The Thorn in the Nest

Martha Finley

Martha Finley

The Thorn in the Nest

CHAPTER I

"A malady

Preys on my heart, that medicine cannot reach."

Our story opens in spring of 1797, in a sequestered valley in Western Pennsylvania. On a green hillside dotted here and there with stately oaks and elms, and sloping toward the road, beyond which flowed the clear waters of a mountain stream, stood a brick farm-house – large, roomy, substantial; beautiful with climbing vines and flowering shrubs. Orchard, meadow, wheat and corn fields stretched away on either hand, shut in by dense forests and wooded hills; beyond and above which, toward the right, towered the giant Alleghenies; their summits, still white from the storms of the past winter, lying like a bank of snowy clouds against the eastern horizon.

But night drew on apace, the light was fast fading even from the mountain tops, and down in the valley it was already so dark that only the outlines of objects close at hand were discernible as our hero, Kenneth Clendenin, mounted upon Romeo, his gallant steed, entered it from the west and slowly wended his way toward its one solitary dwelling. The road was familiar to both man and horse, and ere long they had reached the gate.

A negro boy perched on the top of the fence, with his hands in his pockets, whistling softly to himself in the dark, broke off suddenly in the middle of his tune, sprang nimbly to the ground and took the bridle, exclaiming, "Ki, Massa Doctah! t'o't dat you and ole Romeo comin' up de road. Ole Aunt Vashti she tole me watch out hyar an' ax you ef you's had yo' suppah, sah?"

"Yes, Zeb, tell her I have and shall want nothing more to-night," answered the traveller, alighting. "Rub Romeo down and give him a good feed."

"Dat I will, Massa Doctah; I neber 'glects ole Romeo," returned the lad, vaulting into the saddle and cantering off to the stable, while the gentleman walked quickly up the path leading to the house.

Within a wood fire burned brightly in the wide chimney of the living room. An arm-chair stood on each side of the hearth, the master of the house occupying one, his wife the other, she with her knitting, he half crouching over the fire, watching the flickering flames in moody silence.

At a table on the farther side of the room, a little girl was poring over a book by the light of a tallow candle. She had seemed very intent upon its pages, but at the first sound of the approaching footsteps sprang up and ran to open the door.

"At last, Kenneth!" she cried, in a joyous but subdued tone.

"Yes, little sister," he said, laying his hand caressingly for an instant on her pretty brown hair, and smiling into the bright, dark eyes. "I'm glad to find you up, I thought you went to bed with the chickens."

"Not to-night – the last – O Kenneth! Kenneth!" and she burst into passionate weeping.

"Marian, my little pet sister," he whispered, sitting down and drawing her to his breast with a tender caress, "try to be cheerful for mother's sake."

"I will," she answered, hastily wiping away her tears. "I have a parting present for you, Kenneth," she went on with a determined effort to seem bright and gay; "a pair of stockings made of my own lamb's wool, and every stitch knit by my own fingers – I took the last to-night, and you're to travel in them."

"Many thanks," he said, "my feet will surely keep warm in such hose, though the nights are still very cool."

"Yes, come nearer to the fire, Kenneth," said the mother, who had been watching the two, silently, but with glistening eyes.

She was a woman of middle age, gentle mannered, with a low and peculiarly sweet-toned voice, a tall and stately figure, and a face that told a story of trial and sorrow borne with patience and resignation.

Kenneth resembled her strongly in person and manner, he had the same noble contour of features – the broad high forehead, the large dark gray eye, keen yet tender in expression.

"Thank you," he said, coming forward and taking his stand upon the hearth, where