office here. Get my old spyglass; I may need it, and I always fancy to have it with me when I travel, as was my custom in the West. Secure for our costs in travel some gold—three or four hundred dollars, I imagine. I will take some in my belt, and give the rest to you for the saddle-trunk."

"Your Excellency plans to go by land, then, and not by sea?"

"I do not know. I must save all the time possible. And Peria——"

"Yes, Excellency."

"Have my pistols well cared for, and your own as well. See that my small powder-canister, with bullets, is with them in the holsters. The trails are none too safe. Be careful whom you advise of our plans. My business is of private nature, and I do not wish to be disturbed. And here, take my watch," he concluded. "It was given to me by a friend—a good friend, Mr. Wirt, and I prize it very much—so much that I fear to have it on my person. Care for it in the saddle-trunk."

"Yes, Excellency."

"Do not call me 'Excellency'—I detest the title! I am Governor Lewis, and may so be distinguished. Go now, and do as I have told you. We shall need about ten men to man the barge. Arrange it. Have our goods ready for an early start tomorrow morning."

All that night, sleepless, fevered, almost distracted, Meriwether Lewis sat at his desk, writing, or endeavoring to write, with what matters upon his soul we may not ask. But the long night wore away at last, and morning came, a morning of the early fall, beautiful as it may be only in that latitude. Without having closed his eyes in sleep, the Governor made ready for his journey to the East.

Whether or not Peria was faithful to all his instructions one cannot say, but certainly all St. Louis knew of the intended departure of the Governor. They loved him, these folk, trusted him, would miss him now, and they gathered almost en masse to bid him godspeed upon his journey.

"These papers for Mr. Jefferson, Governor—certain land-titles, of which we spoke to him last year. Do you not remember?" Thus Chouteau, always busy with affairs.

"These samples of cloth and of satin, Governor," said a dark-eyed French girl, smiling up at him. "Would you match them for me in the East? I am to be married in the spring!"

"The price of furs—learn of that, Governor, if you can, while on your journey. The embargo has ruined the trade in all this inland country!" It was Manuel Liza, swarthy, taciturn, who thus voiced a general feeling.

"Books, more books, my son!" implored Dr. Saugrain. "We are growing here—I must keep up with the surgery of the day; I must know the new discoveries in medicine. Bring me books. And take this little case of medicines. You are ill, my son—the fever has you!"

"My people—they mourn for me as dead," said Big White, the Mandan, who had never returned to his people up the Missouri River since the repulse of his convoy by the Sioux. "Tell the Great Father that he must send me soldiers to take me back home to my people. My heart is poor!"

"Governor, see if you can get me an artificial limb of some sort while you are in the East."

It was young George Shannon who said this, leaning on his crutch. Shannon had not long ago returned from another trip up the river, where in an encounter with the Sioux he had received a wound which cost him a leg and almost cost him his life—though later, as has already been said, he was to become a noted figure at the bar of the State of Kentucky.

"Yes! Yes, and yes!" Their leader, punctilious as he was kind, agreed to all these commissions—prizing them, indeed, as proof of the confidence of his people.

He was ready to depart, but stood still, looking about for the tall figure which presently he saw advancing through the throng—a tall man with wide mouth and sunny hair, with blue eye and stalwart frame—William Clark—the friend whom he loved so much, and whom he was now to see for the last time.

General Clark carried upon his arm the baby which had been named after the Governor of the new Territory. Lewis took him from his father's arms and pressed the child's cool face to his own, suddenly trembling a little about his own lips as he felt the tender flesh of the infant. No child of his own might he ever hold thus! He gave him back with a last look into the face of his friend.

"Good-by, Will!" said he.



CHAPTER XVIII

THE WILDERNESS

The Governor's barge swept down the rolling flood of the Mississippi, impelled by the blades of ten sturdy oarsmen. Little by little the blue smoke of St. Louis town faded beyond the level of the forest. The stone tower of the old Spanish stockade, where floated the American flag, disappeared finally.

Meriwether Lewis sat staring back, but seeming not to note what passed. He did not even notice a long bateau which left the wharf just before his own and preceded him down the river, now loafing along aimlessly, sometimes ahead, sometimes behind that of the Governor and his party. In time he turned to his lap-desk and began his endless task of writing, examining, revising. Now and again he muttered to himself. The fever was indeed in his blood!

They proceeded thus, after the usual fashion of boat travel in those days, down the great river, until they had passed the mouth of the Ohio and reached what was known as the Chickasaw Bluffs, below the confluence of the two streams. Here was a little post of the army, arranged for the commander, Major Neely, Indian agent at that point.

As was the custom, all barges tied up here; and the Governor's craft moored at the foot of the bluff. Its chief passenger was so weak that he hardly could walk up the steep steps cut in the muddy front of the bank.

"Governor Lewis!" exclaimed Major Neely, as he met him. "You are ill! You are in an ague!"

"Perhaps, perhaps. Give me rest here for a day or two, if you please. Then I fancy I shall be strong enough to travel East. See if you can get horses for myself and my party—I am resolved not to go by sea. I have not time."

The Governor of Louisiana, haggard, flushed with fever, staggered as he followed his friend into the apartment assigned to him in one of the cabins of the little post. He wore his usual traveling-garb; but now, for some strange reason he seemed to lack his usual immaculate neatness. Instead of the formal dress of his office, he wore an old, stained, faded uniform coat, its pocket bulging with papers. This he kept at the head of his bed when at length he flung himself down, almost in the delirium of fever.

He lay here for two days, restless, sleepless. But at length, having in the mean time scarcely tasted food, he rose and declared that he must go on.

"Major," said he, "I can ride now. Have you horses for the journey?"

"Are you sure, Governor, that your strength is sufficient?" Neely hesitated as he looked at the wasted form before him, at the hollow eye, the fevered face.

"It is not a question of my personal convenience, Major," said Meriwether Lewis. "Time presses for me. I must go on!"

"At least you shall not go alone," said Major Neely. "You should have some escort. Doubtless you have important papers?"

Meriwether Lewis nodded.

"My servant has arranged everything, I fancy. Can you get an extra man or two? The Natchez Trace is none too safe."

That military road, as they both knew, was indeed no more than a horse path cut through the trackless forest which lay across the States of Mississippi, Tennessee and Kentucky. Its reputation was not good. Many a trader passing north from New Orleans with coin, many a settler passing west with packhorses and household effects, had disappeared on this wilderness road, and left no sign. It was customary for parties of any consequence to ride in companies of some force.

It was a considerable cavalcade, therefore, which presently set forth from Chickasaw Bluffs on the long ride eastward to cross the Alleghanies, which meant some days or weeks spent in the saddle. Apprehension sat upon all, even as they started out. Their eyes rested upon the wasted form of their leader, the delirium of whose fever seemed still to hold him. He muttered to himself as he rode, resented the near approach of any traveling companion, demanded to be alone. They looked at him in silence.

"He talks to himself all the time," said one of the party—a new man, hired by Neely at the army post. He rode with Peria now; and none but Peria knew that he had come from the long barge which had clung to the Governor's craft all the way down the river—and which, unknown to Lewis himself, had tied up and waited at Chickasaw Bluffs. He was a stranger to Neely and to all the others, but seemed ready enough to take pay for service along the Trace, declaring that he himself was intending to go that way. He was a man well dressed, apparently of education and of some means. He rode armed.

"What is wrong with the Governor, think you?" inquired this man once more of Peria, Lewis's servant.

"It is his way," shrugged Peria. "We leave him alone. His hand is heavy when he is angry."

"He rides always with his rifle across his saddle?"

"Always, on the trail."

"Loaded, I presume—and his pistols?"

"You may well suppose that," said Peria.

"Oh, well," said the new member of the party, "'tis just as well to be safe. I lifted his saddlebags and the desk, or trunk, whatever you call it, that is on the pack horse yonder. Heavy, eh?"

"Naturally," grinned Peria.

They looked at one another. And thereafter the two, as was well noted, conversed often and more intimately together as the journey progressed.

"Now it's an odd thing about his coat," volunteered the stranger later in that same day. "He always keeps it on—that ragged old uniform. Was it a uniform, do you believe? Can't the Governor of the new Territory wear a coat that shows his own quality? This one's a dozen years old, you might say."

"He always wears it on the trail," said Peria. "At home he watches it as if it held some treasure."

"Treasure?" The shifty eyes of the new man flashed in sudden interest. "What treasure? Papers, perhaps—bills—documents—money? His pocket bulges at the side. Something there—yes, eh?"

"Hush!" said Peria. "You do not know that man, the Governor. He has the eye of a hawk, the ear of a fox—you can keep nothing from him. He fears nothing in the world, and in his moods—you'd best leave him alone. Don't let him suspect, or——" And Peria shook his head.

The cavalcade was well out into the wilderness east of the Mississippi on that afternoon of October 8, in the year 1809. Stopping at the wayside taverns which now and then were found, they had progressed perhaps a hundred miles to the eastward. The day was drawing toward its close when Peria rode up and announced that one or two of the horses had strayed from the trail.

"I have told you to be more careful, Peria," expostulated Governor Lewis. "There are articles on the packhorse which I need at night. Who is this new man that is so careless? Why do you not keep the horses up? Go, then, and get them. Major Neely, would you be so kind as to join the men and assure them of bringing on the horses?"

"And what of you, Governor?"

"I shall go on ahead, if you please. Is there no house near by? You know the trail. Perhaps we can get lodgings not far on."

"The first white man's house beyond here," answered Neely, "belongs to an old man named Grinder. 'Tis no more than a few miles ahead. Suppose we join you there?"

"Agreed," said Lewis, and setting spurs to his horse, he left them.

It was late in the evening when at length Meriwether Lewis reined up in front of the somewhat unattractive Grinder homestead cabin, squatted down alongside the Natchez Trace; a place where sometimes hospitality of a sort was dispensed. It was an ordinary double cabin that he saw, two cob-house apartments with a covered space between such as might have been found anywhere for hundreds of miles on either side of the Alleghanies at that time. At his call there appeared a woman—Mrs. Grinder, she announced herself.

"Madam," he inquired, "could you entertain me and my party for the night? I am alone at present, but my servants will soon be up. They are on the trail in search of some horses which have strayed."

"My husband is not here," said the woman. "We are not well fixed, but I reckon if we can stand it all the time, you can for a night. How many air there in your party?"

"A half-dozen, with an extra horse or two."

"I reckon we can fix ye up. Light down and come in."

She was noting well her guest, and her shrewd eyes determined him to be no common man. He had the bearing of a gentleman, the carriage of a man used to command. Certain of his garments seemed to show wealth, although she noted, when he stripped off his traveling-smock, that he wore not a new coat, but an old one—very old, she would have said, soiled, stained, faded. It looked as if it had once been part of a uniform.