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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/35141-8.txt b/35141-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9fe6bff --- /dev/null +++ b/35141-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10619 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Plowshare and the Sword, by Ernest George Henham + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Plowshare and the Sword + A Tale of Old Quebec + +Author: Ernest George Henham + +Release Date: February 22, 2011 [EBook #35141] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PLOWSHARE AND THE SWORD *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +[Illustration: Cover art] + + + + + +THE PLOWSHARE + +AND + +THE SWORD + + +A TALE OF OLD QUEBEC + + + +BY + +ERNEST GEORGE HENHAM + + + +"Empire and Love! the vision of a day."--_Young_ + + + +TORONTO: THE COPP, CLARK CO., LIMITED + +LONDON: CASSELL AND COMPANY, LIMITED + +MCMIII. All Rights Reserved + + + + +À Toi + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +CHAPTER + + I.--THE FATHER OF WATERS + II.--AN ENEMY IN THE CAMP + III.--CHRISMATION + IV.--MAKERS OF EMPIRE + V.--DOUBLE DEALING + VI.--THE INTRODUCTION TO A FIGHT + VII.--THE FIGHT + VIII.--COUCHICING + IX.--THE GAUNTLET DOWN + X.--PILLARS OF THE HOUSE + XI.--THE SWORD IMBRUED + XII.--SPLENDOUR + XIII.--ENCHANTMENT + XIV.--FIRESIDE AND GROVE + XV.--GLORIOUS LIFE + XVI.--CLAIRVOYANCE + XVII.--STAMEN + XVIII.--COMMITTAL + XIX.--ENKINDLED + XX.--SACRAMENTAL + XXI.--IRON AND STEEL + XXII.--OR AND AZURE + XXIII.--THE EVERLASTING HILLS + XXIV.--ART-MAGIC + XXV.--NOVA ANGLIA + XXVI.--STIGMA + XXVII.--REVELATION + XXVIII.--BODY AND MIND + XXIX.--WOMAN'S LOVE IS LIFE + XXX.--LAND-LOCKED + XXXI.--IN THE FALL OF THE SNOW + XXXII.--ARMS AND THE MAN + XXXIII.--THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED + XXXIV.--THE THIRST + XXXV.--SWORDCRAFT + XXXVI.--SETTLEMENT + XXXVII.--THE PLOWSHARE + XXXVIII.--VALEDICTORY + + + + +THE PLOWSHARE AND THE SWORD + + + +CHAPTER I. + +THE FATHER OF WATERS. + +It was an evening of spring in the year of strife 1637. The sun was +slowly withdrawing his beams from the fortress of Quebec, which had +been established some thirty years back, and was then occupied by a +handful of settlers and soldiers, to the number of 120, under the +military governorship of Arnaud de Roussilac. The French politicians +of the seventeenth century were determined colony builders. However +humble the settler, he was known and watched, advanced or detained, by +the vigilant government of Paris. The very farms were an extension, +however slight, of the militarism of France, and a standing menace to +Britain. Where, further south, Englishmen founded a rude settlement, +the French in the north had responded by a military post. The policy +of peace taught by that intrepid adventurer, Jacques Cartier, exactly a +hundred years before, had become almost forgotten. "This country is +now owned by your Majesty," Cartier had written. "Your Majesty has +only to make gifts to the headmen of the Iroquois tribes and assure +them of your friendship, to make the land yours for ever." + +But Samuel de Champlain, the colony-maker who followed Cartier, was a +man of pride who understood how to make war, but had left unlearned the +greater art of bidding for peace. In 1609, acting under what he +believed to be a flash of genius, Champlain brought against the +Iroquois the Algonquins, their bitter hereditary enemies; and with +their aid, and the use of the magic firearms which had never before +been heard in the country of the wild north, he had utterly defeated +the proud and unforgiving people who had won the admiration and respect +of Cartier the pioneer, thus making the tribes of the Iroquois +confederacy sworn enemies of France for ever. Had Providence been +pleased to make Samuel de Champlain another Cartier, had the latter +even succeeded the former, Canada, from the rough Atlantic seaboard to +the soft Pacific slope, might well have been one great colony of France +to-day. + +It was, however, not the past history of that land, nor even its +present necessities, which occupied the mind of the Abbé La Salle, +great-uncle of the future Robert of that name, who, half-a-century +later, was to discover the mighty river of Mississippi--which was to +deprive the St. Lawrence of its proud birth-title, the Father of +Waters--and explore the plains of Michigan. The abbé was lying, that +spring evening, on the heights, smoking a stone pipe filled with coarse +black tobacco from Virginia, and watching a heavy ship which rocked +upon the swift current where it raced round the bend in the shore. He +was building up a future for himself, a fabric of ambition upon +foundations of diplomacy and daring. This senior priest of the +fortress--there were two others, Laroche the bully, and St Agapit the +ascetic--was a handsome man, powerfully built, of fair complexion +marred only by a sword-cut above the left eye. Although priest in +name, he was more at his ease flicking a rapier than thumbing a +breviary; an oath was habitually upon his tongue; a hot patriot was he, +and above all a fighter. He had fought a duel before his early mass, +and had left the altar to brag of his prowess. He was, in short, one +of the most notorious of that band of martial Churchmen, imitators of +Armand du Plessis Richelieu, for which colonial France at that age was +noted. Far from the eye of the mighty Cardinal and the feeble mind of +Louis the Just, they swaggered through life, preaching the divine +mission of the Church to the natives one hour, drinking deeply, or +duelling in terrible earnest, the next. The lives of the fighting +priests of Quebec make not the least interesting page of that romance +which three centuries have written around the heights. + +Wooden huts were dotted thinly along the slopes, which ended where the +forest of hemlocks began, about half a mile from the edge of the cliff; +and below, where a log landing-stage jutted into the stream, a +man-of-war flying the flag of France rode at her ease, a party of +turbaned men, no bigger to the abbé's eyes than children, gambling at +dice upon her fore-deck. Anchored beside the shore opposite appeared +another vessel, more rakish in build, less heavy at the stern, and +showing four masts to the Frenchman's three. A pine branch fluttered +at the main truck, and a great bough of hemlock depended over her bows, +completely draping the heavy and grotesque figure-head. + +It was this latter ship which La Salle was watching with suspicion, as +attentively as the distance would permit. The abbé mistrusted all +foreigners, even when, as in this case, they came bringing gifts. He +had recently been informed of that hasty alliance patched up between +France and Holland, and the policy found no favour in his eyes; he +frowned to think that a Dutch man-of-war should be permitted to sail up +the St. Lawrence and cast anchor beneath the heights. Was there any +genuine desire on the part of Holland to strengthen the hands of her +new ally, or were the crafty Dutchmen playing some deep game of their +own? The Indians, who surrounded the fortress as closely as they +dared, were entirely hostile to the holders of the land. Rumours of at +least one band of Englishmen, friendly with the natives, hiding in the +forest or among the clefts in the rock, waiting to strike a blow when +opportunity offered against the servants of King Louis, had been +circulated by a French dwarf known by the name of Gaudriole, a +malevolent, misshapen creature, who passed unharmed about the country, +and escaped hanging merely because of his value as an interpreter of +the various native dialects. The Dutch ship, which had arrived only +that afternoon, might well have sailed northward with some plan of +joining for the time with either Indian or English to wrest the mastery +of the maritime provinces from the clutch of France. + +While La Salle thus meditated with a mind to his own advancement, his +keen ears detected the fall of footsteps over the crisp grass, and he +pulled himself round to discover a priest, like himself wearing a +sword, a stout man, panting after his long climb. + +"What news, Laroche?" called the smoker, indicating the distant warship +with the stem of his pipe. + +"Corpus Domini!" gasped the new comer. "The sun strikes across yonder +rocks like the fire of Gehenna. What news, ask you, of yonder +piratical thief of a Dutchman? She is under commission, mark you, to +pick a quarrel and fight us for this coast, for all the fair talk of +alliance and the chopping up of the Spanish Netherlands between Paris +and Holland----" + +"What of Roussilac?" broke in La Salle. + +"The commandant is now aboard the floating gin-tank, and there you may +swear he shall impress upon the mind of Van Vuren, her master, the +certain fact that Louis the Thirteenth is lord here, from the sea +outward to wherever this endless land may reach. But we know the +Hollander. A smooth rascal, who flatters to a man's face, and when his +back is turned--Proh stigmata Salvatoris! Dost remember the Dutchman +who pinked you in the shoulder at Avignon?" + +He broke off with the question, and his fat body shook with laughter. + +"A priest must remain a priest in Avignon," said La Salle sourly; "but +he may here be a man. What news has this Hollander brought?" + +"Why, that England is in revolt from end to end," answered Laroche +gladly. "We shall find none of their clumsy ships, nor any of their +barbarian fist-using soldiers here. The people have risen against the +king. A man named John Hampden has refused to pay ship-money, a new +tax levied to raise a fleet to defy the Pope, the Dutch, and the +Cardinal, and this man carries the people with him. Also this Charles +has made himself hated in the north by forcing some new form of heresy +and insult to his Holiness in the shape of a prayer-book down the +throats of the Scotch. All but a handful have fallen away from him, +says Van Vuren, even the lords temporal have begun to despair, and many +are preparing to set out for the West." + +La Salle's martial spirit flamed up. "Here?" he questioned eagerly. + +"They would no more dare seek a home here than in Rochelle," went on +Laroche. "They go south to take up the lands where the last of their +mariners harried the Spaniards. It is reported that Lord Saye and Sele +proposes to transport himself to Virginia, Lord Warwick to Connecticut, +and the yeomen, weary of heavy taxes and fearing the extortions of the +Star Chamber, seek information concerning New England now that the star +of the old has set. We hold the seas, France or Holland unaided is +strong enough to sink the rotten barques which the English call their +fleet. There is no money forthcoming for new ships. Richelieu shall +soon rule the world! Come down. We shall perchance obtain a bottle of +wine along the Rue des Pêcheurs before vespers." + +"I join you at Michel's after sundown," said La Salle. "At this +present time I remain in the wilderness." + +He stood up, brushed the dry grass from his almost entirely secular +costume, and gazed landwards under the wide brim of his hat, until a +crow came presently flapping out of the valley where the great forest +began. The black bird soared over the heads of the martial priests, +and dropped slowly to drink of the river. + +"There are finer birds in yonder forest," muttered La Salle, a smile +about his mouth. + +"Ha! An assignation?" exclaimed the stout priest, and at the +suggestion wiped his moist forehead and laughed loudly. Then he turned +and rolled away down the slope, shouting a song of the cabaret which +had been popular among the soldiers of Paris two years before. La +Salle followed his progress with a cynical smile, before he also +turned, and descended upon the opposite side out of sight of the river, +and crossed the plain where the French were to rule for two centuries +more and then to fly with the kilted men of Scotland at their heels. +Here the cool hemlock forest murmured, the dense forest which stretched +northward to the mud flats of the salt bay named after the adventurer +Hudson, whose lost bones were somewhere tossed in its cold and lonely +waters. The sun was hidden by the hills, big golden lilies stared at +the priest, an indigo-winged butterfly tumbled into shelter to die at +the ending of the day. The dew sweated out of the ground, and the +foliage smelt like wine. + +"This is better than the gutters of Paris," muttered the priest. + +The bushes parted at the sounding of his voice, and a radiant vision +stood before him, backed by the greenwood shade. A young woman, but a +few years removed from childhood, stepped forth, hungrily regarding the +abbé with a splendid pair of eyes, brown-red and full of fire, and +burning with the health and passion of life. + +This young maid was Onawa of the Cayugas, that boldest of the tribes of +the allied Iroquois, who held the interior under their confederacy, all +the plains, backwoods, the river and seaboard, with the exception of +those spots where military posts had been established--the small +palisaded farm, and even the trader's hut, being marked upon the map as +military posts, and made so by the simple order, "_Le roi le veut_." +This girl had been present at the council fire when Roussilac had +endeavoured to heal the breach between French and Indians by specious +promises, none of which he intended to fulfil; La Salle also had been +present, accompanying the commandant as the representative of the +Church. The council had been a failure, owing, said the soldiers, to +the trickery of Gaudriole, the only interpreter available; but in fact +due to the overbearing manner of Roussilac, who fell into Champlain's +error of relegating an uncivilised people to the level of animals; and +to the innate hatred entertained by the Indians for their conquerors. +The Iroquois sachems answered the representative smoothly that they +would consider his offer of peace and the terms accompanying the same, +and subsequently resolved that, though they might tolerate English and +Dutch in their midst, their final answer to the white race who had +armed the Algonquins against them could only be made by arrow and +tomahawk. Onawa, who because of her sex was allowed to take no part in +the discussion, held aloof, and regarded the figure of La Salle +standing haughtily in the yellow glow of the fire. When the deputation +withdrew she followed and caught the priest's attention with a smile; +and when night fell she was still watching the lights of the rude +little town upon the cliffs. + +La Salle was no woman's man. He was too healthy a soldier; but he was +ambitious, and had moulded his policy upon that of his master, the +character which did not shame to describe itself in the unscrupulous +terms, "I venture upon nothing till I have well considered it; but when +I have once taken my resolution I go directly to my end. I mow down +and overthrow all that stands in my way, and then cover the whole with +my red mantle." The daughter of an Iroquois chief had great power +among her own people, and the priest reflected that he might add some +fame to his name and win perhaps the red hat for his head, if he could +secure the withdrawal of the hostile tribes; or, better, inflame them +against the English, who were, so said report, but awaiting an +opportunity to strike at the north. But a difficulty lay in his path; +neither he nor Onawa could speak the other's tongue. + +But this was not an overwhelming obstacle, because then, as now, the +language of signs might make a dumb tongue eloquent. Thus it was not +altogether by accident that the handsome abbé came to the fringe of the +forest at evening, and it was not chance alone which brought Onawa from +the camp into the enemy's country. + +She held between her fingers a flower, a lily as golden as that +emblazoned upon the royal standard; and while standing before him she +placed the flower to her forehead, and then gave it him, without +turning away her eyes, and without shrinking from his. + +La Salle understood that she was expressing her willingness to give +herself to him, with or without the will and consent of her people. + +"By St. Anthony!" he muttered. "How shall I tell the jade that I have +abjured women? Does she then desire me to strip and paint, that she +may make of me a heathen husband?" + +He shook his head, and the light changed in the eyes of the girl, and +her brow wrinkled. He saw the sudden gleam of her teeth and heard her +sigh. + +"Jezebel of the forest," he cried, "name me this flower!" + +He extended it with a sign, and the ready girl spoke softly a +dissyllabic word. La Salle repeated it, again indicating the flower, +and Onawa nodded vigorously. + +"Ah!" exclaimed the priest. "Here is light out of darkness." + +He came nearer and took the girl's hand, making the same sign. She +spoke again. He touched her hair. Again she spoke. Then her cheek, +her nose, her lips, her ears, and Onawa answered him every time, +laughing delightedly as the priest pronounced each soft Iroquois word +at her dictation. + +"A few such lessons, and Gaudriole may be hanged," said La Salle. + +Then, with a quick gesture, Onawa put out her fawn-coloured hand, and +touched his right eye with the tip of one finger. + +"L'oeil," answered La Salle. + +She patted his cheek. + +"La joue," he said. + +She tweaked his nose, with a laugh. + +"Le nez," he gasped. + +She slapped his mouth. + +"La bouche," he growled, adding, "I might have said, 'La grimace.'" + +The girl was very near. He caught her and drew her up to him, and +pressed his lips powerfully upon hers. + +"C'est le baiser," he said carelessly. + +The salutation of the kiss was unknown among the Iroquois. Onawa +started, thrilling with a feeling altogether strange; then turned to +him, putting back her head as a Parisienne might have done to receive +her lover's salute. + +"Le baiser _again_," she demanded, clinging to the word which had made +life a new thing. "Le baiser _again_." + +"By all the wiles of Satan!" exclaimed La Salle, thrusting her back. +"She is in league with the enemy." + +Again he held her before him, his arms slightly bent, and said +haltingly in the tongue of the hated race, which he knew little better +than the Cayuga: "You speak the English?" + +Onawa's face lighted. "A ver' little words," she answered. Then she +drew up to him, her eyes more eloquent, and softly repeating her +bilingual request: + +"Le baiser again." + +It was dark when La Salle reached the group of huts planted upon the +cliffs. The warships were invisible and unlighted, because lamps would +have revealed figures patrolling upon deck, and there were keen-eyed +enemies watching from either shore. The priest stumbled along the +rocky path, his long boots kicking the stones before him, until he came +near the waterside and the Rue des Pêcheurs, situated immediately below +the main cliff on the site occupied to-day by Little Champlain Street. +The way was inhabited, as its name implied, by fisher-folk who swept +the wide river when times were fairly peaceful, and served as soldiers +in war. There was no street in the accepted sense of the word. A few +cave dwellings burrowed out of the rock; huts here and there, a tent, +or a simple erection of sticks and stones plastered over with mud, were +barely visible, sprinkled irregularly, out of the darkness along the +high shore. + +Where a worn pathway went round and curved towards the landing-stage, a +square log-hut occupied some considerable portion of space. A very +dull lamp smoked over the entry, below a board bearing the inscription, +"Michel Ferraud, Marchand du Vin." A grumbling noise of conversation +and the rattle of dice sounded within. + +"Deuce and three for the third time!" shouted the high-pitched voice of +the Abbé Laroche. "I'll throw you again, Dutchman--one more throw for +the honour of the Church; and the devil seize me if this box plays me +the trick again." + +La Salle bent his head and entered the cabaret. He made two steps, +then stood motionless, his fingers feeling for his sword-hilt. + +Laroche looked up, the dice-box poised in his fat right hand, and a +smile wandered across his face at beholding the attitude of his +fellow-priest. + +"The master of the Dutch man-of-war," he called, indicating the player +who sat opposite him. "Sieur," he shouted over the table, with a burst +of unctuous laughter, "the renowned swordsman, L'Abbé La Salle." + +Then Van Vuren looked up. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +AN ENEMY IN THE CAMP. + +At sunset Roussilac, the commandant of Quebec, after receiving +reassuring reports from the sentries and thus closing his official +duties for the day, went aboard the man-of-war. Having personally +superintended the shipping of the gangway, to satisfy himself that +immediate communication with the shore was cut off, he withdrew to his +cabin, which he occupied in preference to his hut upon the slope. +Before retiring to his hammock, he mentally reviewed his position, the +difficulties of which had not been lessened by the unexpected arrival +of the Dutch ship. + +It had never been the way of Holland to go out of her course to be +friendly. The commandant could not forget that she had colonised large +tracts of country further south; he knew that, like England, she +aspired to extend her influence beyond the seas; and what more probable +than that, snatching at the opportunity afforded by this alliance, her +government should have commissioned Van Vuren to spy out the land and +report upon its possibilities? + +Already sufficient dangers threatened the fortress. Disquieting +rumours had reached Roussilac of late. The Indians, it was said, were +growing more restless and bolder because they had discovered the +weakness of the French. It was certain that a band of five Englishmen +had been seen in the district by Gaudriole, and these were probably the +precursors of more formidable numbers. The islanders, Roussilac knew, +had a knack of appearing when least expected; and Agincourt had long +since shown the world that they were never so formidable as when few in +numbers, short of supplies, and worn after heavy marching. It was this +fear which had induced the commandant to adopt the plan of retiring to +the ship each night, so that, whatever might befall his men upon the +mainland, he at least would be in a position of comparative safety. + +By this it will be perceived that Roussilac was not altogether of that +stuff of which heroes are made. Nor was he a man of exceptional +ability. He had fought his way up to his present post of +responsibility with the aid of fortune and a natural capacity for +obeying orders, although, while he had been ascending, he preferred to +forget his Norman parents and connections, merely because they happened +to be poor and humble folk. His mother's brother and her husband, the +latter driven out of France for heresy, were living upon a small +holding, little more than a day's journey from the fortress; Jean-Marie +Labroquerie, their only son, had lately joined the ranks of his small +army; but the commandant was too proud, or perhaps too cowardly, to +acknowledge these kinsfolk, and in his heart he found the hope that +Madame Labroquerie, his aunt, a woman of bitter memories, with a sharp +tongue and a passionate nature, would never seek to reach the fortress +and shame him before his men. The selfish spirit of Richelieu was +working on in Arnaud de Roussilac, as indeed it worked through the +character of almost all the creatures of the Cardinal. + +Still perplexed by the problems of his position, the commandant recited +the prayers without which no soldier of the age could have deemed +himself safe from the perils of the night, placed his sword ready to +his hand, and retired to his hammock, although darkness had scarcely +settled over the land. In a few minutes he was asleep. + +These early slumbers were rudely broken by a heavy hand which seized +and shook him by the shoulder. The glare of a torch hurt his eyes, +when he opened them to discover the tanned features of D'Archand, the +master of the ship, between the folds of the netting spread to exclude +the ever-hostile insects. + +"An attack," muttered Roussilac, in the first moment of consciousness. +"A plague upon these English." + +"Hasten!" cried D'Archand. "The fortress is in an uproar. La Salle +has insulted the Dutch master, and a duel is imminent." + +At that Roussilac awoke fully, and, stretching out his arm, drew the +square port-hole open, admitting the sound of the tidewater under the +ship's counter, and beyond, a sharp murmur of excited voices. Craning +his neck, he discovered an intermittent flashing of lights along the +pathway under the cliff. + +"Now may the saints help me!" the commandant exclaimed, as he felt for +his cloak. "I have no shadow of power over these priests. More +willingly would I oppress a witch than cross a Churchman. Magic can +only rot a man's body, but excommunication touches his soul. What is +the cause of this quarrel?" + +"I know not," answered D'Archand. "But duelling has been forbidden +altogether----" + +"By Church and State alike," the commandant interrupted testily. "The +Cardinal might as well forbid the plague to strike his army. When the +Church itself breaks the law, how is the head of the army to act?" + +The captains speedily left the ship, ascended the winding path, and +entered the street of fishermen. + +All the inhabitants appeared to be gathered together upon the low +ground, to witness the by no means unprecedented spectacle of a duel +between priest and layman. They stood six deep under the cliff, with +as many more upon the side of the river; old and young, women in soiled +stiff caps, ragged settlers, and soldiers in faded accoutrements side +by side. A ring of men, holding spluttering pine torches, or oil +lanterns, the flames of which smoked and flickered up and down the horn +sides, enclosed an open space where two shadowy figures swayed almost +noiselessly, facing one another, each right arm directing a rapier +which flashed continually in the confused lights. + +"I would the challenger were any other than the Abbé La Salle," +muttered Roussilac. "He would cut off my hopes of Heaven as readily as +he shall presently run through yonder Dutchman." + +"There is no finer swordsman in the new world than the abbé," whispered +D'Archand in his ear. "If Van Vuren be killed, the Cardinal shall +account you responsible, and I too shall not escape blame. This new +alliance may not hold if the deed be known in Paris." + +Roussilac started forward, and scattered the people, who were too +excited to recognise him. + +"Put up your swords!" he shouted. "I charge you, sir priest, in the +King's name to cease fighting with this man, who is my guest and our +common ally." + +"Corpus Domini!" cried Laroche, staggering towards the commandant, his +big face flushed with excitement and liquor. "Order the wind to cease, +commandant, or yon river to stop its flow. Attempt to restrain La +Salle when his blood is hot! Know you, sir, this is an affair of +honour." + +"It is not you who shall suffer from the breaking of the law, sir +priest," protested the representative. "By St. Gris! a master-stroke!" +he exclaimed, unable altogether to suppress his soldierly instincts. + +La Salle, foreseeing an interruption, had closed with his enemy in a +vigorous skirmish of rapid and clever feints, culminating in a stroke +the admirable technique of which had wrung an involuntary testimony +from the commandant. Van Vuren escaped by a side movement, which to +the onlookers partook of the nature of a lucky accident. But there was +a smear of blood upon the priest's rapier when he pressed again to the +attack. + +"Yon Dutchman shall be the only sufferer," said Laroche. "Only +bloodshed can satisfy the Abbé La Salle. Nature must run her course. +There stands a scar upon my brother's back, made by this Van Vuren's +sword four years ago at the corner of a dark turning in Avignon. What +was the cause? Well, commandant, a woman they say is always the cause; +but my friend is, like myself, a priest, and therefore above suspicion +so far as women are concerned. Dutchmen have hard heads and slow +brains. It is also said of them that if they can run from an enemy +with honour they will run. My brother was one night returning home +after administering at a sick bed; beside a corner he heard a step, +and, before he could turn, a sword point went in his back. The +Dutchman's honour was satisfied. He ran, but he was marked as he +escaped. In Avignon during those days Van Vuren was known by another, +and less honourable, name. But the devil may wear a halo and remain +the devil." + +While the abbé spoke, some heavy clouds, which had gathered over the +heights, darkening the night, began to discharge themselves in rain, +which presently lashed in so heavy a torrent that the pine torches were +extinguished, and the men holding the lanterns had much difficulty to +maintain the feeble flames. La Salle, with his back to the storm, +drove the Hollander before him through the hissing rain, the people +falling away as the duellists advanced, their blades gleaming and +grating through the silvery lines of water. A muffled shout went up. +Van Vuren had been palpably hit upon the shoulder. La Salle smiled +grimly and still pressed on, lunging repeatedly over the captain's +guard, taking every risk of a wound as he hastened to make his victory +sure. + +Roussilac cleared the road, the people only obeying when the soldiers +prepared to enforce their officer's order. + +"Gentlemen," cried the commandant, advancing, with an imprecation upon +the rain, "drop your swords, I pray of you." + +"The devil seize you!" shouted La Salle, throwing out his left arm. +"His point was not an inch from me." + +"Put up your swords," repeated Roussilac, boldly disregarding the +remonstrance. "Sir priest, it is the will of the Cardinal." + +These were potent words, and for one moment the abbé hesitated. He +lowered his point with an angry side glance upon his interrupter, and +the affair would then have finished had not a dark figure stopped out +from the shadow under the cliff, and thrown itself into position with +the muffled warning, "En garde!" + +"Ah, dog!" cried La Salle, starting forward through the rain with +scarcely a ray of light between him and his adversary. + +When a line of lightning broke the sky, an exclamation burst from his +lips and his bold cheek blanched. During that momentary illumination +La Salle beheld his enemy clearly. He saw a mean man clad in a suit of +faded red with torn and stained ruffles; his hair gathered behind and +tied with a piece of grass; his hat broken out of shape and adorned +sadly with half a plume. And when Laroche held up a lantern, the +fighting priest saw further that what he had taken for a negroid skin +was merely a mask which covered the stranger's face, slit with holes +for the eyes and mouth. + +"This," muttered La Salle, cold with terror as he warded off an attack +which was far more aggressive than that of Van Vuren, "this is the work +of Satan." + +Roussilac touched D'Archand, pointing along the path which bent down to +the river, and whispered, "Wait for the lightning." + +When the flash passed, the master saw the big figure of the Dutchman +hurrying to reach his ship, his sword still drawn in his hand. + +"Then, who is this?" exclaimed D'Archand, with a frightened oath, +indicating through the beating rain the man behind the mask. + +Roussilac signed himself, and said nothing. + +Laroche hurried up, his big face streaming, the lantern shaking in his +hands like a will-o'-the-wisp, his attitude grotesque with terror. + +"What witchcraft is here?" he shouted. "See you how this Dutchman has +changed body and appearance as well as name?" + +"Van Vuren is not here," said Roussilac gravely. "He ran when the abbé +lowered his sword; and so soon as he had gone--nay, before--yonder +figure stepped out of the darkness under the cliff and challenged La +Salle. You see he has covered his face. It is the mad Englishman who +fights for the love of fighting. And the English cover the earth like +flies." + +"I shall stiffen his arm, be he heretic or devil," said the stout +priest; and he went and stood near the duellists, and, boldly facing +the stranger, cursed him prolifically in the name of Holy Church and +the King of Rome. + +The stranger did not turn, and only acknowledged the anathemas by a +perfectly distinct laugh which issued weirdly from the mask. + +No man had ever called La Salle's bravery in question. Facing an +enemy, who had started as it were from the rocks before him in the rain +and the lightning, he met the resolute attack and parried every lunge. +In truth, the priest was a fine swordsman; but his resource in skirmish +and detail was here taxed to the uttermost. All he could do at his +best was to hold out the short sword, which flashed in and out of the +rain, controlled by a wrist of steel and an iron arm. The masked man +gave forth no sound of hard breathing. He was a master of swordcraft, +and La Salle knew that he had met his match. Here was no nervous +Dutchman to be trifled with; no hectoring soldier with a hearty oath +and bluff swagger. La Salle sweated, and his breath came pricking in +hot gasps, and a cold thrill trickled along his back when he allowed +himself to wonder who the enemy might be. + +The stranger guarded against treachery, hugging the cliff lest anyone +with hostile intentions might pass behind and reach his back. Had he +moved out, he would assuredly have beaten down the abbé's defence; as +it was, the latter was acting upon the defensive, and doing so with +much difficulty. + +The rain stopped on an instant. As suddenly the clouds fell back to +admit the light; and the rugged shadows of the rocks traced fantastic +shapes along the Rue des Pêcheurs. + +The strained voice of Laroche broke the stillness. + +"A touch!" + +"Liar!" shouted back the hard-driven but proud priest, although he felt +warm blood oozing between his fingers. + +The masked man feared the light which followed the sweeping away of the +storm clouds. He bestirred himself, feinted with amazing rapidity +within and without the pass, then his limber wrist stiffened for the +second, and his point darted in like a poisonous snake over the hilt +and wounded La Salle upon the muscle of the sword-arm. + +"A touch!" shouted the captains together, both too excited to have any +thought for the law. + +"An accident," gasped the proud priest. "A misfortune." + +"Well, here's a touch!" called a deep English voice; and as the +challenger made his nationality known he lunged beneath the abbé's +blade, thrusting out until the blood spurted upward in a jet. + +"Yes, yes. A touch--I confess," panted La Salle; and he staggered +back, crossed his legs, and fell heavily. + +"By St. Michael!" shouted the fat Laroche, furiously pulling out his +sword and reaching towards the shadow under the cliff. "You shall pay, +assassin, for this." + +The mysterious stranger chuckled, disarmed Laroche in a moment, +scratching the stout abbé's wrist with his point, and before the two +officers and the handful of soldiers could bestir themselves, he had +disappeared round the bend of the Rue des Pêcheurs. Roussilac ran to +the ending of the way, but found no sign of the masked man, who had +vanished as mysteriously as he had arrived. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +CHRISMATION. + +The day following the duel La Salle was under the hands of the +surgeon--who, in the ignorance of that age, treated his patient for +loss of blood by letting yet more--and Roussilac was sending forth men +with the charge to find the hiding-place of the Englishman, and to fail +not at their peril. However, they did at that time fail. Not even the +cunning hunchback Gaudriole had been able to discover the habitation of +the mysterious swordsman who had dared to enter the fortress and openly +defy its officers and men. + +Even the Indian might have walked behind the scrub of tangled +willow-growth over the cave-dwelling, and known nothing of it, had his +eyes or his nose failed to discern the thread of wood-smoke often +curling above the blackened crater of a hollow tree which had been +ingeniously converted into a chimney. A grass-covered knoll made the +roof of the dwelling, the entrance to which only became apparent from a +stone causeway, shelving gradually between the roots of pine trees, and +enclosed by massive logs which banked the eastern front of the burrow. + +Upon the threshold of this rude home a brown boy was playing with a +wolf-hound, while awaiting his father's return from that daring visit +to the fortress. + +Around him Nature thundered like a great organ. The leaden waters of +the great discharge roared where the bush made a screen which no eyes +could pierce; the falls of the Ouiataniche smoked below. Spray flew +above the scrub, bathing the dog's fur and the strong arms of the +child. The one bayed, the other shouted, to the hard north wind that +swept overhead, lashing the branches, tearing the summits of the pines, +snatching the dry wisps of grass and whirling them under the clouds. +The dark bush groaned. The great rocks bore their buffetings with +hollow protests. Ravens croaked as they swung up and down; divers +wailed from the weedy creeks. The boughs chafed, and the plumed +foliage clashed together, loosening a rain of cones and showers of pine +needles. + +"I want to grow. I want to be strong," shouted the boy to his panting +companion. "I want to wear a sword and fight. I want to be a soldier +and shed blood. I want to live!" + +The dog broke away barking, and rushed through the scrub. The child +ran after him, and they met upon the dripping rocks, which made a +natural fortification to the cave beyond. + +A magnificent spectacle rolled away, as full of sound and motion as a +battlefield. Well had the Indians named that place the Region of the +Lost Waters. Islands heaved out of the raging expanse, small and +densely covered with torn vegetation, every ridge of pine-crested rock +moaning under the north wind, splintered and rough and ragged, scarred +like the duellist's arm. About these islands the separate torrents +thundered, seeking outlets for escape. There were a hundred channels, +each striving to be the main, each at war with all others, each leaping +white-crested down to join its rivals at the stupendous fall. Every +separate discharge lifted up its voice to drown the combined clamour of +its rivals. + +A canoe shot the rapids between two islands, quivering like an arrow in +its flight. It swept down, a mere feather upon the water, with only a +shell of rough bark between its two occupants and the hereafter. The +steerer, a handsome and pure-blooded woman of the Cayugas, crouched +like a figure of bronze against the cross-piece, wielding her paddle +with an easy carelessness which spoke of perfect confidence. By a turn +of her wrist the shell of bark swept off a projecting rock; by a deft +motion of her body, almost too subtle for the sight, the canoe glanced +from a reef where the waves were wild; another, more determined, +motion, and the fragile thing pierced a sheet of spray and swept to the +shore. The child caught the shell and held fast, while the man who had +conquered the fighting priest jumped nimbly to the sand. + +"Brave boy, Richard," he cried. "Your mother and I looked out from +yonder bend between the islands, knowing that our son would be awaiting +us. Tell me now, how have you fared during our absence?" + +The boy put out his lean arms, already tight with muscle, to greet his +mother. + +"I have been hunting by the moon," he answered. "Last night I shot a +deer, and to-day have cut it up. A portion of the meat is cooking now." + +The soldier of fortune reached an arm round the boy's shoulders and +drew him close. "You are a man, my Richard. You shall never know what +it is to lack strength." + +Night settled down. The lord of the isles left the cave, and, seating +himself upon a bank, smoked a long pipe, which he had received as a +gift from Shuswap, chief of the Cayugas, with whom he had allied +himself by marriage. Silently he drew the smoke through the painted +stem, then handed the pipe to his wife, and she smoked and passed the +quaint object to her son, who smoked also with a strange expression of +sternness upon his child's features. + +"Was the meat good, father?" he asked, as he handed back the pipe. + +"Somewhat too fresh, my son," the man answered. + +"Was the deer well shot?" + +"It was well done, Richard." + +"It is not easy to shoot straight in the moonlight," the boy said. +"But I shot no more than once. My arrow went true to the side of the +neck, and Blood followed and pulled the creature down." + +The great hound looked up with open mouth, and heavily flapped his tail. + +The boy spoke both English and Cayuga, the former more perfectly than +the latter. His father and mother spoke both languages, each having +taught the other the words of a strange tongue. The woman was tall, of +a type which was soon to grow extinct, her features as regular as those +of a Greek statue, her eyes and hair a deep black, her skin a trifle +darker than fawn-colour. Like all the proud daughters of the Iroquois, +she knew well how to handle the axe and bow. Among her own people, in +the days of maidenhood, her name had been Tuschota; but by her English +husband she was called Mary. + +He, the lord of the isles, was almost mean in stature, with a lean, +careworn face marked with decisive lines of character, grey-eyed and +thin-lipped. His body was clad in a much mended suit of faded red, an +old hat partly covered by a broken feather, with moccasins and leggings +of his wife's make. A short sword swung behind him by a rough belt of +buckskin, and a hunting-knife, the blade hiding in a beaded sheath, +hung closely to his right hip. It was hard to tell his age; he had the +eager face of youth under the bleached hair of middle-age. His wife +and only child called him Thomas or Father, as did the neighbouring +Indians of the allied Iroquois tribes; but none of them knew him by any +other name, except that of Gitsa, the sun, or, as they intended to +convey, "The strong one who sometimes covers his face." + +"Father," young Richard exclaimed nervously, "shall you go away +to-night?" + +"Be silent, child," said the mother. "It is not for the young to know +the father's will." + +"Nay, Mary," said the grave man. "I love the lad's spirit. Let him +speak his mind." + +Richard came nearer and put out his hand, a flush upon his brow. He +patted the hound's back, its head, handled the frayed hem of his +father's cloak, and then his brown fingers passed on to caress the hilt +of the sword upon which his eyes had been fixed while his hand wandered. + +"Father," he exclaimed, in a burst of boyish passion, "I want to wear a +sword." + +The man's grey eyes kindled as he heard this strong boy speak. Child +as he was in years, the father's spirit was in him, and the father +rejoiced. + +"What would you do with a sword?" he said, frowning. "Would you cut +your bread, or make kindling wood for the fire? Have you not your bow +and arrows?" + +"I can bring you down the bird flying, or the beast running. I can +shoot you the salmon in the water. Now I would learn the sword, that I +may go out with you, and fight with you, and--and protect you, my +father." + +The man did not smile; but he frowned no more. + +"Son," he said, in tones that were still severe, "you are yet over +young to join the brotherhood of the sword. The same is a mighty +weapon, never a servant, but rather a tyrant, who shall destroy his +wearer in the end. Know you that the Master of the world said once, +'All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword'? Even as +the tongue is the sword, an unruly member which no man can restrain. +It answers an enemy without thought, even as the tongue throws back an +angry word. It passes a death sentence lightly, even as the tongue +curses an enemy's soul. It strikes a vulnerable spot in one mad +moment; and when the passion sinks, then the hand fails, and the eye +shall close for shame. Only the sword changes not, remaining cold to +the eye, ready to the hand, and responsive to the first evil thought in +the heart. You shall wear the sword some day, my son. Be content till +then." + +"I want to fight Frenchmen," the boy muttered. "Father, let me draw +your sword. Let me see it flash in the moon. Let me feel its point." + +The father's hand closed upon that of the boy, pressing the little palm +strongly against the hilt. "Do not draw that sword, child," he said. +"The virgin hand should hold a virgin blade." + +He rose suddenly and disappeared along the white causeway. The mother +and son were alone on the knoll, the black pines torn by the wind +behind, the spray flying in front. The mother put out her well-shaped +arm to the smouldering pipe, and drew at the mouthpiece, watching the +excited boy over the triangular bowl. She spoke in the liquid language +of the Cayugas, "Remember that you are very young, my son." + +Richard turned passionately, and fanned away the tobacco smoke which +wreathed itself between their eyes. + +"I have lived fifteen years. I am strong. See these arms! See how +long they are, and mark how the muscle swells when I lift my hand. I +am weary of killing fish and birds and beasts. I would kill men." + +"You would be a man of blood, son?" + +"Even as my father. He has taught me to hunt. But when he goes down +to the great river he leaves me here. You he often takes; but I am +left. He goes down to fight. I have watched him when he cleans his +sword. There is blood upon his sword. It is the blood of men." + +"With whom would you fight?" said the mother, her voice reflecting the +boy's passion. + +"With the savage Algonquins in the far-away lands, the enemies of the +Iroquois. And with the Frenchmen whom my father hates." + +More the boy would have said, but at that moment the lord of the place +returned with a sheathed sword and a velvet belt. The sword, a short +blade like that which he himself wore, as slight almost as a whip, he +tested on the ground, and in his stern manner pointed out a spot upon +the summit of the knoll where the moonlight played free from shadow, +saying, "Stand there." + +The boy obeyed, stretching out an expectant hand. + +His father gave him the virgin sword, fixing him with his stern eye, +and suddenly whipped out his own blade, and exclaimed, in a voice which +was meant to strike terror into the child's heart, "On guard!" + +The boy did not wince, but threw up his point like an old soldier, and +his face became wild when along his right arm there thrilled for the +first time an indescribable strength and joy as the two blades met. + +By instinct he caught the point, and parried the edge. By instinct he +lunged at the vital spots, stepping forward, darting aside, falling +back, never resting upon the wrong foot nor misjudging the distance. +His father, who tested him so severely, smiled despite himself, and +Richard saw the smile, and, confident that he could pass his father's +guard, stepped out and took up the attack in a reckless endeavour to +inflict a wound upon his teacher's arm. + +The stern soldier of fortune played with the boy under the rushing +north wind and the swaying light of the moon, while the mother stood +near on the slope of the knoll, her eyes flashing, her nostrils +distended, her bosom heaving with the passion of the sword-play. She +noted how nobly the boy responded to his blood--the enduring blood of +the high-bred Cayuga mingled with the fighting strain of the +Englishman. She watched the sureness of his hand, the boldness of his +eye. She saw how readily the use of the sword came to him, and once +she sighed, because her husband had made her Christian, and she +remembered the warning of the unseen God which her lord had lately +repeated, "All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword." + +A cry broke from her lips. Her husband's sword flashed suddenly across +her vision, drew back, lowered, and fell like the falcon which had made +its blow, and the point sprinkled a few drops of blood upon the +bleached grass. + +"Thomas," she exclaimed in her native tongue, "why have you wounded +your son?" + +"It is his baptism to the sword," her husband answered. + +Maddened, not by the pain in his shoulder, which indeed he scarcely +felt, nor by the sight of his blood flicked contemptuously at his feet, +but at the indignity of the wound, the boy rushed at his father, and +hit at him blindly as with a stick; and when the master caught and held +him, and by the act reminded him that he was yet a child, he began to +sob violently with rage. + +"You shall pay," he flamed. "I will have your blood for mine. I will +fight you again. I will kill you. I will----" + +"Peace, child," interrupted his mother. "He is your father." + +"Take him and see to him, Mary. I did but prick his shoulder," said +the father. "So fiercely did he press upon me that I feared he might +throw himself upon my point. The lesson shall teach him prudence." + +"I am dishonoured--wounded," moaned Richard. + +The father opened his doublet and displayed his chest, which upon both +sides was marred by many a scar. Richard beheld, and blinked away his +angry tears, as the passion departed from him. + +"Must I too be wounded before I am a soldier?" he said. + +"Ay, a hundred times," his father answered; and the boy turned away +then with his former look of pride, and permitted his mother to wash +and bandage the slight wound upon his shoulder. + +Soon they came out together to the knoll where the silent man sat with +the north wind roaring into his ears the song of battle. He looked up +when they were near, and called, "Richard!" + +The boy came, subdued and tired, and stood before his father. + +"Kneel." + +The boy obeyed. The lord of the isles fastened the velvet sword-belt +to his son's waist, secured the coveted sword in its place, then stood, +and drew out his own well-tested blade. + +With it he struck the boy smartly upon the shoulder exactly over the +wound, smiling when the child compressed his lips fiercely but refused +to wince, and loudly called: + +"Arise, Sir Richard!" + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +MAKERS OF EMPIRE. + +As the days passed, and Van Vuren's attitude of diffident friendliness +remained unaltered, Roussilac's suspicions began to leave him; and even +La Salle modified his former opinions when he again walked abroad and +discovered that out of the seventy-five fighting men who made up the +military complement of the Dutch man-of-war, no less than thirty had +been sent out upon a hunting expedition in the western forests. These, +and other circumstances, tended to impress the minds of the French +officers that their ally was acting in good faith; thus the commandant +relaxed his vigilance, and Van Vuren was permitted to go upon his way +unwatched. The Dutchman came seldom to the fortress, because he feared +a second meeting with La Salle; but he frequently stole under cover of +night into the forest to the north, where the Cayugas had their camp, +little guessing that these visits were known, not indeed to the French, +but to a company of five Englishmen, who had been thrown upon the coast +to the west of the settlement of Acadie during a storm of the previous +October, and had wintered in a cave among the rugged cliffs some little +distance beyond the falls of Montmorenci, believing themselves to be +the sole representatives of their country in all that land. + +These men--the sole survivors of an expedition which had set forth with +the object of establishing a small colony in the north--wasted no time +in repining over their ill-fortune, or considering the hopeless nature +of their position. They engaged themselves in mastering the topography +of the fortress and ascertaining the strength of its garrison; they +watched the river, and noted the coming and going of each ship; they +made themselves friendly with the Iroquois, and from Shuswap, the chief +of the Cayugas, a man who loved the English, they obtained from time to +time much information of value. It was one of their number, Jeremiah +Hough the Puritan, who had followed Van Vuren to the Indian camp-fire; +and when he discovered that the Dutchman was indeed faithless to his +allies and was endeavouring to stir up the Iroquois to strike a blow +against the French position, he returned with the tidings to his +comrades, and the little council of five sat for a long night and +discussed this Dutch policy with the cool shrewdness of their race. + +As a result of their debate, one of the little band was deputed each +night to lie concealed upon the shore and watch the Dutch ship. Simon +Penfold, the leader, a spare, grey man of two score years and ten, but +hard and hale as any oak in his home meadows, played spy on the first +night; Jesse Woodfield, a yeoman scarce thirty years of age, did duty +on the second, and handsome young Geoffrey Viner, the boy of the party, +beloved by his comrades for the sake of his long fair hair and comely +face, kept watch on the third. On the fourth night the task devolved +upon George Flower, a middle-aged, sad-featured man, the captain's +faithful friend since the days of boyhood; and the next night found +stern Hough the Puritan lying among the willows above the shingle, with +his cold eyes fixed upon a single star of light which marked the +position of the Dutch ship. + +These five men, who made up the little company of Englishmen venturing +into the French colony, were yeomen of Berks, farmers of the valleys +and fields watered by the Thames, men of good repute, who had been +driven to leave their native shore and seek another home in the wide +new world through the oppression of the agents of the greedy English +king. + +The man who had discovered Van Vuren's plans had indeed delayed his +flight too long. Scarred and lined as were the faces of Flower and +Penfold, their features had at least escaped the terrible mutilation +which had been inflicted upon Hough as an outward and visible sign of +the royal displeasure. His ears had been cropped close to the skull, +his nostrils slit, his cheeks branded, as a penalty for having stoutly +refused to supply any portion of the necessities of King Charles, +according to the demand of the most honourable Court of Star Chamber. +The strong black hair which spread thickly over the Puritan's face, yet +without hiding the trail of the branding iron and the primings of the +executioner's knife, added a terrible touch to his dehumanised +appearance. + +It was on the fifth night after the watch had been appointed that Van +Vuren played for his big stake. From a safe shelter among the willows, +Hough observed a small fire upon the shore, and two men, one of whom +appeared to be a native, watching beside the flames. Presently he +heard a voice hailing softly from the darkness which overhung the +river, and soon a black hulk loomed beside the shore. + +Hough counted six men as they disembarked one by one, he saw the boat +drawn up, and the beacon fire extinguished. That fire was still +hissing under the water which had been thrown upon it when the Puritan +crawled out of the thicket of red willow, and stood, leaning forward, +listening attentively. When the sound of footfalls died away, he +scaled the cliff behind, ran over the flat to the little river of +Montmorenci, which was flecked with foam and shivering as it neared its +long straight plunge, pulled a canoe from beneath the bushes, and shot +across that dangerous passage as though it had been no whit more +formidable than some sluggish reach of his native Thames. Had he +dropped his paddle, death would have been inevitable; had he allowed +himself to drift beyond a certain point the current would have dragged +him down to the white bar of foam which marked a phosphorescent line +across the darkness beyond. + +Plunging again into the forest, he proceeded in the same headlong +fashion, bearing to the right, always descending, until he struck a +path through the interlacing trees, and finally reached rock-land and a +cave cunningly concealed behind a screen of willow. + +He whistled softly, and when his signal was answered pushed inward, +drawing away a sheet of canvas which had been stretched across the +entry to imprison more effectually the light. A fire burnt within, the +smoke escaping from a shaft two hundred feet above; and round this fire +were grouped his four companions, who started up with eager faces when +the Puritan made his entry. + +"Good news, I wot," cried old Penfold. "'Tis spoken already by your +eyes, friend Hough." + +"My eyes lie not," the Puritan answered. "Comrades, the Dutch have +shown their hand. If we strike at once we shall assuredly kill their +plan, and may perchance seize their leader." + +In a few words he disclosed what he had seen. + +"They go to hold council with the sachems," said Penfold, adding +thoughtfully, "There will be no light until the dawn." + +"Let us lie in wait for them beside their boat," the Puritan advised. + +"Nay, let us fall upon them in the forest," cried Wood field. + +"Not so," answered the leader. "A man cannot use his sword for the +bush and the splintered growth from the pines." + +"An Iroquois guide will accompany them," said Flower. + +"The boat! the boat!" shouted young Viner. "That is the place." + +"Peace, lads," cried Penfold, stroking his beard. "Let us discuss with +reason. Why has this Dutch vessel made her way up the river? +Roussilac would tell us that she has come to strengthen the hands of +the French. Is it so? I trow not. It has ever been the policy of the +Dutch to dissemble. Holland intends to keep the English from this +coast if she may. Surely she desires also to drive out the French, in +order that she may make herself mistress of the North American land. +She is eager to make colonies, and she knows full well that the +fortress may easily be defended once it be captured." + +"She is, then, a privateer," exclaimed Hough. + +"Not so. She is commissioned by the Government of the Netherlands to +seize North America. The French are only a handful here. England has +no fleet. Now is the crafty Dutchman's opportunity. Look upon this, +my lads." + +Penfold pulled a flaming stick from the fire and walked across the +cave. He stopped where the side sloped as smoothly as a wall, and held +the torch above his head, pointing to a map of the American colonies +traced upon the wall of silica by charcoal. The design was roughly and +incorrectly made; rivers were placed where mountains should have shown, +and the scale was entirely inaccurate; but politically it was correct. + +"See!" cried the leader, passing a finger through Chesapeake Bay, and +laying his hand lovingly upon the province of Virginia. "There lies +the fairest of England's colonies. Here, mark you, flows the Potomac, +and here to the north behold the province of Maryland. What country +lies back in the beyond we do not know, because the Mohawks are masters +there; but pass north along the coast and we reach New England, the +provinces of Connecticut and Massachusetts, with the king's towns of +Boston and Plymouth. Between lie our enemies." + +He passed his fingers across the words written on the wall, "New +Netherlands," while the four men murmured behind. + +"Did the Hollanders acquire their colonies in fair fight?" demanded +Penfold, returning to the fire. + +He flung down the brand, and as the sparks showered upward he went on, +"I say it was through deceit. During the glorious reign of our +Elizabeth, of blessed memory, our men of Devon, our Grenville, our +Drake, our Hawkins smoked out the Spaniards, and wrested these colonies +of the new world from the King of Spain in fair fight. Fair do I say? +Ay, surely one tight English ship was ever a match for three popish +galleons. But mark you how the jackals followed the lion, even as +travellers from the Indies tell us they follow to take of that which +the lion shall leave. Where the land was free, where there was no +tyranny of the church to dread, mark you how the Dutch jackals crept +in, to find a home and found a colony under the protection of the +golden lions of England." + +"Come, old Simon," broke in Woodfield. "Enough of talk." + +"Ay, ay. Put out the fire, my lads. Rub out yon map. We have a plan +which, with God's help, shall perchance furnish us with better quarters +than this poor hole in the rock." + +Young Geoffrey stepped back, spat upon the white wall where the words +"New Netherlands" appeared, and obliterated the Dutch colonies with the +flat of his hand. + +"Let the map now stand!" he cried, and the others gathered round the +boy whom they loved, clashing their swords, and taking courage from the +thoughtless prophecy which was in God's good time to be fulfilled. + +Then the Englishmen went on their way through the dark night. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +DOUBLE DEALING. + +The Dutch master had played his game of duplicity with no little skill. +His arrogant attitude towards the head men of the fortress, his +outspoken hatred for the wild north land and its uncivilised +inhabitants, his outward indolence and distaste for fighting, were all +subtle moves towards the object he had in view. The culminating stroke +of practically disarming his ship by sending out thirty of his best men +upon a hunting expedition was, he considered, a veritable inspiration +of genius. The plan had indeed succeeded in its purpose of hoodwinking +the French, and Van Vuren was satisfied, because he knew nothing of the +venturers who had discovered his plans and were preparing to strike a +blow against him for the glory of their country and themselves. + +Six men were admitted into their leader's confidence, and five of these +only at the last hour. Everything seemed to favour the enterprise. +The night which had been chosen for the council between Van Vuren and +the headmen of the Iroquois was very dark. No sound came from the +sleeping fortress; not a light was showing upon the French ship. The +usual sentries were posted, but the darkness was too impenetrable for +the keenest sight to carry more than a few yards. Van Vuren stepped to +the side of his ship, listened intently for some minutes, and when the +silence remained unbroken whispered an order, and the five picked men +clambered down a ladder and guided their feet into a boat which rode +alongside. The master followed, the boat was pushed off, and floating +down stream swung rapidly round the bend. + +"To your oars," muttered Van Vuren. + +The black water began to trickle gleefully under the bows, the rowers +dropping their blades cautiously and lifting them high to avoid a +splash. Soon a spark of light broke out upon the shore, at no great +distance from the falls of Montmorenci, where the river of that name +discharges into the mightier stream. Swinging the tiller round, Van +Vuren aimed the boat towards that light. + +Beside the fire awaited them a stout Dutchman, who had lived in New +Netherlands among the Indians on the banks of the Schuylkill and there +had learnt the language, and with him was an Indian squatting upon his +haunches. The latter was naked to the waist; a round beaver cap came +low over his forehead, and long hair streamed down his cheeks. His +body shone like polished mahogany as the firelight played across it. +He rose when Van Vuren approached, and remarked upon the exceeding +blackness of the night, and the stout Dutchman answered in the native +tongue, "It is well." + +After drawing their boat up the shore and putting out the fire, the men +listened again for any sounds of hostile movements, and when Van Vuren +was reassured as to their safety the party set off along an +imperceptible trail, following their Cayuga guide, who strode rapidly +towards the cover of the forest. + +At the end of an hour's march they drew near the camp and perceived the +glow of the council fire. The boles of the trees became ruddy, and +they smelt the acrid smoke which curled upward in wreaths to find an +outlet through the solid-looking roof of foliage, There was no +vegetation below. Splintered stumps projected stiffly from the +conifers; sometimes a fallen trunk lay across the way; the peaty ground +was soft with pine needles. A fox barked monotonously in the distance. +Occasionally a gust of wind passed with a sigh and a gentle straining +at the mast-like firs. + +The party stepped into a clearing, and Van Vuren halted nervously, +tightening the sash which secured his doublet at the waist. Nine men +appeared before him, seated under a protection of skins stretched +tightly across a framework of boughs, the whole forming a lean-to which +might readily be moved, either to break the force of the wind or to +afford shelter from rain. The men squatted cross-legged, the majority +naked to the waist and shining with fish-oil, a few wrapped in +blankets, the heads of all covered with fur caps adorned with pieces of +white metal or black feathers. Only one man was painted, and he showed +nothing more than a triangular patch of red upon his forehead, the apex +of the triangle making a line with the bridge of his nose. This man +was smoking, and did not put down his pipe when the strangers arrived. +The smoking was indeed a compliment, being the symbolic pipe of peace. + +The nine were sachems of the great Iroquois tribes who in combination +held the north of the continent: the Cayugas, Oneidas, Mohawks, +Onondagas, and Senacas. The smoker was Shuswap, headman of the +Cayugas, father of Onawa and Tuschota, and the chief doctor, one who +professed to understand the language of the beasts, and knew how to +hold communion with the dead. He looked up, drawing the stem of his +pipe from his thin lips, and spoke: + +"Do the white men, who come to us from the world where the sun never +shines, speak to us now words of peace or of war?" + +Van Vuren moved awkwardly when he saw the grave hairless faces peering +at him through the hot vapour of the fire. At that moment the fat +sailor from New Netherlands reached the clearing, panting like a dog. +He presently interpreted the question, and his leader answered: "Tell +the chief that we come from a world where the days are long, and where +the same sun that warms this country shines from morn till night." + +"That were waste of breath," muttered the seaman, who had none to +spare, and he said instead to the council of nine: "The white chief has +come in peace to seek the aid of the sun's children that he may +overthrow his enemies." + +"A people have taken my children to be their servants," said Shuswap. +"That people armed the enemies of my race against me. Is the white man +friendly with that people?" + +"The French of whom the great sachem speaks are my enemies also," +replied Van Vuren through the interpreter. "I would drive them from +the land, and dwell here in peace beside my allies the great tribes of +the Iroquois." + +The crafty Dutchman reflected that, when the flag of the Netherlands +waved over the heights, it would be easy to hold the Indians in the +forest with a warship upon the St. Lawrence and a few cannon frowning +from the cliff. + +"The white man has called us into council," went on Shuswap. "What +does he ask of us?" + +At that the Hollander played his hand boldly. "I ask you to send your +fighting-men against the French when I give the signal. I will sink +the provision ship which lies upon the river, while your men sweep over +the heights and capture the fortress. So shall you be avenged upon +your enemies, the men who armed the Algonquins against you." + +"It is well said," answered the council of nine. + +"What signal will you give, that we may know when to make our attack?" +said Shuswap. + +"A raft of fire floating down the river." + +The headman removed his eyes from the Dutchman and turned to consult +his colleagues. They conferred for some minutes, without passion, +without animation, apparently with no feeling of interest. Their faces +were set, and they spoke with only faint motions of their lips. + +"We will bring our children," said the old sachem at last. "When the +fire is seen along the Father of Waters we shall make ourselves ready." + +He bent forward, raised a short stick from the centre of the council +fire, and held it out in his brown fingers, then dashed the brand +suddenly upon the ground, and dreamily watched the upward flight of +sparks. + +"So let our enemies fly before us," he muttered. + +"The sparks fly outward," said the sachem of the Oneidas. + +"The Frenchmen shall not be able to stand before the children of the +sun," they muttered with one voice. + +The pipe was passed round with terrible solemnity, every Indian and +Dutchman drawing once at the stem and handing it to his neighbour, and +then the Hollanders left the clearing to return, well satisfied with +their night's work. + +It wanted yet three hours to the first breaking of the dawn, and the +night was as dark as ever when the seven men came out upon the rocks, +where they could hear the faint whisper of the river. There the Indian +guide left them, and the Dutchmen, flushed with success, laughed and +talked loudly, knowing that they were separated from the hearing of the +French settlement by more than a mile of rock and bush. Advancing in +single file, they came to the thicket of willow beside which they had +left their boat. + +"Is all well?" called Van Vuren, who walked at the end of the line. + +As he spoke there fell a storm out of the night; a thunder of voices; +the lightning of flashing swords; a rush of dark bodies around the +boat. In the thick darkness all became confusion on the side of the +attacked. + +"English!" shouted Van Vuren; and, as the long body of the Puritan +descended upon him, the master turned and fled, without honour, but +with a whole skin. Only the stout seaman shared his leader's privilege +of a run for his life, but him the far-striding legs of Hough pursued, +covering two feet to the Dutchman's one. The wretch sweated and +groaned as he flung out his aching legs, his great body heaving and +staggering as cold as ice. He swore and prayed to God in one breath. +He promised a life of service to the Deity, a treasure in the Indies to +the pursuer; but prayer and promise availed him little. The mutilated +man pressed upon him, and it was only the almost tangible darkness +which prolonged his life for a few more agonised seconds. Then Hough +bounded within reach, lunged fairly, pressing home when he felt flesh, +and the fat Dutchman emitted a violent yell, and his big carcase rolled +upon the rocks, his head settled, his mouth grinned spasmodically, his +limbs twitched, and then he lay at ease, staring more blindly than ever +into the night. Out of the six conspirators who had set forth that +night, Van Vuren was the only man to escape with his life. + +"Cast me these bodies into the river," said Penfold, wiping his sword. +"But, stay. It were a pity to waste so much good clothing. Strip them +first, lads. Naked they came into the world, and naked let them go +out." + +The bodies were denuded of their clothes and weapons. Five splashes +shivered the face of the river, and then the Englishmen laid hands upon +the boat and drew her down to the water. But an idea had occurred to +Penfold, and he called a halt. + +"We have the current to row against, and the night may break before we +reach the ship," he said. "Let us disguise ourselves, so that French +and Dutch alike may regard us as friends in the dimness of the morning. +Here are five suits of Dutch clothing. There are five of us. We shall +fight the easier in such loose-fitting trunks." + +"Methinks they that fear the Lord have no need to adopt a cunning +device," protested the Puritan. + +"What know we about the ways of the Lord?" said his leader. "Does the +Lord grant the victory to him who runs? Does He not rather send him a +sword into his coward's back? The Lord, I tell you, helps that man who +is the most subtle in devising schemes through which he may overthrow +his enemies. A murrain on these garments! I shall be as a child when +he has put on his father's trappings for the bravery of the show." + +Already a grey-dark mist spread along the river where the night clouds +were dissolving at the first light touch of the fingers of the day. +The adventurers had but an hour for their project before the coming of +the first light. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +THE INTRODUCTION TO A FIGHT. + +Upon the fore-deck of the Dutch ship two sailors were chatting idly +beside a lantern's shaded light. They had tramped up and down, +performing their duty in a listless fashion, until the general silence +had convinced them that the officer in charge was asleep below. The +determination to take their ease, which they thereupon arrived at, +became strengthened by their belief that the vessel could not have been +safer had she been at anchor-hold in the Zuyder Zee. + +"Yon French ship has no sentries, I warrant," said Jan Hoevenden, the +younger of the two. "What use, when a man may hardly see his hand when +'tis held in front of him? Your Indian does not attack by water, as +Roussilac well knows. Neither shall he attack in such a darkness, +unless hard put to it." + +"'Tis a scheme of the master to deprive us of our hard-earned sleep," +grumbled James Oog. "Come, comrade, let us rest here and smoke. Here +is a parcel of tobacco which I dried yesterday in the sun." + +The two sailors filled their pipes, lighted the tobacco at the poop +lantern, and settled themselves aft speedily to forget their +responsibilities. There was not a sound, except the hum of flies and +the swirl of the river. There was nothing to be seen, beyond the +gloomy masts and spectral rigging. The atmosphere remained still and +close. + +"This is but a poor country, Jan," observed the older man, after a few +contented puffs at his huge pipe. "There be no treasure of gold or +silver buried here." + +"Nought but forest and rock, with a biting wind o' nights," replied +Hoevenden. "'Tis a cold climate. The Indians say this river is thick +with ice for a full half of the year." + +"I wish for none of that. Give me the south. Hast ever been in +Florida?" + +"Nay. Is that land as fruitful as men say?" + +"It knows no winter, and even in the midst of the year the heat is +never so great that a man may not endure to work. The soil is so rich +that grain dropped upon the ground shall spring into harvest in a +month. Sugar and fruit grow there, and much timber for building. +There is also game for the pot, and furs for a man's back." + +"There are pestilent beasts, they tell me," Hoevenden grumbled. + +"Well, man, there was never a paradise without serpents. True there +are mighty reptiles, twenty feet in length, within the rivers, and +monstrous scorpions upon land. But what of it? There are perils upon +every shore. A man may sit out at night under a big moon, beside trees +covered with white or pink blooms, every bloom as great as his head and +smelling like wine, and he may listen to the Tritons singing as they +splash through the sea, and watch the mermaidens--passing fair they say +who have seen them--lying upon the rocks, wringing salt water from +their hair. 'Tis a wondrous shore. I would rather own an acre of it +than be master of all this country of cold forest where there is +neither fruit nor flower." + +"The fog arises yonder," said Hoevenden, pointing down the river. + +The grey mass which he indicated ascended rapidly and drenched the deck +with dew. There was as yet no light, but a heavy shadow had taken the +place of the intense blackness, and the river was visible as it carried +its current to the gulf. The two men rose suddenly, and hid their +pipes when they heard the rattle of oars and splash of water. + +"Shall be found at our duty," said Oog, with a husky laugh, and his +fellow-seaman chuckled with him. + +A boat was making rapid progress against the stream, Penfold, with an +eye upon the fog and his right hand on the tiller, encouraging the +rowers. The muscles sprang out from their arms, the sweat flowed from +their faces, despite the rawness of the air. Hough's mutilated +countenance throbbed terribly beneath his efforts. The ship started +suddenly out of the mist, and Penfold called softly, "Easy, lads. +Spare yourselves now, for we have soon to fight." But immediately the +men stopped rowing, the current dragged the boat down. + +"The use of the sword will be as child's play after pulling against +this stream," gasped Hough. + +Again the men bent their backs, and the boat sullenly made way. Behind +them the morning was breaking rapidly, the fog gathered in whiter +folds, and some flickering bars of grey light crossed the track of the +river. + +"They must not see our faces nor hear us speak," Penfold muttered. +Then he whispered sharply, "Heaven be thanked! A ladder hangs at her +stern." + +He drew the borrowed plume over his eyes, and lowered his head because +he was facing the ship. His comrades gave way, driving the heavy boat +upward with great strokes of the clumsy oars, until Penfold muttered +softly, "Easy now." + +The two sentries were looking down from above; but they perceived +nothing of a suspicious nature, chiefly because they had no cause to +fear the coming of the enemy. + +Young Viner was the first to leave the boat, but Penfold was hard after +him. They scrambled up the ladder, while the others secured the boat +to the steps. + +"Five men!" exclaimed Hoevenden, peering through the perplexing light. +"Where is the sixth? Masters, where is the commander?" + +"Here!" muttered an English voice, and the sentry fell forward with +Penfold's sword through him. Oog opened his mouth to cry "Treachery!" +but all the sound that issued therefrom was a death gasp, as Viner +finished his career with a pretty stroke which effectually deprived the +Dutchman of his hoped-for heritage in the south. + +"A fair beginning," said Penfold, peering forward at the big cabins +which gave the ship a curiously humped shape. "Now to smoke out the +hornets. If we are mastered by numbers, we may yet save ourselves by +swimming to the shore. All silent yet. But see--a gun!" + +He rammed his sword up the muzzle-breach. "'Tis loaded. Fetch me +yonder lantern." + +Hough brought the lantern from the poop; but hardly had he done so when +a head came out from one of the cabin windows, and a pair of frightened +eyes swept their faces. In a moment, as it seemed, the ship was in an +uproar. + +"Now may God deafen the Frenchmen," prayed Penfold, as he swung the +brass gun round and pointed its muzzle at the cabin door. + +Viner and Woodfield were fastening down the hatches, while Hough ran +forward, taking his life in his hands, and severed the cable. The ship +quivered, shook herself like a dog aroused from sleep, and very slowly +answered the downward pull of the stream. + +But before the Puritan could return the cabin door burst open and the +enemy swarmed forth. Hough dropped the first in his shirt, parried a +blow from the second, turned and ran back, while old Penfold opened the +lantern and brought the flame down to the portfire. + +There was light now over the St. Lawrence under masses of wet cloud. +An Indian canoe was flying over the water like a bird, urged by two +pair of arms paddling furiously. She caught the floating ship, and as +she made fast to the side of the steps the gun roared overhead, and +after it an English cheer shook the mist. + +"Keep to my side," said the man in the canoe. "Forget not that pass +under the hilt I taught you." + +Having thus spoken he bounded up the ladder. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +THE FIGHT. + +Although the majority of the thirty-six Dutchmen left aboard had been +secured below hatches, those on deck were sufficient to make the odds +heavy against the Englishmen. The unanticipated arrival of the lord of +the isles and his son--who had been returning from their hunting ground +higher up the river, when their ears were startled through the morning +mist by the sound of English voices--brought up the attacking strength +to the fortunate number of seven; but the new-comers were not even +observed by the five adventurers during the excitement of the opening +stage of that struggle in the fog. + +That incautious cheer, which followed the noise of the gun, was defiant +rather than triumphant. In spite of Penfold's careful aim the ball had +merely crashed across deck and plunged through the cabin windows. A +couple of hurriedly aimed shots came back in angry reply, but one +passed high, the other low, resulting in a wrecked plank in the deck +and the loss of a portion of rigging. The bark of seventeenth-century +cannon was far more formidable than its bite. + +"Have at them, my lads. Drive them over the side," thundered Penfold; +and he rushed forward to clear the deck at the head of his gallant few. + +Before the conflicting parties could meet, three Dutchmen, deceived by +the tumultuous English cheer, had gone over the side to swim for shore. +These men believed that at least a boatload of armed men had taken them +by surprise, and they but obeyed the instinct which in certain +temperaments recommends prudence in the form of flight. + +"We stand too close together," rang out Penfold's voice. "Friend +Woodfield, I had your elbow twice into my side. Separate a little, but +let us keep in line." + +"One rush forward--a strong rush to the cabins," shouted Hough. The +five swords darted through the fog, and every point came back reddened. + +Then they broke into a run, hoping thus to sweep the deck, but their +weakness had by this time become evident to the defenders, who in their +turn pressed forward, conquering by sheer weight of numbers. Each of +the adventurers sought shelter for his back, a mast or bulwark, and +each was driven to fight independently. Three men rushed upon Penfold +and pressed him sore. The Englishman cut at the head of the foremost, +but while his arm was uplifted the others took the advantage offered +and ran in under his guard. Penfold drew his dagger and beat at them +with his left hand. The second Dutchman scratched him deeply along the +side. The third caught and held his left wrist, and shortened his +rapier to run the Englishman through the heart. Penfold saw death +before him, but only called grimly, "Fair play, ye dogs, fair play!" + +The sword was dashed from his hand. He pressed back to avoid the +plunge of the shortened blade, but the Hollanders had him at their +mercy. Penfold prepared to make a last effort to break aside, when the +foe who threatened him started rigid with a gasp of pain, and the +leader of the adventurers saw the point of a sword dart fearfully from +the Dutchman's chest. Then the man fell forward spitted from behind, +and with him another of the soldiers, while the third of Penfold's +assailants splashed heavily into the St. Lawrence. + +The man who had saved the leader's life went on his way fighting with +magnificent confidence in the strength of his right arm, and beside him +went the boy, fighting with all his father's fervour, his brown face +pale with passion, his little brown hands already oozing blood, and his +short sword from hilt to point all bloody too. + +"Angels or devils," gasped Flower, who was bleeding heavily from a +wound in the thigh, "they fight upon our side." + +"At them again," cried Woodfield. "After the brave stranger." + +"He takes too much upon him. I am leader here," grumbled old Penfold +unthankfully. + +The valour of the stranger turned the scale. None of the Dutch could +stand before that terrible blade. They gave way, were hunted back to +the cabins, and there brought to bay. + +"Yield you, sirs!" called Penfold. + +Seeing that they had done sufficient for honour, the men yielded, gave +up their weapons, and sought permission to finish their dressing. +Before this request could be granted, a deep voice exclaimed: + +"You grow careless, my masters. Know you not that a bird cannot fly +unless she has wings to carry her?" + +It was the stranger who issued this caution as he pointed with his +sword over the stern. + +The ship had drifted some eighty yards from her moorings, her keel +grating more than once upon a drift of mud. She had remained close to +the bank, out of reach of the strong central current, and now lay +almost motionless, because she had reached the slack water where the +river commenced its eastward bend. Behind her lay the fortress, +already vested in the golden light of the morning. Between, where the +white mist was stealing upward, came sailing a great hulk, and above +the vapour could be seen the flag of France crushing its golden lilies +against the topmast. At intervals came the indistinct murmur of +voices, the flash of hurried sparks dropped upon touchwood, the rattle +of cannon balls, the ramming home of charges down slim-waisted guns. + +"Fool that I am!" exclaimed Penfold. "Fool and forgetful! Up the +rigging, my lads, and set the mainsail. What breeze there is blows +down the river. Drive me yonder fellows up, George Flower. Do you see +that they set all sails, and if they be not ready to obey hurry them +with the sword point." + +The sailors were driven into the rigging to plume their ship for the +benefit of a victorious enemy. The canvas flapped out, the ship veered +towards midstream, and, instantly responding to wind and current, +floated to the left of the island, with the Frenchman scarce a hundred +yards from her stern. + +A voice came rolling out of the mist, the voice of D'Archand. "Are you +attacked by Indians?" he shouted. The master had undoubtedly made out +the Indian canoe floated beside the steps. + +"Let any man answer at his peril," said Penfold, glaring round upon the +unarmed Dutch. + +"Do we fear the French?" demanded Viner hotly. "Here are five--nay, +seven--good Englishmen, for surely our stout allies here have fought as +only English can----" + +"There are a hundred men upon yonder ship," interrupted the leader, +"men equipped with the newest weapons of Europe. It were madness to +divulge our names and nation. Sir," he went on, turning to the +stranger, "we are much indebted to you. Sir, you have fought like a +brave man, and have helped us to overcome our enemies. What counsel do +you give?" + +"Answer Roussilac that Indians have come aboard, but that the crew are +capable of defending themselves, if you will," the stranger replied. +"So may you avoid his fire. Or with your pleasure I will undertake to +answer the master myself, even as an Englishman should always answer a +Frenchman." + +"And how is that?" demanded Penfold. + +The stranger indicated the brilliant flag, flapping in the sunshine +like a wounded bird trying to fly but falling back. "By defying him so +long as that emblem flies," he said. + +Between heavy lines of mist, waved like the bar nebuly upon the shield +of the woolcombers, the black stem and white deck of the enemy had +become partly visible. Heads of watchers were peering over her side, +their bodies hidden, their faces barely above the fog line. Before the +cabins in front of the poop a canopy fluttered; under it a table, and +upon the table six great golden poppies lifted their heads, their +ragged petals flickering under the breeze. The Englishmen saw the bare +head and richly caparisoned shoulders of a tall priest, who swayed +monotonously from side to side, and muttered Latin in a deep voice. +The table was an altar, the poppies were candles, and the priest was La +Salle reciting the inevitable morning Mass. + +The better-built Dutch vessel, being easily capable of sailing a knot +and a half to the Frenchman's one, drew away, her main and fore sheets +swelling till they were round as the belly of some comfortable merchant +of Eastcheap who had profited by a successful venture upon the Spanish +Main. Very soon the voice of the militant priest became like the +murmur of an overhead insect. + +"Now by my soul!" cried Hough, with a quivering of his slit nostrils. +"It were an everlasting disgrace to Christian men to stand thus idle +and watch a priest of Baal offering sacrifice. Bid us run out the +guns, captain, and drop a good Protestant cannon ball amid yonder +catholic juggling. We have fought for our country this day. Let us +now commit ourselves to the Lord's work, and snuff out yonder stinking +candles, and end these popish blasphemies." + +Penfold made no sign of hearing this appeal. He said merely, "They +cram on yet more sail. But they shall not come up to us unless we are +brought upon a bar, and even so they cannot pass us, because the water +becomes narrow beyond. Where is friend Woodfield?" + +"Guarding the prisoners at the door of the cabin and keeping an eye +that they do not arm themselves." + +"Listen to the men below," said Flower. "Our caged birds become weary +of confinement, and beat their wings to escape." + +Hough and the lord of the isles held their eyes upon the Frenchman, who +was now one hundred and fifty yards away, and almost clear of vapour. +When they could see that the guns had been unshipped and were pointing +over the bows, neither man was able altogether to suppress his feelings. + +"The curse of God shall surely fall upon us," cried the Puritan +furiously. "When summoned to work in His vineyard we turn a deaf ear +to the call. Did evil come to me when I dragged with mine own hands +from the reformed communion table of our parish church at Dorchester a +Jesuit in disguise, and flung the dog into our little river Thame there +to repent him of his former and latter sins?" + +"Peace, friend," said old Penfold. "Here is not England, nor stand we +on English territory. Let yonder papists worship their saints and +idols to their own decay. We are but few in number, though valiant in +spirit, and with every man a wound to show. Remember also that this +ship is not yet our prize." + +"Croaker," muttered Hough disdainfully. + +"Say rather a man to whom age has brought sound judgment," returned +Penfold, unmoved. + +"It is my turn," said the deep voice of the unknown. "Sir Captain, I +have a favour to beg. There is a gun yonder on which I have set my +eye, a brass gun of some twenty pounds weight, loaded with ball. If it +displease you not, I will discharge that gun from the aftmost deck in +such a manner that it shall harm no man. Sir Captain, I have some +small experience in aiming the gun." + +Penfold set his rugged face towards his questioner. + +"Good sir," he said, "you are English among Englishmen. We are plain +countrymen of the royal county of Berks, village yeomen of small +degree, who have beaten our plowshares into swords; but you, I may +believe, judging from your speech, are somewhat higher. Tell us, if +you will, your name." + +"My name is my own, my sword the king's, my life belongs to my +country," said the stranger. "Enough to know that I am a man of Kent. +If now I have answered you, sir, I beg of you to answer me." + +"We should but reveal ourselves." + +"Every minute widens yon strip of water between ourselves and the +pursuer. She is sailing her fastest, and each minute sends us more of +the wind which she has been taking from us. This breeze may endure for +another hour, by which time we shall have reached the chasm which is +called Tadousac. Sixteen years have I dwelt upon this river, good +master, both in winter and summer, and no servant of King Louis, nor +Indian of the forest, knows its waters better than I." + +Penfold turned to the two associates supporting him. "What answer +shall I give?" he asked. + +"Consent," said fanatic and youth together; and Penfold gave consent +against his better judgment. + +Unaided, the stranger carried the short gun up the steps, rested it in +position upon its crutch on the sloping deck, and arranged the priming, +while the stern boy at his bidding produced knife and flint. The men +below awaited results with a certain curiosity, looking for little more +than an explosion of powder, and the hurling of a defiant missile +harmlessly into space. + +It might have been the excellence of the aim, it might have been the +working of Providence, more probably it was sheer commonplace English +luck; but, when the quaint little weapon had howled, kicked viciously, +and rolled over, there came the dull crash of lead with wood, a shower +of tough splinters, and--most glorious sight for the adventurers' +eyes--the top of the French mainmast, carrying the great white and gold +flag, which had been blessed by a bishop upon the high altar of Notre +Dame in Paris, sprang into the air like a pennoned lance, described a +half circle, and plunged to deck, piercing the canopy as though it had +been paper, missing the ministrant by inches only, scattering the +candlesticks and breaking the candles before the eyes of the +scandalised soldiers, who were concluding their devotions to the "_Ite +missa est_" of the priest. + +A great cheer ascended from the Dutch ship, making the cold, pine-clad +hills echo and ring. Hough forgot his sternness, and laughed aloud as +he clasped the gunner's hand. Old Penfold smiled grimly, with more +inward jubilation than he cared to show. + +"Now plume her, lads, and let us fly," he shouted. "Steer her around +yonder bend in safety, and we may laugh at her cannon." + +"The prisoners, captain! We cannot both fight the ship and hold guard +over them." + +"To the river with them," said Hough. "Let them swim ashore." + +"There may be some who cannot swim." + +"What better chance shall they have of learning? My father cast me +into the Thames when I was but a whipster, and said, 'Sink or swim, my +lad.' And I thought it well to swim." + +Protesting, struggling, swearing in an unknown tongue, the prisoners +were brought forth from the cabins and hurried over the side, the +laggards helped by a cuff or kick at starting. The turgid river +splashed with Dutchmen, like a school of porpoises, making with what +speed they could--for the water was exceedingly cold--towards the +rock-bound shore. + +Great was the confusion upon the Frenchman when she became so notably +disgraced, but presently D'Archand restored a semblance of order, and +the men trailed off to their duties, probably not a little afraid at +discovering that the ever-dreaded English, whose appearance north of +far-distant Plymouth had become a familiar nightmare, were aboard their +supposed Dutch ally. La Salle, who had immediately rushed into his +cabin and there divested himself of his ecclesiastical finery, speedily +reappeared in secular costume with his redoubtable sword naked in his +hand. The abbé could swear as heartily as any soldier when put to it, +which fact he proved beyond lawyers' arguments then and there. + +"Body of St. Denis!" he cried. "See to your priming, knaves. Ah, +hurry, young imp of the pit," kicking a scrambling powder-boy as he +shouted. "By St. Louis, our Lady, and the Cardinal! This is a Dutch +word, a Dutch troth, a Dutch alliance. We shall harry the traitors who +have leagued themselves with our enemies, unless their master, Satan, +lends them wings to carry them to the uttermost parts of the earth. We +shall hang them speedily to the rigging, if the saints be favourable. +Fire, rogues! See you not that she is slipping away from us? Ah, for +a sand bank, or sunken rock, to catch her as she runs! Mark you now, +when I throw a curse over them, how they shall be brought down in their +pride." + +Despite the malediction of Holy Church, the trim Dutchman swept on +nearly a quarter of a mile ahead. Sailors manned the rigging, and +crammed on as much additional sail as the masts would bear; the +dishonoured flag was replaced; Roussilac paced the main deck, pale with +rage, his fingers clasping and unclasping his sword-hilt. D'Archand +hurried to and fro, issuing orders with typical French rapidity. + +A jet of smoke broke over her bows, and a ball threw up a spout of +water in the wake of the fleeing vessel. + +"A most courteous and inoffensive messenger," quoth Flower, bowing to +the enemy. "Captain, shall we not make a suitable reply?" + +"I fear me powder and ball are out of reach," said the captain. "The +noisy hornets below guard the magazine. Would that we had a flag to +hoist over us, though it were nothing more comprehensible to our foes +than the five heads of county Berks." + +Another gun exploded, and after it another, and so they continued +ringing their wild music, the balls falling astern for the most part, +though more than one whizzed through the rigging, yet without doing +more damage than cutting a rope. + +"Take her wide round yonder point, master helmsman," cried the +stranger. "There lies a mud-bank stretching under the water well-nigh +to mid-stream. Mark you the place where it ceases by the ripple across +the river? Steer your passage to the left of that ripple, and all +shall go well." + +"Methinks the wind blows more keenly," said Woodfield. + +"There is coming upon us that wind which the Indians call the life of +the day, a breath of storm from the west which endures but a few +moments, blowing away the vapours of early morn and the last clouds of +night," said the man of Kent. "We may be sure of that wind at this +season of the year. After it follows calm, and the sun grows hot. +Haul down the lower main-sail, Sir Leader. The heavy mist upon yonder +hills tells us that the wind shall blow full strength this morning." + +Even as he spoke a ball from the enemy's bows roared overhead, and +snatched away a portion of the sail he indicated. The loose canvas +began already to flap and the flying ropes to whistle in the wind. + +"Let it remain so," said the Kentishman. "We have no need to take in +our sail since they have saved us the work. Didst see how she +staggered then? She shall never carry all that weight of canvas +through the life of the day, and the wind bears more heavily on her +than upon us. Ah, she gains!" + +It was as he had said. The unwieldy vessel fell into the breath of the +wind, and, righting herself after a sudden lurch, settled down into the +water, ploughing a deep white furrow, every mast bending and every rope +straining, every inch of canvas bellying mightily. + +The Dutchman came out to avoid the mud flat. She began to make the +bend, and her helmsman already saw the wide reach of river beyond, when +a terrible shout ascended from the men who were caged between decks. +At the same moment a pungent odour tainted the free air, and a thin +blue vapour began to leak from the cracks and joinings of the planks. + +The Dutchman was burning internally. Soon her deck smoked like a dusty +road under wind, and the shouts of the prisoners became terrible to +endure. The adventurers smelt the choking fumes, saw the curling +vapours, and their faces grew pale with the knowledge that they had to +face a more dangerous foe than the French, knowing well that any moment +a spark or a flame might touch the magazine. + +"Unfortunates!" groaned Penfold. "I had hoped to win this ship, and +with her sail to Virginia, there to gather a crew of mine own people, +and return hither to harry the French." + +"To the boats," cried Flower. "Better be sunk by a cannon ball than +perish like rats in a corn-stack." + +The wind rushed down from the westward rocks with a shout. It smote +the waters of the St. Lawrence, beating them into waves. It penetrated +the womb of the Dutch vessel, and fanned the smouldering fire into +life. It plucked at the cordage, fought with the sails, and bent the +masts until they cracked again. It came in a haze through which the +sun glowed faintly, and behind over the unseen heights the sky cleared +and burst into blue patches, because the passing of the life of the day +was as sudden as its birth. + +Down went the mizzenmast of the Frenchman with its crowning weight of +canvas, carrying away the spanker, the shrouds, davits, and quarter +boat; and her sky-sails, which a moment before had raked the breeze so +proudly, spread disabled in the river. She dragged on with her +wreckage, while men with axes swarmed into the poop to cut away the +dead weight of wood and saturated canvas. The mainmast curved like a +bow from the main shrouds to the truck, but remained fast until the +haze broke, and the sky became a field azure, from which the sun shone +out in his might. + +Flames were now pouring from the doomed ship, and the poop was a mass +of fire. The Englishmen ran for the boats, into which they flung every +article upon which they could lay their hands: swords and guns, axes, +clothing, provisions, bedding, and even spare sails and ropes. +Everything would serve some useful purpose in their life upon the +shore. The lord of the isles alone took nothing. He entered his canoe +with the boy, and before the adventurers quitted the doomed ship they +had reached the shore and entered the cover of the trees, the man +carrying the light canoe beneath his arm. + +"Release the prisoners," cried Flower, as he cast his last burden into +the boat. + +"Not so," replied the vindictive Hough. "Let them perish like the men +of Amalek before Israel." + +"Nay, we are no cold-blooded murderers," protested Woodfield. +"Unfasten the hatches, and let them save themselves." + +"Have they not been delivered into our hands that we may destroy them?" +said Hough. + +"Now you would undo the good work, and raise up again a host to be our +destruction in the time to come." + +"Let us not argue, lest we be destroyed," said young Viner. "What says +our captain?" + +But old Penfold was lying back in the boat, fainting with exhaustion +and loss of blood, and when Woodfield appealed to him he only murmured +the death sentence of the Dutchmen, "Let Jeremiah Hough command." + +"Cast off," said the Puritan. "Let the enemies of our country perish. +The Lord do so to me and more also if I spare any of the accursed race +who have sworn to sweep England from the seas." + +So the boat pushed off, and came after hard rowing to the shore, beside +the mouth of the little river which enters the main stream midway +between Cap Tourmente and the cleft of the Saguenay. Up this river the +men pulled to find a place for encampment, until the sweet-smelling +pine forest closed behind and hid them from their enemies, whose flag +they had flouted and beaten that day. While they worked their way +inland a mighty explosion shook the atmosphere, the cones rained from +the overhanging trees, the rock land thrilled, the face of the water +shivered, and the birds flew away with screams. + +"I fear me," said Hough, as he ceased his nasal droning of a psalm, "I +fear me that the popish dogs have been given time to rescue the +Hollanders." + +True it was that the French had been allowed both time and opportunity +for setting at liberty the wretches in the burning ship, but neither +Roussilac nor any of his captains dared to lead the venture, knowing +that any moment might witness the destruction of the ship. The master +took in his sails, cast anchor, and waited for the end. + +Thus the undertaking of Holland failed, as her treachery deserved. It +was her one attempt at wresting the fortress from the Cardinal's grip. +And from that day to this no man-of-war from the Netherlands has ever +sailed up the gulf of the St. Lawrence. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +COUCHICING. + +A month went after the failure of the Dutch venture, and the sachems of +the Iroquois still awaited the signal of the raft of fire. Van Vuren +had entered the fortress that morning which witnessed the loss of his +ship, and there remained at the mercy of the French, spending his days +in making friendly overtures to the commandant, avoiding La Salle--who +still refused to believe that it was not Van Vuren who had been his +cowardly attacker that distant night at the street corner in +Avignon--and anxiously inquiring for news concerning the expedition +which he had sent out to the west. The Dutchman was being punished for +his treachery by the knowledge that a sword was suspended by an +exceedingly frail thread above his head, for he strongly suspected that +the dwarf Gaudriole was cognisant of his visits to the council fire. +He was therefore afraid to approach the Indians again; but his mind was +yet occupied with its former plot of seizing the fortress with their +aid. + +During that month Roussilac had not been idle. With half his men he +had harried the country to east and west, that he might find and hang +the Englishmen who had dared to occupy his territory and disgrace his +flag. He did not venture into the forests of the north, because the +Iroquois were masters there. Once the adventurers came very near to +being taken, but bravery and English luck opened a way for their +escape. They were, however, compelled to abandon their cave among the +cliffs, and flee for refuge into the district inhabited by the friendly +Cayugas; and there, a few paces from the brink of Couchicing, the Lake +of Many Winds, they built them a hiding-place surrounded by a palisade, +which they ambitiously named New Windsor. To the north they were +protected by the face of the water, to the south by the primæval +forest; on the west the Cayugas held the land, on the east the Oneidas, +both tribes well disposed towards the English and bitterly hostile to +the French. + +Finding himself again defeated, Roussilac cast about in his mind for a +sounder policy, and finally resolved to adopt Samuel de Champlain's +cunning and stir up the Algonquins anew to attack their hereditary +foes. Accordingly he despatched Gaudriole with a couple of soldiers to +the north, with a present of guns and ammunition and a message to the +chief Oskelano, praying him to descend straightway to the river, and +view for himself the majesty and power of the representatives of the +King of France. Oskelano, a treacherous and heartless rogue, snatched +at the gifts, asked greedily for more, and consented to return with the +dwarf to the fortress. + +This move on the part of the commandant escaped the knowledge of the +men who were busy in their way spinning the web of England's empire, +fighting for their own existence and for supremacy at one and the same +time. At their councils figured the lord of the isles--whose +well-hidden shelter in the heart of the region of the lost waters had +never been suspected by the searching party--and his stern young son. +Since that unlooked-for meeting on the deck of the Dutch vessel the +Kentishman had come into frequent contact with the men of Berks, and +their common nationality, cause, and necessities had quickly forged a +stubborn tie between them. But the geniality of the yeomen never +succeeded in breaking down the reserve of their mysterious colleague. +When asked to recount some portion of his past history he would but +answer brusquely, and when they demanded to know his name he merely +returned his former answer, "I am a man of Kent." + +During that month another provision ship, the _St. Wenceslas_ of +Marseilles, had sailed up the St. Lawrence, and so soon as she had made +fast and told the news of the world D'Archand lifted anchor and headed +for home, carrying Roussilac's despatches, and those soldiers and +settlers who, by reason of wounds or sickness, had become unfitted to +fulfil their military obligations. The French Government had taken +advantage of the dissensions which were rending England apart to send +by the _St. Wenceslas_ more emigrants into the new world--all picked +men, destined by the Government to be established, willing or +unwilling, regardless of soil or natural advantages, upon such +districts as might be considered to need strengthening, there to +survive or to become extinct. It would be their duty to form, not a +settlement capable of extension, but a military post; and they would be +sustained by supplies brought over from France by warships. It was a +weak policy, bound by the test of time to fail. The English motto was +settlement and a friendly attitude towards the natives; that of her +great colonial rival, aggrandisement and the destruction of the +aborigines. + +These facts were remembered by the venturers, when they beheld the +coming of the one ship and the departure of the other, and, egotists +though they were, the truth that they could not possibly form a +settlement unaided became at last too obvious to be ignored. After +repeated deliberations they decided upon a course which was indeed the +only one open to them. The advice, that one of the party should +attempt to reach the king's loyal town of Boston by overland journey +and there beg for help, proceeded in the first instance from the man of +Kent. He explained that the province of Massachusetts was well +occupied by Englishmen of every grade--soldiers of fortune as well as +artisans, farmers, and titled scions of great houses; and, he added, +there were ships of war in Boston and Plymouth harbours. This advice +found favour in the eyes of the others, and they proceeded to draw lots +to decide which one should make the hazard. The lot fell upon Geoffrey +Viner, the youngest of the party. His seniors at once held forth +objections, grounded upon his youth and inexperience; but the boy as +stoutly held out for his privilege, until the dissentients gave way. + +At noon upon the day which had been selected for the young man's +departure, the lord of the isles appeared at New Windsor to bid the +messenger farewell. Geoffrey went out with him, and they stood alone +in the shade of a hemlock, facing the lake and a white cascade which +streamed like a bridal veil over the face of the rocks. After the +Kentishman had imparted what little knowledge he had of the country to +the south, he went on to fix deeply into the mind of his listener the +importance of seeing Lord Baltimore, the Governor of New England, +personally, and of impressing the papist peer strongly with the vital +necessity of sending immediate succour to the north. + +"And what if my Lord Baltimore will not hear me, or hearing will not +believe?" asked Geoffrey anxiously. + +"Give to him this ring," replied the other, drawing reluctantly from +his left hand a gold circlet set with a stone bearing a coat-of-arms. +"Bid him remember the promise made to this ring's owner one summer +night in a Kentish orchard. Bid him also recall the words of King +Henry the Sixth upon Southwark Bridge, hard by Saint Mary Overies, to +his ancestor the keeper of the privy seal, and to mine the sheriff of +Kent." + +"Think you that our plans shall prosper?" the young man asked. + +"Have no doubt. Believe that already we have succeeded. Persuade +yourself that the French are driven out of their fastnesses, and the +land from Acadia to Hochelaga gives allegiance to King Charles. As a +man wills so shall it be. And yet be cautious." + +"Should I not bid them attack Acadia first? It is but a small colony, +and open to the water they say." + +"Nay," said the other. "Let us fight with our faces to the sea. How +shall it profit us to drive our enemy inland and disperse them as a +swarm of flies which rises and settles in another spot? We must drive +them eastward to the sea, where they shall either conquer or die. I +pray you guard that ring." + +As they moved away from the hemlock's shade a canoe swept over the lake +and touched the sand, and two stern-faced Cayugas lifted their paddles, +shaking the water from the blades. These brought a brace of +land-locked salmon to the beach. A young woman followed, and after her +an old man, his thick hair adorned with a bunch of feathers. These +were Shuswap and Onawa, his youngest daughter. + +The lord of the isles went forward, and met his native relatives upon +the beach. + +"Gitsa," cried the old man. "We greet you, Gitsa." + +"Is it well, Shuswap?" + +"It is the time of the wind of life, the good time," the old man +answered. "The waters are free, and the animals breed in the forest. +Where are the white men of the smooth tongue, Gitsa? Where are the men +who came to us at the council fire and said to us, 'Your enemy is our +enemy. Aid us now when we rise up against them'? Shall they return +with the wind of life?" + +"The north wind came upon them and swept them away," his son-in-law +replied, employing the sachem's figurative speech. "You have something +to tell me, Shuswap?" + +"There is a strange ship come to the high cliffs, a great ship from the +land of the accursed people," said the old man. "What is this that you +have told us, Gitsa? Said you not that the King of England shall send +many ships and men when the ice has gone, to drive out the men of +France and restore their own to the tribes of the Iroquois? What is +this that we see? The priest of France sends more ships, and more men +who shall kill the beasts of the forest and the fish of the waters, and +drive us back with their fire-tubes into the forests of the north where +the enemies of our race, the Algonquins, lie ever in wait. Is there a +king in England, Gitsa? Has he ships to send out? Has he men to put +into them? Have you lied to the sachems of the Iroquois?" + +"Be not afraid, Shuswap," said the white man. "You shall learn whether +there be a king of England or no. But he has many enemies in the +far-away world, and these he must conquer first. Even now we are +sending a messenger to the king's country, and he shall return with +ships and men, and the French shall flee before them." + +The man of Kent spoke with a heavy heart. He dared not confess what he +believed to be the truth--namely, that England was already embroiled in +civil war. + +"A tribe divided against itself shall be annihilated," said the sachem +sharply, with the clairvoyant power of the primitive man. "The +remaining tribes stand by until it is exhausted, and then fall upon +that tribe, and it is known no more. Is it so with the English, Gitsa?" + +"It is not so," replied the Englishman, a flush upon his tanned +features. "England stands above other nations of the world, even as +the sun is greater than all lights. She shines over the earth in her +strength. Were there no England the world would fall into decay, the +creatures who supply us with meat and fur would die, the fish would +fail in the waters, the forests would wither, there would be no rain +and no light by night or by day. The sun would turn black, the moon +would fall into the sea, the very gods would die if England were no +more. She shall take possession of this land in her own time, and +Frenchmen shall have no place in it except as subjects of our king." + +The old sachem lifted his cunning eyes and said: "It is well, Gitsa. +But if it be so, why does not your king lift his hand and drive away +his enemies, or blow with his breath and destroy their ships? Surely +that would be a small thing to a king who governs the world." + +"It would be a small thing in truth," replied the Englishman, smiling +in spite of his sorrow. "But the ways of the king are not our ways. +He allows his enemies to go upon their course, until a day comes when +he shall say, 'You have gone too far.' It is thus that he shows his +power." + +"It is so," said the sachem gravely. "We cannot read the mind of him +who rules. One year there are many animals in the forest, and we live +in plenty. The next we starve. A small tribe overthrows a great one. +A great tribe becomes too prosperous and is plagued with pestilence. +The young men are smitten. The old live on. The wind destroys the +forest, the river breaks its own banks. The lightning strikes down the +totem-pole which we have raised for his pleasure. It is so. There is +a mystery in life. The gods destroy their own handiwork. They remove +the strong, and let the weak survive." + +He passed on, an erect figure, in spite of his age, and treading firmly. + +Onawa, a silent listener to their talk, stepped out. She was good to +look upon, with her wealth of black hair, her large eyes, her rounded +face, the cheeks and lips lightly touched with paint, her slim muscular +figure. She could run against any man, and aim an arrow with the +sureness of any forester of Nottingham. But she was headstrong, as +changeable as water, and the Englishman did not trust her. + +"Where have you been, Onawa?" he said. + +"I have come from the camp with my father," she replied. "Where have +you left your son? They say, among the tribes, that he grows into a +great warrior. They say also that he carries wood and draws water and +cuts up the deer which he has killed. Our young men despise a woman's +work." + +"I have taught him the duty of helping his mother," came the reply. +"In my country a man lives for his mother or his wife, and her good +favour is his glory." + +The girl hesitated, a frown crossing her forehead. "Why are the French +so beautiful, so bold-looking?" she asked suddenly. + +"That they may captivate the minds and eyes of women who are weak." + +"They are better to look at than Englishmen. They do not wear old +garments marked with dirt. They do not let the hair upon their faces +grow down their bodies. They do not talk deep in their throats. They +are not serious. I love to hear them talk, to see them move. They +walk like men who own the world." + +"I have warned you against them," he said earnestly. "They are the +natural enemies of your people. Consider! What Frenchman has ever +married into your tribe and settled down among you?" + +The girl laughed scornfully, and turned to go, grasping her long hair +in her hand. + +"You hide from them because you know that they are better men than +you," she taunted. "It was a Frenchman who first came Jo our country +from the other world. Perhaps there was no England in those days. The +sun loves to shine upon Frenchmen. The English live in the mists. You +have taken my sister for wife, but I--I, Onawa, daughter of Shuswap, +would marry a Frenchman." + +"Never shall I wish you a harder fate," retorted the calm man; and +having thus spoken he turned aside towards the tiny English settlement +to greet his friends and join again his son. + +It was the first hour of night when Viner started upon his great +journey. The forest was white with a moon, and sparks of phosphorus +darted across the falls. When the wooden bars were drawn out of their +sockets and the five men emerged from the palisade, the monotonous +chirping of frogs ceased abruptly, and a great calm ensued. + +In single file they passed along the dark trail, the wet bush sweeping +their legs, the branches locked overhead. They rounded the red fires +which marked the camping-ground of the Oneidas; they smelt the acrid +smoke, and dimly sighted many a brown lean-to; the dogs jumped out +barking. They passed, the lights disappeared, the silence closed down. +Presently the trail divided; the branch to the left leading to the +river, that to the right bearing inland to the lakes, rivers, and +hunting-grounds known only to the Indians. + +"Get you back now," said Viner, halting at the parting of the ways. +"We are already in the country of the enemy. Bid me here God-speed." + +There they clasped hands, and in the act of farewell Flower slipped +into Viner's hand a little black stone marked with a vein of chalk. +"Keep it, lad," he muttered. "One spring when I was near drowning in +the Thames by being held in the weeds I caught this stone from the +river-bed. Methinks it has protected me from ill. May that same +fortune be on you, and more added to it, in the work which lies before +you." + +A ray of moonlight fell through an opening in the trees, and whitened +the five keen faces. + +"Superstition made never a soldier of any man," muttered the stern +voice of the Puritan. "Fling that idolatry to the bush, Geoffrey, and +go your way, trusting rather in the Lord with a psalm upon your lips." + +"It is but a reminder of home for the lad," protested Flower gently. +"We have each other. But in the solitudes what shall he have?" + +"'Tis but a stone from our river, friend Hough," said Geoffrey timidly. +"I thank you, neighbour," he added. + +"Fare you well," said old Penfold sadly. "We shall lack you sore." + +They turned away, and instantly became lost from the man who was going +south, because the trail bent sharply. The little band of adventurers, +now reduced to four, walked slowly and sorrowfully towards New Windsor, +until they came out upon the lake, and heard the beavers gnawing the +rushes, and the wind splashing the fresh water up the beach. + +"What has come to our nightingales?" said Penfold suddenly. "I like +not this silence." + +The frogs about the palisade were songless, and the sign was ominous. +At their leader's hasty remark the others came to a stand, and scanned +the prospect keenly, until silently and abruptly the ghost-like shape +of a woman rose between them and the moon. + +"'Tis but the girl Onawa, daughter of Shuswap," muttered Woodfield +reassuringly; but there was a suspicion in his mind which prompted him +to add, "What does she here?" + +Even while he put the question Hough cried out, and pointed with a wild +gesture, feeling that same moment for his sword. Gazing in the +direction which he indicated with a quivering hand, his brethren saw +before them the palisade, but not as they had left it. The wooden bars +had been set back into their sockets, as though to forebode the +occupation of their enclosure by an enemy. + +"Stay!" called Onawa haughtily, when the men approached her at a run. +"Your tepee has passed from you into the power of the king." + +"There is only one king," cried old Penfold. Then he shouted at her, +for all the land to hear, "What king?" + +"King Louis," said the girl defiantly. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +THE GAUNTLET DOWN. + +Oskelano, chief of the Algonquins, that unstable race, false alike to +friend and foe, and doomed to be the first of the savage tribes to be +extinguished, reached the fortress about noon on the day which had been +fixed for Geoffrey's departure to the unknown lands. Roussilac +personally met the treacherous old man upon the heights, and dazzled +his savage eyes with the splendour of a blue surcoat, upon which +gleamed the fleur-de-lys worked in gold. He proceeded to point out the +soldiers in their brave array, the strong huts of wood or stone dotted +about the cliff, the _St. Wenceslas_ riding upon the river, the +glistening guns, and the flashing steel. Finally he bade the old +savage note the impregnable nature of the French position. + +"Behold the citadel which my master has ordered me to build for your +protection," the commandant continued, pouring his figments through the +leering mouth of the dwarf Gaudriole. "We have not destroyed your +forests, nor robbed you of your shelters. You may enter our forts in +safety, and obtain whatsoever you desire in exchange for skins and +feathers. We do not mass together in one place. We distribute our +strength. Our forts are dotted along the coast. The tribes of +Maryland and of Massachusetts have shown you how the English congregate +upon the Potomac River. When you go to them for supplies of food, or +demanding recompense for that which they have taken from you, they +threaten you with death. Is it not so?" + +"Um," replied the Algonquin, not a muscle of his face stirring. + +"The English have their eye upon this north of the continent," went on +the governor. "In the south they rule, but only by permission of our +king. Have you obtained any benefits from them? Have they not rather +hunted you like wild beasts when you have resisted them? Remember how +Samuel de Champlain armed you so that you might fight against the +tribes of the Iroquois. He did not fear the Iroquois, but he saw you +in danger, and reached out his hand to save you." + +"Um, um," exclaimed Oskelano, with some symptom of feeling. + +"And now the King of France bids you choose between him and Charles of +England. If you accept my master's friendship he shall protect you +from your enemies. But if you refuse him he shall leave you to the +mercy of the Iroquois and the English, who shall rob and kill you until +there is not one Algonquin left." + +"The chief desires to know," said the interpreter, "why it is that the +English in the south have brought their wives and families, and why the +French come alone." + +"The English desire to take the country that they may make it their +home and abide here for ever," answered Roussilac. "The French are +here to protect the Algonquins, and when danger is over they shall +return to their wives and families in the homeland." + +"The chief also desires to know what is the cause of the king's +friendliness to a people whom he has never seen," continued the +interpreter. + +"King Louis has forbidden the English to enter this country, and when +they disobey he sends ships and men against them. It is his will that +the Algonquins shall possess this land in peace." + +"Um," said Oskelano profoundly, when these fictions had been expounded. + +"What says the wooden-faced fool?" asked Roussilac. + +"The doctors of his tribe tell him that all white men are liars," +replied the dwarf. "But the English are greater liars than the French." + +"Would that I might collect all the savages in this country upon yonder +island in mid-stream, and there exterminate them root and branch," the +governor muttered. + +"Import a shipload of bad brandy, commandant," suggested the +interpreter, with an evil grin. "That would spread a disease which +might carry them off in a few generations." + +"What say you?" exclaimed Roussilac. "Away, hunchbacked devil!" + +But when Oskelano had gone to the quarters which had been prepared for +him, and Gaudriole had followed with a grating laugh, Roussilac +remained to pace the cliff and consider the evil thought. "'Tis a vile +plan," he muttered. "Yet beasts are poisoned when they overrun the +land. By St. Louis, it is a plan which might work." + +That poor twisted freak of nature, Gaudriole, had lived formerly in the +gutters of Paris by his wits and the predatory powers of his fingers, +begging by day, stealing by night. Favoured by fortune beyond his +deserts, he had continued to escape the great stone gallows which had +been erected for the dismissal of vagabonds of his kind, and had +finally escaped to the New World, there to fall speedily into the hands +of the Indians. Having saved his life by the performance of some +sleight-of-hand tricks, he robbed the tribe which had taken him captive +and escaped that same night. For years he had lived among the natives, +learning their language, adopting their manner of living, until he had +made himself as much at home in the dense forests as in the slums of +his native city. Indian braves and French soldiers alike stood in awe +of him on account of his impish form and devilish ways. The governors +of the forts found him useful because he brought them information. The +free life suited the unprincipled dwarf, who was little better than an +animal invested with a trick of reasoning; and he knew that, like an +animal, he was liable to be hanged and his body thrown to the crows any +day of his sinful life. + +The cabaret in the Rue des Pêcheurs was noisy that evening because the +ship which had lately arrived from Marseilles had replenished Michel's +casks. Soldiers were gaming behind the red curtain which half-blinded +the single window, and fierce songs sounded under the cliff as +Gaudriole shuffled down the pathway. The dwarf had not listened to the +welcome noise of the tavern for many a month, and his crooked heart +heated at the sound. + +"Saints of God!" the high voice of La Salle sounded. "If it be true, +as they say, that the devil lends favour to gamblers, then are you +lost, brother, body and soul. Michel, an you sing that lewd song +again---- A plague strike you drunkards! Have the streets of +Marseilles no new song?" + +"There is nothing new, my father," bawled a hoarse voice. "His sacred +Eminence holds all France as a man might contain in his hand an egg. +Only strong men, good fighters, be they priests or laymen, find favour +in the Cardinal's eyes, and 'tis said, though with what truth I know +not, that he sways his Holiness as the wind may play with a cornstalk. +Not a brick has been added to Marseilles this year past. The very +mass-bread is mouldy, and the women are hags----" + +"Peace, brute!" La Salle shouted. "Laroche, smite me yon babbler +across his mouth." + +Standing in the doorway, Gaudriole saw the fat priest heave, and aim a +terrific blow at a half-drunken soldier whose head lolled against the +wall. The dwarf shuffled forward with his malevolent laugh as the +soldier lurched aside with an oath. + +"The English are upon you, Messires!" he shouted with all his strength. + +Instantly there arose indescribable confusion. Trestles and stools +were flung aside, wine from overthrown goblets soaked black patterns +into the earthen floor, as every soldier made for the outside, grasping +his sword, or swearing because he could not find it. Out of the noise +grated the laugh of the dwarf, who slunk against the log wall, rubbing +his hairy hands. + +"A jest! A jest!" screamed Ferraud of shrill voice, his waxen face +regaining colour as he wagged his hand at the dwarf. "Masters, behold +Gaudriole! Liar, hunchback, bastard! Were you used as you deserve you +would hang from the roof-tree. Masters, come back. There are no +English within a thousand miles." + +"What found ye outside, my soldiers?" chuckled Gaudriole, as the men of +Mars tumbled disorderedly into the cabaret. "There is the wind. The +west wind, which the Indians say brings all that a man may wish for. +Comrades, did ye find the wind?" + +His hideous figure doubled, and his laughter grated again. + +"Buffoon of the pit!" cried Laroche, striding up and shaking the dwarf +until his head rolled. "Would make a laughing-stock of his Majesty's +brave men, deformed imp of darkness? Come forth now and sing to us. +Sing to us, I say, lest I beat your crooked shape into a lath." + +Because Gaudriole was aware of his value he dared to play such pranks. +He was indeed a capably grotesque comedian, and formerly had garnered +many a capful of sous at the corners of Paris by his antics, songs, and +contortions. His pathetic shape had saved him from the punishment +which often attended the tricks of less daring jesters; and it may be +surmised that his malignant face and cross-seeing eyes not unfrequently +repelled the would-be striker. Men were superstitious in the days when +the world was large. + +"Some wine first," the hunchback panted, for the priest's arm was +rough. "The ship moves not till she has wind in her sails. I have +been a drinker of water these months, and my dreams have been red of +wine. Ah, friend! may your beard grow golden, and curl even as your +mistress would have it." + +This to a singularly ugly soldier, with a flat, scarred face and +stubbly black beard, who handed him a potful of wine. + +"My beard becomes me well enough," the man growled, when a laugh went +against him. + +"Well, in faith. It grows out of your skin like bristles from a +chimney-brush." + +"Cease your gibes, hunchback, and to your capers. We grow thin for +want of laughter in this accursed country," cried Laroche. + +"What shall it be, Messires, a dance, a clever contortion, or a song--a +song of fair ladies, such as one may see upon the streets of Paris, +saving the presence of these most holy and renowned priests?" jeered +Gaudriole, with his intolerable laugh. + +"All. Give us all, buffoon, and invent somewhat for the occasion," the +master of ceremonies ordered. + +Not loth to practise his talents, Gaudriole took the centre of the +floor. Voice, in a musical sense, he had none. The noise he made was +little better than the screech of wind roaring through the hollow +mouthpiece of some gargoyle of the roof-gutter. Every fresh contortion +of his face was more hideous than the last, as he danced, shouted, and +twisted bonelessly over the wine splashes on the ground, until he +appeared to the spectators as some frightful creature of nightmare, +presenting the evil scenes and actions of their past lives before their +wide-opened eyes. + +He concluded his vaudeville amid shouts of applause, in which La Salle +alone took no part. The priest was disgusted at this exhibition of so +much that was brutal, and he was disgusted with himself for remaining a +listener and a watcher. He was, for those days, well-educated, and the +spectacle of the little monster writhing and yelling before him +repelled. It was Paris in truth that Gaudriole recalled; but not, for +him, the Paris of the corners and byways, not the Paris of vagabonds +and free-livers, but the city of the most brilliant court upon earth, +the city of intrigue where Cardinal Richelieu spun his red web to +entangle the feet of kings. The cabaret was but an interlude, a by-way +of the path to power; but the priest realised, as he sat among the +fools, that he had trodden the by-ways frequently and too well. + +He left the tavern with its fumes of smoke and wine, and escaped into +the cool, moist wind under the cliff, but a pair of cross-seeing eyes +followed his departure, and Gaudriole wormed his way through a +labyrinth of arms that would have detained him for more folly, and +hopped loosely up the ascent of the crooked path. + +"What would you, creature of sin?" demanded La Salle, when he perceived +who it was that followed him. + +"A word with you, holiness," panted the dwarf. "The woman Onawa sends +you greeting and prays that you will meet her at the beginning of the +forest where formerly she saw you by chance. She engages to show you +where your enemy may be found. She waits for you now, most renowned." + +"Dog!" exclaimed La Salle. "What have I to do with this woman? What +enemy is it of whom she speaks? I have no enemy save Van Vuren, who +lives now under the protection of the governor, and slinks at his heels +like a frightened hound." + +Gaudriole could never suppress the malignant grin which escaped from +the ends of his slit mouth whenever he spoke. + +"I but repeat the message as it was spoken. Think you that I dare +betray a Frenchman, and that a most holy priest? An I wished to do so, +the game would not be worth the candle. Gaudriole loves life as yonder +crows love carrion." + +"See you tell no man of this," the priest muttered, as he moved towards +the cliff. + +The way was rough, the breeze cold, as La Salle crossed the heights, +turning once to see the flag beating over the fort and men creeping +like midges about their tasks. He descended, and the swaying wall of +forest broke the wind. The pale purple crocus pushed its furry hood +from the short grass, the songless robins hopped before him, the smell +of fresh water was in the air. The fighting priest felt strong as he +breathed the wind. + +Onawa flashed out of the brush and waved her bow to him. + +"She has painted her face and looks forth ready for battle," said the +priest. "A comely maid, by St. Louis. What a figure is there, and +what freedom! She has a trick of moving her head which would make a +fashion at court." + +"Come!" Onawa called. "Hasten!" + +She spoke in English, and hope revived in the heart of the priest. + +"English. I show you," she cried. "I have waited a long time. It is +growing late," she went on in her own tongue, hoping vainly that he +might understand. + +"I commit my body to this adventure," said La Salle. "If these be the +English who captured the Dutch vessel and mocked us, the reward of +discovery shall be mine. A ship sails for home next week. Tidings +from the New World carry apace throughout Europe. The first step. Ha, +it is the first step that gives confidence. The rest is easy." + +He followed Onawa along a trail which bewildered with innumerable +twistings, and after an hour's sharp walking they reached an untrodden +bed of sage brush glistening upon the flats. Onawa picked up a faint +thread, which was invisible to La Salle's eyes, and led him on through +bush where the spikes of dead pines snagged his feet. Then came a cold +ravine down the sides of which quaking asps drooped and moss spread +thickly. More forest, growing every pace denser, until the girl +stopped and motioned her companion to enter what appeared to be a hole +made in the centre of a thicket. She held back the rough bushes to +allow him to pass ahead. For a moment La Salle hesitated. He was +human enough to know that his manliness had made an impression upon +Onawa, but at the same time he feared treachery. The Iroquois were +sworn foes of the French, and here was a daughter of the chief of the +Cayugas abetting a Frenchman. He looked at the girl. She smiled +brilliantly and made an impatient movement, and he advanced boldly into +the cold thicket. + +The ground shelved, and under the arched branches a spring freshet, +scarcely seven feet in width, ran hurriedly into the unseen. A canoe +rocked upon the water, held to the crooked root of a pine by a knotted +willow. Onawa motioned him into this canoe, and when he had taken his +place after sundry lurchings and difficulties, the girl stepped in, +unfastened the twig, and struck her paddle into the water. The canoe +swept away under the low branches. + +"I would I had Laroche with me," said La Salle, watching the cold trees +and the pale rocks approaching and receding. + +"English," said Onawa softly from time to time. "I show you." + +The trees went back and the rocks heightened. La Salle heard water +rolling up a beach and the sweep of wind across an open surface. The +freshet widened and grew more shallow; the keel of the canoe scraped +across a ridge of silt. With a deft turn of her paddle Onawa shot the +prow upon a sand bank, and signed to him to land. + +She led him along a cliff path, across a flat, again into sage brush, +and finally into more forest. They moved stealthily under cover, until +the trees thinned, and willow scrub sprang thickly out of a grey soil. +At a certain spot the girl halted and motioned her companion to look +forth. + +La Salle saw the little settlement of New Windsor nestling in its +enclosure, and needed no longer the information, "English," which the +girl offered with a smile. + +They lay in wait while the night grew upon them. La Salle watched when +the bars of the palisade were removed and five men came forth, and +marvelled to learn the weakness of the enemy. A bold scheme instantly +suggested itself. He would engage the enemy single-handed upon their +return, and wear them down one by one. + +Here Onawa became an obstacle, because he could not explain to her his +intentions. He did his best by signs and broken English, but the girl +misunderstood him. She believed that he was telling her that he had +taken the settlement, and she was expected to instruct the Englishmen +that their property had passed away from them. + +The white moon ascended the sky. The wooden bars sprawled where the +Englishmen had left them. La Salle felt confident that he would be +able to strike down the owners of the place as they passed singly into +the fort. + +Suddenly a great hound came out of the forest, sniffed his way to the +palisade, and stopped before the entry, growling and lashing his tail. +Onawa recognised the hound, and called to him. He heard her voice and +turned his leonine head to snarl fiercely. Then he headed for the +forest, giving tongue as he ran. Onawa sprang to the palisade, and +struggled to replace the bars. For a moment she pulled her blanket +over her face, leaving none of it visible except the eyes and forehead, +and the priest shivered. He remembered the mysterious swordsman who +had wounded him upon the Rue des Pêcheurs. He assisted Onawa to put up +the bars. + +They heard voices in the forest. La Salle knew that he would require +his full skill in sword-play to save himself that night. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + +PILLARS OF THE HOUSE. + +The moonlight fell softly upon a clearing where a small fire +smouldered, where the lord of the isles and his son sat in silence, and +between them the great hound full-stretched in sleep. They were +resting before returning home to their island among the lost waters. +Only the cracking of the fiery wood, the overhead boughs chafing +fitfully, and the snapping of twigs too brittle to survive disturbed +the silence of the night. + +The little group made a stern picture in the light of the moon. The +hound bitten and blemished by many a conquering fight; the lean man +scarred by sword wounds; the boy scarce out of childhood, hungry to +learn--even the boy wore his scars. He was developing in a hard +school. He could not know that the work which his father pointed out +would receive, if accomplished, neither thanks nor reward. The +pioneers of empire might be compared with the insects of the coral +reef, insignificant atoms who have planted a foundation for the sea to +build upon. + +"Father," said the boy at length, "shall we not be returning to our +home?" + +There was another interval before the stern man looked up. + +"Methinks when you spoke that word I saw another home," he said, +raising a hand to his eyes as though he would dispel the vision. "I +saw methinks a grey house, its chimneys wreathed with ivy. Lawns +spread far, divided by paths, bound with close-cropped hedges of yew +and lined with flowers, where peacocks lift their feathers to the sun. +Down a green slope to the little river I see orchards of cherry, snowy +with blossom. A road ends at a church where I may read your name and +mine upon many a stone slab. There lies your grandfather, there my +mother. It is peaceful in that garden of Kent, our home at the other +side of the world." + +Young Richard leaned forward over his knees. His father was speaking +in parables. He had seen only the primæval forest, the river torrents, +the lakes with their land-locked fish, the icefields. He had supposed +the world to be made of such. He had heard the clash of swords, the +shouts of war. He had supposed it was so the world over. A place of +peace had never entered into the scheme of his boyish calculation. + +"It is a dream of which you speak, father?" + +"Ay, my lad, for me a dream. You perchance shall see England with your +own eyes, for when I am gone you shall be the head of a family which +has for its motto, 'Let traitors beware.' Son, have you never wished +to learn your name?" + +"My name is Sir Richard," answered the proud boy. + +"I, your father, was called once Sir Thomas Iden. Formerly we were a +famous family, but now we wane, wielding an influence only over the +Kentish village which has been ours for centuries. Two hundred years +past the then head of our family, holding the office of sheriff of his +county at the time, slew a traitor named John Cade, who had openly +rebelled against the crown, and for this King Henry the Sixth conferred +upon him the honour of knighthood, presenting him also with a +coat-of-arms. In return for other services his Majesty bestowed upon +our house an unique privilege: right was granted to the head of the +family in each generation to confer knighthood upon his eldest son, if +that son should be deserving of the distinction. My father knighted +me, when I returned from an exploit against the Irish; and I handed the +honour on to you, when I found in you the hereditary longing for the +sword." + +The boy looked steadily across the fire, with wonder in his eyes. +"This then is not our home," he said, weighing his words with strange +gravity. "Should we not be in England, fighting for the king?" + +"God knows he needs the pillars of our house to help support his +throne," said Sir Thomas. "But no man can serve in two countries. I +have made myself a colonist, have married a daughter of the land, here +I can serve England if not my king, and here shall I die like a man of +Kent, with my face to the foe. I was the first Englishman to make a +home upon this bitter land. I resolved to build about me a colony, to +do for the north what John Winthrop and the papist Lord Baltimore are +doing in the south. I have appealed. I have sent for help. But +England will not hear." + +He paced through the wet grass, his hands clenched behind. + +"Is the cry of the colonies nothing to them? A handful of good men may +only sell their lives dearly in the trust that their example may fire +better men to deeds of conquest. Here we shall die in exile, and be +sent to haunt the great oblivion of these forests. Two such +ships-of-war as sailed from Devon in the golden days of Elizabeth, two +such ships as the merchant traders of Cheapside could send us without +loss, with another Hawkins to command, manned by our brave sailors of +the east country, would sweep the French out of their forts and clear +the land of them for ever. The Dutch hold the seas. France extends +her arms. England is again divided, the bloody rivalry between the +houses of York and Lancaster having taught her no wisdom. The +Parliament is against the king, and the country must bleed for it. We +are abandoned." + +The boy knew nothing of the politics of Europe, neither could he enter +into his father's dream of empire. He hated the French merely because +they were enemies, and because they had betrayed the Iroquois. To go +out and fight against them was more exciting, because more dangerous, +than to engage with the beasts of the forest; but the struggle between +the Powers of Europe for the ownership of North America had injected no +venom into his soul. + +"Shall I not live here always?" he asked. "Am I not to choose a maid +from the Cayugas, and settle upon the isles beside you, my father?" + +"Talk not of the future, son. Life is to-day, not hereafter. That +lies in the hand of God to give or to withhold. You shall return when +I am gone--return, did I say? You shall go to England with letters to +a notary in Maidstone, and he shall see that you come into your own. +You are dark of face, but English in heart, my Richard." + +The boy lifted his head with a sudden sharp movement. "Perchance that +day shall never come." + +The hound also lifted his head, and as his eyes sought the haunt of +shadows his jaw dropped in a wild howl. + +"Spirits sweep across my burying-place," whispered the youth. + +The hound lowered his head and howled again. + +"Frenchmen," muttered the boy. + +The brute slouched a few feet, broke into a trot, and disappeared. + +"He goes in the direction of New Windsor," said the knight. "Hast +heard any sound in the forest?" + +"There is no stir," replied the boy, holding his well-trained ear to +the ground. "The smoke from our fire carries. Let us go aside into +the shadow of the bush and watch." + +They retreated, flashing glances to right and left. The snap of a +twig, the very crushing of pine needles, sufficed to disturb that calm. +There was no premonitory shiver of the moon-rays, no suggestion of any +human presence upon the chilled air. Their feet sank audibly into the +white moss. Their breath made the semblance of a whisper between +father and son, the lion ready, the cub longing. The rim of the deep +shadow ran behind as they turned to face the clearing they had +abandoned. + +"The wind blows from New Windsor," said the knight. "The wind off +Couchicing." + +"If Blood takes hold of a man he shall die," went on the boy. "He will +hold at the back of the neck, and there hang until his fangs meet. Ha! +Didst hear that?" + +A branch had broken with a dry report. The trees moaned, and a few +distended cones struck the ground like spent bullets. + +"The breeze freshens. Methinks I hear the waves breaking upon the +beach." + +A raven passed before the moon, knelling violently. + +"He smells carrion," whispered the boy. "Already he smells blood upon +my sword." + +"Peace, boy," said his father; adding, compassionately, "He is but a +child." + +"Nay, father," said Richard, his blood rising. "I am no child. See +the mark of my wounds! Remember that glorious day when we captured the +Dutch privateer. I have prayed for such another day. Did I there +acquit myself as a child? Or did you call, 'Richard, come back! You +are too bold.' Hast forgotten, Sir Thomas?" + +His father passed the sword into his left hand, and threw his right arm +about his son's shoulder, drawing him upon his own thin body, and +kissed his cheek. Silence came between them. It was the first time +that the man had kissed the boy, and both for a moment were ashamed; +then young Richard's heart swelled with the pride of having won his +father's love. + +As they stood they moved, and their swords clashed. They remembered +their other bond of relationship, the brotherhood of the sword, and +each drew back. + +The raven had gone, but his note came upon the wind. + +The boy stood leaning forward, his ears drinking in the shuddering +noises of the bush, his face sharp with cold. The smoke stood upright +in the clearing like a swathed mummy. Now and again a spark drifted, +or a flurry of white wood-ash circled. There was yet no voice from the +lungs of the forest. + +"Blood smelt no animal," said the resolute Richard. "He does but +tongue softly when he follows a bear. That howl he gives when he runs +on the track of a man." + +"A wanderer lost in the forest. A spy from the fortress. One of +Roussilac's creatures," his father muttered. + +"They would take possession of the forest," the boy said passionately. +"Along the river I have come upon trees marked by the robbers +with--what is the name of that sign which they bear upon their flag?" + +"The fleur-de-lys. They brand the pines with that mark to signify that +the trees have been chosen for ship-masts and are the property of +France. Our hut upon the island is faced with logs which bear their +brand." + +"The Cayugas fell such trees and burn them, or cut them in half as they +lie. The Iroquois are yet masters, despite the decrees of King Louis. +How cold is this wind! Let me but warm my hands in the embers of our +fire." + +The boy crossed into the moonlight, and knelt within the smoke, rubbing +the palms of his hands upon the warm ground. His father stood in the +shadow, and watched every moving line of his son's body, muttering as +he listened to the outside: + +"At his age I was learning how to figure and spell in Tonbridge school. +Quarterstaff and tennis were my sports, with mumming and chess at home. +His sport is to hunt the wild beast, to track the deer, to lie in wait +for men. The sword is his pastime. His pleasure the dream. God +pardon me for bringing him into the world." + +The breeze bore along in a gust, bringing the muffled bayings of a +hound. + +"He calls me!" exclaimed the boy. "That is Blood's war-cry. Come!" he +shouted. + +"Patience, boy. Let the dog guide us. By advancing recklessly we may +fall into a trap." + +Each throb of the night brought the wild sounds nearer. Blood was in +full cry, the foam blowing from his jaws, the hackles stiff upon his +back. He was coming down the wind full-stretched. The bush gave, the +dew scattered from the high grass in frosty showers as he leapt the +moss-beds, his foot-tracks far apart. But no sound followed, except +the play of the branches and the murmur of the rising lake. + +"Remember how I brought him from the encampment as a puppy," said +Richard appealingly, "how I have trained him from the time that his +eyes opened. Whatever he discovers is mine. Say now that I may go +with him. He and I can cover the ground together. You shall follow in +your own time." + +"Perchance they shall be too many for you," said the father. + +"Nay, we shall advance with care, and hide if there be danger. The +whole army of France could not follow me in this forest." + +"There comes no noise of fighting." + +"It is but a spy who has discovered New Windsor. He must not carry +that secret back to the fortress." + +The hound broke forth, clouding the cold air with his breath, his eyes +like lamps. He leapt at his master, and snatched his sleeve with a +frothing muzzle, pulling him away. + +"Say now that I may go," the boy cried. "The enemy may already have +taken fear, and be retreating as fast as his cowardly feet may carry +him." + +The long awaited shout drifted down the wind, and the pale moon +shivered when she heard. + +"Go!" granted the stern man. + +"St. George!" yelled the maddened child, clutching at the hound's thick +collar of fur. The cry had no meaning. It was but a shout of war, a +valve to his passion. "On, Blood! St. George!" + +At full cry they were gone from the moonlight into gloom. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + +THE SWORD IMBRUED + +While the pendulum of a clock might have swayed thrice, the four +venturers stood facing Onawa as though her words had turned them into +stone. Then Hough, forgetting all save rage and lust for vengeance, +broke forward to reach the traitress. Instantly she ran for the bush, +and the voice of Penfold called his follower back. + +"Lift not your hand against a woman," he cried. "To the forest, my +lads." + +"To the forest an you will," Hough shouted. "I at least shall advance +to smite this woman's partner in sin, be he Frenchman or devil." + +"Be it so, neighbour," his captain answered. "Together let us stand, +or together fall. Advance, then, and take the place by storm." + +As they rushed out, La Salle braced himself to face the odds. He made +a few passes to free his arm, and trod the beaten ground to make sure +that it would not yield. Then, loosening the top bar, he flung it +forth as the spidery form of Hough descended, and it struck before the +Puritan's feet and stopped him dead. The same moment La Salle sprang +upon the lowest bar, but the support weighed down beneath its burden, +and his blade merely stabbed the air. + +"A priest, neighbours," Hough shouted. "Now to avenge our martyrs +burnt at Smithfield by Bloody Mary and the Pope." + +Onawa, standing forgotten at the edge of the bush, cast around her a +searching glance. The encampment of her tribe was far distant. The +hound had gone out howling. Danger from that quarter was yet to come. +She stood in shadow, the moonlight whitening the sand in front and +darkening the shapes which hurried to regain their own. No eyes were +upon her. She raised her left hand to her right shoulder and with the +same ominous motion dropped upon one knee, falling unconsciously into +the pose of a goddess of the chase. + +The attackers hesitated, knowing the reputation of the man with whom +they had to deal. To attempt to scale the palisade at that point meant +certain loss, and they were not strong enough to take the risk. Hunted +and hunters glared at each other over the pine bars. "Get you round, +Jesse," whispered Penfold. "The dog is bold because he knows his back +is safe." + +Woodfield ran beneath the palisading to a place known to him, where he +might scale the fence and so take the priest from behind. + +La Salle detected the ruse and taunted his baiters in native French, +while his keen eyes sought an opportunity to strike. He bent +cautiously and gathered a handful of sand. Hough sprang upon the bars, +and for the first time swords were clashed; for the first time also the +Puritan realised the power of the priest's wrist. The point escaped +his forearm by a mere margin, and La Salle laughed contemptuously. + +"Brave Lutherans!" he cried. "Four soldiers against a priest. +Advance, soldiers. The point a trifle higher. The elbow close to the +side. Now you stand too near together." + +"Wait until friend Woodfield comes up," muttered Flower. "Then he +shall laugh his last." + +As he spoke there came a sound through the moonbeams, as it were the +vibrating of the wings of a humming-bird, and to the music of this +disturbance Flower flung up his arms with a choking cough and closed +his sentence with a gasp of pain. His sword darted to the ground. He +swayed to and fro, his eyes wild, his mouth open in a useless endeavour +to appeal to his comrades, and then plunged down, like a man diving +into the water to swim, and sprawled at their feet, with a rough shaft +topped by a crow's feather springing from his back. + +A cloud of sand stung the faces of the survivors, and before they could +recover their eyesight, or awaken to the knowledge of Woodfield's +approaching shout, La Salle was across the bars and bearing down upon +them, his cold face branded with its mocking smile. He dashed their +opposition aside, and turned, flushed with success, to renew the +struggle, the taunts still ringing from his tongue. + +But help was near at hand. Before the maddened and half stupefied +Englishmen were able to move the night again resounded. Blood had +scented the foe and could no longer be restrained. The priest wheeled +round when he heard those howls, and escaped into the shadows with +Penfold and Woodfield at his heels. + +There was indeed one man, and he the most vengeful of his enemies, who +might have outstripped the priest, but it so happened that the +long-striding Puritan had lost his reason. Obeying the first impulse, +he pursued the traitress, mad to avenge the good yeoman who was +stretched to his long sleep at the entrance to New Windsor. Nor did he +realise his mistake until the shadow, after mocking him for a long +mile, flitted into the unknown depths of the bush, and so disappeared. + +"Fear not, masters," called young Richard, as boy and dog passed, +running as freshly as at the start. "Do but show my father which way I +have gone. Blood shall hunt the Frenchman down, and I shall slay him. +I shall slay him, friends." + +They swept on, flinging the dew across the bars of moonshine. That +triumphant voice came back to the two men as they slackened speed for +lack of breath: "I shall slay the Frenchman. I shall slay him, +friends." + +Penfold sank upon a bed of moss and panted into his hands. Woodfield +stood near, his breath coming in white steam, his breast rising and +falling. + +"It is God's way, neighbour," he said gently. + +The old leader's voice came in a sobbing whisper: + +"Through the device of the devil, smitten down foully.... A man of few +words, a good soul, with a smile for all. I knew him as a boy at home, +a gentle boy, who would never join in stoning birds in the hedgerow or +in killing butterflies, because, quoth he, God made them to give us +song and happiness. And yet none quicker than he at ball or quintain, +none braver at quarterstaff. Twice won he the silver arrow in Holborn +Fields, and at home would lead his mother to church a' Sundays, and a' +week-day drive the horses out to field. A sober lad as ever sang with +the lark beside our Thames.... An arrow in the back, an arrow shot by +an Indian witch. It passes all. Call you that God's way? God wills a +man to die in fair fight, with his death in front. And this! Oh, +George! To fall like a beast hunted for the pot." + +"Yet 'twas a soldier's end." + +"Tell them not at home," cried Penfold. "Let them not know, if ever we +see Thames-side again, how George Flower fell. Ay, like a flower he +came up, and as a grass has he been mown down. Many are the wiles of +Satan. The arrow that flieth by night, the coward arrow of treachery. +'Tis a foul wind that blows out a good man's life. He was a good man. +His old mother, if yet she live, may look upon his past and smile. +Such as George has made our England live. The strong oaks of the land. +From treachery and sudden death, good Lord deliver us!" + +"Amen, captain!" + +"Where is friend Hough?" asked the old man sharply, rising and groping +like one awakened from sleep. + +"I saw him rushing into the forest as a man possessed." + +"His zeal consumes him. I fear me while the madness last he will +thrust his sword through that witch and so bring us to trouble with the +Indians." + +"She will escape from him in the forest." + +"Bear with me," said Penfold brokenly. "To-night I am old. My leg +pains me so that I may hardly rest upon it. What is here? See! Whom +have we yonder?" + +The man of Kent came striding through, with the hot question: "Hast +seen my son?" + +As shortly Woodfield answered, and the knight hurried on without a word +along the dim trail where the pursued and the pursuers had passed. + +"I am but a useless hulk this night," groaned Penfold. "Do you follow +and bring me word, while I stay to keep company with our George." + +So Woodfield went. It was but a parting for the hour. He withdrew +himself from his tough old captain and fellow villager, without a grasp +of the hand, with no word of farewell, nor even a kindly look at the +rugged features that he loved, never dreaming that he and Simon Penfold +would speak again no more. + +The knight, more skilled in woodcraft, proceeded faster than the +yeoman. The clash of steel reached his ears against the wind, the wild +bayings of a dog, and deep French accents mingled with shrill +counter-blasts in an English tongue. The shuddering forest became +hideous, and the moonbeams came to his eyes red between the branches. + +Man La Salle feared not at all, but the fangs and glowing eyes of the +hound appalled. Any moment the brute might spring upon his back. He +could not hope to escape from hunters who covered the ground with the +speed of deer and might not be thrown off the scent. He stopped, +breathing furiously, and set his back against a smooth trunk; but when +his foes swept up, and he beheld the size and innocence of the +sword-bearer, he laughed, even as Goliath laughed when young David came +out against him armed with a sling and a few smooth pebbles from the +brook. + +"By the five wounds of God, 'tis but a child!" he muttered, as his +breath returned. "May it never be said that La Salle ran in fear from +a baby and a dog." + +He smiled with compassion for the white face which became visible when +a bar of light crossed it. "I will deal lightly with the child," he +said, "but the dog must die, or he shall hunt me through the night." + +"Down, Blood!" called the young voice; and the brute crouched like a +tiger, sweeping the grass madly with his tail. + +"He bears himself like a veteran," muttered La Salle, with a brave +man's admiration for courage. "The pity that he is so young!" + +"On guard, sir!" shouted Richard, stepping up with the challenge which +his father had taught him. + +"Back, little one," said the priest in his own tongue. "Put up your +sword until you become a man, and return to your fishing-lines, and be +young while you may." + +The boy could not understand one word of the hated language. Saving +his breath, he replied by springing forward, to cross swords with his +renowned antagonist as confidently as on the former memorable night he +had faced his father. A few passes, a turn or so, a quick lunge over +the guard, a rapid bout of skirmishing high upon the breast, and the +astonished Frenchman became assured that his youthful opponent was a +swordsman almost worthy of his steel. + +"By St. Denis!" he muttered, playing his sword from side to side with +his inimitable sureness. "What wonder is this! Are these Englishmen +soldiers from their cradle? A doughty stripling! He fences like a +maître d'armes." + +But time was passing, others were upon his track, and, though La Salle +was willing to spare, he knew that he was compelled to strike. + +He stepped forward, closed with his antagonist, and by a deft turn of +his iron wrist caught the boy's sword at the hilt and wrested it from +his hand. Then he raised his point and lightly pricked the near +shoulder. + +"Go in peace, my son," he said in English. + +That contemptuous manner, naturally assumed before inferior and +superior alike, stung young Richard to the soul. He ran for his sword, +while Blood sprang up with a deep challenge, and plunged after La +Salle, who again had taken to flight. Richard followed at full speed, +his blood boiling to avenge the insult to his knighthood. + +"They come," said La Salle resignedly. "He must have the coup de +grâce. Now God have mercy upon his infant soul." + +He came in his flight to a natural opening, one half in deep shadow, +the other lit by the sparkling moon and carpeted by short grass. +Columnar trees stood at regular intervals around this garden in the +forest. A few night lilies opened their sulphur cups. The place might +have been a dancing-ring for elves, and the priest crossed himself when +he stopped, looked round, and swiftly wiped his sword. + +"The turf like a rich cloth," he murmured. "The trees falling back, +the moon soft yet sufficient. An ideal spot for sword-play. But +methinks somewhat weird." + +The peace of the glade was broken in a moment. Blood dashed out, his +fangs bared, and made two fierce bounds over the turf. La Salle fixed +his eye upon a white spot in the underpart of the flying body, and at +precisely the critical moment stepped aside, catching the hound upon +his point and running him through from the centre of the white patch to +the stiff hackles of his back. He turned sharply, lest his sword +should break, and the dying body passed swiftly from his blade and +crashed into the bush. + +"When killing is too easy it carries the mask of murder," the priest +muttered. + +He turned again, for Richard was upon him with a sob of rage, and +shouting: "Devil! You shall die for killing my dog, devil that you +are!" + +Aware that his time was short, La Salle parried the boy's wild lunges +and replied by his own calculated attack. In that supreme moment of +his life Richard fought, even as his father might have done, with +strength, accuracy, and cunning manoeuvre. The swords played together +for little longer than a minute, and then came the _passe en tierce_ +outside the guard, which put an end to the unequal fight and left a +body bleeding upon the grass. + +A cry came from the forest, a near reassuring cry: + +"Hold him out, Richard. On the defensive. Do not attack. Remember +the pass I taught you." + +The priest's eyes dimmed. Hastily he arranged the warm body, closed +the eyes, straightened the legs and folded the stubborn arms, muttering +a prayer the while. + +"Heretic though you are, our Lady of Mercy may yet plead for you," he +said; but his words were inaudible to his own ears, because of the +shout which rang behind his shoulders: + +"Hold him off, Richard. I am with you. Keep your eyes upon his point. +I am here." + +As the bush gave before the avenger of blood, La Salle ran swiftly from +that spot. And all the forest seemed to be moaning for the child thus +cut down before he was grown, and the winds off Couchicing sobbed above +the hemlocks, and the moon sank down as cold as snow, drawing the +purple shadow closer to that white face and the straight, stiff limbs. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + +SPLENDOUR. + +In one short day the hand of fate had divided the little band of +venturers, destroying the physical life of Flower, leading Woodfield +into the trackless forest and losing him there, and driving Viner into +the unknown country of the south. Viner's course, during its early +stages, may first be followed, beside the lakes and across the thickly +wooded plains of the land which was later to be known as the northern +part of the State of Maine. + +No event marked his journey during the first day. On the second he saw +in the distance a party of Dutchmen, who also sighted him and gave +chase; but the swift young athlete shook off these slow men with ease. +Later he perceived the smoke of an Indian encampment, and bent off his +course, fearing lest the tribe might be hostile to all of his +complexion. By doing so he lost his bearings, and while attempting to +regain them wandered at evening into a glorious valley, bright with +flowers, and green with high grass undulating gently in soundless +waves. Perceiving a line of trees beyond, Geoffrey determined to gain +their shelter, and wait for the stars to guide him back to his +southerly route. + +He came to a shallow stream, a mere brook winding through the valley +amid red willow and wild rice and fragrant beds of brown-topped reeds. +A flight of swans passed overhead, their necks outstretched, their +bodies casting gaunt shadows across the grass. On the near side +patches of bush variegated the plain; beyond, the descending sun cast a +dazzling haze. The wind was murmuring in the reeds, and the whistlings +of aquatic fowl made a plaintive music. The lonely boy relieved his +solitude as he walked, by reciting to the tune of the breeze one of the +poetic fables he had learnt at school: + +"And when he was unable to restrain his secret, he crept among the +reeds, and murmured, 'King Midas has the ears of an ass.' But the +reeds betrayed him. When the wind passed they bent together and +whispered, 'Midas has the ears of an ass--the ears of an ass.'" + +Stepping among the sedges, where single stalks shuddered in the cold +water, Geoffrey looked for the ripple which would indicate a place of +crossing. The reeds inclined their feathery heads towards him, and the +malicious whisper seemed to follow, "Geoffrey has the ears of an +ass--the ears of an ass." Laughing at the idle fancy, he ran on at the +sight of a line of foam some little way down the stream. Drawing off +his shoes, he passed across the yellow gravel, the keen water nipping +his ankles, the reeds brushing his head. Old Thames had often been as +cold, when as a schoolboy he had waded through its weeds hunting the +dive-dapper's nest. + +Viner hesitated where the Indian trail split. That to the left ran +into the sun. He could scarcely see it, so dazzling was the glory. +That to the right was bare and cold, but leading, had he known it, +direct to the south. At the foot of a long bank the brook poured away +its water, and above in the fruit-bushes the wild canaries sang away +the hours. The youth took the bow from his shoulder, held it on end, +and let it fall. The bow pointed as he wished, as perhaps his fingers +had guided it at the moment of release. It fell into the sun. + +A breath of fire was in the splendour ahead, an acrid smoke crept down, +he heard the crackling of twigs. It seemed to the traveller that the +sun was consuming the grove before him. A voice began to sing. +Geoffrey tried to persuade himself that some little yellow bird was +sitting in the sun-grove warbling its soul out to him. Then an envious +night cloud swooped upon the lord of day and rolled him up in its dewy +blanket, and immediately a palisade, a grass roof, and a thicket +started out like black upon white. But the song went on. + +A log-cabin stood right in the centre of the setting sun, a snaky +palisade winding around, enclosing also a garden planted with corn and +potatoes, where already blade and crinkled leaf pushed from the dark +alluvial soil. Trees surrounded the house. + +Amid the smoke the side of an iron pot showed at intervals. The singer +held her head back, the slightest frown creasing her forehead. She was +waiting for the fire to burn clearly, and to encourage it she sang. + +Her hair, which hung all about her body, was golden-brown, no one tress +the same shade as another, the whole a bewildering mantle of beauty. +Its wealth became reckless when one crafty ray of sunlight eluded the +cloud and shot across her head. + +"Oh, oh!" she sighed, breaking off her bird-like song. "The sun will +not let my fire burn, and--this wicked wind!" + +The breeze, delighting to flirt with so glorious a creature, veered +slyly, and fanned the bitter smoke around her. She danced away +coughing, her cheeks scarlet, her red mouth gasping for pure air, her +tresses gleaming in their mesh of sunlight. Her movements were as +supple as the swaying dance of the pine-branch over her. She tried to +laugh while she caught at her breath, and, failing, fell back panting, +showing her tiny teeth. + +Then the violet eyes moved along the path, and all the pretty laughter +went out. A white hand drifted like falling snow, stole a tress of +hair, and shining pearls began cruelly to bite the silk. + +No maid could have desired a fairer vision. + +Geoffrey, tall, slender, and flushed, stood between the trees, his bow +in his hands, his Saxon blue eyes meeting the violet glances of +timidity with free admiration. The maid of the fire-side beheld his +clear complexion, his fair hair tied loosely at the nape of his neck, +his strong figure; and as she watched for a few moments, which were not +measured by time, her bosom began to rise and fall. Had she not prayed +for such a vision? She had surely wasted her sweetness long enough +upon the unsatisfying things of her daily life in that lone, hard land. +There was that in her young blood which rebelled against her +convent-like environment, where she had indeed her freedom, but where +the tree of knowledge had not been trained to grow. + +Viner stepped out and doffed his feathered cap. + +"Fair mistress," he said, bending before this beauty of the grove, +"give me your pardon for coming on you so suddenly. I am a traveller +on my way to the south." + +Madeleine Labroquerie answered him only with her eyes. + +"Can you tell me how many English miles I am from Plymouth?" + +He looked up, and learnt that the sun had not yet left the grove. He +saw the cloud of hair waving iridescent. His gaze wandered over the +beautiful head, until two eyes like purple iris flowers met his. + +"But I am not English." + +"Yet you speak in English," he protested. + +"Why, yes. In England I was brought up. I love England; but I am +French, and a Protestant." + +Geoffrey looked into the grove as he spoke on softly, mindful of his +duty: + +"Tell me, lady, how many days must I travel before I come to the +province of Massachusetts?" + +Madeleine Labroquerie had not a word to say. This handsome stranger +had hardly arrived, and already he suggested departure. + +"I must not delay," he faltered. + +"My fire!" cried Madeleine, stretching out her hands. "It will not +burn. Stranger"--she turned to him with a winsome glance--"will you +_make_ my fire burn?" + +She hurried to the smoking pile. He was beside her instantly. + +"You shall not soil those hands." + +"They are already smoked and soiled. And see--a burn!" + +Because Geoffrey dared not look Madeleine pouted at his back. Then she +kicked the smouldering wood, and exclaimed spitefully, "There!" + +"Your fire is too closely packed." + +"It is not," she snapped, daring him with her eyes. + +"You say it is not," he agreed; but loosening the heap. + +"I fear that it was," she sighed. "And the wood is damp." + +Geoffrey rebuilt the fire, placing the hot embers to face the wind, and +fanned the sticks until they burst into flame. + +The daylight went out like a failing lamp, and a red glow flung about +them as the fire increased. + +"I know that you are weary, sir," said the girl winningly. "Let me +lead you into the house and present you to my mother." + +Seeing wonder upon the young man's face, she pointed her shapely hand +through the smoke. + +"Down there my father lies," she explained in a hushed voice. "Deep in +the hollow where the beavers bite the bark at night. There the Indians +made his grave. French though we are, the Iroquois have been friendly, +because my father, who was a skilled physician, used them well. Here +my father hid from the world. He found a rest here, and yonder he +rests still hidden. I am with my mother and one native servant, who +loves us because my father saved his life. And I--I have never known a +friend." + +"Lady," said Geoffrey suddenly, "I would serve you if I might." + +"Rest you here a few days," she said quickly, "and tell my mother what +is doing in the world." + +"I must down to the coast." + +"Did you say Plymouth just now? Learn how ignorant I am. I did not +know there was a town of that name in all the New World. I have been +to the English Plymouth. There I saw the brave ships in her harbour, +and the red and white flags, and the sailors looking over the sea for +what might come sailing by, watching thus and hoping all the day. That +was a happy time." + +"There are yet as good men in Plymouth as ever sailed westward from the +Hoe," said the boy with eager pride. + +While he spoke the expression on Madeleine's face altered. She drew +away, murmuring as she moved, "Here is Madame, my mother." She added +hurriedly, and as he thought with fear, "I pray you be gracious to her." + +Viner turned, and there in the fire glow walked a little old woman in +black, a white cap holding her thin grey hair, her face pale, her eyes +sunken, and her colourless lips a tight line. She smiled coldly, and +showed no amazement when her daughter presented the traveller. + +"You are welcome, sir," she said in English. "We are poor and lonely +folk left to perish in the wilderness. My husband was an atheist, a +philosopher, and every man's hand was against him. He brought his wife +and family to the New World that he might study in peace and learn +somewhat of Nature's secrets. Last summer he was taken, babbling of +the work of his misspent life, careless of our farewells, heedless of +the state in which he left us. Philosophy is of a truth the devil's +work, inasmuch as it hardens the heart of man, loses him his God, and +wraps its slave in selfishness." + +The old woman signed herself slowly; then suddenly pushed beside the +traveller and snatched at her daughter's arm. + +"Cross yourself, girl! Infidel, cross yourself!" she cried. + +"Mother!" Madeleine shrank back, appealing with her lovely eyes. + +"Lutheran!" screamed the little woman. "Make the holy sign, and so +strive to save your wicked soul from the pit of destruction wherein +your father lies." + +"My faith is fixed," murmured the girl. "Ah, ah!" she panted. + +Madame Labroquerie struck the girl thrice upon her fair cheek, staining +the white skin red as a roseleaf. + +"Madame, forbear!" Viner stood between them, his blood hot with shame. +"This is no sight for a stranger and a man to witness." + +The little woman smiled at him and abandoned her daughter, who bent +over the fire to hide her crimson face. + +"You are English, sir. Your brave countrymen yield to none in their +respect for a woman, when she be young and fair to see. Let her be +old, they shall call her witch and fling her in the nearest pond. +There be young witches, good sir, better able to seduce the soul of man +than the old, though they keep neither cat nor toad, nor ride at night +across the face of the moon." + +Madame Labroquerie made him a low courtesy, and walked noiselessly to +the gate of the palisade. + +"That so lovely a daughter should be cursed with such a mother!" +muttered the youth as he watched her go. + +He came to the side of Madeleine, and found her crying. + +"My mother has a strange temper. She has suffered much," the girl +sighed. + +There was a pause, one of those rare intervals when ears are opened to +the music of the spheres, and souls may meet. + +"You are not happy here," he said. + +Her glorious eyes were two blossoms heavy with dew. + +"Friend!" She put out one hand, groping for something to hold. "I am +miserable." + +They stood together, hand in hand. + +"She struck you." + +There was no answer. Divine pity dropped upon his heart, sweet and +dangerous pity out of heaven. + +"Stay a little," she whispered. "For the sake of your religion, stay. +If for a day only, stay. Stay, for a woman's sake." + +It was dark in the grove outside the circle of the fire. He drew at +her fingers. He bent his head suddenly and breathed upon them. She +placed her other hand--a cold little hand--upon his. + +Then the evening breeze flung itself sportingly into the trees, and all +the branches sprang before it, and the foliage danced and shouted in a +laugh, singing noisily the old secret of the river reeds, singing, +"Midas is a king of gold--a king of gold." + +So the fire died down into an angry red, and all the birds of the grove +were songless. Madame walked alone from the rude house, her small face +white against dark clouds, and passed into the clearing. The Indian +who worked for the widow and daughter approached with a burden of wood. + +"Wind is coming," he said in his own tongue. + +"May it blow away heresy and all heretics," muttered the little woman. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +ENCHANTMENT. + +Within the grass-roofed cabin another fire glowed, and beside it +Madeleine entertained the guest, her white hands clasped upon her knee, +her eyes lustrous as she listened to the tale of adventure which her +young companion had to tell. + +"And now you would reach the south and bring your countrymen hither," +she said with the sweet practicability of her sex, after hearing his +story of ventures both by land and sea. "You would win territory, +perhaps fame. Then what would you do?" + +"Then? Why, I would return home," answered Geoffrey. + +"And then?" the girl pursued, the colour rising in her cheeks. + +"Then I would fight for the king." + +Madeleine sank back. + +"Would your fighting-days never be done?" she sighed reproachfully. +"Friend, the world gives better things than the sword. Think you," she +went on hurriedly, "we are put upon this world to hate one another and +be always at strife? Ah no. We are here to live! The soldier's day +must pass, his arm grow stiff, and 'tis then he sighs for life--the +sword gives only death. How wretched is that soldier's lonely end! It +is love in life that ennobles the body, and 'tis death in love that +clothes the soul in its flight to God." + +Her eyes had been fixed upon him. She cast them down suddenly and sat +trembling. + +"My father taught me the use of the sword, and explained to me the +action of the gun," Geoffrey faltered. "He taught me nothing else." + +"Your mother?" Madeleine whispered. + +"She died when I was a child." + +"She would have taught you. She would have told you to take the best," +murmured the girl. + +He could see only a rich coil of hair glowing in the firelight. + +"But I am untaught," she went on. "My father was ever a stranger, my +mother has never been a friend. I grew up with Jean-Marie, my brother, +who was a follower of your creed. He too believed that life has +nothing better than the sword, so went away to fight, and I have had no +word of him again. Alone I have taught myself to live, to see that +life is glorious, to find joy in drawing each healthy breath. I have +studied the birds and animals, and spoken to them, until they have +answered me so that I could understand. It is so magnificent, this +life!" + +A chill crept into the cabin and with it Madame Labroquerie, who peered +at the comely couple, and said in her grating voice: "You are weary, +sir. Daughter, show our guest where he is to rest." + +With another courtesy to the Englishman the bitter little woman passed +into her own room, and almost immediately the muttering of prayers and +clicking of beads disturbed the silence which her entry had created. + +"Rest you here," Madeleine whispered, pointing to a palliasse partly +covered by a bear-skin. "You shall sleep soundly I promise, for I have +filled that palliasse with the sweet-scented grass which grows in +yonder valley. May you rest there like Endymion, and may his dreams be +yours." + +"His dreams were of love--if the old tale be true," said Geoffrey, +flushing at his boldness. + +"Soft," she prayed, but she too had flushed. "My mother's ears are +keen. God be with you, my friend." + +"And with you also," he murmured, and raising her fair white hand he +pressed it reverently to his lips. + +No hostile sound disturbed the silence of the grove throughout that +night, and Geoffrey made no stir upon his scented bed, until the sun +streaming into the cabin and the noisy turk, turk, turk of the wild +bush-fowl rendered further sleep impossible. Having performed the +hasty toilet of that age, when by day and night a man had to be +prepared to fight for his life, he went outside, and was straightway +made welcome to the grove by a brilliant and versatile bluejay, which +obtruded itself upon the stranger and with cheerful chattering +friendliness volunteered to be his guide in return for a little +flattering attention. But when Madeleine came out into the sun, the +fickle bird deserted the man and paid court to the maid. + +It had been Geoffrey's honest determination to proceed that morning +upon his journey, but noon, and then evening, came and found him again +a tenant of the grove. All day he and Madeleine wandered in the green +valley, like children of innocence in a garden, the girl pointing out +her favourite haunts, the flowery ridges where she would while away +hours in day-dreams, and guiding him along faint paths which her small +feet, and hers only, had trodden into being; and as they so walked +Geoffrey forgot for the time his mission, and became blind to the path +of duty, because the spell of enchantment was over him, and all the +world went far away while Madeleine was laughing at his side, and her +sweet voice was in his ears, and her fragrant presence stirred before +his eyes. No day had ever been so short, no sun more bright, no +self-surrender ever more complete. + +Again the grove was in splendour at the close of the day, and again +Madame Labroquerie met her guest with a grating word of greeting and +her bitter smile; and again the laggard slept upon the scented couch +and had his dreams; and his dreams that night were not of power, nor of +duty, nor of his harassed friends beside Couchicing; but of shaded +bowers, and green valleys, and love in life, and Madeleine. And once +the girl cried out in her sleep, but neither her mother nor her lover +overheard her unconscious utterance, "I cannot let you go." + +But during the day which followed Geoffrey's conscience awoke and +reproached him for this love-in-idleness, and as the evening of that +day drew near his higher self conquered. Lying at Madeleine's feet, he +told her with averted face that on the morrow he must depart; and she +merely sighed very softly and made no answer, but longed in her heart +that the morrow might never come. + +Once again they returned to the grove, where Madame curtsied as before, +and muttered to her guest: "You are welcome, sir. For the third time I +bid you welcome to my poor home." + +Her meaning was unmistakable, and the young man flushed hotly as he +bowed in reply and thanked her for her words. More he would have said, +but Madeleine touched him lightly and motioned him to keep silent. He +turned and followed her to the hut, and they partook of food, and +afterwards sat together and talked on, and yearned for one another; and +in the meantime darkness fell, and the fire outside, which was +maintained at night to keep wild beasts at bay, surrounded the cabin +with a roseate glow. + + +Alone through that twilight Madame walked, muttering as was her wont, +and started in superstitious terror when she saw a tall figure standing +erect, spectral, beside the leaping fire. A few more steps and the +Frenchwoman recognised a priest. She hurried forward, and a minute +later genuflected to kiss the cloak of that man of blood, the Abbé La +Salle. + +In wonder the priest gave her the blessing which she sought and went on +to question her. Eagerly Madame responded, telling him her name and +circumstance, explaining her position, and mentioning her longing to +escape from that lonely spot. Her desires were, like herself, made up +of selfishness. She did not question the priest concerning the son who +had been driven out by her bitter tongue to join the commandant's +little force; nor did she mention Roussilac's name, because--so +entirely isolated was that shelter in the grove--she was not even aware +that the man who ruled the land was indeed her nephew. But La Salle +waived her petulant inquiries aside, and asked whether any Englishman +had lately been known to pass that way. Then Madame shortly acquainted +him with the coming of Viner. + + +"Bring me here something to eat," said the priest wearily, when he had +obtained the information which he sought. "Afterwards I will rest me +by this fire." + +"Now the saints forbid," cried Madame. "Shall an infidel lie in my +house, while a holy Churchman sleeps outside? Out the Lutheran shall +go, and you, my father, must honour my poor home this night." + +"'Tis not for me to provoke a quarrel," La Salle replied. "I may but +fight in self-defence. Let me have food and a palliasse here." + +Madame bent her grey head, and went to do his bidding. + +The cabin was in gloom when Madame entered and passed through silently +to procure food for the priest. Madeleine rose, seeking to be of +service, but the grating voice sent her back to the fireside. Viner +had also arisen, dimly suspicious. The girl's head reached his +shoulder, and to put away the thought, which recurred more strongly +when he noted her helplessness, he resorted to selfishness. + +"Am I safe?" he asked. + +Madeleine gave him a reproachful glance. + +"My mother hates all Protestants. The heathen Indians are merely +animals in her sight; but such as you and I are children of the devil." + +"The fire beyond the palisade is burning more strongly," he said. + +The door was open, and the glow entered the cabin like moonlight. + +"It is to keep away the wolves. You do not suspect--me?" + +"No, no," he said, in a manner that brought a smile to her mouth. "For +myself I care nothing, but I may not forget my comrades. I must be +upon my guard for their sake." + +The dame reappeared, a mantle over her shoulders and her hands. She +smiled grimly, and gently addressed her guest: + +"I have my birds to feed. They are the sole companions of my +loneliness, and each night finds them awaiting me beyond the palisade. +They are brighter birds than those of my country, but sadder because +songless. The saints protect you, sir, in your sleep to-night." + +"Shall I come with you, mother?" said Madeleine. + +"Why upon this night more than others?" answered Madame bitterly. +"Your way is never mine. When you shall learn to pray with me then you +may walk with me." + +She left the cabin, drawing the door close. + +"Stay you here," whispered Madeleine, detaining Viner with a gentle +hand. "There was that in my mother's manner which makes me fear. I +will follow her and bring you word." + +"I would not have you put yourself to danger." + +"For me there is no danger." + +"I go with you," he said. + +"No!" cried Madeleine, stamping her foot. "You shall not." + +He gave way and let her have her will. + +When Madeleine returned with the tidings that a tall French priest was +without, the young man's first impulse suggested that he should rush +out and attempt to silence the spy, but prudence and a girl's hand +detained him. For the first time Geoffrey shuddered at the thought of +danger. With those two beautiful eyes watching him tenderly he felt +that it was good indeed to live. + +"I shall watch over you," said Madeleine's fearless young voice. "See, +I will move your palliasse. Now this thin wall of wattles shall alone +divide us. We shall be so near that I can listen to your breathing, +and shall hear your faintest whisper. I pray you trust in me." + +"In the morning I shall see you," he urged. "I shall not depart +without thanking you?" + +"Oh, talk not of the morning," she cried. + +He seized her fingers, and when he kissed the hand it fluttered like a +bird. + +"I shall have my dreams," cried Madeleine, her face uplifted, and her +eyes moistened. "And they may be so happy that I shall not wake. See! +Yonder is my resting-place. The wattle-wall shall separate us. There +my head will lie. Give me your sword." + +She grasped the hilt, and thrust the blade through the trifling wall. +Then she spoke with averted face: "When you are lying down to rest I +shall tell you why I have done this." + +They separated after a few tender words of commendation. The fire +burnt down, and the north wind played roughly among the trees until the +cabin hummed like a cave. Madame entered, as noiseless as a cat, and +passed into her room. The rattling of her beads sounded at intervals, +before sleep deadened the enmity of her mind. + +"My hair is long," whispered Madeleine's sweet voice. "I am passing a +coil through the hole in the wattles. Hold it, and if you hear +disquieting sounds do not speak, but pull." + +"I have it," he whispered, seizing the warm silk enviously. + +"The holy angels watch over you," she murmured. + +"And you. As for me, I am already protected by an angel." + +"Angel?" she wondered. + +"Sainte Madeleine is her name." + +"Ah!" she said. + +The sound of uneasy breathing arose between the groans of the wind. +After a long pause Geoffrey spoke: + +"In sleep I may lose what I am holding." + +"Twist it about your fingers," said a whisper. + +"Still, I may lose it. You will draw it away from me when you turn." + +"Lie upon it." + +"My hair is also long. I am tying yours to mine." + +"I had thought of that," she murmured. + +Another period of silence. Then, in turning, Geoffrey's lips pressed +upon the rich coil, and left it with a kiss. There came a little +movement and an almost soundless whisper: + +"Did you call?" + +"You are not yet asleep," he reproved. + +"I am watching and listening." + +"I would rather you slept while I watched." + +"Then I should be the guardian no longer." + +"But always the angel." + +The glow from without was still over the cabin where Madeleine lay +wide-eyed. A spider let itself suddenly from the roof, and swung +spinning in wild glee at the end of a silver streak. + +"Friend," Madeleine murmured. + +"I am listening," he said. + +"There is a spider spinning from the cross-beam." + +"Would you have me destroy it?" + +"No. Oh, no! It is so happy in its life. I do not remember why I +called you. I had something more to say." + +"I shall not sleep until you think of it." + +"Shall you go away in the morning?" she whispered suddenly. + +There was no reply. + +"And leave me?" + +"The present is life," he reminded her. + +"The thought of the future may destroy the happiness of the present." + +"What would you have me do--obey my conscience or my heart?" + +"Both," she sighed. + +"Let us talk of it in the morning." + +"Now. Oh, the spider is spinning faster--faster." + +"The morning," he repeated. + +"Now," she breathed. "But soft! Set your lips to this hole, and you +shall find my ear." + +A sound of restless movement came from Madame's room, and a grating +voice: "From witchcraft, enchantment, and heresy our Lady and the holy +saints protect us." + +It was her lips that Madeleine placed to the hole in the wattle wall. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + +FIRESIDE AND GROVE. + +Ambition and not chance had brought La Salle thus far from the beaten +track. He had made it his policy to pursue the Englishmen in that land +until he should have brought about their extermination, knowing well +that any success in that direction would be rewarded by the richest +gift which his master Richelieu had to bestow. From Onawa he learnt of +Viner's departure for the south on the day following that venture +against New Windsor. The girl had discovered the young man's track and +gladly accompanied the priest, pointing out the trail, which was +imperceptible to his untrained eyes, and so bringing him to the grove +where Geoffrey tarried in the enchanted sleep. + +After Madame Labroquerie had gone to find him food, La Salle +reconsidered his plans by the light of her information. It was no way +of his to hide his light beneath a bushel, and the slaying of Viner in +that lonely country would, he reasoned, bring him little fame. If, +however, he should return to lodge the information with Roussilac, all +men would know of his agency. Therefore, when Madame returned, he +impressed upon her the necessity of detaining Viner for at least three +days within the grove. + +"'Tis easy," the little woman muttered. "I shall be courteous to the +young man, and praise his face and flatter his pride. Madeleine, my +daughter, shall do the rest. I warrant you he shall not stir from here +till the soldiers arrive; and then, I trust, a stake shall be prepared +and a goodly pile of faggots for the proper despatch of his heretic +soul." + +"I shall see that execution be done upon him," La Salle replied grimly. +"Now get you gone, for I would be alone." + +"Your holiness will remain until the morning," Madame prayed. "I would +then make my confession, and receive the peace of absolution." + +"Find me here at the dawn," La Salle answered. Then, uplifting his +blood-stained hand, he bestowed upon her his benediction and sent her +away. + +Not fifty yards distant Onawa stood as a guardian over the man she +loved, staring into the night, heeding every sound in the valley, +dreading the approach of some emissary from her tribe. The maid had +become an outlaw. Through her treachery the boy Richard, her own flesh +and blood, had come to his death. With her own hand she had slain a +man friendly to all her race. In the forest beyond the river a cruel +death by torture awaited her; her own father would be the first to +condemn her to the fire. She was thus compelled to stand or fall +beside the priest whom she had aided with that disregard for self which +has ever dominated a woman's actions. + +As she stood watching the firelight and the grove, dim ghosts arose and +began her punishment. She seemed to hear a sound of scuffling, and to +see young Richard and his great hound, Blood, wrestling together, as +they had been wont to do among the pine barrens, to the roar of the +wind and the lost waters. Again she heard the boyish voice, gasping +and triumphant, "I have beaten him again. I am stronger than he." And +as she shivered, there came an echo of her own former words from the +line of tossing trees, "He is brave and strong. He shall make a man +before he has grown." + +Beside the fire La Salle slept, lulled by the wind. He knew Onawa was +acting as a guard over him, else he had never dared to close his eyes. +Yet his rest became presently broken into by spiritual beings hovering +around in the grove, anxious to point out his future. The chafing of +boughs, the beating of leaves, the gnawing of the beavers around the +philosopher's grave, with more distant sounds from the country beyond, +were the media these beings employed. The disturbances passed into his +ear, which pressed upon the palliasse, and entered the torpid brain to +make a dream. + +Through the unlighted streets of a city a way was revealed before the +sleeper by means of lightning flashes. No fellow-creatures were in +sight, and yet the tongues of a multitude shouted as he ran, bells +clashed above, and trumpets blared below. Before him a vast square +opened, empty and wind-swept, and here the shoutings of the unseen mob +became terrific, here also a mountainous building rose into the clouds, +and midway upon a flight of marble steps sat an old man in white, +crowned with the tiara, extending a red hat towards the yelling +solitude. The dreamer rushed out to seize the prize; but between the +principality and power, as represented by the scarlet blot rising in +the gale, the silent lightning cut, and between this fire and Urbano +the Eighth a figure descended, and the lightning was a sword, which his +untiring arms flashed between the aspirant and his soul's desires. +"Cardinal-Archbishop!" cried the white figure. "Bought by blood!" +outcried the man in black, and his sword turned all ways in a flame of +fire. + +La Salle awoke with a shudder. That figure seemed to be upon him, +bending, holding him down with the hands of Briareus. Casting off the +terrible sleep, he started upright. A face was indeed over him, and +arms were dragging at his shoulders. The wind-tossed grove cleared, +with its fire glowing, and sparks flickering like a thousand eyes, and +the sleeper awakened recognised Onawa, who was summoning him to action +in her unknown tongue. + +"Perdition!" he muttered. "The witch haunts me like an old sin." + +Onawa went on pleading, pointing wildly at intervals down the wind. + +"You shall lead me into no more death-traps!" the priest cried. + +The frightened girl brought a knife from her side, and made as though +she would stab him. Then she pointed again, and, falling to her knees, +indicated her own tracks. + +La Salle peered along the glow of the fire and beyond where the sparks +were beaten back, then rose and approached the palisading, Onawa +clinging to him like a shadow. There was no danger there. He advanced +to the wattled door, prepared to receive an attack. When there came no +response to his unspoken challenge he turned back, and Onawa again +pointed along the way she had come. + +"Would to God I had spared that child! His face is there!" the priest +shivered. + +"Tuschota!" cried the girl. She touched the ground, reading him with +her eyes. + +A smothered cry broke from the lips of the priest. Onawa followed his +gaze, which went, not along the trail, nor into the fire-lit grove, but +above where the eastern sky had almost cleared of drift. + +"A portent!" moaned the priest. "'Tis the end of the world, and I am +found with the sword drawn in my hand." + +There was war in heaven. Across the plane of eastern sky hung a wild +picture of forest and rockland where pigmy men rushed together without +shock, where spectral weapons fell silently, and shadowy smoke burst +and rose. Tiny figures climbed a cliff, and similar grotesques fought +on high and pressed them back. The combatants appeared ant-like and +ridiculous objects as they swayed reflected upon the floor of heaven. + +Onawa watched the spectacle unmoved. She had witnessed the mirage +before, and by this present vision merely understood that an attack +upon the citadel was even then in progress. As the weird picture broke +up and scud came flying across a faint grey sky, she prayed in her +treacherous heart that the French might win. + +La Salle rose with some shame when he perceived that the sky had +resumed its normal aspect, and light at length dawned upon him as he +sighted a shadowy being stealing within the radius of the fire. + +"Tuschota!" warned the voice at his side. + +The priest knew then that Onawa had saved him from the knife which +would have avenged the half-breed boy, who had flung himself with such +desperate courage upon death. Casting away the arms which encompassed +him, he passed swiftly into the shadow of the grove, while Onawa +advanced boldly and met the woman she had wronged so grievously, and +dared to face her without shame. For a space they stood, gazing at one +another by the firelight, until the younger cast down her eyes and +began to shiver with the coldness of fear. + +"Approach me, sister," said the stern woman. "There is a question I +would have you answer. Refuse you dare not, for we are flesh and +blood; we are daughters of Shuswap the truthful, and the same mother +gave us birth. I seek not to know what brings you here this night, but +tell me now have you seen that proud priest who has slain my son?" + +"I have not seen him," cried Onawa fiercely; but she was cold to the +heart beneath the gaze of those colder eyes. + +"'Tis well. A daughter of the Cayugas lies not, save to an enemy. But +why do you slink thus away? You do not fear me, sister?" + +Onawa stared aside speechless. + +"After I became wife to the great white man you came often to our home +among the lost waters," Mary Iden went on. "My Richard loved you. +Remember, sister, how often you played with the child, how many times +you carried him in your arms, and told him the old stories of our race. +Hast forgotten how he would laugh at your coming, how he would run down +to meet you with a gift, and draw up your canoe and bring you to our +shelter by the hand? Remember when he had committed a fault how you +pleaded for him, calling him _Dear child_ and _Sunlight of the camp_. +Sister, I know that you grieve for the boy." + +Chilled at her words Onawa passed to the fire, turning from those +pursuing eyes. + +"I shall not forget how Richard loved you. When you need me, sister, +come, and I will give you your former place beside the fire. So shall +you rest and forget the strangers in this land. By the love that you +bore for my boy, sister, I will not forget you." + +Onawa looked up and saw only the figure of La Salle emerging from the +grove. Her sister had drawn back into the night. + +The gale circled the embers in whitening eddies. Onawa wildly snatched +a stick and raked the glowing fragments into a pyramid, upon which she +flung some roots of willow. A yellow fog ascended, torn hither and +thither by the spirits of the wind. + +She crept to La Salle's feet and fawned upon them. He spurned her and +still she struggled to approach, to cling as the weed upon a rock. She +had made the sacrifice of her life that she might serve him. She had +discharged the arrow to slay the Englishman solely that she might win +his love. She had relied upon her fierce beauty, her youth, and her +strength to conquer the handsome Frenchman. She had staked her all +upon her heart's desires. + +And now he flung her from him, and strode away from the fireside and +the grove. + +She followed, crying along the wind. He motioned her back and even +threatened with his sword, but she pursued, setting her feet in the +marks which his had made. When he halted for weariness she stood near +to guard him from her sister. When the grey day came she still +followed him, across open country, and so northward into the hills, and +towards the river, where the wind contained a breath of smouldering +bush. + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + +GLORIOUS LIFE. + +When Madame found La Salle gone and the fire black in the early +morning, she frowned until her eyes became hidden and went back to the +palisade, passing her old servant, who was shredding ears of wild rice. +She entered the windy house calling. Soon she came out, shaking a +willow stick in her angry hand, and stopped opposite the old man, who +continued his work, grumbling softly to himself, "Ah, Father Creator! +Father Creator! Why do you send this north wind in summer time? The +day is dark and cold. Send us the west wind, Father Creator." + +"Have you heard noises in the night?" Madame's voice grated. + +"I slept with the wind in my ears," answered the native. + +"Have you seen my daughter, or the young Englishman?" + +"I have seen the light struggling to break, and the grey heaven +rushing, and the thick wind beating. I saw a red fox run and a +blue-bird chattering across the wind," said the old man. + +"Have you not seen the priest?" urged Madame. + +"I was up at the dawn," replied the stolid worker. "The fire was dead +and the sleeping-place white with rain. A bear was seeking warmth upon +the embers." + +"I have been blind and deaf," cried Madame in a rage. + +At the first glance of light the cabin was as noisy as an ocean cave. +Madeleine's brain became too active for sleep when she knew that the +day was at hand. She rose softly, glowing with her new-found +happiness, and as she stirred she murmured the intensely human line of +that unhappy boy Kit Marlowe, who had perished in a tavern brawl a few +years before her birth, "Whoever loved that loved not at first sight?" +She darted up with that thought, but a coil of her long hair tightened, +and there came a startled movement from beyond the wall. + +"Hush!" she whispered, lifting a pink finger, forgetful that he could +not see. + +"Is it the day?" said Geoffrey. + +"Yes, yes. Release me. Let me fly. Do you not hear the wind?" + +"I am listening to you," he answered. + +"Forget me. Listen! That was like thunder. Are you listening?" + +"I am coming out with you," he said. + +Reaching the open, Geoffrey discovered Madeleine, her arms +outstretched, her hair rising in ripples above her head as she bathed +in the wind, battling and panting, her lovely face all heather-pink. + +"I can smell the pines," she gasped, "and the salt sea, and the +mountains. I can hear the roaring of water and see the soaring of +eagles. Oh, oh!" she panted. "It is glorious to live!" + +She cried as she drew him away impetuously: + +"The black priest has gone. Let us hope that he has been blown away +into a swamp, where the fairies shall bewitch him into a frog to croak +at the world for ever. Come now away. Tell me whether you had dreams +in the night. But stay!" + +She drew away from him suddenly. + +"Madeleine!" he exclaimed, wondering at her changed face. + +"I must remove this mask," she cried in a stately fashion, frowning and +placing her hands upon her sides. "Sir, who are you that you should +strive to win the heart of Madeleine Labroquerie? Why, I have sworn to +wed a knight, a man of title and estate, and you, a smooth-faced boy, +with long hair and cheeks as pink as mine, you come and speak to me of +love. Sir, how dare you thus to use an innocent maid?" + +She passed on ahead of her astonished lover and the trees of the grove +closed round them. + +"Madeleine----" he began, protesting. + +"Madeleine," she imitated. "Here is free-speech indeed. Now, sir, +stand and let me show you what you are. You are an Englishman, an +adventurer, one of a small band who think themselves strong enough to +attack the power of France in this new land, and you, the enemy of my +people, come to me with a tale of love, believing me to be a maid of +the wilds to be won and cast aside at will. Speak not to me. I will +not hear you. I am no simple provincial maid that I should fall in +love with a soldier's handsome face. Last night, yes, last night, +after an acquaintance of but three days, you dared to own your love, +and to humour you--in truth I was afraid--I confessed that I also loved +you. I, a French girl, such a traitress as to love an enemy of my +people! I was but fooling you. How I laughed to myself at deceiving +you so readily." + +She laughed disdainfully and curled her lovely lip. + +"I fear I have already tarried here too long," was all that Geoffrey +could say. + +"Stay one moment," cried the haughty beauty. "I should be base did I +not warn you. Soldiers are waiting for you upon every side. East, +west, north, and south they lie in wait for you." + +"There are no soldiers nearer than the fortress," said Geoffrey wildly. + +"You may believe so," replied the traitress. "But you have learnt +little of this country if you do not know that military posts are set +about from place to place. One such post is near at hand, and thither +I sent our servant after your coming. Can you not perceive that I have +betrayed you?" + +Had Geoffrey looked he might have seen her shiver as she spoke. + +"I thank you for your warning, but I may stay no longer," the young man +said, and he stepped away with his head down. + +"Which way do you take?" she demanded. + +"I am southward bound." + +"You are--brave, friend." + +"Friend!" he exclaimed, with a sobbing note of indignation. "Would you +have me trust in you again?" + +"I had forgot," she admitted. "Are you going now?" + +He moved on through the grove; but he had not made a dozen steps before +she called to him. + +"Have you, then, no word of farewell?" + +He turned, but did not look at her as he said: "May you live to fortune +and a happy future." + +"You said you loved me," said Madeleine, her figure drooping. "Why did +you deceive me?" + +"I loved you," he said hotly, moving back a step. "And I love you +still. When I first saw you standing by the fire with the sun falling +on your head I loved you. When I have left you I shall see, not the +girl who desired to betray me, but her who gave me this to hold for my +protection while I slept." + +He drew forth a long coil of golden-brown hair and held it in the wind. + +"You cut it off," she faltered. Then her manner changed again. "Throw +it down. Stamp upon it. Tread it into the ground." + +"I use it," he said, "as I longed to use you." And he put the lock +back into his bosom. + +At that she ran forward with the cry: "You love me. Take me there, +Geoffrey. That is my place. I will not be held out. Geoffrey, I love +you. Oh, blind, blind! I love you with all my heart and soul." + +She tried to force herself into his arms, warm, loving, and +irresistible. + +"I am the wickedest of liars," she breathed, twisting her fingers +within his. "I would not have gone so far, but I thought that you +knew. I thought that you feigned to hate me in return for my cruelty. +Ah, Geoffrey, I loved you when first our eyes met. I did so desire +your love, but, sweetheart--foolish, credulous--I--I feared you might +think I was won too easily. Will you value your prize the more, when I +tell you that my treachery, the story of the soldiers, the +settlement?--Oh, oh!" + +He guessed what she would have said, and so had seized her. + +"Betray you, blind love!" she whispered. "Dear foolish sweetheart, I +would open my veins and give my blood for you. How I tortured you! +Knowing what a cruel nature your love possesses, knowing it, can you +still love her?" + +"Madeleine----" + +"Stop," she entreated, lifting her violet eyes. "Repeat that name a +hundred times, and find for it a new attribute of love each time. But +let the first be false and the second fair." + +"Sweet Madeleine!" + +"Call me so, Geoffrey," she murmured. "And I shall not wish to change." + +There was a hill beyond, its sides covered with bleached grass, and +above a few gaunt pines beating their ragged heads together and +stabbing one upon the other with jagged arms where limbs had been +amputated by previous storms. To this place Madeleine led her lover. + +It was a strange day. Though long past sunrise there was barely light. +The clouds swept low, grey or indigo masses rushing south with the +speed of rapids. The dark, solid wind of the lowlands came in a +furious succession of great waves. The lovers might have been upon an +island with the ocean roaring round in storm. Out of the gloom the wet +rocks glimmered and the trunks of long-fallen trees described weird +shapes upon the plain. + +"This is life!" cried Madeleine. "Glorious life!" + +Geoffrey held her closely, looking down upon her wet and radiant face. + +"We can fight together, you and I," she went on. "No wind shall +conquer while we hold together. It may roar at us, but we are young +and strong, and the wind is old and worn. Think you that you can bear +with me always? I promise you I will never use deceit again. We shall +be together when the winds have all passed under heaven, and the trees +are gone, and the seas have dried. Our souls will live in the same +life and the same love. Together while the old world crumbles, and the +sun becomes cold, and the moon fades. There is no death. We shall +close our eyes one day and change our home. Life will run on for us, +the same magnificent life of love." + +"There is no death," he repeated, as though the idea had not occurred +to him before. + +"How many thousand years has this wind rushed upon this hill? How many +thousand shall it beat after we have changed our home? We are made to +live, Geoffrey. It is not we who are sick, not we who are oppressed. +We are made of stuff that does not perish, not flesh and blood which +wither, but breath and love. Kiss me, Geoffrey, kiss me with your +soul." + +"Sweet, you have more knowledge than I," cried Geoffrey as he kissed +her eyes. + +"See that huge cloud! How the monster wishes to smother us! There it +rushes, flinging its rain to spite us." + +"I shall see this wild spot for ever," he murmured. + +"In years to come," said Madeleine, "a city perchance may grow in this +solitude, and where we now sit a palace or a cathedral may be built, a +king may command, a pastor teach his people, bells may ring for +Christmas, and heralds sound their trumpets. But we shall not see that +city, my Geoffrey. We shall look below the brick and the stir of +people, and we shall see a hill of white grass with old pines atop, and +below streaming rocks and decaying trunks, with beyond a grove all +covered in damp gloom and lashed by wind." + +"I can see the faces of my friends," he muttered. + +The girl turned upon his shoulder and drew his face lower with her cold +hand, lifting her own until their eyes met. + +"Look there," she entreated. "Tell me what you see." + +"Heaven opening." He paused. "I see also my duty to my neighbour." + +Madeleine's head drooped. Presently a small voice whispered out of the +wind, "I would have you obey that message, lest by offending God we +wreck our happiness." + +"I live upon your will." + +"You must leave me. You shall not see me shed a tear. But I must have +you for this day, and afterwards"--she caught her breath. "Had ever a +young soldier so brave a love?" + +He kissed her hands, and her cold face, and her hair, which dripped +like seaweed. + +"No ifs," she implored, when her ears caught his broken words. "The +doubter fails. Look upon the deed as done, and God shall pardon the +presumption, because He was once a young man upon earth, and He knows +the longing of a brave heart. Already I think of you, not as going +forth to duty, but as returning to claim me for your bride." + +"I shall succeed," he cried, in a voice which defied the winds. +"Madeleine, you have made me strong. Listen, sweet. I have a home in +Virginia, most fair, they say, of England's colonies, and I come to +take you there. I have a house in a garden where the sun never sets, +and where a river runs gently to the sea between banks of flowers. +There is no hard winter or rough wind there, neither enemy nor noise of +battle to terrify your dear heart. There the potato grows, and the +white tobacco blooms scent the night, and there the voice of Nature +sings of peace. Will come with me, sweet?" + +"You have learnt your lesson," she sighed, content. + +Misty rain smote them, but they strained at each other and laughed at +it. The cold numbed their feet, but their hearts were so warm that +they did not heed it. Nature thundered at them, but the roar of menace +became a triumphal march, and the shriek of the fiends a benediction. + +"This one day you shall spare to me," said Madeleine. "Let us spend it +as a day to be remembered. I have a cave down yonder, around which I +have trailed the bushes and taught ivy to grow. There we will build a +fire and I will be your housewife. Come! let us run along the wind." + +He bent to assist her, and she feigned to be stiff with cold, the +lovely traitor, so that she might feel his arms about her. Hand in +hand they ran, the rain and wind driven upon their backs, the angry sky +lowering upon the two who thus dared to endure the perils of life so +happily. But the lovers knew that behind the damp gloom and the storm +smiled the kindly sun; and they knew that he would conquer in good time. + +So that happy day drew to its end in mist and rain, and the wind died +down, and the storm clouds went out of the sky one by one. The moon +broke wanly into light and a pale star of hope gazed serenely down. +Nature wearied of her tumult, and old Æolus drove the turbulent north +wind back into its cave and set his seal upon the mouth. + +Geoffrey and Madeleine stood struggling to part. There was no tear in +the violet eyes of brave beauty as she looked up smiling, dwelling +always upon the future to sweeten the bitterness of the present. "Love +must be tested," she murmured with her radiant philosophy. "Hearts +must be tried. Geoffrey, I love you." + +"Madeleine, I love you." + +She stood alone, swaying weakly, her face as pale as the moon. Then +she laughed to drown the beating of her heart, threw out her hands, and +ran breathlessly up the hill where the ragged pines merely nodded, and +down into the plain towards the grove, crying to the solitude: + +"Life is glorious--glorious!" + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + +CLAIRVOYANCE. + +While Geoffrey Viner was winning the love of Madeleine Labroquerie, and +escaping the snare which La Salle had contrived for his capture, +history was being made around the river and the heights. The priest's +daring venture into the forbidden country acted upon the tribes of the +Iroquois confederacy as a spark upon gunpowder; and when it became +known from one camp-fire to another that George Flower, and Richard, +son of Gitsa, had fallen upon Cayuga territory by the hand of a +Frenchman, the native stoicism was changed into madness and the signal +for a general uprising went throughout the land. It was the eve of +that great assault upon the French position which lives in oral +tradition among those degraded descendants of a once great people who +occupy the maritime provinces of to-day. + +Previous to that struggle, one phase of which was shown through the +portent of the mirage to La Salle while he stood in the haunted grove, +many deeds occurred which the chronicler cannot afford to pass over. +The narrative must therefore be resumed upon the second morning +following the dispersion of the venturers, that morning which saw Mary +Iden set forth on her mission of vengeance, and Oskelano returning to +his fastness in the north to prepare his men for battle. + +The sun had fought down the mists, and black craft of the fishermen +were already leaping along the river, when Van Vuren abandoned the +fortress and climbed the cliff, hoping, as every day he hoped, to find +some trace of his missing men. The night had been cold with north +wind, and the rock country, was still haunted with wet and flickering +shadows. One shadow, so dark and angular as to attract the Dutchman's +eyes, lurked under a crag, as a patch of sheltered ice might linger in +the midst of a land steaming with sunshine; but when Van Vuren +approached, this shadow moved and took upon itself a semblance of +humanity, and with the dispelling of the illusion the Dutchman beheld +the evil face of Gaudriole. + +"Adversity finds hard resting-places, my captain," said the dwarf, as +he crawled forth. "Your rock makes a bed rougher than a paving-stone, +but methinks a safer. Here a rogue may snore in his sleep without +bringing the king's men upon him. I have a message for you, my +captain." + +"Hast any tidings of my men?" asked the Dutchman eagerly. + +The head of the dwarf was on a level with his elbow; his matted hair +was wet with mist. His habiliments, partly native, partly civilised, +surrounded his crooked body in a ragged suit of motley; and a long +knife was driven into his belt. + +"He who answers must be paid," answered the hunchback, grinning. + +"Perchance you have already been paid," said Van Vuren suspiciously. + +"The honourable captain possesses the gift of Divination," sneered +Gaudriole. "See you how low yonder warship sits in the water?" he went +on, pointing down at the _St. Wenceslas_, which had lately arrived at +that coast. "Is it true, as I have heard the settlers say, that she is +loaded with gold from the shore of Labrador? 'Tis said that a man may +there see the precious metal shining at his feet, and has but to bend +to gather sufficient for a knight's ransom." + +"I pray you give me the message, good dwarf," said Van Vuren +flatteringly. + +"The cloak upon my captain's shoulders is of a truth a thing to be +desired," Gaudriole went on, fingering the rich stuff with his grimy +fingers. "Were it upon my back, 'twould handsomely conceal some very +clumsy work of nature. 'Tis the cloth that makes the courtier." He +burst into a raucous laugh, as he danced the cold out of his limbs. + +"His Excellency the commandant shall loosen that insolent tongue," +cried Van Vuren hotly. + +Gaudriole snapped his fingers in the Dutchman's face as he retorted: +"This is not the old world, my brave captain, and there is no restraint +upon lying here. Gaudriole is now a citizen of the New World. The +Cardinal himself is but a shadow here. Even a mountebank of the gutter +may turn traitor in the wilderness. Gaudriole is a man this side o' +the sea. Were we in Paris I might bow to kiss your garments, and call +you Holiness an you desired it. Here the jester is as good as the +general. Hunt me into yonder forest at your sword-end, bold captain, +and bid me play the will o' the wisp. I should but disappear into a +thicket ahead, rise up at your back, and this knife and a moss-swamp +would settle all your business. Doff your hat to a fool, captain, and +give him pipe and tobacco." + +Van Vuren clenched his teeth. He would then have given even his cloak +to effectually silence that biting tongue. But he was a stranger upon +French territory, and he knew that the slender tie of alliance would +not stand a strain. He prudently choked down his anger, and satisfied +the dwarf's more reasonable demand. + +"Never was a better gift sent to man than this same tobacco," said +Gaudriole. "See you, captain, how excellent are its qualities. It +shall manage the warrior beyond the arts of woman. No man shall use +the good smoke in anger, because at the first taste peace settles upon +his body and his soul desires to be alone. But 'tis a dangerous drug +upon an empty stomach." + +"The message," said Van Vuren impatiently. + +"Yonder comes in a good burden of fish," resumed Gaudriole, gazing down +indifferently to indicate a boat grating across the shingle. "I know +the oaf, one Nichet, who at home had not the wit to make a living. +Here he becomes a man with a name. This land is Paradise for those not +wanted across sea. Nichet shall presently leave his boat, to find +himself a stone to anchor her, and then I shall pass that way and take +of his best fish for my breakfast. The knave profits by the fool's +work. Fare you well, brave captain." + +"The message, villain," broke in Van Vuren. + +"Ah! I grow forgetful. 'Tis said that the Abbé La Salle is to go from +here to the land which the Scotch discovered and the valiant French +took from them, to that country upon the gulf which we call Acadie. A +happy quittance, say I. The abbé is too perilously apt with his long +sword. Let them send the fat pig Laroche after him, and this fortress +shall grow more peaceful than the streets of Versailles. Let there be +trouble, you shall always find a fat priest at the root of it." + +"Let La Salle descend into the bottomless pit," cried the Dutchman +violently. "And Heaven be praised if he drags you down with him. +Deliver me the message, hunchback." + +"Now Nichet moves away to search for a fitting stone," went on +Gaudriole. "Had I a message for you, captain? Let me consider. My +memory is weak of a morning." He struck out his long arm suddenly. +"Dost see that man signalling from yonder shore?" + +Van Vuren turned quickly. "Where?" he exclaimed. + +"This is the message," shouted Gaudriole, and as he spoke he rushed +under the Dutchman's arm, and shambled swiftly down the road. "To the +man who has to live upon his wits the Dutchman is a gift from Heaven +itself. Remember, my captain! The tobacco leaf is a brave cure for +ill humour." + +Van Vuren hurled a curse after him, and turned to ascend. From the +summit of the heights he scanned the prospect, and quickly learnt what +Gaudriole might have told him had he exercised greater forbearance. +The expedition had at last returned. Almost as soon as Van Vuren +looked out he heard a welcome cry, and presently perceived a figure, +clad in the distinctive dress of Holland, crossing the valley at a +rapid walk. With an exclamation of relief the captain hastened down, +and met Dutoit, his lieutenant and the leader of the exploration party, +upon the plain. + +Hurriedly the survivors collated their gloomy experiences. + +"Twenty-eight left of our seventy-five," muttered Van Vuren, when he +had heard Dutoit's report of two men lost and one dead of fever, "our +supplies and ammunition gone, our ship destroyed. We have nothing now +to hope for, except a safe passage home. Hast seen any Englishmen?" + +"Yesterday we sighted a spy making south, and him we pursued until he +escaped us in the bush," answered Dutoit. + +"These men never recognise defeat," went on Van Vuren. "They shall +spread upward from the south, flow into this land, and push the French +back from fort to fort. They have a wondrous knack of gratifying the +savages. Know you if any new expedition has come over?" + +"We came upon a man mortally sick, who babbled as he died about a ship +supplied by the wool-staplers, which started from Bristol some nine +months ago and was lost upon the reefs. This fellow had his face set +due north, and believed that he was travelling towards Boston----" + +"Who comes here?" cried Van Vuren, breaking in upon the other's story +with a note of fear. + +They saw the tall, stern figure of Mary Iden descending towards them, +armed as for the chase. She crossed the ridge and halted when she +sighted the men. Her face was ghastly, and her eyes roved wildly over +the prospect. Presently she put out her hand, and the Dutchmen waited +when they saw her sign. + +"Soldiers," cried a wild English voice, "have you seen the French +priest known as La Salle pass into the fortress?" + +Van Vuren, who had touched at most of the New World colonies in his +time, knew the Anglo-Saxon well enough to answer; but he started, and +said bitterly to his subordinate: + +"The very savages speak English. Where is the Indian who has a +knowledge of French in all this country, which the French rule? Did +not I say to you that it is as impossible to keep the men of King +Charles out of this land as it is to dam the ocean behind a bank of +sand?" + +He turned to the Englishman's wife, and demanded further knowledge. + +The woman struggled to return the answer which policy advised, but +passion overmastered her. Her eyes flashed wildly as she answered: + +"Your race has ever been friendly with mine. 'Tis true you are foes of +the English, but all nations hate England, even as the birds of the +forest hate the eagle because of the strength of his flight. Soldiers, +show me where I may find this priest. I have walked through the night +seeking him. But a few hours ago I was a mother. To-day my son gives +no answer to my voice. He was a great hunter was my son, though but a +boy, and he feared no man. This day we bury him where the waters +shout. He was good to look upon, he was strong like the young bear. +He had brave eyes. Soldiers, it is the priest who has slain my son." + +The anguished woman had spoken thus aloud as she walked through the +cathedral-like aisles of the forest, addressing the columnar pines, the +fretted arch of foliage, the dim bush shrines; so she had called as her +heart bled to the climbing tits, the ghostly moths, and the long grey +wolf as he slunk away. + +"Who is the father of your son?" pressed the Dutchman. + +Awaking to the consciousness that the question was not wholly dictated +by sympathy, Mary Iden drew herself erect, and, pointing over the heads +of the men, indicated the impregnable heights whereon waved the flag +azure a fleur-de-lys or, that emblem which dominated the land from the +islands in the gulf to the country where the foot of white men had +never trod. + +"I have learnt the story of the wanderings of the children of England," +she said in a strained prophetic voice. "Of the journey of the man +Cabot, who passed into the places of wind, into the great sea of ice, +and reached the land where the Indians dare not walk. Of the seaman +Frobisher, who touched the iron coast and lived. These men passed out +like spirits into the unknown, and came back with their great story as +men restored from the dead. As the crow follows the eagle, to take of +that which the strong bird leaves, so Frenchmen followed the great +adventurers of England. And now I see the French driven from their +fortress, from Tadousac and St. Croix. Those who dwell in Acadie shall +be driven out, and go as exiles into a strange country. I see soldiers +sweeping the great cliffs, freeing the valleys and plains. I see the +French settled upon their farms, and their flag no longer shines in the +sun, and the people bend themselves to the rule of an English Queen, +whose name is Victory and whose reign is peace. Many moons shall come +and go, many suns shall heat the Father of Waters before these things +shall be, and I shall not live to see that day." She pressed her hands +to her aching eyes, and shivered as she swayed, and once more cried: +"Soldiers, have you seen the priest who has slain my son?" + +"A witch!" exclaimed Van Vuren hoarsely. "Let us escape before she +overlooks us." + +The superstitious Dutchmen hurried out to rejoin their men, who were +camping in the forest; while Mary Iden made her way across the plain, +and so into the great red eye of the sun. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII. + +STAMEN. + +That knowledge of forest-craft, which enables the traveller to guide +his feet unerringly through pathless bush, was only in rare instances +acquired by the New World venturers, and then only after years of hard +experience. When Woodfield abandoned his captain to follow the career +of Hough he struck indeed in the right direction, but the native trails +were numerous, and along one of these the yeoman went astray. By +seeking to set himself right he became hopelessly lost in the labyrinth +of the forest; and at last succumbed to weariness and stretched himself +to sleep upon a bed of moss, until a ray of sunlight stabbed through +the dense roof of foliage and smote him across the eyes. + +Woodfield arose and looked around in sore perplexity, knowing not which +way to turn. The globes of dew gleamed in opal tints upon the grass, +the big robins passed wreathed in filmy gossamers, the earth smoked +with mist and thrilled with the voice of the glad west wind. But all +the beauty and peace of nature combined made no satisfying meal for an +empty body. Trusting to Providence, Woodfield started out afresh, and +walked strongly for many hours, but always making direct north and away +from the camping-ground of the Iroquois, away from Couchicing and the +little settlement upon its shore. + +The yeoman tramped on, until exhaustion came upon him. All around the +great white pines lifted two hundred feet in height, interspersed with +dazzling spruce and gleaming poplars. He smoked to still the pain of +hunger, but the strong tobacco made him dazed. He staggered on, and +presently heard the voices of approaching men. The trail bent sharply. +He passed on, with half-opened eyes and wildly throbbing brain, went +round the bend, and started suddenly as from an evil dream. Half-naked +bodies and painted faces closed round him in a clamorous ring; and +Woodfield awoke fully to the knowledge that he had fallen into the +hands of the Algonquins. + +With an effort he drew himself upright, and gazed bravely at an old +warrior with flowing hair, who nodded and smiled at him in a not +unfriendly fashion. + +"J'ai faim," the adventurer muttered, trusting that one at least of the +braves might understand the French language. + +It was the wily old fox Oskelano who confronted the Englishman. He +stretched out his hand--the etiquette of handshaking he had acquired +from his visit to the fortress--and articulated with difficulty: + +"You ... French?" + +Woodfield grasped the brown hand and nodded violently. + +"Necessity makes hypocrites of us all," he muttered for the +satisfaction of his stubborn English conscience. + +Oskelano grinned amicably and gave an order to his men; and straightway +the warriors closed round and escorted Woodfield to their camp, every +step widening the distance between him and his companions. They gave +him food and drink; they provided him with a shelter; they built a +smoky fire before him to keep away the flies. Finally Oskelano himself +came, accompanied by his brother, and the two squatted gravely at the +entrance to the bower and scrutinised their captive with pride and +interest. + +"Um," grunted Oskelano, after a long period of silence. + +"Ho," muttered the weary Englishman with equal gravity. + +The French vocabulary of the Algonquin chief did not extend beyond the +single word _diable_, a word which he uttered constantly in his +subsequent efforts to converse with his guest, without any +understanding of its meaning, but believing, since he had heard it +issue with frequency from the lips of the soldiers in the fortress, +that it was an expression of possibilities. He endeavoured to convey +by means of gestures that it had come to his knowledge that the +Iroquois were about to attack the fortress at the instigation of the +English. His spies had seen a messenger bearing the symbol of the +headless bird. They had also observed the general movement eastward of +the tribes. The gods had provided him with a rare opportunity for +attacking his enemy. He was the friend of the great French people--he +slapped his insidious old heart with his treacherous hand--he was eager +to fight for his allies, and in return he doubted not that the chief +far over seas, King Louis to wit, would graciously send to his good +Algonquin friends many of the magic fire-tubes, with an abundant supply +of that unholy admixture of saltpetre, sulphur, and charcoal which +possessed such a wondrous property of exploding to the physical +detriment of a foe. + +"Diable?" he grunted, staring eagerly at Woodfield. + +"Oui," answered the harassed Englishman, though in truth he had +understood nothing. + +"Um," grunted Oskelano; and there the interview ended, with nothing +gained on either side. + +But as the chief returned to his skin-hut, his brother, a sachem wiser +than he, made the disquieting assertion: "The white stranger is not of +the French tribe." + +"How know you so?" cried the perturbed chief. + +"He does not lift his hands, nor does he shake his shoulders when he +speaks. He sits without motion. He does not laugh. He is one of the +race they call English." + +Woodfield ate the strong bear-meat brought to his shelter by a silent +giant, and turned to compose himself for sleep; but the giant touched +his shoulder and made a gesture which there was no mistaking. The +Englishman rose, and immediately two other figures glided out of the +forest and cut off his retreat. + +They led him along a trail where the fireflies were beginning to light +their lamps, between the big trees, and out into short bush and +sage-brush where the cranes swept overhead, crying mournfully. +Rockland appeared presently, streaked granite overrun with poison-ivy. +The captive noticed that the rock was fretted with caves. + +Into one of these he was ushered by the custodians, who then gravely +divested him of his weapons. A fire was lighted near the mouth of the +cave, and there the bronze guardians squatted, maintaining an +intolerable silence throughout the night. + +A change of sentries took place at daybreak; another at mid-day; a +third the following nightfall. Food and drink were handed in to the +prisoner; but the guards spoke never a word and made him no sign. + +Another day went by, but as the time of evening drew near there came +the sound of camp-breaking down the wind. A host of armed men tramped +beside the cave. A group of doctors, attired in the fantastic mummery +of their craft, followed; and last of all came Oskelano and his brother +side by side. + +Around a solitary poplar men were at work, chopping down the brush with +their tomahawks. The guard stepped up upon either side of Woodfield, +who watched these preparations with a prisoner's suspicions, and led +him out to the cleared space. + +"Um," grunted Oskelano, and shook hands amiably with his victim. + +Then the men put aside their tomahawks and bound him to the poplar with +ropes of vegetable fibre. They piled the moss around him and flung the +sagebrush atop. Others brought up pine branches and piled them waist +high. Oskelano watched, his crafty face wrinkled with smiles. + +At last the Englishman understood that he was about to be made a +sacrifice to the fierce Algonquin gods. He uttered no useless prayer +and made no cry. "They have spared me the torture," he muttered +bravely. "Let me now show them how to die." As the silent and supple +natives worked around him, he recalled the tales that old men at home +had told him, of the Protestants who had died for their faith, laughing +at the flames and bathing their hands in them. The last scene in the +life of the old vicar of Hadleigh had often as a boy moved him to +tears. He remembered how that the old man had lighted from his horse +to dance on his way to the stake, and he recalled his noble words of +explanation: "Now I know, Master Sheriff, I am almost at home." The +passing into death through fire was merely a sting sudden and sharp. + +Water was dashed over the fuel until the pile gleamed frostily in the +fading rays. A fiery death for his captive was no part of Oskelano's +plan. He had discovered that suffocation was more effective and less +rapid than the flames. + +Tree and victim became soon hidden in a dense column of cloud, the +doctors resumed their march, the guard followed, the two sachems +brought up the rear, discussing their proposed attack as indifferently +as though that mighty pillar of smoke pouring upward in the still +evening air out of the plain of sage-brush had no existence in fact. + +Well-laid as was the cruel Algonquin's plan, he had not the wisdom to +guard against that element of the improbable which rarely fails to +enter into, and mar the working of, the best-contrived plot. + +A maid had concealed herself in the bush until the camp became clear. +Then she came forth and ran like the wind, but stopped upon the plain +with a cry of terror when she beheld an old man, who hobbled painfully +through the brush. The ancient turned, suspicious of every sound, but +when he saw the girl his dry face broke into a weird smile. + +"Hasten, child," he quavered, leaning heavily upon his staff. "The +Mother of God forgets not the good done by man or maid." + +He dropped a knife at her feet. The girl caught it up and sped onward +like a deer. + +The old man was a Christian. The maid was heathen. Old mind and young +working independently, the former actuated by the religion of altruism, +the latter wrought upon by nature, had entertained in secret the +self-same plan of rescuing the young Englishman from his terrible +plight. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + +COMMITTAL. + +While Woodfield was a prisoner in the camp of the Algonquins, his +comrades, who had searched for him in vain, made their sad parting from +George Flower upon the Windy Arm where the waters mourn for ever. + +This promontory had been so named by the Indians because it thrust +itself far out, like an arm, into Lake Couchicing, meeting the full +force of every wind. It made a suitable spot, thought the survivors, +for an Englishman's grave, being rough and rugged and strong to behold, +like the man whom they had known and loved and lost. + +When Hough had done droning his prayers, they heaped the soil into the +form of a mound, which they covered with warm peat. While thus +employed they beheld Shuswap passing down to the beach, where a dozen +long canoes lay ready for a start. One, which was covered with green +branches, had already been launched, and was rocking gently upon the +shallows. The Englishmen hastened to complete their work, when they +discovered that the sachem was awaiting them with impatience. + +Then a mournful procession crossed glass-like Couchicing, headed by the +sad canoe where boy and hound slept together as they had been wont to +do at home. It reached the fringed shore opposite, amid the sorrowful +cries of the paddlers. The canoes were carried across the strip of +land and down again to the water where the country was in splendour. +Here Nature struck no mourning note. Only a few stripped trees leaning +out, held from falling by tougher comrades which supported them on +either side, spoke mutely of the presence of death after life; and even +so showed strong green saplings from some living nerve of the +half-decayed roots to proclaim the final triumph of life over death. + +So they continued, until wild islets stood out, their banks humped with +beaver mounds, and the lost waters began to shout with the mourners, +and the swelling north wind shook the shore. The paddlers wrenched the +canoes round, chanting as they worked, and the whitecap waves slapped +the frail birch-bark sides. + +No man stood beside young Richard's grave. A flock of noisy birds +pecked amid the fresh-turned soil and flung themselves away before the +carriers. Sir Thomas took no part in these last rites. From that +pierced body of his son the jewel of great price had been snatched, and +the setting he left for others to handle. + +The mother stood beside old Shuswap, her bosom heaving vengefully as +the warriors consigned her son to the ground. After the heathen rites +had been performed, Hough's stern voice repeated the prayers which he +had but recently offered over his brother of the sword, and when he had +done green branches were flung into the grave, then a weight of stones, +and finally the rich, red clay stopped the mouth of earth which had +opened to devour her own. The Indians swept away, shouting a song of +war. The waters raced on; and wind and rapids met below with the noise +of thunder. + +Penfold walked among the trees; and there, scarce a stone's cast from +the sounding water, he came upon the knight, huddled upon the stem of a +fallen pine, his hands spread out across his knees, his head down, and +on the ground between his feet the two parts of a broken sword. + +The old yeoman came near and wrecked the silence by a gruff word of +sympathy; but Sir Thomas did not look at him. Presently he made a +blind movement and extended one lean arm towards the ground. + +"If you would serve me, friend," he said in a hollow voice, "cast these +fragments into yonder water. My son, whom I should have trained as a +man of peace, took that sword from my hand. My Richard's blood lies +heavy on me now." + +"Not so," said Penfold strongly. "The boy was his father's son. Would +you have seen him grow a weakling? Sons bred beside an enemy's camp +must fight or be found unworthy of their name." + +"The sword has fallen," said the knight. "Last night I had a dream." +A shiver coursed through him. "Take up the sword with which I killed +my son and bury it in the water. I have sworn to lay hand on it no +more." + +"I have lost a friend," muttered the yeoman. "One known to me by +hearth and in field, at work and pleasure. I have buried him this day +in a strange land. I grow old, and my friends drop from me as acorns +shed from the oak, but while my eye is steady and my arm strong I shall +fight for England's empire over sea. Old age, when dotage grows, is +time sufficient to mourn for friends. While strength remains a man +must work. Country, then friends, myself the last. 'Tis the motto of +the Penfolds of County Berks." + +"You have no flesh and blood to mourn." + +"What is relationship if it be not friendship? Know you not that two +brothers may fall in hatred from one another, and yet either have a +friend dear to his heart as his own soul? Our troubles we carry to our +pastor. Our highest love to the woman who stays for us on our way +through life. Such friendship binds more firmly than any tie of blood." + +"Speak not to me," cried the bitter man. "My ambition has fallen to +the ground." + +"Stand by yonder mound," cried Penfold. "The boy shall speak." + +"Vengeance shall not bring him back." + +"Had you fallen he would have gone upon his way stronger than before." + +"He was young and I grow old." + +"Yet I am older far." And the yeoman shook himself like an old lion. +"There is work for me." + +The knight lifted his head, and spoke more bitterly: + +"Poison stirs in our English blood, driving us from home, leading us +across seas to fight unthanked for our country's cause. What gadfly of +madness stings us on thus to build the foundations of Empire? What +honour shall be rendered to pioneers? Who shall seek our graves and +pause to say, 'Here lies one who fought to plant the red-cross flag in +the face of its enemies'? Fools, fools, fools! We forsake home and +kindred in pursuit of a dream, rise up for our unrewarded effort, and +fail. So we are gone and our deeds lie buried in our graves." + +"One leaf makes not a summer," replied Penfold. "The one cannot be +discerned by the eye, and yet that one does its share in making the +tree perfect. We also have our part to play. Our lives are obscure. +Our deeds shall live, if not our names. Let others reap the harvest." + +The knight rose, frowning at the sun-lit scene. + +"There is a cave a league away," he said. "There sorrow and myself +shall dwell. Seek not to find me." + +He placed a hand upon his breast. + +"Something has broken there," he said; and then went with drooping +head, striking the trees in the blindness of his flight. + +Hough stood low upon the shore between the islets. He heard the +footsteps of his captain, and spoke: + +"See where our friend's wife goes. Closing her ears to my good +counsel, she went into the hut, and returned with bow and arrows and a +knife. These she placed in her canoe, and yonder she goes to find the +track of that papist priest who has brought sorrow to us all." + +"Said she as much?" + +"Ay. 'Onawa, your sister, has brought this trouble upon you and us,' +said I, as she pushed away. 'She it was who smote down George Flower +by treachery, and she it was who brought the Frenchman to our +hiding-place.'" + +"Said she anything?" + +"Never a word. But her eyes strained upon the knife." + +Then the two lonely men returned to New Windsor, the slow day passed, +and night enwrapped in cloud fell upon the land. The fires of the +allied tribes spotted the forest with scarlet, and between the black +trees the upright figures of warriors, fully painted and feathered, +crossed as they threaded the mazes of the dance. Five thousand +fighters were there gathered, the best and bravest of the Oneidas, +Senacas, and Onandagas, mad to avenge their wrongs. Spies were posted +at every point; a hundred watched the fortress, passing the word from +man to man. In a chain they stretched from the height above the river +to the council fire, where the nine sachems sat muttering in whispers +and drawing omens from the flight of the smoke and the burning of the +logs. + +"Shuswap, great chief of the Cayugas, the woman your daughter would +speak to you," a voice sounded. + +"Let her come near," answered the old man. + +His keen eyes distended. He had looked, prepared to behold his younger +daughter, but instead his eyes fell upon Tuschota, her sister. The +father noted her warlike bearing, the bow slung upon her shoulders, the +arrows and knife thrust through her girdle. He saw also the sternness +of her countenance. + +"What would you, daughter?" + +"Where is Onawa, my sister?" + +"I know not," said the sachem. + +"Find her and bring her forth. She led hither the Frenchman who has +slain my son." + +The sachems turned and their black eyes glittered upon her. + +"It is false," cried Shuswap. + +"She desires to win the French doctor for husband. She brought him +therefore to the lake that he might lie in wait to kill the Englishmen. +One man Onawa killed with her own hand. My son is your son. Your +daughter, my sister, must die." + +She spoke, and passed away into the glow of the forest. + +Shuswap dashed his grey head to the ground. + +"She must die," muttered the counsellors. + +The news travelled like an evil wind from fire to fire. All the tribes +swore by their gods that the woman who had sought to betray them must +die. Not till then might Shuswap lift up his head among them. They +danced more cruelly, maddened by disgrace. + +A runner came from the depths of the forest, spots of blood thrown from +his flying heels. Three hours had he run at that speed. He passed the +warriors and their fires and reached the council. All the sachems sat +erect, save only old Shuswap, who lay forward, his head upon the dust. + +"Oskelano comes upon us at the head of the tribes of the Algonquins," +spoke the messenger. "They carry the fire-tubes given them by the +French." + +The sachems sat like figures of stone. + +"Which way do they come?" demanded Piscotasin, surnamed Son of the +Weasel, the learned chief of the Oneidas. + +"From the north." + +"They shall find us ready." + +The messenger passed back. Straightway the forest shivered with a wild +cry for battle until the leaves were shed like rain. + +There came another runner. + +"A fire-float passes down the Father of Waters." + +"It is well," said the Son of the Weasel. "It is the signal of the +friendly Dutch." + +Thereupon commenced that great advance of the confederate tribes which +descendants speak of to this day. The flower and strength of the +Iroquois, that great people which from time immemorial had ruled the +north-eastern land from the coast to the chain of inland seas, went out +to avenge their wrongs. The women rushed to find shelter from their +hereditary enemies the pitiless Algonquins. The army poured away in a +roaring torrent, draining the forest, leaving the fires licking the +sharp breeze with forked tongues, leaving only one man behind: + +Old Shuswap, doubled in the dust. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + +ENKINDLED. + +The raft of fire, which had been reported to the sachems as visible +upon the river, had indeed been ignited and started upon its course by +the hands of the Dutch, but without any idea of signalling to their +allies. The man who was chiefly instrumental in giving the signal, +which Van Vuren had arranged for in the time of his power, had never +heard of that secret conspiracy which the action of the English +venturers had brought to nought. + +Because the captain shrank from introducing his party into a camp +friendly only in name, where friction between his men and those of +Roussilac might have occurred, the Dutchmen bivouacked upon the +outskirts of the forest, and while darkness surrounded them sat smoking +solemnly and chatting, altogether ignorant of the contemplated native +rising. These men were of all ages and drawn from almost every station +in life. The most prominent character was one Pieter von Donck, an +elderly sailor of immense bulk, attired in the shapeless sack-coat, +white tucker, and immense knee-breeches of the period. This man, so +report went, had touched at every known harbour in the world, had +explored many an unknown tract of country, and was as well acquainted +with the streets of New Amsterdam, its double-roofed church, its +battery upon the hill, its toylike windmills, and its gallows beside +the wharf, as with the old-world town of Holland on the arm of the +Zuyder Zee. He had been sent out with Dutoit to act as guide for the +expedition, and it was well for the lieutenant that old Pieter had been +with him, otherwise the entire party must have been lost. Von Donck +was very nearly as skilful as an Indian in picking up a trail, and to +his more unenlightened comrades his knowledge of locality savoured of +witchcraft. Van Vuren and his lieutenant were conversing at a little +distance from the big circle, the former frequently consulting a scrap +of vellum covered with names and lines, the first map of the great +eastern coast which had ever been designed. + +"Yonder is a mighty precipice," observed presently one of the youngest +of the soldiers, nodding his head gravely in the direction of the +heights. "How the folk at home would marvel, could they but see what +we look upon daily in this land." + +"What say you, boy? What say you?" cried Von Donck, aroused from his +musings by this criticism. "What! call you yonder hill a precipice? +How would you name the cliffs of Jersey, had you seen them as I, Pieter +von Donck, saw them from the ship _Goede Vrouw_? Should you but cross +the expanse of Tapaan Bay, as I have done, should you enter the defiles +of the Highlands and see the wigwams of the Iroquois perched among the +cliffs like nests of eagles, should you see the black thunder-clouds +chasing the hobgoblins among the Kaatskills, as I, Pieter von Donck, +have seen them, then methinks, boy, you might sit among old travellers +and talk to them the night." + +The old sailor's voice was thick, and he snorted like an ox between his +words. + +"'Tis given to few to venture as you have done," spoke a conciliatory +voice from the circle. "Tell us now somewhat of your journey up +Hudson's River, good Piet." + +"A weird river, they tell me," said another voice. + +"True! true!" snorted the voyageur. "A river of ghosts and devils. A +river which changes the flow of its tide 'gainst all nature. A river +which shoals or deepens in an hour, to hold the explorer back, or to +lure him into the heart of a storm. 'Tis a river which few dare to +tempt. But I, Pieter von Donck, went up it under a master who, despite +his English blood, was the bravest man upon this earth. Ay, but I saw +even his cheek whiten, when we reached the whirlpools at the end of the +known world, and yet saw no sea ahead." + +"Who was that master?" asked the young man who had opened the +conversation. + +A derisive laugh sounded, followed by Von Donck's booming reproach: + +"Young man, have you no pride in the doings of the great? Hast never +heard the name of Hendrick Hudson?" + +"I knew not that you had been with him," muttered the youth. + +"Before Marie von Toit, your mother, was weaned I crossed the seas," +snorted the old man, smiling into the fire. "What Dutchman has not +heard of the ship which brought me over, the _Goede Vrouw_, which lies +as I speak a-rotting within the wooden harbour of New Amsterdam? San +Nicolas was her figure-head, the good saint who guided us through all +perils, and to whom upon landing we erected a chapel within sight of +the sea. He is the patron of our first settlement in this new world, +and shall remain so for ever. Now they call him Santa Claus, and the +children of New Amsterdam hang up each one a stocking in the +chimney-side on San Nicolas' Eve, for the good saint is a lover of +children, and rides that night over the houses, his wide breeches +filled with gifts, which he lets fall down the chimneys and so into the +stockings hung to receive them. All the city is a-laughing with +children on the morn of San Nicholas' Day." + +"Gives he then nothing to the elder folk?" asked one. + +"'Twas once his custom to do so, when he could find an industrious body +who spoke no evil of his neighbour," said Von Donck. "But he has much +ado to find such now." + +"Didst ever see the storm ship upon Hudson's River?" a listener +demanded. + +The old sailor pulled himself round to face the speaker. + +"What story is this?" he muttered. + +"There is a ship which haunts that river and comes a-sailing by night +or day, running 'gainst both wind and tide, her deck crowded with +Dutchmen who neither move nor speak. She comes before a storm, and +goes while men gaze, like a flash of light." + +Pieter von Donck grinned. + +"Will call me a phantom, brave boys? Here you shall find enough sound +flesh to make two men as good as any," he said, slapping his mighty +thighs. "That ship is surely none other than the _Half Moon_ herself. +Know you not that Hudson and his crew haunt the Kaatskills? O' nights +the good ship, which lies sunken at the end of the world, rises, and +the ghosts of my master and my mates pass from the phantom deck to +their revels within the mountains, and back ere morning to their +graves. Peace be to them, brave fellows all! + +"Twenty-nine years past," Von Donck went on, in his strident voice, +which brought Van Vuren near to listen, "we cast away from our new city +on the island, and sailed westward to discover the overland passage to +China. In a day we had left the land of the Manhattoes far astern, and +with a favouring breeze had run under the palisadoes, a wall of rock, +young friend, which makes yonder height seem to my eye no greater than +an ant-mound. The solitude unmanned all, save Hudson, who walked the +deck, swearing that he would reach the sea if he had to explore till +Judgment Day. Awful was that silence when our ship entered the shadow +of the Highlands, where the falling of a rope upon deck broke into +echoes among the hills, and over the river came a noise as of demons +laughing. The terror of the New World was upon us, and when we sang +our chanties, heaving the lead or drawing in sail, we would fain have +stopped our ears, so terrible were the voices which answered us from +the shore." + +"Was there no talk of turning back?" + +"There was no turning back with Hendrick Hudson. He strode the deck +day and night, and at his every order the black rocks pealed and the +precipices shrieked, though the weather would be calm and the wind not +more than a whisper. We held on our course until a storm seized and +flung us upon the shore; and there we made landing, in a place where +snakes darted their heads at us, and having built us a fire under the +basswoods, cooked food and dried our clothes. + +"'This mountain country is the place for me,' cried Hudson. 'Here +might we spend a free life, my sailors, hunting by day, and at sport by +night. Bring out our pipes and liquor from the ship, and in this +hollow let us rest until the storm clouds pass.' + +"So we remained there three days, chasing bears by light, spending the +dark hours around the fire, smoking our long pipes, and playing at +bowls, the favourite game of our master; and the mountains thundered, +and the goblin voices shrieked with every gust of wind. A fearsome +place, that dripping rock-forest at the end of the world. Upon the +third night came Indians to our camp, two sachems old and cunning, who +demanded by what right we had brought ourselves into their land. I can +see the face of Hudson now, with its straight black beard and hard +black eyes, and the angry twitch of his mouth, a trick of his when +crossed, as he answered them. 'We are Dutch,' quoth he. 'And if there +be any new passage across this world Dutchmen shall find it.' Then the +sachems came down from the rocks, and cursed him and his crew, swearing +to call up spirits of river and wind which should fight against our +ship. Hudson threatened them with the sword--there was methinks too +much hot English blood in our captain--and the next day we remanned the +_Half Moon_, and sailed away against the stream. + +"A wind struck us, and the horse-shoe which had been nailed to the mast +before starting dropped with a fearful clanging upon deck. We sang the +hymn to San Nicolas, and fastened the horse-shoe anew, but again it +fell. The Indian spirits were making mischief in the wind. The day +became dark; the sun went out; but Hudson bade us cram on sail, because +every hour he looked to hear the roar of the sea. 'And then for China, +my men,' cried he. + +"We ran into whirlpools and cross currents, and the _Half Moon_ struck +full upon a rock in the middle of the stream. The water roared around, +and I swam for my life through darkness, seeing no man, dreading every +instant lest a hand should seize my heel and drag me down. I reached +the shore, and there found a companion, who had saved himself as I had +done. Of our ship and mates we could find no trace, therefore we set +out together, and made a great journey overland, until by the grace of +God we saw the tower of the church of San Nicolas lit by the morning +sun, and the good folk of New Amsterdam coming out to greet us as men +brought back from the dead." + +Von Donck drew a flaming stick from the fire and relighted his rolled +tobacco leaf. A circle of solemn faces was set towards him. + +"The _Half Moon_ yet sails upon Hudson's River," remarked the sailor +who had questioned the voyageur concerning the storm ship. "She rides +out of a thunder-cloud, her sails flying against the wind, the men +staring over her side. One Sunday in the morn, when the folk were at +church and the dominie was preaching--such is the tale I have +heard--there sounded a mighty wind, and the building grew creeping +dark. Upon that a man ran in, crying, 'A ship! A Dutch ship sailing +by!' The dominie and all ran into the gloom of mid-day and saw a +vessel riding against the tide, full of men in wide breeches and +sugar-loaf hats, with faces as white as wool. Some of the bolder +youths manned a boat, and rowed out signalling, but the stranger gave +them no heed. Sometimes she would appear so nigh to them that they +could mark the flakes rotting from her beams and the weeds trailing +round her bows, and the same minute she would appear as though half a +mile away. And while they still rowed after her, they heard a noise as +of iron ringing upon her deck and straightway she rode into a cloud and +vanished. And afterwards came a great storm which wrecked close upon a +score of houses." + +"The old ship," muttered Von Donck, his eyes astray, his cheeks less +ruddy than their wont. "'Twas the sound of the horse-shoe falling to +deck which the rowers heard. Hudson swore in the face of Heaven that +he would make that passage. Mayhap he still strives, the storm holding +him back from the unknown north-west for ever." + +As the old sailor ceased to speak Van Vuren advanced, the strip of +vellum between his fingers, and stood a sharp figure in the firelight. +The men ceased their mutterings and leaned forward to hear what their +leader had to say. + +"Our expedition upon this land has failed, my men," he cried. "Our +ship lies burnt, our comrades are lost, we are not strong enough to +withstand the French. Shall we now make a journey through the unknown +land, and so down to our own free colony, through which pours Hudson's +river, of which I have heard you speak? Let us strive together to gain +the island of the Manhattoes, where our city of New Amsterdam smiles +upon the sea." + +The Dutchmen did not break into a shout as Englishmen might have done, +nor did they raise a noisy chatter after the manner of the French. +They looked on one another with grave faces, and each man puffed his +smoke more heavily. Finally old Pieter von Donck snorted and spoke: + +"I have played the pioneer before to-day, captain. 'Twould gladden my +eyes to see again the tower of San Nicolas by the sea." + +"Then let us away before morning," said Van Vuren. + +Boats of the fishermen were drawn along the white road of shore, and +these the Dutchmen requisitioned for crossing. They worked warily, +fearful of seeing the flash of torches along the path beneath the +cliff. The river brimmed and the stream flung down with a ceaseless +undertone. + +"What have we here?" snorted Von Donck, while he groped under the +gloomy wall. + +A number of dry logs, crossed and pinned together by wooden wedges, lay +upon the gravel spit, piled with dry grass and resinous boughs +interlaced. Beside were lengths of pine to act as rollers for +launching. The mass of inflammable material rose high. Torches were +pressed between two stones beside the logs. + +"'Tis but the raft made to give signal to the Iroquois tribes," +explained the lieutenant. + +"To the water with it," cried a voice. + +"Peace, fool. The French have sentries posted." + +"Fire it," snorted Von Donck. "Let not so much good work be spent in +vain. Will float it upon the French man-o'-war for a parting message." + +Eager hands set in place the rollers, and soon the unwieldy mass +grumbled riverwards. It nosed into the water and settled with a +splash, riding deep because the logs had weight. Flint and steel +struck, a shower of sparks rained upon the catch-fire, the torches were +ignited. At a word the grass flared, and the raft, released, struck +upon a rock, turned slowly, and raced down stream, a red and yellow +sheet of fire under a whirling canopy of smoke, straight for the +lantern which marked the presence of the man-of-war. + +"To the boats!" whispered Van Vuren. + +A cry was raised above, and soon the answering voices resembled a +chorus of daws frightened round a dark steeple by the shadow of a bird +of prey. While the Dutch were floundering in mid-stream a brass gun +thundered. The column of fire swept on, illuminating the seamed wall, +and throwing into black contrast the trees on the opposite shore. + +As the laughing Dutchmen reached land a terrific din from the hemlock +forest shocked the night, and this wild revelry became each moment more +terrible, until the wind seemed to cease to breathe. + +The raft was opposite the landing-stage, burning rapidly down to the +water, casting out flakes of fire and wisps of blazing grass. Lights +flashed confusedly upon the heights, and the tramp of armed men carried +solemnly across the river. + +"The Iroquois are coming out!" cried Van Vuren. + +"Let us wait like vultures for the pickings," muttered the lieutenant +at his side. + +"Vultures!" shrieked a malignant voice. "A good word, traitors." + +The men swung round and stared into the gloom. Upon a point of rock +they saw Gaudriole, squatting like a toad, his features half lit by the +glow of his pipe. + +"The plain of Tophet lies ahead," he snarled at them. "Others may play +at fire as well as ye." + +He sprang up and danced furiously upon the rock. + +"Slay me that hunchback," shouted Van Vuren in a rage. + +His men ran at the rock. Gaudriole spat at them like a cat and +vanished among the scrub. + +A wave of smoke fanned over the ridge. A deep glow, waving up and down +like a red rag, grew along the southern sky, advancing storm-like, +deepening in colour. + +The bush had been fired. + + + + +CHAPTER XX. + +SACRAMENTAL. + +The military routine of the fortress continued that day as usual, and +the approach of night brought no suspicion of the forthcoming assault. +The absence of La Salle was alone commented upon, yet without +apprehension, for the priest was notoriously lax in the performance of +his ecclesiastical duties, and only Laroche was seriously troubled in +mind for his brother priest. Roussilac indeed breathed more freely +when La Salle was not present in the fortress. At eventide two little +bells rang out, that to the east of the citadel being the bell of the +chapel of Ste. Anne, presided over by the junior priest, St Agapit, +that to the west the bell of Ste. Mary Bonsecours upon the hill. Here +Laroche, in the absence of La Salle, officiated to recite vespers and +hear confessions. + +Laroche, though a fighting bully lacking in every priestly quality, +was, among the soldiers at least, more popular than St Agapit. The +latter was a scholar, a man too learned, and somewhat too honest, for +his age, an ascetic, and a priest in every sense. It was well known +that he looked with a stern eye upon drunken brawls or vengeful +threats, whereas Laroche, himself a brawler when in his cups, judged +such offences leniently. St Agapit had no ambition, apart from the +faithful performance of his duty, the carrying out of which rarely +brought him into even remote contact with either of his colleagues. + +It was good to feel the cool breath of the evening after the heat and +burden of the afternoon. The little stone church of Ste. Mary upon the +brow of the hill darkened, and an aged crone passed into the sanctuary +to light the strong-smelling lamps. Laroche entered to recite vespers, +and rolled away to divest his great body of cope and alb; but as he +appeared again within the church his eyes fell upon some half-dozen +men, who waited to obtain an easier conscience by confession of their +sins. + +"A plague on ye," the priest grumbled as he stumbled into his box. +"Why are ye all such miserable sinners? Ha! is it you that I see, +Michel Ferraud? What sin now, you rogue?" + +The keeper of the cabaret in the Rue des Pêcheurs fell straightway upon +his knees, and began to whimper: + +"The former wickedness. I am driven to the act, my father. Wine is +scarce, as your holiness knows, and great is the demand therefor. I +must eke out the supply against the coming of each ship, and it has +ever been but a little aqua puralis added to each keg; but to-day, +father, the devil jogged my elbow, and that which is blended cannot be +separated. The wine remains a rich colour, holy father, as you shall +see, and none shall know----" + +"Vile and shameless sinner that you are," the priest interrupted. "To +dilute a wine which is already too thin to gladden the heart of man and +make him a cheerful countenance--to do so, I say, is to commit a most +deadly sin." + +"Exact not so heavy a fine as at last confession, good father. Would +not have me close my tavern? The wine is a good wine," Michel added +professionally, "and the little water added is methinks an aid to +virtue." + +"Art so fond of water?" replied the confessor grimly. "Water you shall +have. Go down now to the river, swim across, and return in like +manner, and afterwards come to me again. Go now! I have lesser +sinners to absolve." + +"The river will be villainous cold, my father. And I cannot swim." + +"Learn," said the inexorable priest. "Come not to me again till you +have crossed the river as I have said. May you take into your evil +stomach an abundance of cold water while learning." + +The taverner retired dissatisfied, and when outside the church rubbed +his head and ruminated. "The confession was ill-timed," he muttered. +"His reverence is in an evil humour. The devil shall seize me body and +soul before I set one foot into that accursed river. But there is +Father St Agapit. I will go forthwith and confess to him." + +The taverner's propitious star was in the ascendant. When he reached +the chapel of Ste. Anne vespers had not concluded, for the office was +there recited with greater reverence and detail than in the church of +Ste. Mary Bonsecours. Michel pushed himself into a front place and +hastened to make himself conspicuous by various fussy acts of outward +devotion. The office over, he lingered until St Agapit came to him, +and the taverner then repeated the confession which he had already +made, with such disastrous consequences, to Laroche. + +"Since the evil nature of man drives him to drink much wine, let him +partake of it as weak as may be, for his soul's health," said the +sincere priest. "But, my son, it behoves you to make known to your +patrons the truth." + +"I dare not," said Michel, rejoicing at heart because he saw a prospect +of cheating the devil. + +"Then are you guilty of deceit," said the priest. "Mix water with your +wine no more, and for your deceit you shall say the litany of St. +Anthony of Padua six times before the altar of Ste. Anne. But see that +you wash before approaching the holy shrine, because I perceive upon +you the odour of wine-casks." + +Having brought his duty to an end, St Agapit drew his cloak round him +and went out. While studying that day the work of a German philosopher +he had been confronted by the startling theory that the brain and +stomach of the human system were possibly connected by means of nerves. +He desired to procure from one of the settler-soldiers a dead rabbit +which he might dissect for his own enlightenment. + +As he went a woman met him. + +"Father," she cried, "a soldier lies at my house at the point of death, +praying for a priest to confess him." + +"Follow me to the church," said St Agapit. + +He passed back into the little log-building, took the reserved Host and +the sacred oils from an inlaid case, and wrapping these consolations of +the Church in his cloak accompanied the woman. + +Upon a palliasse in one of the cabins on the eastern slope a young man +lay dying of pneumonia, that fell disease which the medical science of +the day could only fight by sage shakings of the head and a judicious +use of the cupping-glass. The commandant's own doctor stood there, a +man with some knowledge of medicinal plants and skilled by long +experience in the treatment of sword-cuts, helplessly watching the +exodus of his patient. + +"I resign him to your charge, good father," he said, bending his back +to the priest. "He has passed beyond the help of science. Had I been +summoned earlier"--he shrugged his shoulders--"a discreet use of the +lance might well have relieved the fatal rush of blood to the brain and +saved a life for the king." + +"Perchance an incision in the stomach to release the foul vapours----" +began St Agapit. + +"Useless, my father. The disease, I do assure you, is in the blood." + +The abbé knelt and administered the last sacraments of his Church. The +young soldier remained entirely conscious and his confession came in a +steady whisper. + +"Father," he concluded, "I would speak with the commandant." + +St Agapit looked at the physician by the flickering light of a pine +torch. The latter shook his head. + +"'Tis impossible. Roussilac is at supper. But I may leave a message +as I pass." + +"Say that Jean-Marie Labroquerie calls on him with his dying breath," +whispered the soldier. + +The physician left; the woman who owned the cabin moved silently in +preparation for the carrying out of the body, because people were +practical in the days when death by violence occurred almost hourly. +St Agapit lowered his thin face to catch the message of the passing man. + +"Hidden in the straw you shall find a roll of parchment. I pray you +take it and use it as you will. It is the work of my father, a learned +man. We quarrelled. I stole his work and left my home. I repented +and would have taken it back. It was of no service to me. I cannot +read. If it be of value, let my old father gain the profit." + +"Does he live within the New World?" + +"Two days' journey beyond the river. In a log cabin surrounded by a +palisade which these hands erected. My father healed some Indians who +were sick, and thus obtained their friendship. There was I brought up +with my sister, my fair sister. Oh, my father, I would see again my +sister. I would feel the touch of her hand, and see her bright hair +that flamed in the sun. I would give these my last moments for the +sight of her eyes, and the sound of her voice, saying as she was wont, +'Jean-Marie, my brother! Life is a glorious gift.' Ah, my father!" + +"Peace, son. Set your mind upon this suffering." + +The abbé held a crucifix into the glow of the torch. + +"Jesus is not so jealous, father, that He forbids us to love our own. +I was going back when I could obtain my congé, like the prodigal, to +seek my father's forgiveness. My mother was to blame for our +unhappiness. Solitude and disappointment had embittered her life. She +had a cruel tongue and her hand was rough. I was a coward. I fled. +My sister's eyes have pursued me. I made myself a profligate, to +forget. But memory is a knife in an open wound." + +The minutes passed punctuated by the gasps of the sufferer. The torch +burnt down to its knot, and another was kindled by the pale woman. The +sound without was the wash of the tide. + +"He comes not," moaned the soldier. "Bear me a message, father." + +The dry rattling of beads broke the silence. + +"Speak, my son." + +The soldier uttered a piteous cry: "Madeleine! Madeleine!" + +"Oh, son! Call rather on the name of Mary." + +A gust of dark air swept into the cabin, the torch flame waved like a +flag, and a man stood behind muffled to the eyes, breathing as though +he had come with speed. He threw aside his martial cloak, and +straightway stood revealed. + +"Jean-Marie," he muttered. + +"Arnaud. Stand aside, my father. Let me meet my cousin face to face." + +The priest moved back, and the two soldiers, the officer and the +fighting-man, stared into each other's eyes. + +"Had I known this, Jean-Marie----" began the commandant; but the figure +upon the palliasse, straining from death as a dog from the leash, broke +in upon him. + +"Cousin, you knew. When I have passed have you not averted your eyes, +ashamed of the man who has had neither the wit nor the opportunity to +rise? You have made yourself great, and I--but this is no time for +calling up the past. I am spent. Come to me, cousin--nearer. Why, +commandant, art afraid of a dying man?" + +"Is he dying?" + +"He is in God's hands," the priest answered; and the woman grumbled: +"Yes, yes, and a long time lying there, keeping me from my bed." + +"Out!" said Roussilac, turning upon her. "Out, and repeat not what you +may have heard." + +The woman slunk away frightened. + +"Ah, cousin, that old manner," smiled Jean-Marie. "So spoke you as a +boy. They said you would find greatness. My father would say, 'He is +a Brutus. Would condemn his own son.' I know not who Brutus was, but +my father was a learned man." + +He coughed terribly and lay back gasping. + +"Say what lies upon your mind and have done," reproved St Agapit. "I +would have you die with better thoughts." + +"Cousin," panted Jean-Marie, "I forgive you as I hope for mercy. Place +now your hand on mine." + +Roussilac did so, shrinking at the freezing contact. + +"Your aunt and uncle and Madeleine your cousin dwell in this land, two +days' journey beyond the river. My father was hunted for his life. +They called him a wizard. You know? Yes, once at home you might have +shielded him, but there was your advancement to be thought on. Swear +to me to find them. Tell Madeleine how I died. Be good to her. Ah, +cousin, be a brother to Madeleine. You shall find her the fairest +sister in all this world. Swear to bring them from their solitude, to +protect my father. Swear before this holy priest to feed and clothe +them if they be in want, to care for them, and be to them a brother and +a son." + +Roussilac, who had softened for the moment, grew again stern. His +position was not so sure that it could withstand the attacks of tongues +that might whisper at home that the young governor of the new colony +sheltered a heretic uncle. Jean-Marie was quick to note the change. +He knew the hardness of his cousin's heart. + +"Swear to me, or have my shadow cursing you through life." + +The priest put out his arm with a word of adjuration. + +"The crucifix," the commandant muttered. + +St Agapit held it over the dying man. + +"Touch not the sacred symbol without a prayer, my son. Beware God's +wrath!" + +With one hand grasping the cold fingers, the other pressed fearfully +upon the metal figure thrilling in the priest's grasp, Roussilac took +the oath that was required of him. + +"And that I will keep it, I call God, our Lady, and the blessed saints +to witness!" he concluded in a hushed voice. + +Hardly had he spoken, and while he still watched his cousin lying white +with the light fading from his eyes, the fortress from end to end +became tumultuous. A gun roared, a din of shouting, the thud of flying +feet, the shriek of women, the cry of his soldiery swept up the slope +in wave upon wave of uproar. + +"An attack!" he cried. "And I am from my post!" + +"Peace!" said St Agapit, with a frown. "The God of battles is not +here." + +"Arnaud," came the hollow whisper out of the tumult, "I have more to +say. My voice goes. I pray you bend your head." + +"I came secretly," said Roussilac wildly. "I cannot stay. Father, +duty is calling me. My reputation, my position----" + +"Your family," said the priest, pointing sternly. + +The night air became a storm with the shout: "The Iroquois! The +Iroquois are upon us!" + +"Cousin!" whispered the dying man. + +"My position!" cried the commandant; and turning with the confession he +caught up his cloak, saying: "I will return. I will come back to you, +Jean-Marie. My country calls me." + +"His ambition!" murmured the lean priest, as the door swung back, and +the tumult rolled in like a raging sea flung upon a cave. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI. + +IRON AND STEEL. + +The fortress was invested upon three sides: up the precipitous westward +slope swarmed the Senacas and Cayugas; the fan-shaped body of the +Onondagas advanced from the east, where the ground was broken; eastward +and westerly on the valley side, where the attackers hoped to strike +the victorious blow, the confederate bands of the Mohawks and Oneidas +lay hidden, awaiting the signal which had been agreed upon. The river +occupied the line to the south, and between its banks and the enemy +ambushed in the valley an outlet was left in order that the French +might be given the opportunity of vacating their position. Once in +open country, they might be broken up into bands and hunted down. + +The attack from west and north had been arranged to draw the French +from the one point where the fortress was vulnerable. It appeared as +though the besieged were tumbling blindfold into the trap, which a +general of experience would have at once suspected. Every fighting-man +in the fortress assembled to hold the almost impregnable heights. In +the absence of the leader this mistake was pardonable. There the noise +of battle was terrific. The wild light of the bush fire beyond the +river flung its shadows over the grass hill and cast into detail +figures and flashing tomahawks. A storm of hissing arrows swept over +the rocks. The bronze-skinned warriors rushed up and climbed the +heights. The bravest of the Senacas, that hardy fighting race of the +highlands, were already within the fortress, tomahawking the gunners +with hideous yells. + +The man-of-war was useless. Boats were let down, and the sailors flung +ropes round the ends of the logs which supported the fire-raft, and +towed the flaming peril away. Then the clumsy ship blundered up +stream, only to find herself helplessly cut off from the enemy by the +sheer wall of rock. She drifted back, and the master gave the order +for the guns to be beached and dragged up the slope to strengthen the +resources of the besieged. + +"'Fore Heaven!" cried Van Vuren. "The natives win!" + +The Dutchmen had perforce returned to watch the progress of the +assault. They saw the Cayugas dealing blows against the summit, +repulsed, but never actually losing ground. Each assault found the +height invested more strongly by the overwhelming host. Similar +success attended the ascent of the Onondagas. The rival factions +swayed upon the distant summit, lit by the fire of the cannon. + +The Dutchmen hovered in uncertainty, until the opposition yielded and +the Indians began to burn the huts which looked down upon the river. +At this signal a shout went up from the valley, and the Mohawks and +Oneidas rushed out to complete the work. At the same time Van Vuren +gave the word, and the big men re-crossed the river, gained the level, +and joined the sachems and doctors who were dancing and screaming at +the foot of the hill. + +Abruptly a line of soldiers formed upon the crest to the roaring of +cannon, and these trained fighters bore down through the smoke, +sweeping away the opposition as wind carries the snow. Immediately +yells of dismay sounded above, where the Indians who had been trapped +were being put to the sword. The blind repulse had at length given way +to method. + +A report had passed about the fortress that Roussilac had been +assassinated, and the body deprived of its brains became thereupon +powerless to act. But Gaudriole came hopping from gun to gun, crying: +"Courage, my comrades! I have seen the commandant. He did but go down +to the chapel of Ste. Anne to confess his sins. See where he comes! +Long live our governor!" + +The soldiers caught up his cry and fought with new energy when they +beheld Roussilac's slight figure wrapped in a long cloak. He passed +deliberately from east to north, issuing his orders and rapidly +altering the entire nature of the fight. The besieged became the +attackers; the hunters became the hunted. Roussilac's pale face +restored confidence. His contemptuous coolness brought victory within +sight. Before setting the trap for the Cayugas and Senacas his martial +eye had lingered upon the silent valley. There he concentrated his +best fighters, and despatched an order to the ship, directing the +master to bring up the naval guns. The sailors were soon at their +work, dragging the light guns into position and training the muzzles +upon the suspected valley, while powder-monkeys ran up with charge and +ball, and the gunners arranged their port-fire. + +With the attack of the previously ambushed Mohawks, the battle for +possession may be said to have commenced. Skill, holding a position +which subsequent history proved to be practically impregnable, became +opposed by numbers blindly indifferent to death. + +The Dutchmen fled at that repulse when the natives about them had been +flung back almost to the forest. They halted upon the beach and +deliberated on the practicability of flight through the smoking country +which hemmed the opposite shore. It was then that Dutoit made the +discovery that two of his men were missing. + +"We cannot regain the bodies," said Van Vuren, when the announcement +was made. "The French mayhap have already discovered them, and thus +know that we have taken arms against them. Flight is now forced upon +us." + +Dawn was near when Hough reached the scene of action. The din of +battle had carried over the land, driving the birds and beasts +northward in fear, and he and his stout comrade had started out at +once. Scarce a mile had been traversed when Penfold's leg gave way; he +sent his companion on, and hobbled slowly along his track, hoping to be +in before the end. + +At a glance the Puritan perceived the flaw in the attack. + +"Why do ye waste your men against that wall?" he shouted at the chiefs. +"Bring every man round to the east. Follow me, warriors. Follow, we +shall conquer yet." + +He might as profitably have addressed the stones. He ran in among the +fighters, dealing blows with the flat of his sword, and pointing +through the shadows to the fierce conflict upon the edge of the valley. + +"There!" he shouted, trying to recall some scattered words of the +language. "There, where the sun rises!" + +At length he made himself clear, and a section of the fighters, more +cool-headed than the remainder, professed themselves willing to follow, +and some of the hot-headed chiefs, perceiving method in the +Englishman's madness, turned also calling back their men. + +Twice had the Mohawks broken through the front line and been repulsed +before reaching the cannon, which spouted its hail down the valley. A +barrier of French dead piled the space beside the artillery. Roussilac +strode to and fro, withdrawing men from points where they could ill be +spared that he might throw them upon the side where the lines wavered. +Here the flower of the fighting-men struggled. Laroche fought here +like the brave man he undoubtedly was, swearing fearfully, but never +ceasing from the skilful sword-play which freed many a brown warrior +from the burden of the fight. A charm seemed to protect his great +body, the arrows leaving him unscathed, the blows of the tomahawks +seeming to deflect as they descended, until the soldiers fought for the +pride of place at the side of the priest, whom they believed to be +under the special protection of the saints. + +"Infidels, unbelieving and unbaptised! Down, down!" shouted Laroche, +blinking the sweat from his eyes. + +Repeatedly the Iroquois turned the line at the weak spot which Nature +had overlooked in her plan of fortification, but Roussilac was prepared +always with a band waiting to stem the rush. This could not last. His +soldiers were thinning, and there seemed to be no limit to the numbers +of the Indians. They pressed up in horde upon horde, their shouts +cleaving the moist wind, their arrows inexhaustible, their courage +undiminished. Then the word came that the Cayugas and Senacas were +giving way upon the west with the manifest intention of strengthening +their allies. + +"Let them come," cried Roussilac loudly, for his men's benefit. "Only +send me as many soldiers as can be spared from that position." But to +himself he muttered: "The game is up," and he wrung his brain for a +_ruse de guerre_. + +"Send me a dozen men with a cannon yonder to work round and attack +these savages in the rear," he said to one of his captains, who had +been put out of the fight by a wound in the arm. "If they can but +raise sufficient noise they may appear as a relieving force. It +disheartens even a brute to fight between two foes." + +"We cannot spare the men, Excellency." + +"They must be spared," replied Roussilac. + +A messenger rushed up, breathless and triumphant. + +"Excellency, the Algonquins are coming to our aid in force," he panted. + +For the first time in many hours the commandant smiled. + +"You spoke truly," he said to the captain. "We cannot spare those men." + +He turned and recoiled with a shiver. St Agapit, a long, black figure, +stood beside him in the wet wreaths of the dawn. + +"Your cousin is dead," said the priest. "He died but half an hour ago, +with a curse upon his tongue. You have lost me that man's soul." + +He half lifted his hand and moved away, seeing nothing of the great +struggle, heeding the clamour not at all, because the sun was about to +rise and he had his Mass to say. + +While light was breaking over the cliffs in the east, where the +fishermen of Tadousac hid themselves throughout that night, Oskelano +brought his men clear of the forest and disposed them upon the plain. +The old man was no mean general. He sent out his spies, and when the +men returned with the information that the French were being crushed by +superior numbers he divided his force into three bands. The first he +sent like a wedge between the Onondagas and the force advancing from +the west under Hough's leadership; the second he flung to the north of +the Mohawks and Oneidas; and, having thus completely separated the +allied forces, he threw his third band upon the rear of the men who +were slowly carrying the position from the valley. + +The Cayugas and Senacas were beaten back to the river. The Onondagas, +attacked on two sides and at first mistaking foe for friend, were +shattered at a first charge and fled for the forest. The fighters in +the valley alone held their ground, until the light became strong; and +then Roussilac drew up his entire force and directed in person a charge +which hurled the stubborn Mohawks back upon the axes of the Algonquins +awaiting them upon the lower ground. The survivors fled and were +pursued by the northern tribe. The French flung themselves down +exhausted, while Laroche wiped his sword and streaming face, and panted +a benediction upon dead and wounded and living alike. + +Thus the Iroquois Confederacy received a shattering blow from which it +never recovered; and the land was made secure to France for a long two +hundred years. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII. + +OB AND AZURE. + +After that complete repulse of the Iroquois tribes the French found +themselves so weak as to be practically at the mercy of a foe. Another +resolute attack must have driven them from their position. But the +Iroquois bands were completely disorganised; the few English scattered +about the maritime provinces, including that remnant of Scots in the +east, who had settled Newfoundland and Nova Scotia only to see their +territories wrested from them, were entirely inadequate even in +combination to menace the supremacy of the House of Bourbon; and it may +be questioned whether, at that time, any Scotsman would have stood to +fight side by side with the English. Soon another ship would arrive +from Marseilles, bringing, not only provisions and ammunition, but a +reinforcement of men, prepared to till the ground as settlers should, +but far more ready to continue the French error of attempting to +colonise with the sword. On the heels of the discovery of two Dutch +bodies among the Indian slain, La Salle returned, and conveyed to +Roussilac the information that an English spy was escaping south. +Gaudriole also announced that Van Vuren and his company were bearing in +that same direction. Roussilac's hand was forced. If these men +escaped him the fortress might be called upon to resist, not only an +English, but possibly a Dutch invasion also. He sent out twenty men +immediately to cut off the Hollanders, leaving the garrison depleted to +no more than fifty men available for defence; and the commandant made +haste to reward Oskelano for his services as suitably as his resources +would permit, and sent him home, fearful lest the treacherous Algonquin +might discover, and take advantage of, his weakness. + +When La Salle stood before him, and announced that the English spy was +the guest of one Madame Labroquerie, a widow living with her daughter +in the country to the south, the commandant refused to betray himself, +but replied that he would accompany the priest and be a witness to the +hanging of the Englishman. At the same time, he considered, he might +keep the oath which he had sworn to his dead cousin. Having given the +order for a troop of men to attend upon his person, he abandoned the +subject which awoke in him unpleasant memories, and bowing haughtily to +La Salle--for he and the priest were in a manner rivals--congratulated +him upon his appointment to the governorship of Acadie, the +confirmation of which, signed by the Cardinal himself, had lately been +delivered by the hand of the master of the _St. Wenceslas_. + +"This fortress will be the weaker for your loss, Sir Priest," he said, +feigning a sorrow which he could not feel. "May I seek to know when +you propose to set forth to the undertaking of your new +responsibilities?" + +"If my work here be finished what time the _St. Wenceslas_ sails +homeward I shall depart with her," La Salle replied, flashing a +disdainful glance upon Roussilac. "But I have yet to rid this land of +its English vermin." + +With that implied scorn of the governor, and suggestion of his own +superiority, La Salle departed to make his preparations; and an hour +later a troop of horsemen rode forth, Roussilac at the head, and beside +him Gaudriole jesting for his chief's amusement; on the other side the +two priests--for Laroche accompanied his senior--and behind six +soldiers, riding two abreast on bright bay ponies, their weapons +flashing in the sunlight. + +There had been war in the grove. An angry scene passed between mother +and daughter when Madeleine returned after seeing her lover upon his +way. For the first time in her life the girl lost her sweet patience, +and returned word for word so hotly that Madame at length became +afraid, and backed away, yet muttering: + +"Men shall stay your pride, girl, if a weak woman may not." + +"They also shall find that a resolute mind is not quickly broken," +Madeleine returned. + +"The law against heresy is still in being," Madame threatened, made +still more bitter by the knowledge that her daughter and Geoffrey had +together outwitted her. "I have borne with you, because you are my +child. Our Lady punishes me for my lack of devotion. I had speech but +recently with a holy priest. We shall see, when that priest returns. +We shall see!" + +"Drive me from you with that bitter tongue, as you drove out +Jean-Marie," cried Madeleine, her fair throat swelling like a bird in +song. "So shall you die without son or daughter at your side, and none +but an Indian shall see you to your grave." + +At that Madame put up her hand with a superstitious gesture, and limped +away, her yellow face wrinkled with rage; nor did she speak again to +her daughter until the Indian servant entered the cabin to announce the +coming of a warlike band. Then she croaked at Madeleine: "'Tis the +holy priest. Know you not, girl, how those are punished who conspire +to aid an enemy of their country?" Then she hasted away to don the cap +and gown which she had kept against the coming of a change of fortune. + +There came a sound of voices, the troop rode into the grove, and +Madeleine, as she stood trembling at the door, was greeted by +Gaudriole, who bowed and grinned as he announced his Excellency the +Commandant to visit the Madame Labroquerie and the fair lady her +daughter. + +"I am Madeleine Labroquerie," stammered the girl, frightened for a +moment by the brave show of mounted men. + +"Cousin," cried a half-familiar voice, "hast put a friend and relative +out of memory?" + +Dazzled by the sunlight after the gloom of the cabin, Madeleine shaded +her eyes. She saw before her a tall man, sallow and dark, his hair +falling in snaky lines to his shoulders, the golden fleur-de-lys worked +upon his blue surcoat making his face the more sickly by comparison. +Before she could return his salutation he had dropped to his knee and +kissed her hand. + +"Years have passed since we parted, cousin," he said. "The present +finds me with position, and you with beauty. I knew not that you were +here until your brother told me." + +"Arnaud!" she exclaimed, giddy with amazement at finding the boy who +had been the autocrat of childhood's games grown into a man of power. +Then, because her heart was so tender to all that breathed, she forgot +the character of the man who was looking down upon her with increasing +wonder to find how the plain child with the tangle of flaming hair had +blossomed into this lovely creature, and asked quickly: +"Jean-Marie--what of him?" + +Roussilac was not a man to tell ill-news gently. Wasting neither words +nor sentiment, he replied: "Your brother died but recently of fever, +calling upon your name with his last breath." + +His final words were intended to show her that he had been by the sick +man's side until the end. + +Madeleine turned white and tottered. Then, as her strong heart +recovered, she said: + +"Let me call my mother. My father has long been dead. We have +remained poor, Arnaud," she added defiantly. "But if you have +ascended, we have at least not descended." + +"To what higher pinnacle can a woman wish to attain than that of +perfect beauty?" he replied gallantly; but he noticed that she left him +with a frown. + +"Had I but known that she had grown so fair!" he muttered. + +Gaudriole was grinning at his side. The dwarf put up his red hand and +showed his chief a dead butterfly, its bright plumage well-nigh worn +away, its wings crushed and wet. + +"Short-lived beauty, Excellency," he leered, with the jester's +privilege. "Yesterday shining in the sun. To-day!" He laughed +hoarsely and dropped the ruined insect. "'Tis a world of change and +contrast," he chuckled. "Mark this philosophy, my captain. When old +age sends me white hairs and a reverend aspect you shall perchance call +me beautiful, if you look not too closely at my hump; but when the +bloom of yonder beauteous lady turns to seed----" + +"Off, Bossu!" cried Roussilac angrily. "Learn to turn your jesting +with a better judgment, or your tongue shall be slit and your back +whipped." + +"My faith!" the dwarf chuckled. "I have no back. I am like the frog, +but shoulders and legs." + +Madame herself appeared in a fresh white cap and an antique gown. It +was not her way to be gracious, nor were her recollections of her +nephew's fidelity of the happiest; so she did but greet him coldly, +asking why he had now come since he had tarried so long. + +"Good aunt," came the reply, "I would have sought you earlier, had I +known you were in this land. I have not long held command, and my +hands have been filled in crushing the strength of the Iroquois. I +entreat you both to return with me now and take up your abode at the +fortress, not indeed as my guests, but as an honoured mother and +sister." + +"Pretty talk," sniffed Madame. "I said in the old days you would make +a courtier. So you, the governor of the land, knew nothing of this +home of your poor relations a paltry two days' journey beyond the +river. There is no man so blind as he who makes a living by that +infirmity. This girl tells me that my son is dead. Died he in the +faith of the Church?" + +"Surely," said Roussilac. "But tell me I pray, good aunt, is it true, +as this Indian says, that the English spy has already escaped?" + +"Yes, he has gone," cried Madeleine, flushing warmly. "He has gone, +Arnaud, to--to the west." + +Her deceit was so transparent that even Roussilac could not restrain a +smile. + +"And why, fair cousin," he asked, addressing her with marked deference, +"why should this Englishman seek the unknown west, where it is believed +none dwell save Indians? Would he not rather turn towards the south, +and seek New England and his own people?" + +"Indeed I know not why he should seek the west," Madeleine replied, +between tears and laughter. "But I do assure you he has gone in that +direction----" + +"Peace, girl," her mother cried. "The fool lies to you, Arnaud. She +is a heretic, shame though it be, and her master is the father of lies. +'Tis true the English spy escaped in the early morning, but he knows +not the land, and may yet be secured. I am surrounded all my life long +by wickedness," the bitter woman continued. "My husband was perverted +by the sin of science. Jean-Marie was but a knave. He left me here. +Madeleine is a heretic, and she has threatened to leave me also. Well, +I will come with you, Arnaud, but see that you give me a scented pillow +for my head and a cup of warm wine at evening. Stand not there, +nephew, like a wooden stock, but command one of yonder evil-faced +rogues to bring up a horse fitted for the age and dignity of the first +lady in this thrice-accursed land." + +An evil smile curved the thin line of Roussilac's mouth. His aunt had +indeed not changed; but she had yet to learn that he had advanced. He +turned to where the priests were talking loudly in the shade of the +grove, noting La Salle's anger at the failure of his mission, and a few +paces beyond his troopers jesting in the sun. Then he looked upon the +fair face of Madeleine and smiled again. + +"Tamalan," he called, dividing his attention between the soldier he was +addressing and his aunt, "prepare your pony for the use of the first +lady in this great colony of France--the lady Madeleine Labroquerie." + +He bowed slightly towards the silent girl. + +For one instant Madame appeared to stifle. Then she drew back her lips +and snarled at her nephew, yet without uttering a word. + +"This is not Normandy, Madame," said Roussilac calmly. "And you have +not here the boy whose cheeks you would smite when the angry fit was on +you. This is the New World, and I am the Representative of his most +sacred Majesty, King Louis the Thirteenth." + +Madame started forward, two passionate red spots upon her cheeks, her +bony hand uplifted; but Roussilac indicated the golden fleur-de-lys +upon his breast and said, in the quiet consciousness of power: +"Remember!" + +The little woman stood for a moment motionless, grinding her teeth, her +black eyes starting from a ghastly countenance, then flung herself back +into the cabin, tearing at her hair and cap in the madness of her +anger. Roussilac watched with the same quiet smile, and when she had +gone turned to Madeleine and said: + +"My aunt forgets that time may work a change." + +"Pardon her," murmured the girl. "This solitude has touched her brain." + +Then La Salle strode up with angry questionings: "Shall we tarry here +all the day, Sir Commandant, while the heretic escapes? Know you not +that New England swarms with Puritans, who, if they but hear of our +weakness, shall fill this land and compel us forth by their numbers?" + +"You speak truly, Sir Priest," Roussilac answered. "We do but waste +our time." + +Crossing to the men, he selected the five strongest ponies and the five +most trustworthy soldiers, and charged the latter to ride out, secure +the Englishman, and hang him out of hand. These men set forth +immediately, while Roussilac turned himself to the task of soothing La +Salle, and to the pleasure of flattering the fair lady his cousin. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII. + +THE EVERLASTING HILLS. + +After their escape from the dangerous region of the fortress on that +night of battle, Van Vuren and his band made towards the far-distant +country watered by the Hudson, travelling under the guidance of Pieter +von Donck across the unfrequented territory, over balsamic hills of +spruce, through swamps and thickets, and across a desert of dusty +stone, until they reached a range of green mountains which made an +immense backbone along the land. Here they halted, and the note of +argument was raised. Van Vuren had developed a sullen mood, induced by +jealousy of Von Donck, who had taken the office of leader upon himself, +and at this point he turned upon the sailor and a heated battle of +words ensued. The captain indicated the flat district spreading +westward, and confidently declared that the route lay there. His men +obediently turned to follow, with the exception of Von Donck, who, when +his argument failed, separated himself forthwith from the company. + +"Take then your inland path," he shouted at them angrily. "You shall +in due time come among the savage Adirondacks, where the Mohawks dwell +unconquered, and where all manner of wild beasts fill the fastnesses. +No white man has preceded you there. This way I smell the sea. Keep +your course, captain, if you will not be ruled by me. I am for New +Amsterdam and the hostel beside San Nicolas." + +"Pieter knows the land," urged Dutoit. + +"Go then with the stubborn fool," replied Van Vuren hotly. "Follow me, +my men. This way for the sea!" + +The rest of the company succumbed to discipline and followed their +leader, though with manifest unwillingness; while Von Donck gave them +over to their fate and travelled alone into the green hills. + +What befell Van Vuren and his company history relateth not. It is +certain that they were never taken by the French, because the party +which Roussilac had sent out returned in due course to the fortress, +and reported that they had failed to discover any trace of the +traitors. But at a later date there went a story about Hudson's river, +concerning a party of Dutchmen said to be haunting the spurs of the +Adirondacks, weather-beaten men, wrinkled and long-bearded, their feet +covered with scraps of hide, their clothes eked out by furs, +continually setting out upon a journey, but always returning to their +starting-point. Still later, after New Amsterdam had been conquered by +the English and had received the name of New York, mothers would often +frighten their errant children with the tale of the lost Dutchmen who +wandered about the north, their beards dragging on the stones and +tangling among the bush, watching the sun by day and the stars by +night, and sometimes separating as though in anger, but only to combine +again and renew the hopeless search. Probably Van Vuren and his men +were destroyed by the fierce Mohawks; possibly they fell a prey to the +animals which roamed in their thousands among the Adirondacks, or +perished of want after their ammunition became exhausted; the one fact +is certain that not one of them ever reached the sea-blown country of +the Manhattoes. + +While this fatal dissension took place Geoffrey was crossing the plains +upon the further side of the green mountains, only a short distance +ahead. He had made excellent progress, concealing himself cleverly +from bands of marauding Indians, guiding his feet by the constellations +at night, and searching by day for the tree-moss which delicately +furred the north side only of the hemlock boles; but there still +remained over two hundred miles of wild country between him and the +town of Boston. He tramped on, unheeding sore feet, feeling the spirit +of brave Madeleine at his side, averting the perils of night, guiding +his feet accurately southward. As time went on, and he reflected how +great was the distance he had already traversed, the joy of life became +so strong that he could have flung away his sword and dared the world +with bare hands. + +Two weeks had passed since that parting from his comrades; and on the +evening of the fourteenth day he broke from the bush and for some +moments stood bewildered at the scene before him, blinking his eyes, +and longing to step back into the greenwood shade. + +White masses of mountain glowed ahead, peaks and crags all glittering +in the sun like a huge cascade streaming down from the clouds; ranges +of pure crystal, polished like glass, and edged with rose-pink by the +colours of the western sky; snow-white gorges of milky quartz, and +silver cataracts flung in foam from the whiteness above to the green +below. + +"These," he said softly, with a thrill of old-world superstition, +"these must surely be the great crystal mountains where the Iroquois +believe that the gods dwell." + +He hurried on, his eyes watering because of the dazzling light +reflected from those crystal walls; and as he went he turned to lover's +thoughts, and determined that, after all, the sun glow upon the white +peaks was not one-half so lovely as the flush upon Madeleine's soft +cheek. Here before him was Nature's finest insentient handiwork. It +was glowing and full of music, but its loveliness lacked life, and its +warmth was borrowed from the sun. It was only beautiful as a part of +the environment of the life of the soul. How he longed for Madeleine +to stand at his side and behold those everlasting hills in splendour +and the sun swimming in red! And with that longing he half +unconsciously breathed the healthful text to which she had attuned her +happy soul, "It is life--glorious, everlasting life!" + +Vitality rose to its full height within Geoffrey's body; and when he +felt no more the weight of his heavy kit, he ran over the broken ground +and up the narrow gorge, until two white walls closed him gently into +the panting bosom of the crystal hills. + +"Here is the home of fairies," he exclaimed, when he stopped at a great +height, and looked upon three tiny lakes which made a trinity of +motionless mirrors decked by feathers of cloud, the water like white +wine brimming in great bowls of granite. + +Immediately a gentle voice was wafted through the air, "Here is the +home of fairies," and after a pause the information was repeated like +the warble of a weary bird, the last notes dying inaudible around the +cliffs. + +Geoffrey dared not speak again. The genius of the place was over him, +waiting to give a signal to the expectant choir. Footfalls preceded +the traveller, the echo of his own. The many-mouthed King of the +Mountains pattered before him, breathing the stranger a gentle welcome +to the district which he ruled. Geoffrey crept on tiptoe to the edge +of the nearest pool, until he could see the weedless rock-bottom and +the land-locked salmon lying near the surface, gently fanning their red +fins, and watching him with wondering eyes. Seating himself, the +traveller bathed his weary feet and watched the water swallows, darting +and splashing, snatching the fat flies which spotted the surface like +drops of rain, sucking them in and pushing out their little black noses +for more. + +The sun went down and a chill crept into the wind. Geoffrey left the +enchanted spot, and the salmon shooting like silver arrows through the +darkening pool, and, again ascending, entered a richly-wooded glen +through which a cascade ran in a white thread; and here, close to a +winding path beaten out by the feet of mountain sheep, he pitched his +camp and ate his frugal meal of dried meat, which he eked out by a few +early berries and some sweet roots of the wood althæa. + +The light went out from the long day as he sank into dreams of +Madeleine. He pictured her swaying among the scented grasses of the +lowlands, or breathing a prayer for his welfare while she awaited the +evening star in the faint blue of the sky. He saw her leaning from the +hill-top watching the southern line, and bounding joyously away when +she found the sky all clear. He imagined her lying asleep with her +mind awake for him; and he believed that in his sleep her sweet dreams +would cause his lips to open and his tongue to call her name. + +A rustling in the near bush recalled him to the present. He thought +the sound was occasioned by some restless bird, but when the +disturbance became more decided, he rose, alert, and, putting out a +hand for his bow, shrank back into a place of shelter. Hardly had he +done so when a thicket of willow shivered and parted. + +The watcher saw two savage eyes aglow like lamps, and as he sank to the +ground and remained motionless as a figure of stone, a great panther +slouched into the open, with its nose upon the ground. + +The creature passed, blowing up the dust as though following a fresh +scent. Geoffrey noticed with a thrill of relief that the ground it was +intent upon was not that which he had traversed. When the huge cat had +crawled into the bush, he drew out one of his few remaining arrows and +cautiously followed; but not more than twenty paces had he advanced +into the clinging bush when there came to him for the first time during +his wanderings the exclamation of a human voice. + +Geoffrey plunged forward recklessly until he saw a circular opening +such as Nature delights to make in her laying out of the densest +forest. The cataract formed the left; a bank of trees rose to the +right; opposite him a big man sat in the half light, holding a +smouldering pipe, his eyes fixed in terror upon the panther, which lay +upon its belly half a dozen yards away, growling and lashing its tail +in its savage cat's joy. The man was unarmed. He had left his pack +and weapons under a shelf of white rock which gleamed behind. + +Viner edged nearer, but as he stirred a twig snapped and the panther +looked round, its eyes full of fire and blood. At the same moment the +stout man discovered his rescuer and a flush of colour returned to his +bloodless cheeks. Keeping his eyes upon the enemy, he began to crawl +towards the rock, shouting as he went: "Drive at him, boy. Send a +shaft through his neck, and Pieter von Donck shall stand your friend +for life." + +The bolt, well-aimed by the boy's cool hands, sprang that instant into +the beast's shoulder. As it felt the sting of the barb, the panther +roared and leapt mightily into the bush, landing upon the exact spot +which Geoffrey had cleverly vacated in time to save his life. Again +Von Donck bellowed like a bull: + +"Let him have one such another, comrade. Then into the bush and dodge +him. I have powder here and ball." + +Geoffrey hurriedly slipped another arrow along the groove of his +cross-bow and secured the string. Quick as he was, the great cat was +quicker. It hurled itself upon the tree behind which its enemy had +taken shelter, and its iron claws wrenched off great flakes of bark. +Again Geoffrey saved himself by leaping back, but the panther was up at +the rebound and on him. For the third time Geoffrey dodged, and in +doing so released the string, and the bolt, by happy chance, pierced +the demon in the chest as it descended. The next instant Geoffrey was +felled to the moss. But this effort was the panther's last. An +explosion shook the bush, there came a villainous smell of saltpetre, a +whirl of smoke, and the mountain cat fell upon its side, quivered, and +lay dead. + +"A brave invention this powder," snorted Von Donck triumphantly out of +the smoke. "But methinks too costly save for an emergency." He broke +off and muttered into his beard: "A thousand devils! The boy is +English." + +"A strange meeting, friend," said Geoffrey, as he rose somewhat blindly +to his feet. + +"Adventure makes many an alliance," quoth the Dutchman. "Were you +black, or brown, or yellow man, I would take your hand and swear to +stand your friend. You have saved my life, boy. Nay, deny it not, and +at the further risk of your own. By my soul, the brute has clawed your +shoulder. This must be seen to. Come, lie you here, while I bring +water and wash the wound and bind it up as best I can. A pestilence +destroy these same unholy animals. They strike a man like lightning." + +"If I have saved your life, you have done as much for me," said +Geoffrey. "Let us divide the honours." + +"A hand-shake upon that," cried the hearty Dutchman. "We are enemies +by blood, boy. You have fought against my people before this night, +and are like, I doubt not, to do so again. The Puritans of +Massachusetts have their eyes upon our New Netherlands. You and I may +yet meet upon opposite sides in the battle; but may God forge a +thunderbolt for my destruction if I do not seek to preserve the life of +one who has shed his blood for me. I suspect, boy, you are no true +Englishman. I dare swear your father or mother came of a good Dutch +stock." + +"I am English born and bred," said Geoffrey. "I could wish you were +the same," he boldly added. + +"Out, jester!" said the big man as he went down to the cataract. "It +is your envy speaking. Black never made itself whiter by longing." + +The Dutchman returned with his hat half filled with water and attended +to the injuries of his new friend, with podgy hands which were but a +little less rough than the nature of the man who owned them. Every +protestation on the part of his patient he silenced by a growl. When +the slight flesh-wound had been bandaged, he replenished the fire to +keep other mountain cats at bay, and they sat together under the white +wall, Von Donck occupied in skinning the defunct panther, chatting +noisily the while. + +"Do you wonder that I speak your language when I have been brought up +to a better?" he observed as the soft night grew upon them. "A soldier +of fortune must needs pick up all he can, grains and chaff alike. Many +years past, before that yellow hair of yours had grown to trouble a +maiden's heart--Ah, that blush was good. Shall repeat the phrase. +Before that yellow hair had grown to win a Dutchman's heart--see how I +spare your blushes to hurt your pride--I served under Hendrick Hudson, +who called himself English, though plague me if I could ever tell what +was English in him save his oaths. I promise you he could ring an +English oath to drown the best of yours. To-morrow will tell you how I +sailed with him up the Mohican river which now bears his name. 'Tis a +happy day for you, young comrade. Your future wife and children shall +bless this day--when you and old Pieter met. Plague the lad! His face +is like a poppy in a corn-field. Shall stand together, young +yellow-head, till the end of this journey. I do not seek to learn your +business, but you shall know mine. I am going home, boy, back to San +Nicolas by the sea, and there shall grow a yet rounder belly, and tell +travellers' tales, and toss my neighbours' children upon my knee. We +shall part in New England, enemies if you will, but until we reach the +fields of the Puritans we stand together, and the Indians that burn you +shall burn me also." + +"How come you to be travelling alone?" asked Geoffrey. + +"When you reach my age, young whipster, you shall learn that questions +are like thistle-seed, tossed here and there, serving no better purpose +than the sowing of a fresh weed-crop. I ask no question, but I know +that you carry a despatch to your Puritans in the south. See how +shrewdly I have hit it. Until two days back I travelled with my +company, but when they chose the way which leads to destruction I left +them. They have gone to the devil, and I am for the sea. At this +present time I am for sleep. When the moon touches yonder ridge, wake +me and I will take my watch. This panther's family may be on the +prowl." + +"'Tis a fine skin," said Geoffrey, indicating the striped coat which +Von Donck was stretching along the rock. + +"Will look well upon my shoulders," said Pieter complacently. "'Tis +mine by hunter's right. Shall swagger about New Amsterdam in it and +shame the burgomaster. At nights will sit in the hostel and say how I +killed him with mine own hand. The folk shall not believe, but I shall +have the hunter's satisfaction of making a brave show. By San Nicolas, +the brute shall not die so easily when I come to tell the story." + +The garrulous old sailor made a bed of grass and moss, and prepared to +sleep. Suddenly he broke into a deep laugh, and lifted his hand to +indicate a crystal ridge towards which the moon was drawing. "See you +how yonder granite is shaped into a man's face?" he said. "And, as I +live to sin, a likeness of mine own. See there my crooked nose and +flabby forehead and my hanging lips? Behold my beauty, boy, and bear +in mind that Pieter von Donck and yourself are the first travellers in +these crystal mountains. Ah, Pieter von Donck! Pieter von Donck!" he +continued in a shout, lifting himself upon his elbow, and shaking his +fist at the massive face of granite. "You sleep well yonder, Piet von +Donck. May you sleep as soundly for ten thousand years. Now, boy, +remember me in your prayers, but see that you put me not before your +sweet maid. God forbid that you should put an ancient rogue before +her. Forget not to shake me by the shoulder when the moon snuffs the +nose of yonder old man of the mountains." + +He fell back and soon began to snore, while Geoffrey watched the stern +stone profile and the moon rolling serenely over the crystal heights; +and as he watched he drifted away into dreams. + +These aerial castles toppled and fell when there came to his ears from +the adjoining valley a disturbance, which might have been occasioned by +mountain gnomes beating the rock with hammers of iron. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV. + +ART-MAGIC. + +Throwing off his sleep with a deep breath so soon as Geoffrey touched +his shoulder, Von Donck stared up at the moon, and then upon the +equally pale face of the watchman, who knelt over him and exclaimed: +"Hear the sounds along yonder valley?" + +In a moment the Dutchman was on his feet, alert and listening. + +"So," he snorted, when the steady tap-tap of the fairy hammers reached +his ears. "We are first here by only a little. How is that shoulder, +young fighter? Too stiff to draw a bow, or cross a sword?" + +"What mean you?" asked Geoffrey. + +"Frenchmen are upon us. The knaves to ride o' night when honest folk +sleep! They have forgot that the blessed echo carries far beyond them. +Now 'tis for me to contrive some snare for your executioners." + +Geoffrey quaked at the ugly emphasis which the big man gave to his +words. A new feeling of security had come to him with the sealing of +his partnership with the stout Hollander; and it appeared as though his +dream of safety was to be dissipated before it had taken a concrete +form. + +"What else think you?" went on Pieter, with his snorting laugh. "Shall +Roussilac allow a spy to reach New England, there to make known his +weakness, without striking a blow for his capture? See you that +straight limb on yonder pine? I tell you that slim body of yours would +have swung there ere sunrise, had you not by good luck fallen in with +Pieter von Donck." + +"They shall never hang me," said Geoffrey defiantly. + +"Spoken like a Dutchman," said the sailor. "But now to work. I have +as little mind as you to die out of season, for my shrift shall be as +short as yours if yonder little men pull me down. Scatter the fire, +and remove all traces of our camping-place, while I pull at my pipe and +think. The soldiers have a hard climb before them yet." + +Von Donck screwed the pieces of his wooden pipe together, filled the +bowl, and taking a brand from the fire, removed to the edge of the +cataract. There he sat, puffing great clouds, his eyes settled upon +the ravine, his face stony in thought, while Geoffrey swept the fire +into the cataract and obliterated all traces of the recent struggle +with the wild cat. + +"Bring me my panther hide," called Von Donck, rising with leisurely +movements. "We shall win a bloodless victory, and enjoy a laugh to +boot. Yonder lies the man to fight for us." + +He pointed with the stem of his pipe into the middle of the moon. + +Refusing to divulge more of his plan, Von Donck threw the pelt across +his shoulder and strode into the bush. Geoffrey followed, and the two +men struggled on for upwards of a mile, until the ground went away +sharply and the cataract thundered far below through a neck of rock +scarcely more than four feet in width. Here Von Donck halted and +steadied his body upon the brink. + +"If I fail to make this jump, reclaim my body from yonder depths, and +say that I fell like a soldier," he jested. + +Crossing the chasm, they descended, letting themselves from rock to +rock, and running whenever a sheep walk became visible. As they +entered the ravine the noise over the hills became more definite. + +"How is it they have tracked me?" asked Geoffrey as they ran. + +"I have no breath for idle talk," gasped his comrade. "They bring with +them an Indian, one of the cursed Algonquins, who shall tell when even +a bird has hopped across a stone." + +The climb began, up the face of the hills to the region of the moon. +The crystal wall was nowhere precipitous. When the summit had been +attained, Von Donck flung himself between the mighty lips of the +granite face and gasped heavily. Some minutes elapsed before speech +returned to him. + +"I would as soon carry a man upon my back as this weight of flesh," he +growled. "By San Nicolas, I did never so sweat in my life." + +"This is open rock, without tree or shelter," said Geoffrey +wonderingly. "We could have made a better stand in the bush." + +"Hasten yonder," ordered Von Donck. "Bring me as much dry wood as you +can bear, and ask no question, or I shall heave you down the face of +this cliff, which it has well-nigh killed me to climb." + +When Geoffrey returned with a few dry pine sticks, Von Donck was +collecting some moist moss from the underpart of the rocks. The moon +stood above the granite nose of the colossal face, and by her light the +Dutchman drew an imaginary line from the twin projections, which became +invested by distance with an exact similitude of the human mouth, to a +hole in the rock some twelve yards away. Here he built a fire, placing +above the grass and dry sticks a pile of white moss. Then he sat down +and well-nigh choked with laughter. + +"Prepare to strike a spark," he whispered. "But let no smoke arise if +you would escape hanging. The troop shall carry away with them a tale +to make these crystal mountains feared for ever." + +"What plan is this?" said Geoffrey irritably. "We stand upon the most +exposed spot of these mountains, and do you propose to light a fire so +that all who are concerned may know where we may be found?" + +"Control that voice and temper," whispered Von Donck. "Every sound +carries over yon ravine. Come, sit near me, and watch as pretty a +piece of art-magic as brain of man ever devised. Show not yourself +above the great face, or we are undone, and drop no spark into that +fire if you love your life." + +Geoffrey crawled along the side of the face and lay flat beside the +Dutchman's knee. The latter proceeded: + +"The Indians have great fear of these mountains. I promise you yonder +Frenchmen are driving their guide at the point of the sword, and +feeling none too secure themselves at entering the devil's country. A +man who fights a good sword shall sweat when a bird screams o' night. +So soon as they show themselves the old man of the mountains shall lift +up his voice, and you shall find, boy, that his tongue is mightier than +our swords." + +When Von Donck had spoken a breath of wind swept the exposed ridge. As +it passed a faint groan arose from the rock, and passed, leaving them +staring at each other fearfully. + +"It was but the wind," Geoffrey muttered. + +"San Nicolas!" stammered the Dutchman. "This comes of playing with the +powers of darkness. 'Twas the groan of a lost spirit." + +"Stay!" whispered Geoffrey. "I thought that the sound proceeded from +yonder stone." + +His comrade regarded the round mass which had been indicated with +starting eyes, but when he saw nothing supernatural, crawled near and +examined it nervously, asking: + +"Think you some spirit is imprisoned within?" + +"See this hole?" exclaimed Geoffrey, pointing to a small aperture +visible at the base. "'Tis what they call a blow-stone, if I mistake +not. Here the wind enters and so makes the noise that we heard." + +"Soft," said Von Donck, vastly relieved. "Soft, or you spoil my plan." + +Setting his lips to the hole, Geoffrey sent his breath into the womb of +the rock. A subdued murmur beat upon the air and settled the matter +beyond dispute. Von Donck rocked himself to and fro, chafing his legs +with his podgy hands, scarlet with excitement. + +"A hundred thousand devils, but they shall run," he chuckled. "I had +purposed to use my own voice, but this is better far." + +The sound of other voices came in a murmur across the ravine. + +"To the fire," whispered the Dutchman. "Nurse the flame, and let it +not burst forth until I give the word." + +He scrambled up the side of the rock and looked over the giant's nose. +The opposite cliffs were bathed in moonlight, and the watcher saw two +men standing above the cataract. + +"Now, boy," he muttered deeply. "Let the fire burn, and when the +flames dart up choke them with the moss." + +Geoffrey complied with the mysterious command; but as he pressed the +moss down and a cloud of smoke ascended, a mighty bellowing shook the +air, and he started round to behold Von Donck lying flat along the +rock, his grotesque face and bulging cheeks pressed against the +blow-stone, his body heaving like a gigantic bellows as he pumped his +breath into the hole. + +"More fire," came a choking whisper. "A strong flame, then smoke as +before." + +The flames darted up and whipped the moonbeams, the smoke followed, and +again the bellowing shocked the night. Then Von Donck scrambled up, +and his triumphant voice came down: + +"They run! They run!" + +The trackers were fleeing wildly from the crystal hills. Had they not +seen fire and smoke belched up from the mouth of that terrible face of +granite, and heard the giant's awful roars of anger? Headlong they +went, mad with terror, leaving their ponies in the bush. + +"Here is a brave victory," snorted Von Donck; and he gave vent to his +delight by turning a caracole upon the forehead of the giant. + +"Now for New Netherlands and Hudson's River!" he chanted, drawing at an +imaginary cable as he danced along the great stone face. "'Tis scarce +a hundred miles down to the sea. We have but to keep clear of Indians, +and all shall be well. Yonder are ponies for us to ride, and, I doubt +not, bags of provisions hanging to the saddles. We may laugh at +pursuit, boy. The French shall not dare to return. Take now my hands +and let me see you make a holiday caper. Higher! San Nicolas, the boy +shall make a dancing-master. Ha, Pieter von Donck! Pieter von Donck! +'Tis as cunning an old rogue as ever wore shoe-leather!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXV. + +NOVA ANGLIA. + +Good fortune and fair weather smiled upon the two travellers during the +remainder of their journey, and not another notable adventure befell +them before they rode from the forest during the fall of day, and saw +the fenced fields of the Lincolnshire farmers stretching before them +down the Atlantic slope. Melancholy stumps of trees dotted the +prospect as far as the eye could travel; beyond, the thatched or wooden +roofs of small houses glowed in the strong light; and from the far +distance came the inspiring wash of the sea. + +Von Donck reined in his pony and fell from the saddle. "Dost now feel +at home?" he cried. + +Somewhat sadly Geoffrey shook his head. He was indeed grievously +disappointed to find New England so different from the old. He had +hoped to see neat hedgerows, compact farms, and sloping meadows, such +as he might have looked on in his native county of Berks. He had hoped +to see a wain creaking over the fields, to hear the crack of a whip and +the carter's cheery song. He saw nothing but poverty, small +beginnings, and the signs of a hard struggle for existence. Some men +were working in the distance. He could see the quick flash of their +axes and hear the solemn blows as steel bit the wood. Between dreary +lines of fencing, jagged stubs, patches of corn, showing yellow here +and there, springing from every cultivated foot of ground; beyond, some +acres of burnt ground, and those cold wooden houses with their enormous +chimneys, so altogether unlike the warm brickwork of Old England homes. + +"This is not Virginia?" he asked. + +"Virginia lies five hundred miles to the south, very far beyond +Hudson's River," replied Von Donck. "'Tis a fairer province than this, +and better settled, because older. Be not downcast, boy. Here thought +is free, and here a man may reap the full reward of his labours. You +shall find no tax, nor persecution, nor kingly oppression in this land. +Here the people rule for the people; and here you may worship God after +your own inclining, and dwell in peace all the days of your life." + +"It is a barren land," protested Viner. + +"What would you look for in the new world? That island of yours was +once a land of forest and swamp. The first man was put into the garden +to till it. Labour shall conquer here as elsewhere. Mark you the +richness of the soil and the purity of the air. Here you shall fear no +pestilence, and if your hands be not afraid to work you shall raise two +crops of corn in one season. Gold and silver there are none; but he +who owns an ox and has no corn may exchange with him who has corn but +wants for meat. In our settlement we use strings of wampum for +currency. A shell from the beach becomes gold when it shall buy a man +that which he lacks." + +The comrades drew back into the forest and waited for evening, because +Geoffrey would not advance alone, and Von Donck dared not risk his life +among the Puritans, who were at war with the people of New Netherlands. +They partook of their last meal together, and when the shadow of night +grew heavy upon the fields, Pieter rose and shook himself. + +"We have now come to the parting of our ways," he muttered. "You are +among your people. We will together cross yonder fields, and then you +shall wish me God-speed. The town of Boston lies upon your right hand. +I shall beat inland at the base of Connecticut, until I reach the bank +of Hudson's River, and there I am upon my own territory where no man +shall lead me. I shall ride beside the river until I come to the +little city of the Manhattoes, where William Kieft rules. San Nicolas! +How old Will the Testy shall stare and blow at his pipe when he sees +Pieter von Donck on the steps of his bowerie!" + +They set out upon the last stage along a trail between the whispering +corn. Von Donck had grown suddenly silent. He plucked at the panther +skin, snorting occasionally, and casting side glances at his companion, +who rode close to his side, intent upon the prospect of low houses and +broken bush. When Geoffrey at length leaned over with a warning to +point out the figure of a man, who was proceeding down a side path with +a dog at his heels, the old Dutchman replied by touching the shoulder +nearest him and saying: + +"Dost feel the smart of that wound yet?" + +"It is nothing," Geoffrey answered. "See you not that man advancing?" + +"The marks shall remain," went on Pieter solemnly. "The scar will be +there to remind you of a good friend in New Amsterdam. My lad, I shall +seek to hear of you. Each time I look on this skin I shall breathe a +wish for the happiness of the boy who saved my life in the crystal +hills. When you come to make your home in Virginia, send to Pieter von +Donck at the hostel by San Nicolas, and if he be alive, and not grown +too fat to walk, he will come out to meet you. Will not forget the old +rogue who tricked the French?" + +Geoffrey put out his hand and grasped the podgy fingers. "May I meet a +traitor's end if I forget my friend," he answered. "Had it not been +for you my dry body would now be swinging in the wind of the mountains. +I wish you well, Pieter; I shall ever wish you well. Now ride! You +would not have me fight for you against my own people." + +"There is no English blood in him," snorted Von Donck. "A Dutchman, I +say, a Dutchman to the ends of his hair." + +The dog was bounding towards the travellers, and the farmer put up his +hand and hailed them. + +"We are Englishmen," Geoffrey called back. + +"Now, by the sack of San Nicolas, out upon you," shouted Von Donck. "I +am no Englishman. I am a Hollander, fellow, Hollander from head to +heel." + +"Ride!" exclaimed Geoffrey, smiting his comrade's mount. "God be with +you, Pieter." + +"And you, boy." + +Von Donck lashed his pony and the nimble animal bounded off to the +west, while Geoffrey dismounted, and, holding the savage dog at bay +with his sword, advanced to meet the owner of the land. + +"Do not fear, friend," he said, as they drew together. "I am no spy, +but an Englishman from the north. He who rides yonder is a friendly +Dutchman who has accompanied me upon the way. I pray you tell me is my +Lord Baltimore within the town?" + +The settler, a tall man in a quaker hat and black cloak, which fell +from his neck almost to the ground, regarded the speaker with cold, +unfavouring eyes. + +"You know little of this country, young sir, if you believe that Lord +Baltimore governs here," he replied at length. "You stand within the +province of Massachusetts beside the town of Boston, and the lord you +seek rules over the province of Maryland and that country to the west +of the bay of Chesapeake." + +Geoffrey's heart sank at this chill reception, and he lowered his eyes +despondently before the stern gaze of the Puritan as he answered: + +"I come to pray for a ship and men to be sent against the French, who +hold the north. He who sent me, charging me to deliver this ring in +his name to Lord Baltimore, believes that his countrymen and mine will +not fail to help us in the time of need." + +"Put not your trust in Massachusetts," said the listener dourly. "We +have much ado to defend ourselves against the Mohicans and the pinch of +famine. We know not ourselves where to turn for aid, and your cry is +ours also. You have reached the valley of dry bones, young stranger." + +"The dry bones stood up in an exceeding great army," returned Geoffrey +boldly. + +"Even so. If it be God's will, we also shall stand up. What is the +name of him who sent you?" + +"Sir Thomas Iden." + +"Of county Kent?" + +"The same." + +"I have heard of that family as most loyal to the Crown. Arms, a +chevron between three close helmets, if my memory mistake not. I also +am from the south, driven out, like many a better man, by the hand of +persecution. Come now! I will lead you to the house of John Winthrop, +our governor." + +The town of Boston was then a mere village of distressful huts crowded +within a great palisade; the single street, which led to a quay of +closely-packed logs covered by stones with earth atop, was rough ground +over which the tyreless wheels of primitive carts jolted woefully. The +candle-light from a few windows shed a dreary gleam across the way, +where men closely muffled drifted along with a stern "Good-e'en." +There was neither laughter nor tavern-singing nor play-acting in that +cheerless town, no throwing of dice nor rattle of cups. The Puritan +mind was dominant; and the only sound of music that disturbed the +unhappy silence was the lugubrious droning of a psalm or sad-toned hymn. + +A lamp flickered near the entry, and beside the watchman, who kept the +light burning at the gate, stretched a board; and upon the board +appeared in short black letters the notice:-- + +"No person within this province, professing to believe in Jesus Christ, +shall be in any ways troubled, molested, or discountenanced for his or +her religion, or in the free exercise thereof." + +"See!" said the guide, without a smile. "Here we have liberty!" + +At the entrance to a low house near the end of the street they stopped, +and the guide knocked. After a long interval a shutter was pushed back +and a voice demanded to know who it was that knocked. + +"A stranger from the north to see the governor," said the guide. + +The voice grumbled and lessened gradually, still grumbling, until it +sounded more loudly and the door opened. An old man stood on the +threshold, a lighted candle in his hand, the thick grease running upon +his fingers. He looked from one to the other, and cried in a shrill +voice: "The governor is with his reverence. The stranger must wait." + +"I am content to wait," said Geoffrey. + +Hearing a sound, he looked back, and saw the man who had brought him so +far already receding in the gloom of the street. The porter bade him +enter, and when he had done so provided him with a seat, and there left +him for a good hour, at the end of which time he reappeared in darkness +and said shortly: "Come!" + +The room into which Geoffrey was ushered contained all the marks of +extreme poverty. The light came from one great log glowing in the big +fireplace, for the night was chill with the breath of the sea and a +sharp north wind. Two figures occupied this comfortless room, one on +either side of the fire, the older man attired in the simple gown and +bands of a minister of religion; the other, dark, with luminous eyes +and white forehead, leaned forward, the long fingers of his right hand +trifling with his wig. Both were well-known in their generation. The +layman was John Winthrop; the minister Roger Williams. + +"You are welcome to Boston, sir," said Winthrop, without rising, but +merely lifting his head in the firelight to scan the face of the +visitor. "Come you to our town by chance?" + +"I come from the far north to seek aid," said Geoffrey, with a boyish +pride which caused Williams to frown. + +"_Terra incognita_ indeed," he murmured. "A cold land where Popery is +rampant. How great is the distance, and how came you thence?" + +Geoffrey told his story and delivered his message. The two men watched +him intently, Winthrop always playing with his wig, Williams leaning +out with hands clasped over a massive Bible held upon his knee. When +Geoffrey had finished his tale, there was a moment of silence, broken +only by the spitting of the fire. Then the Puritans looked across the +hearth and smiled. + +"The poor man is the helper of the poor," murmured Williams. + +John Winthrop laughed bitterly. + +"When a poor man begs of me he has my all, and that I give to our poor +brethren in the north. They have my prayers. Young man," he went on, +rising and confronting the messenger, "you have nobly performed a noble +duty; but in coming to us you confront poverty indeed. Here night and +day we struggle for existence. I myself have gone to rest, knowing not +how to face the morrow. We have our wives and little ones to feed and +protect, and these are our first charge. Daily the cry goes out to us: +'We want.' Nightly we dread to hear the shout of 'Mohican invasion.' +We fight, not for fame nor for honour among nations, but for a foothold +upon this continent, where we are striving to plant a home for the +free, to the glory of God, and the shame of England who has cast us +out. Young man, you have done your duty." + +"And your help shall come from Heaven," murmured the divine deeply. + +"I shall proceed to Lord Baltimore. To him I was sent," said Geoffrey. + +"Go to him if you will, but the answer you shall there receive will be +that you have heard already," said Winthrop. "Virginia is in sore +straits, being unable to convey her tobacco crop to the Old World, +since there are no English ships to cross the seas." + +"Nevertheless I shall go," said Geoffrey. + +John Winthrop bowed his head. "You shall sleep under my roof this +night and accept what poor hospitality I have to offer. My friend and +servant shall minister to your needs." + +He made a slight movement of his hand to signify that the interview was +ended, and the messenger retired, sorely depressed at the manner of his +reception. The old man who had opened the door gave him food and +drink, asking no question and imparting no information; but continually +droning through his nose a hymn, or muttering in gloomy tones some sad +portion of the Scriptures. He was one of the most zealous of +Winthrop's company, all of whom were Nonconformists, but not +separatists. Indeed, they esteemed it an honour to call themselves +members of the English Church, and openly admitted that they had +emigrated in order that they might be divided from her corruptions, but +not from herself. For all his devotion, the old servant was not a +cheerful companion for a man who was already cast down in mind, and +Geoffrey was glad to be rid of him and alone in a cold, bare room, +which was as sad in all its details as the men who occupied the town. + +It was long before sleep came to the traveller. He had become so +accustomed to the open air that the atmosphere of his room stifled him. +When at last he succeeded in finding unconsciousness the boom of the +sea shook the house and occupied his brain. + +Morning came, and with it a heavy tramp of feet. A rough hand struck +the door, and the sleeper awakened with a start, to behold at his side +three men, cloaked and stern, the foremost holding a scrap of paper, to +which was affixed a red official seal. + +"Sir stranger, surrender yourself," he said. + +"What means this?" exclaimed Geoffrey. "I am an Englishman in a colony +of the English." + +"The charge against you is that of treason," replied the stern Puritan. + +"Treason!" repeated the young man; and rose dumbfounded. + +"It is suspected that you are a spy, in the employ of our enemies the +Dutch." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI. + +STIGMA. + +Thus Geoffrey became a prisoner among his own people, owing to the +friendliness of Von Donck, the honest Dutchman having failed to reckon +with the intense suspicion of the Puritan mind. When the manner of his +guest's arrival had been explained to John Winthrop, that pious +governor raised his eyebrows in astonishment, and did not hesitate to +give instructions for the new-comer to be held in close confinement, +pending an inquiry into the movements of the Dutch. While this +investigation was being pursued, justly and in good order as the +governor directed, or, in other words, with extreme slowness, many +notable events occurred in the disordered country of the north. + +The _St. Wenceslas_ had slipped from her moorings and drifted down the +St. Lawrence, bearing La Salle towards Acadie, and certain despatches +which were destined for the chief minister of France. Unwillingly +Roussilac had been compelled to record the services rendered to Church +and State by the proud departing priest. + +"You have well served yourself, Sir Commandant," La Salle had said, +after insisting upon his right to peruse the detailed history of the +Iroquois defeat, which contained no word of reference to the assistance +rendered by the Algonquins. "And now, by Heaven, you shall serve me." +And Roussilac, for all his ill will, was not strong enough to dare +resist the priest. + +There yet remained in that district the Kentish knight, old Penfold, +and the Puritan; and when the man of Kent came to learn of La Salle's +departure, he left his solitary cave, and buckled on his sword, and +returned to action, though the dream of his life had vanished. His +younger brother, the fool of the family, who from boyhood had spent his +days in idleness, trolling for pike or chasing with his dogs, would +continue to occupy the old mansion which the elder had abandoned, and +leave it, as he had been empowered to do failing news from the New +World, to his son, when the days of fishing and the chase should be +accomplished. + +The knight came to his home beside the lost waters, and his wife, who +had visited him each day with food in the lonely cave, received him +with her proud silence and stood to hear his will. She it was who had +told him of the sailing of the ship and the going of La Salle. + +"Let us also travel to this land of Acadie," the knight said. "My +Richard haunts me with reproaches. I go to make ready our canoe for +the long journey. My mind shall find no rest till I have avenged our +son." + +He went out and built a fire upon the beach, and while the lumps of +pitch, prepared from native bitumen mixed with pine resin, were +melting, he peeled soft sheets of bark from the snowy birch trees and +patched the canoe, caulking every seam with pitch. About the time of +the evening shadow his work was done; but as he was returning to his +home a voice called, and the Puritan hastened to his side. + +"Welcome, friend," said the knight. "How fares it with you and your +brave comrade?" + +"We suffer who sojourn in Mesech," said Hough. "Old Penfold lies +grievously sick of a fever." + +"Dwell you far away?" the knight asked. + +"Nigh upon two miles by land and water. We have returned to the cave +which we occupied before our taking of the Dutch ship." + +"My wife shall prepare a medicine. She is well skilled in the arts of +healing," said the other. "You shall bring us to your cave with all +speed." + +"The disease has already taken hold upon his mind," said Hough. "One +time he is holding his mother's gown, old man though he be, and +wandering in water-meadows to pluck long purples and clovers, muttering +as he picks at his blanket. 'Here is trefoil, good for cattle, but +noisome to witches.' Another time he reaches for his sword, and +swears--the Lord forgive him--at the weakness which holds him down. +'The French are upon us, comrades,' he calls. 'Let me not lie like an +old dame with swollen legs.' Then he falls a-crying, and shouts, +'England! England!' Methinks if his mind were healed he would stand +up again." + +Mary Iden being summoned, and having made her preparations, the three +set forth and came to the cave, which the adventurers had hoped to +exchange for the Dutch vessel, then lying fathoms deep beneath the +cliffs of Tadousac. There they found Penfold stretched along a heap of +grass, babbling incessantly at the cold walls and the shadows. When +the figures darkened the entrance, he screamed at them and sprang up, +only to fall back upon the rude bed, a fever-held body agitated by +stertorous breath. + +"Build me here two fires," said the quiet woman, as she passed to the +sick man's side. + +"Witch!" shrieked Penfold. "Flower! Woodfield! Comrades, where are +ye? Save me now from sorcery. Hough! Go bring the villagers, and bid +them fling this hag into the Thames and pelt her with stones when she +rises. To me, comrades! Leave not your old captain to perish by +witchcraft." + +"Canst heal him from this madness?" muttered Hough. "Myself I dared +not let his blood, fearing lest I might do that which should hasten his +end." + +"Our people let no blood," came the answer. "We bring great heat into +the body, so that the evil spirit shall come forth to seek water. Then +we strengthen the body, so that it may be able to resist his return." + +Already Penfold ceased to struggle beneath her soothing hands. The +fires blazed fiercely, the smoke and hot vapours being drawn upwards +into the natural chimneys. Obeying instructions, the men placed their +sick comrade between these fires and covered him closely, while the +skilful healer moistened his brow and lips with water in which she had +steeped the young pink bark of the bitter willow, thus wringing the +fever out of his body like water from a sponge. + +"I am saving the old man," she whispered in a confident voice. + +At the end of another hour the limp rag of humanity was steeped in +sleep. By then the night was strong and the stars little orbs in +splendour among the clouds. The breathing which the men heard when +Mary Iden rose from her knees might have been that of a little child. + +"The evil spirit has been driven forth to find water. Lift the man +quickly; for the foul creature travels faster than the moonlight." + +Obedient to superior knowledge, the men reconveyed the sleeper to the +grass bed, and there the healer roused him to administer a decoction of +bruised herbs: serrated calamintha, the perfoliate eupator, later more +popularly known as the fever-wort of North America, and the white-rayed +pyrethrum, which lifted its bitter bloom upon the heights. The sick +man gasped as he swallowed the powerful tonic, and sank back into +untroubled rest. + +Presently the knight and his wife departed, and Hough accompanied them +upon the first stage of their return journey; and when they reached the +lake-side, where the canoe sprawled along the shingle, the knight +acquainted his fellow-countryman with his plan of departure. Hough +listened, gazing dimly over the scintillating surface, where a silver +ribbon of moonlight led away to the Isle of Dreams. + +"Where lies that land whither you go?" he asked at length. + +"In the far east where Sebastian Cabot first touched," the Kentishman +replied. "There I may sight the great ocean, which we islanders love, +and scent the good brine and watch for an English sail." + +"Here there is nothing we may do," said Hough, removing his eyes from +the dreamy lake. "There surely we may look for the ship which Lord +Baltimore shall send when Viner comes down to Virginia. I too would be +near the sea and smell liberty." + +With that they parted, and Hough returned to his hole among the rocks +with visions of the sea. Within that cave, where Penfold slept during +his guardian's absence, the fires darted, tincturing with red the +silver of the moonbeams against the sable wall of cliff. Between the +granite and the forest of pines a stream of moonlight spread like a +glacier. A figure stole from the black belt, stepped cautiously into +the white road, and waded, as it were, through the rippling beams. It +was Onawa, who had watched the two men and her sister making west; she +knew that one of the men would return after a little interval; and she +understood that the work which she had undertaken must be done quickly. + +No croaking bird aroused Penfold from his sleep to warn him of the +she-wolf. It was one of those ironies which run through life that one +sister should have cast the sick man into healthy slumber in order that +the other might stab him as he lay. + +A cloud of blood-sucking insects trumpeted around Onawa. Their thin +noise seemed to her a tumult, and she stopped and looked back along the +cold white stream. A lean wolf was slinking in her direction, his +muzzle snuffling the dust. She shivered when she remembered that the +murderess was doomed to become a werewolf after death to prowl about +the scene of her former sin. The creature howled. The pale girl +started and ran into the cave. + +Her belief remained constant that she might still win the love of La +Salle by destroying his enemies. She knew that he had gained renown by +her betrayal to him of the English settlement. Now he had gone in the +great ship to Acadie. She was about to follow, having neither home nor +people, being indeed hunted for her life; but first she might destroy +another of his enemies. Then she could learn to say: "I have killed +the old Englishman who stirred up my people to attack yours." And she +thought that he might welcome her at last for the sake of her good +deeds. + +A frightened howl broke upon the night. The wolf, disturbed by some +enemy of its species, was hurrying for cover. The crisp snapping of +twigs, succeeded by a rattling of small stones, were caused, not by the +pads of the black loup-garou, but by a body weightier and less +cowardly. These sounds were deadened by the walls of rock, and Onawa +did not hear them. Swiftly she drew away the coverings from the +white-faced sleeper, and old Penfold smiled innocently at her in his +drugged sleep. Onawa drew in her breath, unsheathed her knife, and +felt its point; then leaned back, measuring the distance by the faint +glow, and her arm went up to strike. That next moment she screamed +with terror, turned, struck wildly at the air, and was carried back to +the granite floor with Hough's iron fingers driven round her throat. + +Step by step the grim Puritan dragged the girl back to the mouth of the +cave, and there pinned her to the rock with one arm, while reaching +with the other to the corner, where he had piled a rope taken from the +deck of the privateer. He bound her hand and foot; and thus helpless +she stared up, and read her death upon his face. + +For over an hour Hough paced the floor of the cave, listening to his +captain's gentle breathing, and recalling the violent death of +Athaliah, slain by order of Jehoiada, and the fate of Jezebel, cast +from an upper window at the command of Jehu; for such a man as the +Puritan regulated all the actions of his life by the light revealed to +him from the Bible. There was, he reasoned, the highest authority to +justify the act which he contemplated; only the manhood in him recoiled +from the slaying of a woman. At length his mind became fixed. He bent +and drew together the scarlet embers of the fire. + +Onawa made no sign of terror, and no appeal for mercy; but her eyes +followed every movement of her stern captor, as she sought to learn her +sentence without betraying her fear. + +"The witch is fair," the Puritan muttered, standing over and regarding +her fawn-coloured skin, her even features, and large dark eyes. "A +woman takes pride in her beauty. May the Lord punish me if I act now +unjustly and for vengeance alone." + +He pushed a stick into the fire and watched it grow red, then turned +sharply upon his victim. The girl's eyes flashed defiance when they +met his. + +"Behold!" he exclaimed, drawing a thin hand across his terrible face, +upon which the Court of Star Chamber had written its unjust judgment. +The girl saw the slit nostrils, the cropped ears, the branded cheeks, +and the scarred forehead. Her tongue became loosened at that sight, +and she prayed for instant death, because she knew it was vain to plead +for mercy. + +Outside the cave the long black wolf, which if native testimony were +accepted, contained the soul of some sorcerer, or of some vile man who +had slain his friend, crept back to search for scraps of food. As a +cloud drifted over the moon the brute dropped a bone which it had +snatched, and scurried away like a human thief into the shadows, +terrified by a wild scream from within the granite cave. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + +REVELATION. + +Had Madame Labroquerie continued firm in her resolve never to approach +the fortress while her nephew ruled, all might have been well; but +unfortunately for her daughter, and, as it was to prove, for herself, +the bitter little woman permitted her longing to enter again into the +affairs of the world to prevail over her hatred for the commandant, and +so suffered herself to be brought to the citadel, railing savagely +throughout the journey. Before a week had passed she revealed herself +fully as an unnatural mother and an implacable foe. Yet, to do justice +to even a worker of evil, it must be admitted that Madeleine, with all +her sweetness, was a sore trial to a fanatical Catholic and bigoted +patriot, for she refused to be ashamed of her heresy, and was never +weary of singing the praise of her English lover. + +Left to themselves, neither Laroche, now the head of the Church in that +district, nor Roussilac would have taken action against the lovely +sinner; but Madame, in one of her fits of ungovernable anger, publicly +preferred two charges against her daughter, accusing her of heresy and +treason, and calling upon the Church to punish her for the one offence +and the State to exact a penalty for the other. + +These were grave indictments, but both priest and layman closed their +ears, the former not wishing to be troubled by unpleasant duties, the +latter hanging back, not on account of the tie of relationship, but +because of Madeleine's beauty. But when Madame, in another fit of +fury, openly denounced the commandant before D'Archand, who for the +second time had arrived at that coast, as a Lutheran at heart, and a +protector of the enemies of the Church, he was driven to act for the +sake of his ambition. So Madeleine was arrested and confined in a +small stone hut high upon the cliff, and before her door a sentry paced +both by day and night, while Laroche, with many deep grumblings, was +compelled to undertake the uncongenial task of saving the fair girl's +soul. + +To the credit of the priest, be it said that he was charitable. He +believed Madeleine had been perverted from the right way by some spell +of witchcraft, and this belief was strengthened by the fact that, when +he adjured the girl by the tears of the Saviour to weep, she merely +laughed at him. It was notorious that a guilty witch was unable to +shed tears. Accordingly Laroche attended himself to the obvious duty +of exorcising the evil spirit which had taken up its abode in her; but, +in spite of all his efforts, the girl remained as wickedly obstinate as +before. + +"The Church acts towards her children with wondrous love, and because +of that love may chasten," the abbé preached. "'Tis the duty of the +faithful within the fold to bring in the wandering sheep, either by +suasion or by force. Being bewitched, my daughter, you stand in great +peril, and we, by the powers entrusted unto us, may remove that danger, +when reasoning fails, by bodily torment. Be converted, and your soul +shall live. Remain in your unbelief, and punishment shall follow, +because a living heretic is a danger to the world and a dishonour to +the holy saints." + +Even such sound doctrine as this failed to move the heart of Madeleine, +and each day Laroche grumbled louder at his failure, and Roussilac +shrank yet more from bringing his cousin to trial, and Madame became +more stinging in speech and more furious in her awful passions, because +of the suffering of her mind during lucid moments, when she could see +herself in sunny Normandy once more young and sane. Her hatred for +Roussilac increased, until she would spit and snarl at him when he +passed, and scream: "Infidel! This shall be known in France. Power +shall fall from you, and the people shall curse your name." And when +the men who had been sent after Geoffrey returned afoot with their tale +of failure, Madame Labroquerie made it known from the ship to the +citadel that it was the commandant who had secured the spy's safety for +the love of his heretic cousin. + +Coward as he was in many ways, Roussilac at length saw that he must act +or be dishonoured; he must either release Madeleine or bring her to +trial for treason. The former alternative was impossible, because the +girl was an ecclesiastical prisoner. The lightest sentence he could +pass for treason was banishment, and he could not endure the prospect +of losing Madeleine. Besides, when he had sentenced her, she still +remained to be judged by the clerical court. It needed a wiser brain +than Roussilac's to solve so tangled a problem. Nevertheless, he +resolved to attempt it. After some speech with Laroche, who was +heartily weary of the whole business, the commandant passed from the +church of Ste. Mary, after the hour of vespers, and ascended the +winding path which led towards the hut where the impenitent was +imprisoned. The sentry saluted as the governor approached, then +resumed his march along the brown scar which the constant tread had +made. + +"Withdraw yonder," Roussilac ordered. + +A happy voice broke out, as he put up his hand to the door: + +"There is the sun upon the side of the wall. So it is already evening. +Time flies as fast in prison as elsewhere. I pray you, sun, shine upon +Geoffrey rather than on me!" + +Cribbed and confined as the girl was, she steadily refused to be cast +down, because she was assured that life had far better things in store. +Her lover was pursued, but then she knew he would escape. Her body +might be held in prison, but her spirit was free, flying over forest +and hill, and singing like a lark against the clouds. + +Her note changed when Roussilac flung open the door and stood before +her in a flood of light. + +"Cousin," Madeleine said coldly. "You break upon me suddenly. I had +better company before you came. Why do you drive my friends away?" + +The commandant closed the door and stepped forward, his sallow face +working. + +"You are alone," he said. "None dare visit you without permission." + +"I am never alone," she declared. "My friends left me when you +entered; but they shall return when you depart." + +"Am not I a friend? Nay, more--I am a relation," began Roussilac; but +she checked him with the reproof: "I have no family now that Jean-Marie +is dead." + +"Your mother," he reminded her. + +"She has delivered me into the power of the Church." + +"Because it is best for you. I would care for your body, Madeleine, as +your mother cares for your soul. Cousin, think not unkindly of me. I +would release you; but what power have I to remove the judgment of the +Abbé Laroche? He has sentenced you to close confinement, until----" + +"My lover returns to release me," she finished, and backed from him +with a laugh. + +Roussilac clenched his fingers tightly, and jealousy venomed the words +which then left his lips: + +"Foolish girl, would you rouse all the evil in me? Bear with me, +cousin," he went on quickly. "It is not in me to endure patiently. +Since that day when I stood before you in the grove I have not known +the meaning of peace. My nights have been long, my days dark, my +position unprofitable----" + +Again she interrupted him, to simplify what she knew must follow: + +"Because you think that you love me." + +He stepped forward to seize her hands; but she drew back and steadied +herself against the wall. + +"I do love you, sweet cousin." + +"You do not love me. Need I give you the lie when your own tongue +gives it you? Is it love when the nights become long, and the day +dark, and position brings no pleasure? Arnaud, I love, and am held in +prison; but my nights are short, my days warm, and my position is a +happiness. Believe you that love, however unrequited, takes away from +life? I tell you it adds, it enriches, it beautifies. It is a crown +which makes a humble man a king, and the halo which makes the +singing-girl a saint. Love gives a man strength to use his power, to +defy superstition and false religion, to snap his fingers in the face +of a fat priest who believes that a strong will may be bent and broken +by holding the body in bondage. Had I my heart to offer I would scorn +your cowardly love." + +He had faced her while she spoke, but when she stopped he turned, and, +feeling the sting of her eyes, savagely pulled at the cloak which had +drifted from his shoulders. + +"My mother has sent you," said Madeleine. + +"She and I are bitter enemies," came the sullen answer. "I have but +borne with her for your sake. She seeks to stir up mischief all the +day long." He turned abruptly. "Have you no kind word for me, little +cousin?" + +He looked worn and old, and the girl pitied him; but she was too honest +to deceive by fair speech. + +"You brought me to this place against my will," she reminded him. "I +was happy in our cabin beyond the river. You have played into the +hands of my mother, who desires to see me punished because I have +abjured her faith. Would you have brought me here had you found the +plain country maid you had looked to see?" + +"I swore to your brother to protect you." + +"Do not recall that death scene, I pray you," she said firmly. "If the +spirit of Jean-Marie looks down upon us now, he finds you--protecting +me!" + +Roussilac winced as that shot struck him. "Blame me not," he said more +submissively. "Were you a civil prisoner only, I would open this door, +and you should go as free as air. My purpose in coming to you is to +urge you to free yourself." + +"Never at the price demanded. Arnaud, I put your courage to the test. +I trow that the man who loves a woman will for her sake perform what +she may demand, even though he lose position for it. Open the door, +and lead me to Father Laroche, and say to him: 'Father, I have taken it +upon myself to release your prisoner, since it shames me to see flesh +and blood of mine confined against her will in the fortress over which +I rule.' Do so, Arnaud, and I shall believe in you." + +"It is madness to ask it," said Roussilac loudly. + +"Let us have the truth. You dare not." + +"It is so," he confessed. "I dare not set myself against the Church, +which has the power to consign a man's soul to hell." + +Madeleine smiled contemptuously. + +"If you would search your heart and read truly what there you find, I +should hear a different answer. You do not fear Father Laroche. He +does not wish to hold me here. Rather would he cast me from his mind, +that he might have more time to spend at the tavern and his brawls. I +will tell you what you fear: your actions are watched, your words +criticised. If you let me free, it would be rumoured that you were +false to the faith. That rumour would be wafted across seas, and your +enemies at home would see to it that you were recalled and relegated to +the obscurity from which you have arisen. You would rather treat your +cousin as a courtesan than abate one fragment of the pitiful power +which shall some day fall from your body like a rag. Now, my +commandant, are you answered?" + +Roussilac said not a word when he saw the scorn in those violet eyes. +He merely put out his hand, and opened the door, muttering, as though +to himself: "That pride shall break when she knows." + +"Know?" cried Madeleine. "What should I know?" + +He looked at her savagely, feeling that it was in him to make her +suffer. + +"That your lover is hanged at my command." + +He closed the door quickly and fastened it, half hoping, half dreading, +to hear the scream of anguish which he believed must follow. But there +came to him as he waited a peal of joyous laughter, and the happy words: + +"Geoffrey, Geoffrey! would that you could hear that! Dead! Why, my +love, you are full of life. Were you to die, which God indeed forbids, +your dear spirit would fly at once to me. Dead! Have I not seen you +in my dreams? Do not I see you now walking within sight of the New +England fields? Oh, Geoffrey! Near--how near! Who is that great man +riding beside you, a panther skin across his shoulder? How noisily he +talks ... and now leans over, and pats you on the arm. Ah, gone--gone! +And he would have me think that you are hanged!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + +BODY AND MIND. + +Roussilac strode towards the river, and in that hour found it in his +heart to envy the meanest settler in the land. Like many a man who has +risen from the ranks, he found himself destitute of friends. He had +cut himself off from his own relations, lest they should hinder his +ascent, and none had come to take their place; the captains of noble +birth, his official equals, having refused to receive into friendship +the son of a Normandy farmer. The home government was but using what +military talents he possessed to their advantage; and when his services +had been rendered, he would be cast aside by the proud priest who ruled +the destinies of France, and another chosen in his stead. + +"Courage!" he muttered. "'Tis but imagination which makes a weakling +of me. I will to D'Archand, and inquire of him whether or no my name +be yet in favour. Then to stand up like a man, and sweep away my +enemies, let them be priests, relations, or demons." + +D'Archand was idling upon deck, but at a word from the commandant +entered his curtained cabin and produced a flask of Burgundy as an aid +to conversation. First Roussilac sought to hear more particularly the +news of the world, and induced the master to expatiate upon the +revolution of the Scottish Covenanters, the struggle of Charles for +money and ships, the resolute stand of John Pym for just law, the +prosperity of France under Richelieu, and the breaking of the short +treaty between that country and Holland. D'Archand warmed to his +discourse under the influence of the wine and a thrill of patriotism, +as he concluded: "I have but recently crossed the high seas without +sighting a hostile vessel. The Dutch privateers have gone home empty. +The English coffers are bare. France now holds the world. I drink to +the Cardinal and our King." + +Abstractedly Roussilac lifted his glass. When the master leaned over +and emptied the flask between them, the commandant observed, with an +assumption of indifference: "Didst hear any word of praise for my work +in this land?" + +"My stay was short," D'Archand answered. "I heard no talk of you, +commandant--at least, not upon the streets, and to be spoken of in the +street is the only fame, I take it. But there were rumours afloat +regarding the Abbé La Salle." + +"Perdition!" muttered Roussilac. "Shall these priests never confine +themselves to their own affairs?" + +"Your princes of the Church are statesmen now rather than priests," +said the master. "The Abbé La Salle comes of a renowned family. 'Twas +said that he is wasted in this colony. I also heard it said--accept +the rumour as you will--that his Holiness has set a cross against his +name." + +"What means that?" asked the commandant hastily. + +"Urbano the Eighth, who, I may tell you, has recently bestowed the +title of Eminence upon his Cardinals, having suitably enriched his +family and acquired the Duchy of Urbino, now seeks strong men, priests +who are fighters rather than scholars, to aid him in the execution of +his plans, and he who has the cross set against his name may be assured +of sudden promotion. A canon of Notre Dame, who is much in favour with +Cardinal Richelieu, informed me that La Salle may immediately be +recalled. His Holiness will raise a parish priest to the cardinalate, +through the grades of canon, dean, and bishop, in a month or less, +according to his necessity for that man's help." + +"The _St. Wenceslas_ now bears for home with my despatches," said +Roussilac moodily. "I have mentioned the abbé as instrumental in +holding heretics at bay." + +"His Holiness loves a fighter," muttered D'Archand significantly, as he +opened another flask of Burgundy. + +A light glimmered here and there when Roussilac made his way homeward, +and the murmur of the forest brushed his ears as he passed. The news +of another man's advancement hurt his selfish nature as though it were +a premonition of his own failure. He hesitated where the path split, +then hastened to his house, entered, and immediately found himself in +the presence of his aunt, who awaited his coming, knitting her fingers +in the lamplight. + +"So!" she snapped, her little face hard and wrinkled like a sour apple. +"We have now open treachery at headquarters. Treachery against Church +and State. You, the representative of the King, the upholder of the +faith! You shall be stripped of your power and be disgraced. And I +will walk a hundred miles barefoot, if there be need, to see sentence +executed upon you." + +Her attack was ill-timed. The commandant was then in no mood to bear +with a mutinous subject, though she had been his own mother. + +"Out of my sight," he said fiercely. "Out, I say. Madame, my +forbearance is at an end, and I will be obeyed. Would you have me +forget that you are a woman and a relative?" + +"Since you have forgot your duty to God and the King, forget that +also," screamed the little woman. "Seducer, what have you done with my +daughter? Where have you hidden her? Abductor! You shall learn what +it means to defy Holy Church. Tell me, where have you taken her?" + +Roussilac's anger cooled at that, and he lowered his voice as he +answered: "I left my cousin not three hours ago in the place where she +is confined as an impenitent by the judgment of the Abbé Laroche. +There you shall find her." + +"Arnaud," shrieked Madame, "deceive your men, cheat a priest, you may, +but you shall not so prevail upon me. I know your deeds and the +vileness of your heart. As a child you were ever false; as a man you +hated your own people, because you had risen and they remained obscure; +and now you stand before the mother of the girl whose heart you have +helped to harden, whom you have taken and hidden for your own purpose, +and ask her what she means when she demands to know the truth." + +"If you have information, I will in my official capacity hear it," +Roussilac answered. "But forget not that my nature can be fiercer than +yours, and do not tempt my power." + +"Your power!" sneered Madame. "It has already departed from you. I +thank you, Arnaud, for having disowned your honest family. How ill the +cloak of innocence lies upon your shoulders! Madeleine's cell stands +empty, as you know well. Beside the door the sentry lies stabbed +through the heart, murdered by your hand as surely as though you +yourself had driven home the dagger. I have but come from there, and +none know what has been done, save you the doer, and I the accuser." + +Roussilac caught up his cloak, and wrapped it about his shoulders. +"What took you to her prison?" he demanded, his own nature being no +less suspicious than hers. + +Madame laughed furiously. + +"You are a brave rogue, Arnaud. You plot, and murder, and seduce, and +smile through it all, and act the innocent like a mime. Know that +Father St Agapit came to me--a haughty priest, with no respect for +age--to recommend that Madeleine should be entrusted to his care, that +he might obtain her conversion by a new method. 'Let her not be +crossed,' quoth he. ''Tis human nature to offend more deeply in the +front of opposition. I would let her go free, and win her by gentle +persuasion to the fold.' What does a priest know of the pride of a +girl's heart? 'Is the branch broken by persuasion for the fire?' said +I. 'No, you shall take it in hand strongly and break it by force.' To +that the abbé said, 'You shall not compare the inanimate thing with the +living creature whom God has gifted with free-will. Go now to her and +be gentle. Try her with mother's milk rather than with the strong meat +of human nature. I have bidden the sentry admit you.' So I went to +win my erring child as the priest taught me, for I never yet have +disobeyed a Churchman, and what I found you know." + +"You are right, Madame, if what you say be true," said Roussilac +sternly. "There is treachery here." + +"Behold my hand! It points at the traitor," screamed the pale woman, +her fury surging back upon her. "You shall not escape with your +fellow-sinner. You shall not go from me until I hear from your own +lips where you have placed Madeleine, my child." + +"Woman, I know nothing," he snarled. "Is my position nothing to me +that I should play so loosely?" + +A cry of animal rage broke that instant from his throat. Madame had +dashed upon him, and, before he could beat her back, had clawed his +face like a maddened bird from cheek-bones to chin. + +At that terrible indignity the pusillanimous spirit of the commandant +was sobered into resolution. He hurled her back screaming, and put up +a hand to his burning face. The finger-tips came away reddened. + +He shivered from head to foot. Madame was raving. Roussilac steadied +himself, then walked from that place, a cold, sinister figure, the +howling of the mad woman pealing into his ears. + +Scarce a minute had elapsed before he returned, accompanied by two +soldiers; and again facing Madame Labroquerie, whose bloodless face was +distorted with the fury of her terrible nature, issued his orders in a +pitiless voice: + +"Secure that woman, and keep her in ward this night." He raised his +hand, and smiled vengefully at the marks on his fingers, as he drew off +his ring, which he extended to the man nearest him with the words: +"Take your authority. Spare not force, if force be wanted. Restore +this ring to me after sunrise, when you shall have hanged this woman +upon the eastern side of the fortress." + +Again Roussilac smiled, and, turning quickly, passed outside. One +terrible scream made him lift his hands to his ears, then he hurried up +the steep path, to see with his own eyes the cold body of the sentry, +and the empty cell, and to learn that Madame had not lied. + +For a few moments he stood, like a man in a trance, seeing indeed his +problem solved, but knowing that Madeleine was lost to him. He turned +to the dead body, and commanded it to speak; and when he understood +that the spirit had passed for ever from his discipline, he spurned the +cold matter with his foot, and in a fury cried: "I would give my +position and all I have to hear this dead man speak." + +"Listen, then," said a cold voice. "The dead are not silent." And +Roussilac cried out with superstitious fear, then started, when he +beheld a tall figure proceeding from the shadow of the doorway, and +recognised St Agapit, the priest. + +"Who has done this?" he demanded. "What lover of this girl has dared +to enter the fortress, to stab one of my guards, and carry her off +beneath my eye?" + +"I am no reader of riddles," said St Agapit. "I came here to reason +with the maid, because it seemed to me that her heart, young as it is +and tender, must surely respond to the message of love. Why she +refuses the only faith by which mortals may be saved passed my +understanding. But now I know that she has been driven into heresy by +the neglect of a father and the unnatural spirit of a mother, and +strengthened in her sin by the persecution of a cousin." + +"Father, I loved her." + +"Not so. You shall find at your heart passion, but not the warmth of +love. It is not the ice which produces the plant and the flower. It +is the warm rain and the sunshine. You offered her the storm, and +wondered because she desired the sun." + +"Where has she gone?" cried the blind man. + +"To freedom. My blessing follows her, unbeliever though she be." + +The ascetic moved forward, thin and stern, and made the sign of the +cross over the fallen sentry. + +"Bless me also," cried Roussilac, catching at his skirt. "Father, I +have done much evil. Bless me before you go." + +"I may pity where I may not bless," said St Agapit, and passed with +that same dignified step which awed the Iroquois into silence when on a +distant day they led him out to die. His shadow flickered once upon +the slope, went out, and the governor was alone with the dead. + +The soldiers who had been left to execute their commander's unnatural +order glanced fearfully at one another, and he who held the ring +muttered a charm against the evil eye. That cry of impotent rage, +which had caused Roussilac to stop his ears, fell from the lips of +Madame Labroquerie so soon as her mind caught the meaning of her +sentence; and when the men at length advanced to take her, she writhed +and bit the air, and hurled after her nephew words of execration which +caused the soldiers to draw back and cross themselves in terror. All +the hate and madness of the unhappy woman's ruined mind poured forth in +one awful torrent, until she sank to the floor and settled there to +silence. + +Then the men took courage to seize her, believing that the blood which +they saw issuing from her mouth was produced by the wounds which her +own teeth had inflicted; but when the body fell limp in their arms they +realised that nature had intervened. + +One at the head, the other at the feet, they carried through the night +the silent shape of Madame Labroquerie, who was never to move, never to +rave, again. Yet so blindly obedient to their officer's word of +command were these men in the ranks, that they carried the body out and +executed sentence upon it an hour after sunrise in the valley of St. +Charles. + +At that same hour rumour went about the fortress--set in motion by a +sentry, who had seen the governor rushing down to the forest during the +night--to the effect that Roussilac was lying under a spell of +witchcraft. This rumour became an established fact when the Abbé +Laroche was seen proceeding from the church upon the hill with asperges +brush and a shell of holy water. + +"Such is the end of ambition," murmured St Agapit, when they had +brought him the evil tidings. "Can a clay body resist free spirits of +the dead?" + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + +WOMAN'S LOVE IS LIFE. + +Before we leave the fortress, to return thither no more, a glance must +be taken at Madeleine, evading the power of the Church and the secular +arm, escaping from the mother who had grown to hate her and the cousin +who had not courage to shield her. Her rescuer was not a man--if it be +true that man was made in the image of God--yet his actions upon that +night went far to prove that he owned a human heart. + +So soon as Roussilac had gone from his cousin's sight for ever, the +tramp of the sentry's feet began again beating out the seconds like a +clock. The girl was unable to see the soldier, but at regular +intervals his shadow blackened the cracks along the door, and sometimes +she heard him growl when a mosquito pricked his neck. Life became +strangely mechanical as she lay half-asleep, her eyes opening and +closing at intervals, her ears half unconsciously admitting the sounds +of the outer world, her body subdued for the time and yielding to +languor. But soon she stirred, hearing voices outside her cell. A +grating laugh hurt her nerves, and after it came the order of the +sentry calling on some unwelcome visitant to depart. Then the heavy +tramp sounded monotonously again. + +"Would rather be a toad gnawing the root of a tree, than a machine to +pace a dozen yards of grass," taunted an ugly voice. "Admit me into +the hut, Sir Sentry. Know you I have this day been ordained a priest +of Holy Church, and 'tis my duty to reason with the fair impenitent. +Shall defy me, rascal? I can mutter a spell that shall knock the sword +from your hand and shake your body with ague." + +"Begone!" muttered the soldier. "I talk with none while on my duty." + +Madeleine stirred uneasily. Something fell lightly against her arm, +and she looked up to the aperture which made a window. Nothing unusual +met her eyes; but when she moved again a soft odour brushed her face, +and her delighted hand caught up a bunch of wild bush roses. + +"I go." The fully aroused girl felt that the hideous voice was +intended for her ears. "There is no moon to-night, and after dark, +when none shall see, I will be here to ease your duty by a song of +roses and woman's love, brave comrade. Mayhap I shall then meet with a +less churlish welcome." + +"That may be," answered the soldier sullenly. "Another shall have +taken my place. Sing to him if you will." + +"Oh, the lovely flowers!" murmured Madeleine. The blooms had opened +since noon and their yellow hearts were wet, because the gatherer had +dipped each one into the river, before tying them together with a blade +of scented grass. + +She brushed these sweet companions against her cheek, wondering who +could have dared to show himself her friend. The time passed happily +while she waited in tingling expectancy for the coming of dark. + +First came Laroche, full of bluster and talk of the wickedness of +self-will, of the fate of the unbeliever in the next world, and the +punishment of the heretic in this. The abbé had employed the afternoon +in putting an edge to his sword with his own clerical hands, and his +mind was fully occupied with the fineness of the bright steel and the +excellence of the point while he talked. + +"We must save a soul from the everlasting burning," he said with +menace, as he made to depart. "When the body is put to pain the mind +is said to yield with wondrous readiness, and there is joy in Heaven +over the sinner that repenteth. Impenitence in one so young is surely +the work of the devil. The power of exorcism has been conferred upon +the priests of Holy Church. Pray to our Lady and the saints, daughter, +that they strengthen you for the ordeal." + +Laroche swaggered out conscious of having well performed an unpleasant +duty, and hurried down to the street of fishermen, to convince himself +that Michel had not again dared to adulterate his wine. + +After vespers came St Agapit. He had spent the day over his +manuscripts, endeavouring to unravel some of the perplexities of the +human mind. The ascetic was liberal beyond his time. He regarded +Madeleine as rather an object for pity than for punishment. Her brain +had been worked upon and her mind possessed by some spirit of darkness; +and it became his duty to deliver her from the benumbing influence and +to point out to her the way of life. + +But when he came to leave the stone hut, he was for the first moment in +his life a doubter. Madeleine had spoken with such happiness of the +joy of life; had held out to his colourless face her blushing rosebuds, +bidding him note that their smell was as fragrant to her the Protestant +as to him the Catholic; had dwelt upon her faith, which was pure and +perfect even though it excluded the aid of saints and the help of the +Mother of God. And thus had she answered his final argument: + +"In the free country birds would surround me, and each one had its own +way of showing me affection. One would peck at my gown, another caress +me with its wings, another, too shy to approach, would sit on a bough +and sing as best it could. But I loved them all, and the shyest the +best. Father, if the birds have each a different way of showing us +love, may not we, who are better than many sparrows, be allowed to +worship God after our own different promptings?" + +St Agapit blessed her less sternly than usual, and returned perplexed +to his studies, there to search for proof of what Madeleine had said, +praying like the holy man he was for light and understanding. +Reluctantly he was compelled to admit that it was an evil spirit which +had spoken to him out of the mouth of Madeleine. So he went into his +little chapel and prayed for her and for himself that the doubt of his +heart might be forgiven him. + +But in years to come, after those days when the Islanders had stirred +up the Iroquois to avenge their wrongs, a sachem of the Oneidas would +narrate the story of the death of the white doctor, dwelling upon those +last moments when the priest had turned to him to say: "Tell me, is it +true that you worship the sun?" + +"Surely," answered the sachem. "For the sun is our life." + +"In worshipping the sun," cried the exultant priest, "you have surely +worshipped the one God." + +And over the horde of bloodthirsty natives, who were preparing his +fiery torment, St Agapit made the sign of the cross. + +Evening came, soft and fragrant, with a rush of sweet wind when the +door opened to admit food and drink for the prisoner. Madeleine caught +a glimpse of the sentry who took up his post after the proclamation of +the evening gun; a thick-set man, swarthy and black-bearded, a Cyclops +in appearance, but a Cerberus for watchfulness, as the girl knew; for +once, when she had timidly tried the door, the brute had growled at her +like a dog. + +Darker grew the air. Madeleine stood against the wall, listening to +the rush of water far beneath, the drone of beetles, and the scarcely +audible murmur from the heart of the fortress. The last beam went out, +the tired day was asleep, and Cerberus tramped, growling out his +thoughts. + +It became so dark that the walls disappeared. Clouds hung low, dark as +the under-world; the stars were blotted out; not a gleam of phosphorus +nor a smoky ray shot upward from the north. The land whirled blackly +into space. + +Madeleine moved her forehead from the cold stone and sighed softly. +She crept to her bed and sat shivering gently, holding fast her +treasured blooms. The night damp had revived the flowers and drawn out +their odour, so that the girl pleased herself with the fancy that she +was sitting in a rose-bower. + +She heard the screech of an owl far away, the rattle and splash of +oars, the running out of a chain, the snap of a belated locust. She +heard the ticking of an insect in the walls; and she heard the growl of +Cerberus: + +"A plague upon that ghost-light!" + +She heard a sound which made her shiver, though it might have been +nothing more than a heavy foot struck sharply upon the turf; but hardly +had the thrill passed when a gasp and a great groan made the dark night +wild, and the hill-top and every stone in the building seemed to jar as +the ground was smitten. The silence that followed was unbroken by the +solemn tramp which had become a part of the girl's life. The human +clock was broken. + +Then a subdued voice began to sing, harsh and unmusical, straining to +be sympathetic, and its song was of peace and love in an old-world +garden. Harsher grew the voice, though the effort to be tender +underlay each note. + +"Friend," whispered Madeleine + +The song was stilled. + +"Oh, friend, open the door and let me feel the air." + +"Prepare your eyes for a hideous sight," muttered the voice, dull and +grating like a saw. + +"My deliverer cannot make me fear," she murmured. + +The iron bolt grated, the door opened, and Madeleine beheld in the +gloom the shapeless outline of the dwarf. + +"Thank the night, lady," he said. "It is kind because it hides one of +nature's failures. A spider, they say, once saved a Scotchman. A +hunchback may do as much for a queen." + +Madeleine stepped out to the balmy night. + +"What made you come to my aid?" she murmured. "It is death for you." + +"Lady," said Gaudriole, "I bow to the Church, because hypocrisy drives +many a sinner to play the saint. When the fat Laroche calls me to my +duty, I confess with my tongue in my cheek and burn a rushlight. That +is for policy. Before you I am a Protestant. By myself I am a +believer in living long and cheating the gallows. That again is +policy. I hate the Church and its priests, therefore I have released +you. Also, by some strange mischance, nature has placed a man's heart +within this contemptible body. But let us hasten." + +"The sentry!" exclaimed Madeleine. + +"Look not in that direction," said Gaudriole. "Lady, which way? I +will guide you to safety, stay by your side while I can serve you, and +when you say, 'Back, dog!' I disappear." + +"You have done murder," cried the girl. "Let me see. Stand aside. +Ah, poor wretch! He was but doing his duty, and his blood is on my +head." + +"The deed is mine, both in this world and the next," said Gaudriole. +"I had a grudge against the knave. He stunned me once with his fist +when I stumbled by mischance across his foot. Lady, you must come +quickly. I see lights moving yonder. There is no time to lose." + +"Geoffrey!" murmured Madeleine softly to her self. + +"For his sake," urged the dwarf. Then he paused and ground his teeth. + +"But you?" she exclaimed. + +"I!" Gaudriole uttered his malevolent chuckle. "To-morrow I shall be +hopping about the fortress, full of wild fancies which shall mightily +impress the superstitious. I shall say how, as I lay on the hillside, +I saw lightning strike the sentry dead, and how at the roll of thunder +the door of this hut burst open and you passed out in a flame of fire. +Laroche shall worship you as a saint to-morrow, if he worship aught but +his belly and his sword, and shall keep the day holy in honour of +Sainte Madeleine. Fear not for me. I have a clever tongue, lady, and +a brave imagination, and if I am pushed can devise twenty men to do +this deed. Come!" he whispered sharply. "The lights approach." + +Madeleine permitted herself to be hurried away, and the ill-matched +pair made no stop until the forest had closed behind. Not a sound came +from the heights; only the watch-fires flickered gently in the wind. + +"Which way?" cried Gaudriole. + +"The sea," said Madeleine. + +"There lies your path. 'Tis a mountainous country yonder. If you hide +to-night, I will after dark to-morrow bring down a boat, and in that +you may escape." + +"I know how to find food, and the Indians will not harm me," she +replied. "I have made myself friendly with them, and carry a marked +stone which one of their sachems gave me." + +"Say now the words, 'Back, dog!' and I leave you." + +Madeleine turned reluctantly to the dwarf. + +"Go, friend," she said, with her pitying smile Gaudriole went down on +his sharp knees, and his crooked shoulders heaved. + +"Lady, I am no man, but a beast who has done you what little service it +might. My life shall continue as nature has fitted me, but when I come +to die on the gallows, as such as I must end, I would have one blessed +memory to carry with me into hell. Suffer me to kiss your hand." + +Madeleine hesitated, her lips parting pitifully, her eyes wet as the +grass which brushed her skirt. Then, as the poor villain raised his +hideous face, she bent and swiftly kissed his grimy brow. Her glorious +hair for a moment streamed upon his elfin locks, then she was gone, +breathing a little faster, while Gaudriole lay humped upon the ground. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX. + +LAND-LOCKED. + +With the life of Master William Grignion, alderman, and subsequently +sheriff, of the City of London, these annals are not concerned. The +merchant's existence cannot, however, be altogether ignored, owing to a +certain venture on his part, which resulted in an English ship being +cast upon the shore of Acadie at the beginning of winter. Master +Grignion was an austere man, who, by dint of miserly practice and sharp +dealing, had amassed what in those days was a considerable fortune. +After marrying his only daughter to an impecunious peer, he occupied a +shameful old house upon Thames bank, the greater part of which was +stocked with bales of merchandise. From the single window of the +living-room, which was furnished below the degree of discomfort, the +old man could view the overtoppling houses upon London Bridge; and here +Master Grignion counted his gains each night, while his starved dog +slunk from corner to corner sniffing uselessly for a scrap of food. + +Owing to the scarcity of English ships, no valuable cargo of tobacco, +and none of the products of New World grist-mills or tanneries, had for +many months crossed the seas. For weeks the alderman had been +engrossed by an idea, which grew in strength upon him--namely, that if +he built for himself a ship and despatched her to Virginia, he might +very possibly add materially to the already considerable store of gold +pieces which were secreted about his house from cellar to attic. But +Master Grignion knew well that the seas were held by England's foes, +and the nightmare of failure held him back from his project month after +month. One evening, however, while he watched the muddy Thames after a +good day of business, the finger of inspiration touched him, and, +gazing up into the London sky, which was not murky in those days, he +remarked: "Hitherto ships have been constructed for strength. Dutch, +French, and Spanish vessels are alike slow and cumbersome. It has +occurred to no man to build a ship for speed." + +Having solved the problem, Master Grignion knew no rest until he had +found an enterprising shipbuilder, who was clever at his business and +at the same time weak in bargaining. Discovering in Devon the man he +required, the alderman divulged his plan; and from that day forward +until the _Dartmouth_ stood fully decked before Barnstaple the miser's +talk was of sailcloth and sailmaking, with masts, yards, gaffs, booms, +and bowsprits. The _Dartmouth_, when completed even to the +satisfaction of her avaricious owner, was undoubtedly ahead of the time. + +One Silas Upcliff, an old sea-dog with a face red and yellow like a +ripe apple, and a fringe of snow-white whisker below the chin, a native +of Plymouth, and a man well salted by experience, volunteered to raise +a crew and sail the _Dartmouth_ to the Potomac; and, after a vast deal +of haggling over the questions of provisioning and wages, his offer was +accepted. And one fine day the brigantine shook out her wealth of +canvas and skimmed away westward, over the track of such brave vessels +as the Pelican, the little _Discovery_, and the Puritan _Mayflower_. +Trembling with pride and excitement, and a certain amount of fear lest +at the last moment his ship might be seized for the service of the +king, Master Grignion stood by while the anchor was heaved, shouting +his final injunction: "Fight not with your guns, Master Skipper. +Should an enemy attack you, let out more sail and fly." Silas Upcliff +nodded in stolid English style, and, as he drew away, turned to his +mate and muttered: "From the French, the storm, but most of all from +misers, good Lord deliver us." + +From the French the _Dartmouth_ was indeed delivered, but not from the +storm. Hostile vessels were sighted, but the brigantine's speed +enabled her to show a particularly dainty stern to these privateers; +and all went well with her until the line of the American coast lifted +ominously distinct above the horizon before being blotted out by a mass +of fiery cloud. Then came the storm, which flung the little vessel far +from her course, carried her northwards, and finally cast her upon the +coast of Nova Scotia, after failing in its effort to wreck her on the +western spurs of Newfoundland. When the storm ceased, a freezing calm +set in, and for two days snow descended without intermission. Upcliff +gave the order to build a house out of pine logs, where he and his men +might take shelter while they repaired the ship; for the little +_Dartmouth_ had been terribly strained by the storm and pierced by the +sharp-toothed rocks. The skipper believed that he was near his +destined harbour, and was sorely puzzled by the snow and bitter cold; +but, when a sailor came hurriedly to report that he had seen the smoke +of a distant settlement and a tree stamped with the fleur-de-lys, the +captain began to greatly fear that the miserly alderman had lost his +venture, and he bade his men bring out their cutlasses and to see that +they were sharp. + +When the snow ceased and the atmosphere became clear, a tall figure +came down among the pines, and gave a hearty welcome to the skipper and +his men. The visitor was Sir Thomas Iden, and he came not alone to +greet the master of the _Dartmouth_, for none other than Madeleine was +at his side. + +The brave girl had travelled far that night of her release, and for two +days hurried eastward, keeping near the river, existing on butternuts +and the different kinds of berry which flourished in abundance at that +season of the year, until on the eve of the second day she saw the +smoke of a camp-fire rising from the beach. Descending, she revealed +herself boldly to the campers, who were none other than Sir Thomas and +his native wife; and when the former heard her story, and knew that she +was English at heart, if French in name, and further learnt that she +was the affianced of Geoffrey Viner, who had gone out to bring them +help, he bent with knightly grace and kissed her hand, and besought her +to accompany him to the land above the sea. Madeleine joyously +consented; and from that hour her troubles ceased. + +Afterwards Jeremiah Hough came to the land beside the gulf, and with +him Penfold, fully recovered from his fever; and these men also took +Madeleine to their hearts--though the stern Puritan refused to trust +her--when they heard how she had served their comrade. In the pathless +land above the sea, a little to the east of Acadie, they settled +themselves; the knight, his wife, and Madeleine in one log-cabin in a +hollow; Hough and Penfold in another, placed in the heart of a dense +pine-wood. No marauding band had been abroad to trouble the land. The +only danger which appeared to threaten the Englishmen, now that winter +had set in, was the possibility that some Indian spy might carry the +news of their hiding-place into the town; and this danger was a very +real one, for, though they did not know of it, Onawa had followed La +Salle to Acadie. + +It was Madeleine who sighted the _Dartmouth_ snowed up beside the +beach. She had gone out into the storm to run along the cliff and +fight against the mighty buffetings of the wind which had upset the +plans of Master Grignion. She sped back over the spruce-clad hills, +and coming first to the adventurers' hut stopped to tell them the +tidings. They ran forth, flushed with the hope that Geoffrey had +succeeded, and, standing upon a hill-top, argued concerning the +stranger's nationality, until they came regretfully to the decision +that she could not be from English shores. + +"I saw never a ship so light in build," said Penfold. "See you the +number of her masts? She is made to run and not to fight, whereas our +English ships are made to fight and never to run. She is, if I mistake +not, a Dutch vessel." + +"Peradventure the Lord shall deliver her also into our hands," quoth +Hough fervently. + +The captain shook his grizzled head, and answered sadly: "Recall not +that day of our triumph. Then were we five good men. Now George, our +brother, lies on the Windy Arm, and friend Woodfield is no more, and +young Geoffrey has gone out into a strange country. Only you and I +remain, and my arm now lacks its former strength." + +In the meantime Madeleine had run for her protector; and before the day +was done both Penfold and the Puritan knew of their error, and had +joined hands once again with men from their native land. + +When Silas Upcliff learnt that he stood upon the perilous Nova Scotian +coast, he felt more shame than fear--shame to hear that the land was +mastered by the French. Had not those bold sea-brothers of England the +Cabots discovered it over a century earlier, and had not James the +First conferred his crown patent of the whole of Canada upon Sir +William Alexander, his Scottish favourite? The honest skipper well +knew that the magnanimous Charles had confirmed the bestowal of that +prodigious gift, acting, it must be assumed, under surprising +ignorance, seeing that the land was no more his to give than were the +New Netherlands or Peru. And at that time, when Roussilac held the St. +Lawrence and La Salle the priest ruled Acadie, the Scottish peer, who +was nominal lord of all the land, was peacefully engaged in writing +mediocre poetry in his castle of Stirling! Between the ostensible and +actual ownership spread a vast gulf of difference, as the men upon that +shore were to learn to their cost. + +Silas Upcliff gave his compatriots a sailor's hearty handshake, and the +men who knew the land and its occupants rendered the new-comers what +assistance they might, while Hough lost no time in begging them to join +in an attack upon Acadie. To that Upcliff could only make the reply: +"My services are bought, my ship is armed for defence only, and my men +are sworn to run rather than to fight." + +Then Madeleine offered her services as housewife to the crew, and when +the men knew that she loved an English lad, that she was a Huguenot, +and had formerly trodden the streets and lanes of Somerset and Devon, +that she even knew the familiar names above merchants' doors in Bristol +and Plymouth, and could quote them with a pretty accent, they fell in +love with her forthwith, from Upcliff himself to the rogue of a boy +before the mast. From that time forth she ruled them with a velvet +discipline, joining the workers engaged in repairing the ship's +injuries, and helping them by her happiness and approval. + +"Hurry! hurry!" she would cry. "Ah, but you talk too much. She shall +float to-morrow. Then to break the ice and flee away!" + +"Art in such hurry to lose us, lass?" said Upcliff on the second day +after the snow. + +"But I shall not lose you," cried Madeleine. "I am going to sail away +with you. I shall bring good fortune and favouring winds; and if any +man be sick I will nurse him back to strength. None ever die whom I +watch over. The sick are ashamed even to think of death when they see +me so full of life. You will take me to my Geoffrey, in the land of +the free?" + +"Ay, and to England if you will," cried the hearty skipper, who had +already heard her story. "But, my lass, your Geoffrey may be on his +way back, and you may but get south to find him gone." + +"No," replied Madeleine, shaking her head decidedly. "He is not on his +way back. I think he is in trouble. I cannot understand, but I feel +that he is being punished for what he has not done, and I know that I +can help him. No one can help a man like the woman who loves him. +Geoffrey wants me, and I must go." + +"You shall go, girl," promised the sea-dog; and, turning half aside, +muttered: "If the boy have played her false, I shall have it in my mind +to run out a line from the cross-tree and see him hanged." + +"False!" cried Madeleine, with a scream of laughter. "Is the sun false +when the clouds will not let him shine? Why, I would slap your wicked +face, and cook you no supper to-night, if I believed that you spoke in +faith." + +She ran away, kicking up the dusty snow, and throwing back a laugh +which filled the winter air with the breath of spring. + +Each calm morning the boats of the deep-sea fishermen put out from +Acadie, and returned before evening with their frozen freight. The +Englishmen stifled their fires and stilled their voices when these +boats drew near. Their shelter was well hidden among the pines; the +snowed-up brigantine resembled nothing so much as a rock bearing a few +dead and stripped firs. Every night the sailors laughed at danger; but +each morning found them on the watch. + +A week passed without event, until the evening of the eighth day +arrived and found the sailors packed within their log-hut at the back +of the ice-bound bay awaiting the call to supper. The three +adventurers were also present as the skipper's guests. The cabin was +warm and well lighted, equipped by the men's handiness with nautical +furniture from their ship. From the region beyond a curtain, which +divided the interior, came the smell of cookery and the joyful roaring +of a fire. A feeling of security was upon the company, because +snow-clouds were rolling up outside and the gulf was filled with fog. +As night drew on these grey clouds appeared to melt into feathers +innumerable, and the pines became snow-steeples, and the rocks huge +beds of down. The brigantine was locked within a sheet of ice, and +that mysterious silence which had so terrified Cabot the pioneer held +all the land in thrall. But the Englishmen cared for none of these +things. They knew that the colony of Acadie was being buried in the +snow; the unknown coast had no terrors; nor did they fear the black +winter sea which southwards groaned and tossed. So they gave each +other good cheer, and listened to Upcliff, who beguiled them with +reminiscences of his seafaring life until his throat was dry. Then he +paused to refresh himself with a rolled tobacco-leaf, and his sailors +broke the silence which ensued by singing melodiously a soft musical +chanty, which recalled to the mind of each his free and happy life upon +the main and the rollicking days ashore. This song also stirred into +activity a memory which lay latent in the skipper's mind. + +"I saw the man who made that verse," he said, leaning over the circle, +and putting out his hand for silence. "Will tell you where I saw him. +'Twas on London street beside Globe Theatre, coming by Blackfriars, and +he stood with another honest gentleman watching us wild fellows roll +past. We were singing like boys on the road from school and making the +fat watchmen run. London town was a brave place for us young sailors +up from the West Country, and we were bent on having our pleasure, +though we had to pay for it before my Lord Mayor." + +"What was the name of master?" asked one of the men. + +"A comely gentleman," went on the captain, disregarding the questioner. +"Though methinks as pale as any wench who had lost her lover. Not a +wrinkle on the face of him, and the forehead of him wide and smooth, +ay, and as cold looking as any slab of stone from Portland cliff. But +the eyes of man! I caught the look of them, and they seemed to pass +through my brain learning in one glance more about me than ever I knew +myself. And the smile of man! Can see it now as he turned to his +fellow and said: 'The sailor is the man to drive our care away, good +Burbage.' And then he said softly those words you have now been +singing, 'One foot in sea and one on shore, To one thing constant +never.' A Christian gentleman, they told me. A great actor, and a +poet who made money, they told me. Should watch his 'Tempest' played. +Would make you feel on shipboard, and hold on to a pillar of the pit to +steady your feet withal." + +"He loved a mariner," said a voice. "The Englishman smells of salt +water, say they in France. 'Tis better, so honest Will did say, than +to smell of civet." + +"How goes the weather?" demanded the captain suddenly. + +"Snowing. Our little barque is but a drift." + +The sailor who had sought to learn the poet's name repeated his +question, and while the information was being driven into his obtuse +head by half a dozen of his mates in concert, the curtain dividing the +cabin became suddenly agitated, a white hand fluttered for an instant, +and a bright voice called: + +"Your food is ready, children." + +The sailors rose, laughing as heartily at the pleasantry as though they +had not heard it before, and obeyed the summons gladly. To every man +was set a great bowl of stew, and the fair cook, resting her hands upon +her sides, watched them as they set to work. + +"You are idle," she declared. "I have but little meat left, and you, +great children that you are, require so much feeding. In the morning I +shall turn you out to hunt. The snow shall have stopped by then, and +you may follow the deer by their fresh tracks." + +Madeleine nodded severely at the sailors as she thus made known to them +her mind. + +The crew were still over supper, and Silas was telling one of his sea +stories to ears which had already heard it a score of times, but +listened patiently because it was the master speaking, when a deep +sound broke among the hills and rolled onward through the snow, making +the rough coast throb. + +The skipper's mouth was open to laugh at his own excellent wit, but +that sound brought his lips together, as it caused all his listeners to +start for the door. The same cry was upon every tongue, as their hands +dragged away the sail which stretched across the entrance: + +"A gun!" + +They poured into the terrible whiteness, huddling as close as sheep. +Nothing was visible, except the steady masses shed from the clouds like +wool. Not a sound, nor any sign of life. They waited, straining their +eyes out to sea, but the gun did not roar again. + +"Cast your eyes over to the west," called a voice, and the master found +Sir Thomas at his side. + +A glow in that direction filled the sky, making the surroundings weird, +and from time to time a red tongue of fire leapt up. + +"'Tis a French ship bringing provisions," said the knight, pointing +into the unfathomable mass. "She has signalled, and yonder fire burns +to guide her in." + +"Wreck her!" cried a Cornishman. "Let us build another fire on the +cliff to the east. With fortune, she shall steer for our beacon +instead of theirs." + +"We should but make ourselves known," growled Upcliff. + +A terrified shout broke upon his speech, and one of the men jumped +against the huddled party, shrieking in fear. + +"What ails you, Jacob Sadgrove?" cried the skipper. + +"God save me! A foul spirit close at my side. She grinned out of the +snow and floated away, her feet never touching ground. A warning--a +death warning, and I a miserable sinner." + +The man grovelled upon his knees up to his waist in snow, flapping his +hands and groaning. + +"Speak up, man!" said Sir Thomas. "What is that you saw?" + +"He has seen a wyvern," spoke the master contemptuously. "Was always a +man to see more than other folk." + +"Stood at my side and grinned in a fearsome manner," whined the sailor. +"The nose of her was slit like man yonder, and the ears of her were +like a dog's, and she breathed fire out of her mouth." + +"Stay!" cried Hough, stepping out. "Say you that her face was marked +like mine?" + +"The same," panted the man. "But dead and cold, and her eyes like +fish----" + +The Puritan drowned his wailings by a bitter cry. + +"Forgive me, friends," he cried. "The Lord delivered me that woman to +slay, and I, weak vessel that I am, drew back, and now am punished, and +in my punishment you must share. We are discovered." + +"The name of that woman?" demanded Sir Thomas. + +"The sister of your wife." + +"I knew it," groaned the knight. "The agent of my son's death. Which +way went she?" he cried at the terrified sailor. + +"She flew there--there," stuttered the man. + +"Follow the tracks!" + +"Nay, there are none. The snow already covers them." + +"Her feet ne'er touched the snow," wailed the man. "Her feet were hot +from the everlasting fire." + +"Peace, fool," said Upcliff. He turned to Hough. "Are our lives in +danger?" + +"Never in greater. The woman is an Indian spy, who is now on her way +to the settlement, where rules a hot-headed priest who has sworn to +kill every Englishman in the land. They will be on us ere morning." + +"There is only one way," said the master. "We must break the ice, +release our barque, and put out. The sea is calm." + +"She will not float." + +"She shall float." + +Upcliff gave his orders coolly, and the sailors hastened to obey +through the muffling mists. The greater number attacked the ice with +axe and saw, while the minority dismantled the shelter and reconveyed +its contents to the ghostly ship. Every man worked his hardest, +longing for the sea. The blow of axes and the snarl of a long saw +sounded along the hidden coast. + +Madeleine came down, all white with snow like a bride, and cheered them +on, and presently brought each man a bowl of soup to renew his +strength. A narrow lane opened through the ice, an ink-black passage +in the colourless plain, but beyond stretched a long white field before +the jagged edge where the snow wave curled in a monstrous lip. + +The brigantine righted herself with a flutter and a plunge, casting the +snow from her yards, and the grinding of her keel made joyful music. +The toilers, sweating as though they had been reaping corn in summer, +laboured to open the path to the stagnant sea. + +"The rent in her hold is plugged by solid ice," called the skipper. +"She shall carry that cargo bravely through this calm." + +The big feathers of snow became spots of down, which lessened to the +degree of frost points before morning. The country began to unroll, +all padded with its monstrous coverlet; the trees masqueraded as +wool-stuffed Falstaffs; the cliffs seemed to have increased in the +night; the heavens were nearer the earth. The coast appalled in its +cold virginity. + +"One more hour, and then for the sea," sang Upcliff. "Is everything +aboard?" + +"All but the stove, captain. We wait for it to cool." + +"Bring it out into the snow." + +As Upcliff gave the order, a man crossed the brow of a western hill and +floundered knee-deep towards the bay. It was Hough, and he shouted as +he ran: + +"The French are coming out!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI. + +IN THE FALL OF THE SNOW. + +Because the Father of Waters was frozen over and its track buried in +snow, despatches from Quebec could only be conveyed by the hand of +overland couriers. Winter had set in early that year, and with more +than usual severity; and this was probably the reason why no messenger +had lately arrived from the heights to inform the governor of Acadie as +to what had taken place in and around the modest capital of New France. + +The priest was not concerned by this silence. He had indeed lost much +of his interest in the doings of the New World, since D'Archand had +informed him of his popularity at home. He felt that he had made his +advancement sure. During the weeks which followed autumn, when the +maples were resigning their gorgeous vestments of red and gold, he had +occupied himself in setting the affairs of his charge in order, looking +to shortly receive a command to proceed to Rome, there to receive the +reward of his stewardship. Onawa had passed out of his memory, and +with her the brave young boy whom he had smitten in the forest by +Couchicing. He sent no expedition out to search the land. He had done +sufficient for glory. He was not the man to waste his energies upon +works of supererogation. No slip could lose him that spiritual +principality towards which he had pressed by word and act since the day +of his ordination. As he strode through the snow the settlement seemed +to shrink from him, and the trees to bow, as though foreseeing the +power which was about to pass into his hands. + +La Salle reached his chapel, recited vespers in the arrogant voice +which made him feared, and returned to his quarters. A spirit of +restlessness was over him, and when he could resist no longer he rose, +and, taking his sword, lunged repeatedly at a knot in the wall, +striking it full until his body began to sweat. + +"No falling off," he muttered, as he examined the pricks in the wood. +"No sign of weakness yet." He lowered the sword, and mechanically +wiped the point in the tail of his skirt, then passed his firm hand +caressingly down the blade, murmuring, with a self-conscious smile: "I +have finished my fighting. Henceforth my wrist must stiffen and my arm +rust, while the power which has controlled the sword shall pass into +the use of tongue and pen." + +A knock fell upon the door, and in response to his reply a personal +attendant entered, and with a low reverence announced: + +"A messenger to speak with you, Excellency." + +At the governor's word a man was ushered in, clad in furs, his beard +heavy with icicles, a pair of long snow-shoes slung upon his back. He +made a profound genuflection and stood with bent head awaiting +permission to speak. + +"Come you from the upper fortress?" asked La Salle. + +"Yes, Excellency, with despatches for France and a letter for your +Holiness." + +La Salle put out his hand for the communication, broke the thread, +unfolded the sheet, and, holding it in the lamplight, bent over to read. + +"Ha!" he exclaimed, his eyes lifting. "Laroche. What means this +signature?" + +"The noble commandant Roussilac has been stricken with sickness," +hesitated the messenger. + +"What ails him?" asked the priest. + +The man faltered, but finally gained courage to reply: "It is said, +Excellency, that the noble commandant acts strangely, as a man +possessed by some unholy influence." + +La Salle brought the letter again to his eyes, and hurriedly scanned +the ill-written lines. + +"It is explained here," he said indifferently. "La tête lui a tourné. +Was never an able man," he muttered to himself. "Was ambitious, and +thought himself strong enough to stand alone. 'Tis but justice." He +looked across coldly, and sharply ordered the messenger to withdraw. + +The emissary retired, bowing as he backed out, while La Salle ran his +eyes over the remainder of the letter, muttering his comments aloud. + +"Gaudriole hanged for murdering a soldier. So, so! Was but a brute. +The little Frenchwoman dead of a fit, and her daughter escaped. A +weeding-out, in faith. The traitorous Dutch gone beyond capture. The +English spy also escaped. The men sent after him returned afoot, and +swore that they had been set upon by demons among a range of white +mountains. Would have hanged the fools. The Iroquois tribes gone into +winter hunting-grounds. The country altogether clear. The Algonquins +still friendly. This colony is now settled to France beyond question." + +La Salle dropped the letter, and fell into musings. Once he put his +hand to his brow, as though he could already feel a mitre pressing +there; he fingered his ring, and moved his foot, to frown when his eyes +sighted a rough boot instead of the scarlet shoe of his dreams. Then +he was awakened by a noisy rattling and a shock. + +The crucifix which had hung upon the log wall--more as a sign of +profession, as the gauntlet outside the glove-maker's shop, than as a +symbol he revered--lay broken upon the floor. + +The priest rose, muttering a frightened imprecation, and as he +nervously gathered up the shattered symbol his ears became opened to a +hurrying of feet over the fresh snow. All the soldiers and settlers +appeared to be rushing past afoot, shaking the ground and the walls of +his house. It was doubtless this disturbance which had detached the +crucifix from its nail. La Salle pulled a beaver cap over his forehead +and made for the outer door, and there encountered a messenger who came +to inform him that a ship's gun had been heard at sea. + +"Bid them fire the beacon," said La Salle. + +"It has been done, Excellency. There is not a breath over the water. +But the snow pours down." + +The priest's official bodyguard awaited him; and when he appeared every +man saluted and fell into place, and so accompanied him to the cliff, +where a huge fire was making the sky scarlet. This fire was a centre +towards which all the settlers were hastening like flies towards a +lantern. The coming of a ship from the Old World, with supplies, fresh +faces, and news of friends, was a red-letter day in the monotonous +calendar of their lives. The white figures hurried through the night +like an inferno of chattering ghosts. + +"She shall not be in till morning light," quoth a wiseacre. "There are +rocks, see you, in the gulf, and her master shall run no risk after +escaping the perils of the ocean." + +"Will wager to-day's haul of fish that she lies up here before three +hours are gone," cried another. + +"And I my fishing-net that we shall not see her before day," retorted +the confident first speaker. + +"That net is mine. Didst not hear the gun?" + +"Sounds carry far through the winter air." + +"The snow muffles. She is scarce a mile out." + +"Ah, that is indeed a fire! The light of it shall reach far out at +sea." + +The excitable folk laughed loudly whenever a fresh load of wood was +flung upon the flames, and carried away by their feelings danced an +ambulatory ballet in the red mist, a dance, like the Prosperity of the +Arms of France to be given before Richelieu a few months later, not +altogether without political significance. These settlers danced to +the tune of their song; and their songs were Success to the Ships of +France and Destruction to the English. While these revels lasted no +one observed a soldier hurrying up behind, with a woman at his side. +The woman was Onawa, breathing quickly as though she had been running +at the top of her speed. + +"Yonder stands his Holiness," said the man, stopping to point out La +Salle surrounded by his little band of attendants. + +Onawa abandoned her guide and rushed out, maddened and witless with her +foolish passion, until she reached the side of the man she loved and +was warmed by his dark eyes, which yet flashed angrily upon her, as he +turned to shake off the parasite, ejaculating: + +"Whom have we here?" + +"It is I," she cried wildly in French, having at length acquired some +little knowledge of that language. "Let me speak." More she would +have said, but her store of the language failed in the time of need. + +"Uncover her face," ordered La Salle. "Take her into the firelight +that we may see with whom we have to deal." + +"Let me speak to you here," prayed the girl, drawing back into the +snow-lit gloom; but she was seized and dragged upward close to the +dancing ring, and rough hands drew the covering from her face. + +"Tête de mort!" exclaimed La Salle, and started back when he recognised +the face that had once been handsome set towards him in the wild +firelight, fearfully branded, the nostrils slit, the ears cropped, a +letter seared upon each cheek. "Cover that horror, and drive her out +lest she bewitch us." + +"Hear me," the unhappy girl moaned, holding out her hands in an agony +of supplication. "Yonder your enemy cover the shore. Many men and a +ship held in the ice." She panted forth the syllables in the best +French she could muster, throwing out her hands along the eastern shore. + +La Salle's expression altered as he turned to his subordinates with the +old fighting passion in his eye and heart. + +"My men," he said, "this woman is but an Indian, but she is +trustworthy, I know. An English vessel has been cast ashore, and the +sailors seek to make shelter. What say you? Shall we warm our blood +and relieve this tedious time of waiting by venturing out to +exterminate the vermin?" + +"Should we not first send out a spy?" suggested an old officer. + +"It is well thought on. Choose you a man, and bid him take this woman +for a guide. Let him stab her if she prove false. Do you gather +together our fighters," went on the priest, turning to another, "and +bid them make ready to sally out immediately." + +"Shall you venture yourself, Excellency?" + +"Shall I not!" cried La Salle, his hot blood afire for one more fight +and one more triumph. "I fear we shall find but poor sport, but such +as it is I shall take my share. Break up yonder circle of madmen, and +order them to make ready. Hasten, so that we may have our hunt, and be +ready to receive the ship when she sails out of the fog." + +"I go not," cried Onawa, furiously resisting the soldiers who would +have forced her away. She broke from them, ran to La Salle, and fell +upon her knees, panting: "I go with you, that I may fight with you, and +die for you." + +"The woman has yet to learn a soldier's discipline," said La Salle +coldly. "Secure a rope round her, and if she prove obstinate let her +feel the end of it." + +Onawa flung herself forward to grasp his feet, but two soldiers stepped +out and dragged her away. + +"Now, my brave comrades! To arms!" shouted the fighting priest. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII. + +ARMS AND THE MAN. + +Silas Upcliff groaned bitterly when he heard the Puritan's shout. +Being a brave man, his spirit inclined towards lending aid to his +compatriots, but being honest also, his sense of duty impelled him to +observe the oath which he had made to his niggardly owner. While he +was thus halting between two opinions, the three venturers left him +upon the shore, the blood tingling in their veins at the prospect of a +glorious death. + +Penfold led the way and took command, carrying his burden of years as +lightly as any man upon that coast. Striking upward from the bay, +where the sailors were fighting the ice, he brought his companions to a +height of three hundred feet above the sea, where the cliffs were +divided by a narrow defile down which in summer coursed a stream. + +"I have kept this place in mind," said the old man, when they halted at +the extremity of the pass. "Here we shall make our stand." + +So contracted was the way that the snow, massed heavily upon the sides, +in places nearly touched. Some pines clung to the rock, hanging over +the defile, straining at their rope-like roots. At these the old +yeoman pointed with the order: + +"Fell me two trees so that they shall fall along the pass." + +The others scrambled up the cliff and cut at the snaky roots, while +Penfold occupied himself below in treading the snow into a firm bed. +Soon the tough pines began to crack and sway. First one crashed down, +then another, and after that Upcliff came running, short of breath, +into the defile, having at length made up his mind that Master Grignion +must lose his ship. + +"The enemy show black against the snow yonder, a hundred men if there +be one," he shouted. "Tell me now, how shall I dispose my men?" + +"Return to your ship, Master Skipper, and cut her free with what speed +you may," replied Penfold gruffly. "We stand here to hold back the +enemy so long as life remains." + +"Mayhap they shall not come this way?" suggested Upcliff. + +"If they do not, then are ye doubly safe. Before they can pass round +you shall be away, for I know of no easy path up yonder wall, and on +the south the sea guards us. See you not that they must here advance +singly, and that one good fighter may hold them all at bay?" + +"They have guns," said Upcliff, cocking his ear to listen to the axes +ringing keenly in the bay. + +"They shall not use them. The snow must drench their priming." + +The skipper made a step back, but halted again. + +"I cannot desert you, comrades," he said hoarsely. "My owner is also +an Englishman, an alderman of London town, and, close-minded though he +be, I wot he would lose his venture and his ship rather than see +England shamed. Bid me call my men to the far end of this pass, and +there let us stand together until the end." + +"See you not that this is our affair?" replied Penfold. "We are +fighting for our own hands, having blood of comrades to avenge. Go, +for you do but waste your time and ours." + +"Away," added Hough, pushing the skipper gently back. "The Lord being +on our side, how should we be afraid? They come about us like bees, +and are extinct even as the fire among the thorns, for in the name of +the Lord shall we destroy them. Go, good master, and while we smite +these worshippers of idols do you release your ship." + +Thus compelled to observe his oath, Upcliff gave way, though with great +unwillingness, and ran to the end of the pass, where his eyes were +gladdened by the sight of the _Dartmouth_ riding in the black channel, +dressed out in all her canvas. His sailor's heart warmed at the +spectacle, but sank again when he contemplated the wide white field +which still spread between the deep sea and his ship. He staggered +down, blowing like a whale, and snatching an axe from the tired hands +of one of his sailors wielded it furiously. + +The men in the pass twisted the pine-boughs and snagged the trunks to +form a rough chevaux-de-frise. Before an hour had passed they heard +footfalls crushing the snow, and then Penfold smiled and rose to his +feet. The old man had been resting beneath a tree. + +"Comrades," he said, "I lead by the privilege of age. Not more than +one can make a stand in this narrow pass. Do you ascend the cliff, one +on either side, and as the enemy attempt to climb the barrier cast snow +into their faces. The rest you shall leave to me." + +"Out on you, old Simon," said Hough strongly. "I am younger than you +by many years, and thus shall last the longer." + +"You may fill this place after me," said Penfold. "But while I live I +rule." + +Hough was not satisfied, and the argument was only brought to an end by +the sight of a cap lifting above the ridge. + +"To your places," whispered Penfold, stepping quickly to the barrier. + +The knight was already upon the cliff, sheltering his spare body behind +a pine. He awaited the one man who, he felt assured, would not lose +the opportunity of a fight, and he did not desire to risk his life +until he and that man could meet. + +"Captain!" called a French voice startlingly, "a barrier is thrown +across the way." + +"Over it," ordered the officer. + +The man jumped upon the fallen trunk and threw up his hands to grasp +the higher branches; but his fingers merely clutched the air, he gave a +groan, and fell back, pierced through the heart by Penfold's sword, +which had darted from the interlacing branches. A shout went up from +the pass, which was now a struggling mass of soldiers. + +"Information ever costs a man," said the officer coolly. "Storm the +barrier." + +Two soldiers rushed out and flung themselves upon the locked trees, +jostling each other in the constricted space. A lump of snow hit the +foremost between the eyes, he gasped, and would have turned, but a +sword-thrust sent him to his doom, and his comrade, blinded in the +self-same manner, shared his fate. + +"There are men in hiding yonder," rang a voice. "The villains shelter +behind the trees." + +"Find me a way round," roared an angry voice, and La Salle pushed along +the pass. "Are we to be held here by one man behind a fallen tree?" + +"There is no way up, Excellency," said an officer, gazing up the face +of the rock. "The heretics have well chosen their place." + +"Send men round," shouted the priest. + +A detachment was sent instantly to find a way over the cliff, while +woodmen with axes went out and laid furiously upon the pines. Penfold +disabled the first, but another advanced, and after him another, each +unwilling to obey, but unable to hang back. + +Three dead bodies were dragged out, and La Salle tried the expedient of +sending his men in rapid succession against the barrier. The wet snow +dashed upon their faces, one by one they dropped before that stinging +sword, man after man fell back, but another always stood ready to rush +into the gap, to make the attempt, and give way to someone more +confident than he. Penfold's dogged old tongue counted off the strokes +to the ringing of the ice-axes from the bay. The soldier-settlers came +faster, each man more fierce than the last, because their blood was +heated by the shame of this defeat. The old man's misty breath came +streaming between the branches where his untiring sword flickered in +and out. + +Two at a time came the Frenchmen, until at length, profiting by a +mis-stroke, a couple gained the summit of the barrier. The first to +jump down fell a prey to the stout yeoman, but the second reached the +ground unharmed. A shout of triumph went up, and the soldiers swarmed +the obstacle. + +"Excellency, the Indian woman has shown us a way over the cliff," +exclaimed a voice beside La Salle. "That way, says she, we shall +encounter no opposition." + +"I will myself make the trial," La Salle answered. "Do you in the +meantime win this pass." + +"She says also that we must hasten, because these men are holding the +pass while their comrades free the ship from the ice." + +Penfold fought on, grim to the end, but his sword had lost its +deadliness and his arm was growing numb. His comrades aided him as +best they could, but they too were acting upon the defensive, because +some of the more daring soldiers had scaled the slippery sides of the +pass in a futile endeavour to drag them down. The old man groaned and +tottered as the light failed gradually from his eyes. + +"Let it be said of me," he gasped, "that I gave them half an hour." + +Voices roared in his ears, like the waves of a stormy sea about to +close over his head. + +"Strike! He is spent. Strike him down." + +There followed an onward rush. Over the old man's failing body sped +the bitterness of death. + +He felt a sword in his side, another in his shoulder, and at the pain +he revived like an old lion, and roared and plunged forward, feeling +his way with his point, until he found his striker's heart, and then he +shouted with all the strength that was left: + +"Stand up in my stead, comrade! I have made a good fight, and +accounted for the best. They shall run before us yet. To me, comrade! +Ha! St. Edward and St. George!" + +With that last shout he fell, deep into the red snow, his old body +spouting blood, and so died like a valiant man of Berks, with his sword +fast held, and his grey head set towards the foe. + +Hough hurled back a soldier, who had clambered up the cliff to dislodge +him, and would have flung himself down to stop the way, when on a +sudden a tall figure slid down the side opposite him, and stood +immediately to defy the body of men sweeping through like an inundating +wave, wielding his sword with calm, nervous strength, his keen eyes +starting from a thin, brown face. + +Then Hough's courage gave way, and sinking to his knees, while the +enemy rushed through, he cried aloud. Death had no terror for him; but +the spectacle of that cold man, whom for an instant he had seen, +fighting in the raw light of the dawn, then thrown down and trodden +under foot, made him shiver to the heart. + +"The Lord encompasses us with the spirits of our friends," he cried, +knowing that it was Jesse Woodfield who already lay hacked and bruised +and buried in the snow of the defile. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII. + +THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED. + +The Acadians swept towards the bay, but their governor was not with +them. La Salle had gone alone over the cliffs, along the way which +Onawa had revealed, and he went not unseen. The Kentishman followed, +searching out each footprint in the snow. Once again the priest was +destined to take up the sword, before assuming the mantle of spiritual +power. As he passed among the pines the loneliness of the place began +to make him fear, and when he stopped with a curse, because he knew not +which way to turn, he seemed to behold the sword of his dream flashing +like lightning between the mitre and himself. And while halting he +heard perplexing shouts, lessening, receding, and growing faint, as his +men rushed down upon their foes. + +Hearing those shouts Upcliff looked up from the field of ice, and his +heart for an instant ceased when he saw that the enemy had gained the +pass. + +"Now, men of Somerset," he shouted, "let our bird fly right soon, or we +shall never sight England again." + +"We can do no more than our best, captain," growled the sailor Jacob +Sadgrove. "My arms are near dead with work." + +"Out!" cried Madeleine, sweeping forward. "Out, and make room for a +woman." + +She caught up the axe which the grumbler had dropped, and, lifting her +brave arms, attacked the barrier of ice with never a thought of fear, +until the sailor returned glumly to his work for shame. + +"Only a few more yards," the deceiving girl cried, throwing back her +flushed face. "Look not behind. To regard work closely is to fear it. +Attack boldly, and it is done. See how the ship struggles to be free! +Soon we shall fly through the open water, with the wind in our sails. +Then shall you rest, and it shall delight you to remember the work." + +So she called, laughing and singing at intervals, and running here and +there to encourage the toilers, a faithful angel of hope, while the +axes rang more strongly and the men cast side-glances towards the foe +and swore breathlessly at their impotence. + +"Get you aboard, lass," said Upcliff, loosening his cutlass. "Here is +work for men. My lads, we shall make a good fight for country and +faith, and die, if God will, like true men facing odds. Now we are +taken on both sides." + +He pointed to the north-west. Out of the gloom of dawn and the +fog-wreaths, which ever haunt the Nova Scotian banks, sailed a +full-rigged man-of-war beating against the breeze. It was the +provision ship making for the settlement now that the helmsman could +see to steer between the rocks. + +"Nothing but a miracle can serve," quoth the skipper. "And the age of +miracles is past." + +"Have but faith, and the miracle shall yet be wrought," cried +Madeleine, her magnificent confidence strong within her, even in that +hour when a less bold spirit would have seen the doors of a heretic's +prison reopening. "God shall yet make a way for us to escape. I know +we are not doomed. Help me, captain, and you sailors, with your faith. +We are never to be taken. We are to escape from our enemies, and God +shall give to us the victory." + +Upcliff smiled sadly as he gazed at the radiant face of the prophetess, +shaking his grizzled head as he muttered: + +"May the good Lord bless you, girl. You send us forth strong to fight." + +Then again he faced his men and formed them in line; and when they +stood ready to receive the enemy, every man his cutlass in hand, the +master cried out strongly: + +"Let no man surrender. For such the French have a gallows. Lads, we +shall, by God's grace, leave a deep mark on yonder little army before +the ship comes nigh. See you how slowly she labours down? She can +scarce make headway against the tide, and the breeze freshens every +minute. Now for a bold stand, a stern struggle, and may the Lord have +mercy on us all." + +Stout Somerset throats answered him with a cheer. They had exercised +their privilege of grumbling over the uncongenial work of cutting a way +for their ship through the ice-field while their compatriots fought +upon the cliffs; but not a man drew back from the prospect of that +hopeless battle. + +The Acadians struggled down the long hill, floundering in the soft +snow, and, halting upon the flat, drew up in the form of a crescent. +There were signs of unwillingness among the settlers, due in part to +the reputation gained in those days by Englishmen of never shrinking +from a struggle to the death. They were also perturbed by the absence +of La Salle, whom they had not seen since Woodfield had been +overwhelmed and left for dead in the defile. + +While the French thus hesitated, Upcliff and his impetuous men were for +advancing to the attack; but Madeleine came before them, and in a +strained voice, altogether unlike her usual tones, implored the skipper +not to move towards the shore. + +"Do not leave the ice," she cried. "I charge you go not beyond the +ice." + +"The maid has surely lost her wits," muttered Upcliff. + +"See the eyes of her!" whispered Jacob Sadgrove to his nearest +companion. "Have seen a horse look so, when he knows of somewhat +coming, and would speak of it if he might." + +A roar broke the morning fog. The ship had fired to encourage her +allies. The ball splashed into the black water far from the gallant +_Dartmouth_, which quivered and shook her sails in furious helplessness. + +"Swear to me that you will not leave the ice-field," cried Madeleine. + +"Ay, if you wish it," said Upcliff; adding bluntly: "May die as well +here as yonder. Stand together, lads. They come!" + +"Oh, why so long?" prayed Madeleine, bending upon the snow. "It is +time for the miracle. I know we are to be saved, but it is terrible to +wait. I know that not a hair upon the head of any of these men shall +be harmed; but they know it not, and they prepare for death because +they cannot see. Oh, God, send us now the miracle!" + +"Stand firm!" shouted Upcliff. "Let them make the charge, and we shall +smite them as they stumble in the snow." + +He spoke, and straightway a mighty report rang along the shore. The +ice on which the men planted their resolute feet quivered and heaved. +The attackers halted and drew back; the attacked stared at one another +in superstitious wonderment. No smoke drifted behind. The guns upon +the ship had not spoken. But the echoes of that dry, sharp sound still +crashed among the cliffs. + +Madeleine rose, and sent her rapturous voice singing into the ears of +all: "The miracle! The miracle!" + +Already a channel of black water frothed and bubbled between the +English sailors and the French settlers, a channel which widened each +moment, as the ice-floe which the change of temperature had parted so +suddenly from the shore drifted seawards, drawn out by the strong gulf +current, bearing the men snatched from death, the little ice-locked +ship, and the girl who had trusted so firmly and so well. + +They flocked round her, the rough sailors, crying like children, and +knelt to kiss her hands. + +"To work!" she cried, pointing to the silver strip which held the floe +united. + +But before the men could again use their axes the strain told. The ice +cracked again and the field was divided into two parts. There was a +momentary danger lest the brigantine should be crushed between the +floes, but this peril was averted by the regularity of the current. +The men swung themselves aboard, lifting Madeleine up the ladder of +ropes and so upon deck. The enemy already had become grotesque black +spots upon the shore. + +"Clear the decks for battle!" the captain thundered as the little ship +ran free of the ice. + +The Frenchman had altered her course, and was bearing down upon the +_Dartmouth_, roaring with all her guns. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV. + +THE THIRST. + +Onawa, daughter of Shuswap, vagrant and traitress, she who had brought +disaster upon her own people, continued to reap the reward of all her +constancy to the enemy of her race. Famished and parched, she sank +into a bed of snow, and rested her wildly throbbing head against a +frosted tree. She had not eaten for many hours, her shelter was more +than a league away, and her strength was gone. Her reward also was a +maddening thirst. + +After tracking down the Englishmen, watching them in the fall of the +snow, enduring every privation until she had learnt their strength, she +had gone at full speed to the settlement, madly hoping even then that +La Salle might look on her with favour, despite her branded cheeks and +mutilated face. His reward was to give her over to the soldiers, who +had mocked her because she was of the hated race, a savage in their +eyes, and had bound her with a rope and scourged her with the end of +it, and had even struck her with their fists when she halted from +exhaustion, and would have stabbed her to death had she refused to +obey. Thus she received her full reward. And now she could do no more. + +Neuralgic pains coursed through her head, until the weight of her hair +became a torment. Feverishly she sucked a handful of snow, but the +awful thirst remained unquenched. The sounds of the chase entered her +ears dimly from that half-lit region ahead, until drowsiness passed +into her body, and her head dropped, and her eyes closed, and the sleep +which moves imperceptibly into death came upon her. Her passionate +heart lowered its beat, her pulses throbbed more sluggishly, as she +drew close to the threshold which separates life and its object from +the world of dreams. Her body collapsed, her head slid down; the soft +snow sucked her in like quicksand. + +A figure passed among the slim terebinth columns. Though the sleeper +had brought down her father into dishonour, had betrayed her tribe, and +called the shadow of death across the home of her kindred, her sister +had not forgotten her. The figure approached, bent over the huddled +shape, and shook it roughly back to life. + +"Tuschota!" muttered the girl, as her eyes opened upon the immobile +brown face. + +"Rise," said the woman. "Lean on me, and I will take you to my hut." + +"Leave me here," moaned Onawa. "I would lie until the great sleep +comes." + +"I am your sister. I may not leave you thus to die. Yonder food +awaits you, and drink, and the warmth of burning logs." + +She assisted Onawa to rise. The girl staggered and clung with dead +hands. Together they passed down the slope, and so came to the cabin +cunningly hidden amid snowy bush. A fire burnt redly, and hard by +stood a stone vessel filled with rice-water. Towards this Onawa +reached her hands, with the cry: + +"I am tortured with thirst." + +Without a word her sister gave her drink, and watched her while she +gulped at the tepid liquor. Suddenly she put out her hand, and grasped +the vessel, saying: + +"See! I have meat ready for you." + +Onawa partook of the food like a famished beast, and as strength +returned the former love of life awoke, and she longed to go forth to +renew the hopeless quest; but she felt her sister's eyes reading her +thoughts, and presently she heard that sister's voice: + +"It is good to live, Onawa." + +She made no reply, but leaned forward, thrusting her hands against the +scarlet wood. + +"Even when son and husband are taken away, and the light fails, and all +the ground is dark, it is still good to live," went on the voice. "Why +the good God gives this love of life we may not know." + +"Give me more drink," the girl panted. + +"Our father shall soon pass into the spirit land," went on the stern +woman, unheeding her request. "He is old, but 'tis not age that saps +his strength. Honour has departed from him. He has lost the headship, +and another fills his office." + +Onawa stared sullenly into the leaping heart of the fire. + +"As this life continues we find trouble. You have lost beauty, and I a +son. We shall not regain that which we have lost. Sisters in blood we +are, and sisters in unhappiness also." + +"I have brought sorrow into your life," muttered Onawa, less in +penitence than defiance. + +"And shall do so again. This night you have brought the enemy of my +people out from Acadie. There was a time when you betrayed my son into +the hands of him who now spurns you from his side. That which is done +cannot be undone, and God shall punish." + +"Why, then, have you brought me here?" cried Onawa fiercely. "Why did +you not leave me to perish, that you might be rid of me for ever?" + +"Remember you not the words that I spoke to you in the grove? I bade +you have in mind that in the time when you should hunger and thirst you +might turn to me. I have not forgotten, though you turned against me +when your heart followed its own longing. + +"I grieved for your Richard." + +"So the hunter grieves when he by mischance has slain the bear cub +which has strayed. And so he avoids the mother if he loves his life." + +At that moment there rang in her steady voice a threat. Onawa looked +up and met a suffering brown face and large quiet eyes. There was no +menace there, nothing but longing for the dead and charity for the +living. + +She pressed a hand upon her burning throat. "Give me drink," she +gasped. + +Her sister poured some of the rice-water into a smaller vessel. This +she stirred gently with a stick, watching the ruined face of Onawa with +the same patient eyes. Outside the hut a flight of snow birds whirred +from side to side. + +"When you have drunk you shall go forth," said Mary Iden deliberately. +"You shall seek to aid my enemy when he strives to strike down my +husband." + +Onawa gave a cry. In wondering over her sister's forgiveness she had +forgotten La Salle. + +"They may already have met," she muttered. + +A stern smile crossed her sister's face. + +"Can you not hear?" she whispered. "Yet you say you love the white +priest. I have heard this long while the noise of sword striking +sword. I listen without fear, knowing that no man can conquer my +husband when no treachery hangs behind. Can you not hear the sounds of +the fight?" + +"My ears burn," cried Onawa. "I hear only the cold wind passing among +the pines." + +"They fight!" exclaimed her sister triumphantly. "My Richard shall +rest to-day." + +"The water," gasped Onawa for the third time. "My throat is on fire." + +"Drink and go forth." + +Grasping the vessel in both hands, Onawa drained it to the dregs. +Then, as her arms fell, and the taste in her mouth became exceeding +bitter, and a strange exaltation visited her brain, and her body began +to burn, and numbness came into her feet, she bent with one terrible +groan, to hide her fear and her shame, and--if it were possible--her +awful knowledge of the wolfsbane poisoning that draught, from the calm +black eyes which stared at her across the fire. + +"Aid whom you will," said the steady voice, which was scarce audible +above the furious beatings of the listener's heart. "The day breaks." + +A lifeless winter sun was struggling into the hut. + +The pride of her race remained with Onawa to the end. She would not +show fear, nor useless rage, in the presence of her sister. She would +not confess what she knew, nor acknowledge that she had met with the +punishment which she deserved and the laws of their race demanded. +Passing into a sad beam of light, she drew herself erect and panted: + +"I shall go forth." + +"Go, sister," said the poisoner. "I too go forth, but we shall not +walk together. For you the west and the forest, for me the south and +the sea." + +"I go among the pines." + +"Farewell, sister." + +"Farewell." + +Erect and proud, Onawa passed out with her awful sorrow, through the +opening morning, and so among the trees, still dignified and unbending +because she knew those calm black eyes followed all her movements. On +she went into the increasing gloom, until the snow carpet appeared to +grow hot, and opalescent colours fringed the trees, and sounds of +sleepy music hummed around her head. The red and green lights flashed +up and down; solitude closed behind her; the pine-barrens were on fire. +The world was gone. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXV. + +SWORDCRAFT. + +The path taken by La Salle ascended and brought him finally to the +crest of a hill. Here a wood of storm-beaten pines stood motionless in +the white calm of the long winter sleep. Between the dimly lighted +trees spread a narrow scar of black earth, which had been protected +from snow by the funereal boughs above. The spot was as silent and as +sad as a burying-place. It seemed to the priest that the balsamic +pines might have been planted to neutralise any noxious odours +emanating from the ground. He shivered at the thought, turned to +retrace his steps and find an outlet which might lead him to the shore; +but straightway a restraint fell upon his feet, and a thrill raced +through his body, when he perceived that the place whereon he walked +was haunted ground. + +Before him stood a figure, white-faced and worn, clad in ragged +garments, a man to all outward seeming no more sentient than the pines, +for he moved not at all, nor did he speak, nor make a sign. As though +rooted and frozen, he stood across the way, showing life and feeling +only in his eyes. + +"By all the saints!" the priest muttered. "'Tis but a half-starved +Englishman." + +Then he shouted his ready challenge to the silent man, who passed +immediately with swift movements to the strip of bare ground, and, +halting within touch of his enemy, addressed him sternly in the Gallic +tongue: + +"That you may learn, Sir Priest, with whom you have to deal, know that +before you stands Sir Thomas Iden, a squire of England and a knight of +Kent, a man moreover who has sworn to fight you fairly to the death. +Remember you that night on which you put to death a boy in the forest +beside Couchicing? That boy was my son, my only child. Sir Priest, +you and I have crossed swords before this day. I was then a better man +than now; but, with the help of my God and the spirit of my child, I +shall lay out your body in this lonely spot for the winds to howl upon, +and leave your eyes open for the crows to peck at. I pray you answer +only with your sword." + +Hot words came to La Salle's tongue, but he did not utter them. He +found himself daunted by the horror of the place and the unyielding +attitude of the knight. As he brought up his renowned right arm, it +shivered and the hand was cold. But so soon as their blades met, his +fighting spirit arose and conquered the superstitious fear, and a +fierce light shone again in his eyes, and the knowledge was borne back +upon him that he was in truth the finest swordsman in the New World, +and with that he shouted out, "Have at you, heretic dog!" and attacked +with all his might. + +Not a bird moved through the air, not an insect lived upon that hill +top, not an animal passed that way. The two men had the gloomy wood to +themselves. Not even a breath of wind passed to wave the pines, or +scatter into motion last autumn's rusted leaves, which spotted with red +the sable rent in the great white sheet which Nature had drawn across +the ground. The rhythm of the swords rang monotonously, as the two +weird figures drifted to and fro, from side to side of the dusky bluff, +struggling the one against the other, with life as the winner's prize. +Before the abbé spread his splendid career of power as a prince of the +Church. He had but to emerge triumphant from this last taking of the +sword to assume the dignity of his new office and realise the ambition +of his heart. While the avenger saw neither priest, nor governor, nor +fencer of renown, but merely a fellow-being who had extinguished the +light of his young son's life. + +So the momentous minutes passed. When the sound of quick and furious +breathing began to pulsate around the hill, Mary Iden ascended from the +hollow, after playing her part in the avenging of her son's death, and +watched with bosom heaving rapidly every movement of her husband, sure +in her faith that he was the strongest man alive. Yet she aided him +with her counsel; and when the passion of the fight had entered also +into her she cast contempt and hatred upon La Salle, and mocked his +skill, though he was on that day the finer swordsman of the pair. + +"Wait not, husband," she cried warningly. "He is more spent than you." + +Sir Thomas heard and rushed out. La Salle, standing sideways, parried +the thrust with a slight motion of his iron wrist, and, rounding, took +up the attack, which ended in a feint and a lunge over the heart. His +sword glanced under the knight's arm and the point struck a fir and was +almost held. + +"Perdition!" he muttered. "I must use greater caution." + +For a few seconds the blades were dazzling as they darted together with +the malignity and swiftness of serpents; then La Salle feigned to +stumble, lowering his point as though he had lost his grip, an old +trick he had often employed successfully, and as the knight leaped +forward to take his opening, the priest recovered and sent the blade +into his opponent's side. Life had never appeared to him so good as at +that moment, but before his laugh had died the Englishman leaned +forward, grasping the sword and holding it firmly in his side, lunged +out, and ran the priest through the chest, after La Salle had saved his +life by throwing up his arm and deflecting the point from his heart. + +They fell apart, gulping the keen air for a taste of new life. The +watcher advanced, her brown face ghastly, but her husband put out his +hand and motioned her back. + +"Away, Mary. There is life in me yet." + +Unwillingly she retired, and a flush of pride crossed her face when her +husband staggered across the snow, his eyes still clear and fierce. La +Salle, no whit less dauntless, came up also and stood swaying like one +of the trees behind. + +"You are brave, Englishman, and a worthy foe," he gasped. "We have +shed each other's blood. Let us now cry hold and part." + +"There can be no truce between you and me," came the deep reply. "This +fight is to the death." + +"Life has its pleasures," urged La Salle. + +"Of such you deprived my son." + +"Your blood be upon your own head!" + +Again their swords clashed. No signs of weakening yet upon either +drawn face. The balance swayed neither to the one side nor to the +other. + +Again the watcher started out, appealing to her husband. It would be +an easy matter to attack La Salle from the rear; to trip his foot with +a stick; to blind him by a handful of snow. But the knight would not +hear her; and even threatened when she made as though she would disobey. + +The priest listened for the tramp of feet and the call of voices. He +would then have called the meanest settler in Acadie his brother. +Shoutings came to him from the bay, the roar of the ship's gun, and the +splitting of the ice. He groaned and cursed the folly which had driven +him into this snare. + +Courage revived when he scored by a clever stroke; but again his +triumph was short-lived. The knight answered by driving his point hard +into the open side. Darkness dropped upon their eyes. They reeled +like drunken men, fighting the air, feeling for each other, falling +body to body, and pushing apart with a convulsive shudder. + +"Where are you?" gasped the abbé. + +"Here," moaned the Englishman, striking towards the voice. + +"It is enough," said La Salle, the voice gurgling in his throat. +"Flesh and blood can endure no more. Put up your sword." + +"Only in your heart." + +They held at each other with one hand while fighting with the other. A +wound on one side was answered by a wound on the other. It appeared as +though neither had another drop of blood to shed, not a muscle left +unspent, nor a breath to come. The chill of the winter was in the soul +of each, and it was also the chill of death. They crawled at each +other like torn beasts, upon hands and knees. + +"You are spent," pulsated La Salle. + +"My sword has gone through you twice." + +"Husband, bid me strike him," implored the watcher. "He is scarce able +to lift his arm." + +"Back, woman," panted the dying man. + +Once more they stood upon their feet, and again their points were +raised, but now against bodies which had lost all consciousness, save +the ruling passion of ambition in the one and vengeance in the other. + +"Down!" snarled the abbé, knowing not it was the last word which his +tongue should utter; and, closing with his enemy, threw his remaining +life into one lunge. + +The sword left his hand for ever. By a glimmer of light through the +red darkness he saw the body of the knight stretched black along that +ghastly carpet; he saw the woman running forth with a great cry to +raise it by the shoulders. Then night fell upon the victor as he +stumbled on among the trees, with a small sane voice of consciousness +singing in his departing soul: "You have fought your last fight. You +shall win the red hat yet." + +So he was found by his defeated soldiers, feeling his way from pine to +pine, leaving in his wake two dotted lines more ruby-red than the +cardinal's soutane. They bound up his wounds as best they could, and, +raising him upon their shoulders, bore the dead weight of unconscious +matter into Acadie. + +At noon the ship came to the landing-stage. During the excitement +which accompanied and followed her arrival even the governor became +forgotten. A cadaverous priest was the first to step ashore, casting +around him glances of intolerable pride. Others were quick to follow, +and soon it became noised abroad that Roussilac was to be recalled and +that Pope Urbano had need of La Salle the priest. Even such momentous +matters were put aside by the settlers in their anxiety to hear tidings +of home and friends. + +In the meantime the pale-faced priest had set forth for the governor's +abode, muttering imprecations upon the bitter country in which it had +become his evil lot to settle. + +"His Excellency?" he inquired shortly at the door; and the seneschal, +awed by his morose manner, merely made a reverence and pointed as he +said: "He lies within, Holiness." + +More he would have said, but the nuncio passed on quickly and entered +the room, holding forth a missive tied with scarlet thread, calling in +a jealous voice: + +"Your Excellency! A letter from Rome. A call for your return." + +La Salle was lying along the bed. The messenger came nearer. + +"Awake, your Excellency! His Holiness Pope Urbano sends to you----" + +There the strange priest stopped at beholding a broken crucifix beneath +the sleeper's right hand; and a sneering smile curved his lips, and he +shrugged his thin shoulders, as he callously observed: + +"Methinks his Holiness has sent in vain." + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI. + +SETTLEMENT. + +It has now been shown how the golden lilies prospered in the north, and +how the red lion, who should in time tear those gay lilies down, was +laughed at and despised. The paths of ambition, of treachery, of +vengeance, have brought direct to the same terminus, where that "fell +sergeant death" stood forth to cry "Halt" to soldier and to priest. +The name of La Salle has ever been held in honour, but chiefly to +memorise Robert the explorer, not the ambitious priest his uncle. The +name of Iden is still revered by Kentish folk; but that respect is won, +not by Sir Thomas, who--if the tradition in his family be true--married +an Indian wife and flung away his life to avenge his son, but to Sir +Alexander, who slew the rebel Cade in a Sussex orchard. The name of +Onawa is held in memory by none, though for many generations the wood +wherein she died of the poisoned draught administered by her sister was +shunned by the Iroquois, because there sounded amid the pines at night +the howling of a werewolf. + +The old chronicles mention two Englishmen who escaped from the French, +and Jesse Woodfield and Jeremiah Hough are the names recorded. When +the Acadians swept down the defile to secure Upcliff and his men, the +Puritan was ignored, and the yeoman, who had made so startling an +appearance, was left for dead. So soon as they had gone Hough made for +his companion, and discovered that he was indeed material and alive, +though sorely wounded. Presently Woodfield revived, and when he was +able to stand the Puritan led him away up the white hills to find a +place of shelter. The hut in the pine-wood being too far away, they +proceeded by slow stages towards the home of the knight, knowing +nothing of what had occurred, and scarce guessing it when they gained +the bush-filled hollow, which was stirred to its depths by the wailing +of a death-song. + +"A fitting welcome for broken-hearted men," said the Puritan. "By the +waters of Babylon we sat down and wept. The children of Edom have +smitten us full sore. Happy shall he be that rewardeth them as they +have served us. Take courage, old lad. We are even now at home." + +"Home without friends," broke from the pale lips of the man within his +arms. + +"Where the graves of comrades are, there is the brave man's home. In +England we are gone out of mind, and broken like a potter's vessel. +Here amid the snows old Simon and old George lie sleeping well." + +The song stopped when they entered the hut and stood between the living +and the dead. Immediately Woodfield sank down in unconsciousness, and +after one glance upon the sad scene and a few bitter words, Hough knelt +at his comrade's side and searched for his wounds. + +"Let a woman perform a woman's work," said the pale watcher, rising +from her husband's side. "For him"--she inclined her head to the +silent figure--"the light is gone. He sees no longer the sparkling +air. His eyes shall not burn again. The great God knows how well he +lived and how he died." + +Seeing the question on the Puritan's lips, she went on: + +"The hand that smote our son smote him. I saw the man go, and death +with him like a cloud above his head. Give me the water that stands +yonder that I may wash these wounds." + +"Who brought him hither?" the Puritan asked. + +"These arms carried him. While he lived he would have me bear no +burden. The wood for the fire he took from me, saying, 'This is no +woman's work. A woman shall smile for her husband, prepare him food, +and keep a home for his return.' These arms carried my son to his +grave. My husband was not there, or surely he would have said, 'This +is no work for you.' These arms carried my husband from the place +where he fell. His eyes looked up to mine, as though again he would +say, 'This is no work for you.' Once more they shall carry him. +Afterwards I will wait for the coming of the south wind, which carries +the souls of the dead." + +She applied her skill in healing to the restoration of the white man. +She cleansed his wounds and cooled his fever, leaving him at length +sleeping with a wan smile of triumph on his face. By then Hough also +was asleep, his face terrible in its mutilation and sternness. + +When he revived, Woodfield told his comrade how he had been captured by +the Algonquins and how they had sought to put him to death. + +"I awoke from unconsciousness," he said, "to find myself within a cave, +attended by the maid who had loosed my body from the tree. An old man +watched the entry and brought me food. These two had saved my life, +the maid because she loved my white skin, the man because he was +Christian and had lost a son who would have been of my age had he +lived. I remained in that cave many days, gaining vigour, and on a +certain evening, when left alone, ran out into the shadows and hid +myself in the forest, covering my tracks as best I could. + +"The maid pursued and besought me in her own manner to return. Many +times I escaped from her. Often she brought me food, or I must have +perished of hunger during my long wanderings through the forest. I +would hear her calling after me in the still night. I would from some +hill-top see her following my track, and when she found me she would +hold me by the feet and strive to move my heart. But resisting the +wiles of Satan, who would have me to forget my own country and my +father's house, I ran from her again." + +"We thought you dead these many months." + +"It was the will of God that I should seek for you in vain," went on +Woodfield. "Once I lay in a swamp to hide myself from a band of French +explorers. Once I was attacked by six men. One I killed, and the +remainder fled, frightened by lightning which struck down a tree +between us. Another time I concealed myself in a hemlock while the +soldiers made their camp beneath its branches. So I fought my way on +towards the east with an Englishman's longing for the sea, and when +winter drew on I made me a shelter in the pine woods on the westward +side of Acadie, and there mourned for you and for Simon Penfold as for +comrades who had fallen in the battle." + +"How came you so suddenly to our aid?" + +"In the darkness of the falling snow I ventured to approach the +settlement. Nay more, I entered at the open gate, careless of my life, +and followed the soldiers out, my heart rejoicing when I learnt from +their shouts that countrymen of mine were near at hand. I climbed +among the cliffs, and, looking down, beheld old Simon fighting in the +defile. I was descending to give him help when he fell." + +"The Lord gives and the Lord has taken away," said the Puritan solemnly. + +While the words were on his lips the wattle door was shaken and a soft +voice called. Another moment a white figure entered with a rush of +smoky air, and Madeleine stood before them, wrapped in a sail which she +had assumed to render her progress across the snow invisible. She +threw away the covering and laughed triumphantly. + +"Say not that the ship is taken?" cried Hough. Then he muttered: "A +man may tell nothing from the maid's manner. Sorrow or joy--'tis the +same to her. She laughs through it all." + +"The ship is safe," said Madeleine. "We were attacked by the +man-of-war, but when we drew clear of the ice we soon left her +lumbering astern, until she gave up the chase and sailed for shore. We +have not lost a man." + +"Then what do you here?" + +"Think you that Silas Upcliff would desert friends?" cried Madeleine +indignantly. "So soon as he knew himself to be safe, he changed his +course and beat up the coast eastward until darkness fell. Then he +dropped down, and now has sent a boat to bring you off. I have come +for you, and must take no refusal, else I am sure they shall hang me +upon my return. I would bear the message myself. The master at first +crossed me, but, being a wise man, he gave way to a woman's whim. +Come! The boat waits, and liberty lies beyond." + +She moved across the earth floor and grasped the Puritan's arm. + +"What maid is this?" asked Woodfield, as he gazed at the vision of +beauty; and when Hough had told him the good soldier's heart swelled, +and he raised his stiff body that he might take her hand, while she +smiled at him through a mist of pity. + +"I want you, wounded man," she said. "There are none sick aboard, and +I must have one to care for, or my hands will hang idle all the day. I +have thrown in my lot with your people, because mine own have driven me +forth. You shall call me sister if you will, and you shall be brother +to me, because he who is to be my husband is your true comrade, and +'tis friendship that makes brotherhood rather than blood. Rise, +brother, and lean on me." + +"Girl," said Hough, with his stern smile, "this spell you cast over us +is more potent than witchcraft." + +"We come," cried Woodfield, drawing himself upright. "Say, comrade, +let us flee to Virginia, and settle among our own, that we may hear the +blessed English tongue again." + +"We go," answered Hough gloomily. "Here is no English colony, but we +seek one in the south." + +"Go," said Mary Iden, now again Tuschota, daughter of Shuswap, to the +three. "Take what you desire for your journey, and go forth. Here are +furs, and here strong medicines. Take all. The great God guard you +upon the seas and upon the land whither you go to dwell." + +So the two Englishmen and the French girl went forth under the winter +sky, where a shy moon peeped through laced clouds like a fair maid +looking between the curtains of her bed. A dull glow of firelight +showed when they looked back into the hollow; and once, when they +paused for breath, their ears became filled with the wild sound of +singing for the dead. + +Morning dawned, and the brigantine was well away, running with a fresh +breeze from the colony of France, all hearts aboard as light as the +frosty waves which kissed her sides. Through fog and snow she went, +like a bird flying to the warmth. Little wonder that the men sang at +their tasks; that Upcliff repeated his old stories of the main with a +fresh delight, none grudging him a laugh; that Woodfield gathered +health at every hour; that Madeleine laughed from morn to night. They +were as children released from school, playing on the happy home-going. + +So the _Dartmouth_ drew down to Boston quay, after one delay on the +unfrequented shore to make repairs, the men clanking at the pumps to +keep the leaking barque above the line of danger. The citizens flocked +down to meet her, and Hough's approving gaze fell upon Puritan faces +among whom he could feel himself indeed at home. + +Winthrop himself was called to give the sailors welcome to New England. +He stepped aboard, and grasped the master's hand; but not a word could +he utter before Madeleine came between them, her beauty all in +splendour, her mouth quivering, as she cried: + +"Tell me, sir--tell me quickly, where is my Geoffrey?" + +She had forgotten that other men bearing her lover's name walked the +earth. Winthrop stared in some bewilderment, and the more stern of his +following frowned at so much glorious life and impetuous loveliness. +The majority repeated the name with ominous shakings of bearded chins. + +"'Tis our comrade, young Geoffrey Viner, of whom the maid speaks," said +Woodfield in explanation. + +"Yea," exclaimed Madeleine. "Let me off the ship." + +"Stay," said Winthrop. "The young man is here indeed." He turned to +Hough with the demand: "Is he beyond doubt a true Englishman?" + +"True!" exclaimed Madeleine, her violet eyes two angry flashes. "You +suspect him? Oh, you false man!" + +It was the first time that John Winthrop had been accused of falseness; +and the novelty of the accusation brought a smile to his face. + +"The boy is loyal to the faith, and as true an Englishman as yourself, +brother Winthrop," broke in the voice of Hough. + +"Let justice prevail where I rule," said the pious governor when he +heard this. "I thank God that you have come in time. It has been +proved to our satisfaction against this boy that he has conspired with +the Dutch for the capture of our town, and as I speak he lies under +sentence of death. Thus the wisest judges err, and the humble of us +ask Heaven to amend our faults." + +Madeleine had paled very slightly while Winthrop spoke. Then she drew +her small dignified self upright, and said very confidently: "I knew +that we should arrive in time." + +"Methinks we shall scarcely find any swifter messenger to bear the good +news to the young man----" commenced the quiet voice of Roger Williams, +who had joined his friend and governor upon the quay. + +The end of the pastor's sentence became drowned in a shout of hearty +laughter such as had never been heard before in Boston; for immediately +he began to speak Madeleine picked up her skirt, and was already +running like Atalanta, breathlessly demanding from those who stood by +whether her feet were carrying her in the right way. + +"Send a cheer after her, men of Somerset," shouted Silas Upcliff. +"For, by my soul, a braver lass ne'er loved an Englishman!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVII. + +THE PLOWSHARE. + +It was summer in the year 1647, and over all the colony of Virginia +there was peace. Fortunate were its settlers to be cut apart from +their brethren in the isle of strife, where the deceitful king was +imprisoned in his palace of Hampton Court, and the London citizens +filled their streets with cries of "Parliament" and "Privilege." New +England remained untouched by this wave of feeling, of which indeed it +knew nothing, and its people went on planting their crops and gathering +the increase, happy to be removed from the oppression of a king and the +persecution of the Church. + +Upon the south side of the Potomac, at no great distance from the sea, +stood a two-storey house overhung with wild vines, and approached by a +ladder-like flight of steps which rose between two borders of flowers. +Behind a plantation stretched in a straight mile, fringed on either +side by sweet-smelling bush, where purple butterflies played through +the long day and a silver stream laughed on its way to the sea. + +The Grove, as this homestead was named, had quickly identified itself +among the successful colonial ventures. The day of small things was +rapidly nearing its close. Not only were the joint owners of the +plantation able to supply the neighbouring village with wheatmeal and +cheeses, but their export business to the Old World was growing more +profitable each season. The Virginian exporters, Viner and Woodfield, +were well-known to import merchants of Bristol, and faded invoices of +that firm were to be seen in more than one dusty counting-house a +century later, when change and chance demanded a winding-up of the +business of certain old-time traders across the seas. + +This success was due not altogether to the energy of the partners who +gave their names to the undertaking. It was commonly reported that the +Lady of The Grove was in the main responsible for much of her husband's +prosperity. According to rumour, Mistress Woodfield was an excellent +housewife, clever at her needle, and with a better knowledge of simples +than any woman in the New World, if methinks somewhat over-inclined to +play the grand dame and careful against soiling her hands. With +Mistress Viner it was otherwise. She was never to be found taking her +ease in idleness, or retailing gossip concerning neighbours. Sloth, as +once she said when rebuking the governor--for she feared no man--is an +epidemic which claims more victims than the plague. Early in the +morning she walked her garden, inhaling the sweet air, noting what +progress had taken place during the night, ordering and arranging all +things; and should her husband long delay joining her, how +reproachfully she would call: "Geoffrey! Oh, slug! You are losing an +hour of life." At fall of evening she would walk in the plantation +beside her fair-haired lad, as she loved to call her lord and master, +planning fresh improvements, and never failing to note the beauty of +the life which slept around. Seldom did she speak of the past; never +did she trouble her mind concerning the future. All would be well she +knew. There could be no time so good as the present. "What do we want +with past or future?" she would exclaim, when she caught her Geoffrey +in retrospective or anticipatory mood. "Cold mirrors in which we see +our silent selves like blocks of wood or stone. It is this minute +which is our own glorious life." The cruellest, and falsest, thing +that any woman could say concerning Madeleine Viner was that the fair +mistress of The Grove had been seen wearing a sorrowful face. + +The simple inscription, "An American Woman," was carved by her own +desire over Mistress Viner's burying-place at the dawn of the +eighteenth century;' and at a later date an unauthorised and unknown +hand cut upon the shaft of the wooden column which stood upon her +resting-place, and was destroyed by fire before Canada was wrested from +the French, the not unsuitable motto, "Ride, si sapis." + +Over the fireplace of the principal room in The Grove a ring was set in +the hard oak woodwork. This ring contained a sigil engraved with the +arms of the Iden family, a chevron between three close helmets, and was +given a place of honour in the home because through its power Geoffrey +obtained a letter of recommendation and a subsequent patent of land +from that liberal-minded papist, Lord Baltimore, to whom the ring had +been delivered upon the safe arrival of the _Dartmouth_ in the Bay of +Chesapeake. + +"Better men never bled for England than the men of Kent," said the +peer, when he had listened to Geoffrey's story. "Braver men ne'er fled +from her shores to save their loyal lives. The owner of this ring was +once my honoured friend. His name has for long been most famous for +devotion to the crown." The lord sighed and sadly added: "This Charles +shall learn to rue the day when he first cast aside the help of his old +loyalist families, and by oppression and persecution most intolerable +drove them from their homes. But now, with God's help, we purpose to +build up upon this continent a new people, greater and more +clear-sighted than the old, and the motto of that people shall be, +'Liberty of thought and freedom in religion.' Tell me now, how shall I +serve you?" + +"I would settle, either in Maryland or in Virginia, and help to build +up that new American people of whom you speak," the young man answered. + +So Geoffrey Viner obtained favour in the eyes of Lord Baltimore by the +power of the ring; and when the patent for the land issued, he and +Woodfield forgot their former dreams of power, and, exchanging sword +for axe, felled the big trees and cleared away the bush, that they +might plough the virgin soil and plant their seed. As for stern Hough, +he remained in Boston, to fight Satan, since he might no longer fight +the French, and to preach the gloomy doctrine that he loved; and there +he lived to a great age, and there suddenly died one winter morning in +a bitterly cold church--for the religious feeling of the community +would allow no physical comfort to the worshipper--with a Bible between +his hands and a strained smile upon his face, as the preacher dilated +upon a psalm-singing Heaven reserved for the elect, and a burning fiery +furnace for all else. Hough had been a good man, according to the +light which he had received, and doubtless the psalm-singing Heaven was +his. + +It was evening. Geoffrey and Madeleine walked hand in hand through +their plantation, inhaling fragrance from the dewy blooms. Rain had +fallen during the afternoon, but when the sun broke out, to bid the +settlers good e'en, the country became a fairy-land. A sleepy bird +piped on a distant branch. A pale evening star rose in the east where +warm vapours were swimming in a silent sea. The peace was perfect in +that true Arcadia. Wars were yet to horrify the province, but the +shadow was not yet. For the present the sword was buried, and the +earth brought forth fruit plenteously. + +"If only I might have my wish!" exclaimed Madeleine, breaking a long +silence. + +Her husband looked at her, pressing her fingers within his, but +answered nothing. + +"I would have the whole world like this," she went on. "Geoffrey, we +would not, if we could, seek to conceive a world more beautiful than +ours. Yet how we spoil it by not knowing how to live! Were it my +world I would banish all hypocrisy, all disputings over religion, all +lust for power, and try to teach my people how to love--how to love, +and nothing else." + +"Making us perfect before our time," said Geoffrey, watching tenderly +the evening lights playing across her hair. + +"No, husband. We shall not attain perfection here. But it is from +this country that a light shall proceed to spread throughout the world. +Are we not already showing others how to live? What people before us +have ever dared to permit independence in thought and freedom in +religion? We have already stripped the Church of its mysteries. We +believe that a man may rise to God without a priest. We are going to +grow very great on this side of the seas, and fly very high, and our +motto shall always be Peace. Then we shall destroy all weapons of war, +and break up armies, and settle down in brotherly love, each man upon +his own plot of ground----" + +"Envying that of his neighbour," broke in her husband gently. + +"Ah, Geoffrey! Scoffer! But mayhap 'tis a foolish dream. Could we +but live in love, it might follow that the wolf would be ashamed to +hunt the lamb, and would feed upon grass, and thus it might happen that +our kine would lack. It is best as God ordains. The panther must +remain fierce, the bind-weed choke the flower, the rose grow its thorn, +and the berry retain its poison. But would you walk in my garden, +husband?" + +"And see the devil changed into a monk?" asked Geoffrey, with a smile. + +"There is no devil in my garden," cried Madeleine joyously. "The snake +has no bite, and the devil is dead of idleness. The angels show +themselves among my roses." + +"They are here," said Geoffrey simply. "Madeleine, sweet wife, before +we met I followed the promptings of the body; but through your eyes I +have seen the soul. It is not the soldier who wins life with his +sword. He does but strive in a vain shadow, until that happy day--ill +for him if it comes not--when there dawns upon his heart the light of +love, and his mind is inspired, and his ears hear the stirring of +wings, and his eyes are opened." + +"What does he see, husband?" she asked caressingly. + +"The sweet spirit of the woman who is sent to be his star." + +They returned to their home in the sunset, and Madeleine was singing +softly as she swung her husband's arm. The young matron ran forward, +to be entranced and transfigured by the last sunrays, and kissed her +fingers to the departing orb with a blithesome cry: + +"Wake us before the morning bell, bright sun, and come not in clouds as +you came to-day." + +Upon entering the flower garden a resonant voice, alternating with +tremendous bursts of glee, destroyed the stillness of the evening. +Husband and wife looked at each other in complete understanding, and +Madeleine held a finger to her lips, and motioned Geoffrey to advance +on tip-toe. They pressed through a bower of roses, beneath a tangle of +creepers, through tall rye-grass, and as they advanced the great voice +came more strongly to their ears. At length they stood unseen within +sight of their house front, and, drawing close together, laughed +restrainedly. + +Upon the topmost step, in a line with the entrance, sat a man of +immense bulk, holding a pretty fair-haired child upon his mighty knee; +and this child he was dancing up and down, shouting a quaint +accompaniment meantime. Around his head trailed the luxuriant vines, +covered with their fluffy white blooms, and the dainty humming-birds +went whirring by, chasing in sport the hivebound bees. + +Leaning back, and heaving his knee up and down, the big man continued +to serenely bellow his nursery refrain: + +"Ha! Pieter von Donck! Pieter von Donck! 'Tis as cunning an old +rogue as ever wore shoe-leather!" + +"Funny man! Do it again," chirruped Geoffrey Viner the younger. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVIII. + +VALEDICTORY. + +And now in the days when the world is small, and ships of iron rush to +and fro upon the seas, and the sword has become a burden, and the +mightier plowshare ripples the plain, gone are the golden lilies, gone +the power of the soutane rouge, gone the House of Bourbon; and two +small islands of the gulf, St. Pierre and Miquelon, bound by their +rocks and beaten by the waves, gather the harvest of the sea under the +lion's protection, and mourn in their loneliness over that proud +supremacy which has passed away for ever. + + + + + + PRINTED BY CASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED, + LA BELLE SAUVAGE, LONDON, E.C. + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Plowshare and the Sword, by +Ernest George Henham + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PLOWSHARE AND THE SWORD *** + +***** This file should be named 35141-8.txt or 35141-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/5/1/4/35141/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Plowshare and the Sword + A Tale of Old Quebec + +Author: Ernest George Henham + +Release Date: February 22, 2011 [EBook #35141] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PLOWSHARE AND THE SWORD *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="img-cover"></A> +<CENTER> +<IMG CLASS="imgcenter" SRC="images/img-cover.jpg" ALT="Cover art" BORDER="" WIDTH="363" HEIGHT="567"> +</CENTER> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="t1"> +THE PLOWSHARE +<BR> +AND +<BR> +THE SWORD +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="t2"> +A TALE OF OLD QUEBEC +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="t4"> +BY +</P> + +<P CLASS="t3"> +ERNEST GEORGE HENHAM +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="t4"> +"Empire and Love! the vision of a day."—<I>Young</I> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="t4"> +TORONTO: THE COPP, CLARK CO., LIMITED +<BR> +LONDON: CASSELL AND COMPANY, LIMITED +<BR> +MCMIII. All Rights Reserved +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="t3"> +À Toi +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="t2"> +CONTENTS. +</P> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">CHAPTER</TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap01">THE FATHER OF WATERS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">AN ENEMY IN THE CAMP</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">CHRISMATION</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">MAKERS OF EMPIRE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">DOUBLE DEALING</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap06">THE INTRODUCTION TO A FIGHT</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap07">THE FIGHT</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap08">COUCHICING</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap09">THE GAUNTLET DOWN</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap10">PILLARS OF THE HOUSE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap11">THE SWORD IMBRUED</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap12">SPLENDOUR</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap13">ENCHANTMENT</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap14">FIRESIDE AND GROVE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap15">GLORIOUS LIFE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap16">CLAIRVOYANCE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap17">STAMEN</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap18">COMMITTAL</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap19">ENKINDLED</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap20">SACRAMENTAL</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap21">IRON AND STEEL</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap22">OR AND AZURE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap23">THE EVERLASTING HILLS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap24">ART-MAGIC</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap25">NOVA ANGLIA</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap26">STIGMA</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap27">REVELATION</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap28">BODY AND MIND</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap29">WOMAN'S LOVE IS LIFE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap30">LAND-LOCKED</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap31">IN THE FALL OF THE SNOW</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap32">ARMS AND THE MAN</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap33">THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXIV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap34">THE THIRST</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap35">SWORDCRAFT</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXVI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap36">SETTLEMENT</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXVII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap37">THE PLOWSHARE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXVIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap38">VALEDICTORY</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> + +<P CLASS="t2"> +THE PLOWSHARE AND THE SWORD +</P> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER I. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE FATHER OF WATERS. +</H4> + +<P> +It was an evening of spring in the year of strife 1637. The sun was +slowly withdrawing his beams from the fortress of Quebec, which had +been established some thirty years back, and was then occupied by a +handful of settlers and soldiers, to the number of 120, under the +military governorship of Arnaud de Roussilac. The French politicians +of the seventeenth century were determined colony builders. However +humble the settler, he was known and watched, advanced or detained, by +the vigilant government of Paris. The very farms were an extension, +however slight, of the militarism of France, and a standing menace to +Britain. Where, further south, Englishmen founded a rude settlement, +the French in the north had responded by a military post. The policy +of peace taught by that intrepid adventurer, Jacques Cartier, exactly a +hundred years before, had become almost forgotten. "This country is +now owned by your Majesty," Cartier had written. "Your Majesty has +only to make gifts to the headmen of the Iroquois tribes and assure +them of your friendship, to make the land yours for ever." +</P> + +<P> +But Samuel de Champlain, the colony-maker who followed Cartier, was a +man of pride who understood how to make war, but had left unlearned the +greater art of bidding for peace. In 1609, acting under what he +believed to be a flash of genius, Champlain brought against the +Iroquois the Algonquins, their bitter hereditary enemies; and with +their aid, and the use of the magic firearms which had never before +been heard in the country of the wild north, he had utterly defeated +the proud and unforgiving people who had won the admiration and respect +of Cartier the pioneer, thus making the tribes of the Iroquois +confederacy sworn enemies of France for ever. Had Providence been +pleased to make Samuel de Champlain another Cartier, had the latter +even succeeded the former, Canada, from the rough Atlantic seaboard to +the soft Pacific slope, might well have been one great colony of France +to-day. +</P> + +<P> +It was, however, not the past history of that land, nor even its +present necessities, which occupied the mind of the Abbé La Salle, +great-uncle of the future Robert of that name, who, half-a-century +later, was to discover the mighty river of Mississippi—which was to +deprive the St. Lawrence of its proud birth-title, the Father of +Waters—and explore the plains of Michigan. The abbé was lying, that +spring evening, on the heights, smoking a stone pipe filled with coarse +black tobacco from Virginia, and watching a heavy ship which rocked +upon the swift current where it raced round the bend in the shore. He +was building up a future for himself, a fabric of ambition upon +foundations of diplomacy and daring. This senior priest of the +fortress—there were two others, Laroche the bully, and St Agapit the +ascetic—was a handsome man, powerfully built, of fair complexion +marred only by a sword-cut above the left eye. Although priest in +name, he was more at his ease flicking a rapier than thumbing a +breviary; an oath was habitually upon his tongue; a hot patriot was he, +and above all a fighter. He had fought a duel before his early mass, +and had left the altar to brag of his prowess. He was, in short, one +of the most notorious of that band of martial Churchmen, imitators of +Armand du Plessis Richelieu, for which colonial France at that age was +noted. Far from the eye of the mighty Cardinal and the feeble mind of +Louis the Just, they swaggered through life, preaching the divine +mission of the Church to the natives one hour, drinking deeply, or +duelling in terrible earnest, the next. The lives of the fighting +priests of Quebec make not the least interesting page of that romance +which three centuries have written around the heights. +</P> + +<P> +Wooden huts were dotted thinly along the slopes, which ended where the +forest of hemlocks began, about half a mile from the edge of the cliff; +and below, where a log landing-stage jutted into the stream, a +man-of-war flying the flag of France rode at her ease, a party of +turbaned men, no bigger to the abbé's eyes than children, gambling at +dice upon her fore-deck. Anchored beside the shore opposite appeared +another vessel, more rakish in build, less heavy at the stern, and +showing four masts to the Frenchman's three. A pine branch fluttered +at the main truck, and a great bough of hemlock depended over her bows, +completely draping the heavy and grotesque figure-head. +</P> + +<P> +It was this latter ship which La Salle was watching with suspicion, as +attentively as the distance would permit. The abbé mistrusted all +foreigners, even when, as in this case, they came bringing gifts. He +had recently been informed of that hasty alliance patched up between +France and Holland, and the policy found no favour in his eyes; he +frowned to think that a Dutch man-of-war should be permitted to sail up +the St. Lawrence and cast anchor beneath the heights. Was there any +genuine desire on the part of Holland to strengthen the hands of her +new ally, or were the crafty Dutchmen playing some deep game of their +own? The Indians, who surrounded the fortress as closely as they +dared, were entirely hostile to the holders of the land. Rumours of at +least one band of Englishmen, friendly with the natives, hiding in the +forest or among the clefts in the rock, waiting to strike a blow when +opportunity offered against the servants of King Louis, had been +circulated by a French dwarf known by the name of Gaudriole, a +malevolent, misshapen creature, who passed unharmed about the country, +and escaped hanging merely because of his value as an interpreter of +the various native dialects. The Dutch ship, which had arrived only +that afternoon, might well have sailed northward with some plan of +joining for the time with either Indian or English to wrest the mastery +of the maritime provinces from the clutch of France. +</P> + +<P> +While La Salle thus meditated with a mind to his own advancement, his +keen ears detected the fall of footsteps over the crisp grass, and he +pulled himself round to discover a priest, like himself wearing a +sword, a stout man, panting after his long climb. +</P> + +<P> +"What news, Laroche?" called the smoker, indicating the distant warship +with the stem of his pipe. +</P> + +<P> +"Corpus Domini!" gasped the new comer. "The sun strikes across yonder +rocks like the fire of Gehenna. What news, ask you, of yonder +piratical thief of a Dutchman? She is under commission, mark you, to +pick a quarrel and fight us for this coast, for all the fair talk of +alliance and the chopping up of the Spanish Netherlands between Paris +and Holland——" +</P> + +<P> +"What of Roussilac?" broke in La Salle. +</P> + +<P> +"The commandant is now aboard the floating gin-tank, and there you may +swear he shall impress upon the mind of Van Vuren, her master, the +certain fact that Louis the Thirteenth is lord here, from the sea +outward to wherever this endless land may reach. But we know the +Hollander. A smooth rascal, who flatters to a man's face, and when his +back is turned—Proh stigmata Salvatoris! Dost remember the Dutchman +who pinked you in the shoulder at Avignon?" +</P> + +<P> +He broke off with the question, and his fat body shook with laughter. +</P> + +<P> +"A priest must remain a priest in Avignon," said La Salle sourly; "but +he may here be a man. What news has this Hollander brought?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why, that England is in revolt from end to end," answered Laroche +gladly. "We shall find none of their clumsy ships, nor any of their +barbarian fist-using soldiers here. The people have risen against the +king. A man named John Hampden has refused to pay ship-money, a new +tax levied to raise a fleet to defy the Pope, the Dutch, and the +Cardinal, and this man carries the people with him. Also this Charles +has made himself hated in the north by forcing some new form of heresy +and insult to his Holiness in the shape of a prayer-book down the +throats of the Scotch. All but a handful have fallen away from him, +says Van Vuren, even the lords temporal have begun to despair, and many +are preparing to set out for the West." +</P> + +<P> +La Salle's martial spirit flamed up. "Here?" he questioned eagerly. +</P> + +<P> +"They would no more dare seek a home here than in Rochelle," went on +Laroche. "They go south to take up the lands where the last of their +mariners harried the Spaniards. It is reported that Lord Saye and Sele +proposes to transport himself to Virginia, Lord Warwick to Connecticut, +and the yeomen, weary of heavy taxes and fearing the extortions of the +Star Chamber, seek information concerning New England now that the star +of the old has set. We hold the seas, France or Holland unaided is +strong enough to sink the rotten barques which the English call their +fleet. There is no money forthcoming for new ships. Richelieu shall +soon rule the world! Come down. We shall perchance obtain a bottle of +wine along the Rue des Pêcheurs before vespers." +</P> + +<P> +"I join you at Michel's after sundown," said La Salle. "At this +present time I remain in the wilderness." +</P> + +<P> +He stood up, brushed the dry grass from his almost entirely secular +costume, and gazed landwards under the wide brim of his hat, until a +crow came presently flapping out of the valley where the great forest +began. The black bird soared over the heads of the martial priests, +and dropped slowly to drink of the river. +</P> + +<P> +"There are finer birds in yonder forest," muttered La Salle, a smile +about his mouth. +</P> + +<P> +"Ha! An assignation?" exclaimed the stout priest, and at the +suggestion wiped his moist forehead and laughed loudly. Then he turned +and rolled away down the slope, shouting a song of the cabaret which +had been popular among the soldiers of Paris two years before. La +Salle followed his progress with a cynical smile, before he also +turned, and descended upon the opposite side out of sight of the river, +and crossed the plain where the French were to rule for two centuries +more and then to fly with the kilted men of Scotland at their heels. +Here the cool hemlock forest murmured, the dense forest which stretched +northward to the mud flats of the salt bay named after the adventurer +Hudson, whose lost bones were somewhere tossed in its cold and lonely +waters. The sun was hidden by the hills, big golden lilies stared at +the priest, an indigo-winged butterfly tumbled into shelter to die at +the ending of the day. The dew sweated out of the ground, and the +foliage smelt like wine. +</P> + +<P> +"This is better than the gutters of Paris," muttered the priest. +</P> + +<P> +The bushes parted at the sounding of his voice, and a radiant vision +stood before him, backed by the greenwood shade. A young woman, but a +few years removed from childhood, stepped forth, hungrily regarding the +abbé with a splendid pair of eyes, brown-red and full of fire, and +burning with the health and passion of life. +</P> + +<P> +This young maid was Onawa of the Cayugas, that boldest of the tribes of +the allied Iroquois, who held the interior under their confederacy, all +the plains, backwoods, the river and seaboard, with the exception of +those spots where military posts had been established—the small +palisaded farm, and even the trader's hut, being marked upon the map as +military posts, and made so by the simple order, "<I>Le roi le veut</I>." +This girl had been present at the council fire when Roussilac had +endeavoured to heal the breach between French and Indians by specious +promises, none of which he intended to fulfil; La Salle also had been +present, accompanying the commandant as the representative of the +Church. The council had been a failure, owing, said the soldiers, to +the trickery of Gaudriole, the only interpreter available; but in fact +due to the overbearing manner of Roussilac, who fell into Champlain's +error of relegating an uncivilised people to the level of animals; and +to the innate hatred entertained by the Indians for their conquerors. +The Iroquois sachems answered the representative smoothly that they +would consider his offer of peace and the terms accompanying the same, +and subsequently resolved that, though they might tolerate English and +Dutch in their midst, their final answer to the white race who had +armed the Algonquins against them could only be made by arrow and +tomahawk. Onawa, who because of her sex was allowed to take no part in +the discussion, held aloof, and regarded the figure of La Salle +standing haughtily in the yellow glow of the fire. When the deputation +withdrew she followed and caught the priest's attention with a smile; +and when night fell she was still watching the lights of the rude +little town upon the cliffs. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle was no woman's man. He was too healthy a soldier; but he was +ambitious, and had moulded his policy upon that of his master, the +character which did not shame to describe itself in the unscrupulous +terms, "I venture upon nothing till I have well considered it; but when +I have once taken my resolution I go directly to my end. I mow down +and overthrow all that stands in my way, and then cover the whole with +my red mantle." The daughter of an Iroquois chief had great power +among her own people, and the priest reflected that he might add some +fame to his name and win perhaps the red hat for his head, if he could +secure the withdrawal of the hostile tribes; or, better, inflame them +against the English, who were, so said report, but awaiting an +opportunity to strike at the north. But a difficulty lay in his path; +neither he nor Onawa could speak the other's tongue. +</P> + +<P> +But this was not an overwhelming obstacle, because then, as now, the +language of signs might make a dumb tongue eloquent. Thus it was not +altogether by accident that the handsome abbé came to the fringe of the +forest at evening, and it was not chance alone which brought Onawa from +the camp into the enemy's country. +</P> + +<P> +She held between her fingers a flower, a lily as golden as that +emblazoned upon the royal standard; and while standing before him she +placed the flower to her forehead, and then gave it him, without +turning away her eyes, and without shrinking from his. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle understood that she was expressing her willingness to give +herself to him, with or without the will and consent of her people. +</P> + +<P> +"By St. Anthony!" he muttered. "How shall I tell the jade that I have +abjured women? Does she then desire me to strip and paint, that she +may make of me a heathen husband?" +</P> + +<P> +He shook his head, and the light changed in the eyes of the girl, and +her brow wrinkled. He saw the sudden gleam of her teeth and heard her +sigh. +</P> + +<P> +"Jezebel of the forest," he cried, "name me this flower!" +</P> + +<P> +He extended it with a sign, and the ready girl spoke softly a +dissyllabic word. La Salle repeated it, again indicating the flower, +and Onawa nodded vigorously. +</P> + +<P> +"Ah!" exclaimed the priest. "Here is light out of darkness." +</P> + +<P> +He came nearer and took the girl's hand, making the same sign. She +spoke again. He touched her hair. Again she spoke. Then her cheek, +her nose, her lips, her ears, and Onawa answered him every time, +laughing delightedly as the priest pronounced each soft Iroquois word +at her dictation. +</P> + +<P> +"A few such lessons, and Gaudriole may be hanged," said La Salle. +</P> + +<P> +Then, with a quick gesture, Onawa put out her fawn-coloured hand, and +touched his right eye with the tip of one finger. +</P> + +<P> +"L'oeil," answered La Salle. +</P> + +<P> +She patted his cheek. +</P> + +<P> +"La joue," he said. +</P> + +<P> +She tweaked his nose, with a laugh. +</P> + +<P> +"Le nez," he gasped. +</P> + +<P> +She slapped his mouth. +</P> + +<P> +"La bouche," he growled, adding, "I might have said, 'La grimace.'" +</P> + +<P> +The girl was very near. He caught her and drew her up to him, and +pressed his lips powerfully upon hers. +</P> + +<P> +"C'est le baiser," he said carelessly. +</P> + +<P> +The salutation of the kiss was unknown among the Iroquois. Onawa +started, thrilling with a feeling altogether strange; then turned to +him, putting back her head as a Parisienne might have done to receive +her lover's salute. +</P> + +<P> +"Le baiser <I>again</I>," she demanded, clinging to the word which had made +life a new thing. "Le baiser <I>again</I>." +</P> + +<P> +"By all the wiles of Satan!" exclaimed La Salle, thrusting her back. +"She is in league with the enemy." +</P> + +<P> +Again he held her before him, his arms slightly bent, and said +haltingly in the tongue of the hated race, which he knew little better +than the Cayuga: "You speak the English?" +</P> + +<P> +Onawa's face lighted. "A ver' little words," she answered. Then she +drew up to him, her eyes more eloquent, and softly repeating her +bilingual request: +</P> + +<P> +"Le baiser again." +</P> + +<P> +It was dark when La Salle reached the group of huts planted upon the +cliffs. The warships were invisible and unlighted, because lamps would +have revealed figures patrolling upon deck, and there were keen-eyed +enemies watching from either shore. The priest stumbled along the +rocky path, his long boots kicking the stones before him, until he came +near the waterside and the Rue des Pêcheurs, situated immediately below +the main cliff on the site occupied to-day by Little Champlain Street. +The way was inhabited, as its name implied, by fisher-folk who swept +the wide river when times were fairly peaceful, and served as soldiers +in war. There was no street in the accepted sense of the word. A few +cave dwellings burrowed out of the rock; huts here and there, a tent, +or a simple erection of sticks and stones plastered over with mud, were +barely visible, sprinkled irregularly, out of the darkness along the +high shore. +</P> + +<P> +Where a worn pathway went round and curved towards the landing-stage, a +square log-hut occupied some considerable portion of space. A very +dull lamp smoked over the entry, below a board bearing the inscription, +"Michel Ferraud, Marchand du Vin." A grumbling noise of conversation +and the rattle of dice sounded within. +</P> + +<P> +"Deuce and three for the third time!" shouted the high-pitched voice of +the Abbé Laroche. "I'll throw you again, Dutchman—one more throw for +the honour of the Church; and the devil seize me if this box plays me +the trick again." +</P> + +<P> +La Salle bent his head and entered the cabaret. He made two steps, +then stood motionless, his fingers feeling for his sword-hilt. +</P> + +<P> +Laroche looked up, the dice-box poised in his fat right hand, and a +smile wandered across his face at beholding the attitude of his +fellow-priest. +</P> + +<P> +"The master of the Dutch man-of-war," he called, indicating the player +who sat opposite him. "Sieur," he shouted over the table, with a burst +of unctuous laughter, "the renowned swordsman, L'Abbé La Salle." +</P> + +<P> +Then Van Vuren looked up. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER II. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +AN ENEMY IN THE CAMP. +</H4> + +<P> +At sunset Roussilac, the commandant of Quebec, after receiving +reassuring reports from the sentries and thus closing his official +duties for the day, went aboard the man-of-war. Having personally +superintended the shipping of the gangway, to satisfy himself that +immediate communication with the shore was cut off, he withdrew to his +cabin, which he occupied in preference to his hut upon the slope. +Before retiring to his hammock, he mentally reviewed his position, the +difficulties of which had not been lessened by the unexpected arrival +of the Dutch ship. +</P> + +<P> +It had never been the way of Holland to go out of her course to be +friendly. The commandant could not forget that she had colonised large +tracts of country further south; he knew that, like England, she +aspired to extend her influence beyond the seas; and what more probable +than that, snatching at the opportunity afforded by this alliance, her +government should have commissioned Van Vuren to spy out the land and +report upon its possibilities? +</P> + +<P> +Already sufficient dangers threatened the fortress. Disquieting +rumours had reached Roussilac of late. The Indians, it was said, were +growing more restless and bolder because they had discovered the +weakness of the French. It was certain that a band of five Englishmen +had been seen in the district by Gaudriole, and these were probably the +precursors of more formidable numbers. The islanders, Roussilac knew, +had a knack of appearing when least expected; and Agincourt had long +since shown the world that they were never so formidable as when few in +numbers, short of supplies, and worn after heavy marching. It was this +fear which had induced the commandant to adopt the plan of retiring to +the ship each night, so that, whatever might befall his men upon the +mainland, he at least would be in a position of comparative safety. +</P> + +<P> +By this it will be perceived that Roussilac was not altogether of that +stuff of which heroes are made. Nor was he a man of exceptional +ability. He had fought his way up to his present post of +responsibility with the aid of fortune and a natural capacity for +obeying orders, although, while he had been ascending, he preferred to +forget his Norman parents and connections, merely because they happened +to be poor and humble folk. His mother's brother and her husband, the +latter driven out of France for heresy, were living upon a small +holding, little more than a day's journey from the fortress; Jean-Marie +Labroquerie, their only son, had lately joined the ranks of his small +army; but the commandant was too proud, or perhaps too cowardly, to +acknowledge these kinsfolk, and in his heart he found the hope that +Madame Labroquerie, his aunt, a woman of bitter memories, with a sharp +tongue and a passionate nature, would never seek to reach the fortress +and shame him before his men. The selfish spirit of Richelieu was +working on in Arnaud de Roussilac, as indeed it worked through the +character of almost all the creatures of the Cardinal. +</P> + +<P> +Still perplexed by the problems of his position, the commandant recited +the prayers without which no soldier of the age could have deemed +himself safe from the perils of the night, placed his sword ready to +his hand, and retired to his hammock, although darkness had scarcely +settled over the land. In a few minutes he was asleep. +</P> + +<P> +These early slumbers were rudely broken by a heavy hand which seized +and shook him by the shoulder. The glare of a torch hurt his eyes, +when he opened them to discover the tanned features of D'Archand, the +master of the ship, between the folds of the netting spread to exclude +the ever-hostile insects. +</P> + +<P> +"An attack," muttered Roussilac, in the first moment of consciousness. +"A plague upon these English." +</P> + +<P> +"Hasten!" cried D'Archand. "The fortress is in an uproar. La Salle +has insulted the Dutch master, and a duel is imminent." +</P> + +<P> +At that Roussilac awoke fully, and, stretching out his arm, drew the +square port-hole open, admitting the sound of the tidewater under the +ship's counter, and beyond, a sharp murmur of excited voices. Craning +his neck, he discovered an intermittent flashing of lights along the +pathway under the cliff. +</P> + +<P> +"Now may the saints help me!" the commandant exclaimed, as he felt for +his cloak. "I have no shadow of power over these priests. More +willingly would I oppress a witch than cross a Churchman. Magic can +only rot a man's body, but excommunication touches his soul. What is +the cause of this quarrel?" +</P> + +<P> +"I know not," answered D'Archand. "But duelling has been forbidden +altogether——" +</P> + +<P> +"By Church and State alike," the commandant interrupted testily. "The +Cardinal might as well forbid the plague to strike his army. When the +Church itself breaks the law, how is the head of the army to act?" +</P> + +<P> +The captains speedily left the ship, ascended the winding path, and +entered the street of fishermen. +</P> + +<P> +All the inhabitants appeared to be gathered together upon the low +ground, to witness the by no means unprecedented spectacle of a duel +between priest and layman. They stood six deep under the cliff, with +as many more upon the side of the river; old and young, women in soiled +stiff caps, ragged settlers, and soldiers in faded accoutrements side +by side. A ring of men, holding spluttering pine torches, or oil +lanterns, the flames of which smoked and flickered up and down the horn +sides, enclosed an open space where two shadowy figures swayed almost +noiselessly, facing one another, each right arm directing a rapier +which flashed continually in the confused lights. +</P> + +<P> +"I would the challenger were any other than the Abbé La Salle," +muttered Roussilac. "He would cut off my hopes of Heaven as readily as +he shall presently run through yonder Dutchman." +</P> + +<P> +"There is no finer swordsman in the new world than the abbé," whispered +D'Archand in his ear. "If Van Vuren be killed, the Cardinal shall +account you responsible, and I too shall not escape blame. This new +alliance may not hold if the deed be known in Paris." +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac started forward, and scattered the people, who were too +excited to recognise him. +</P> + +<P> +"Put up your swords!" he shouted. "I charge you, sir priest, in the +King's name to cease fighting with this man, who is my guest and our +common ally." +</P> + +<P> +"Corpus Domini!" cried Laroche, staggering towards the commandant, his +big face flushed with excitement and liquor. "Order the wind to cease, +commandant, or yon river to stop its flow. Attempt to restrain La +Salle when his blood is hot! Know you, sir, this is an affair of +honour." +</P> + +<P> +"It is not you who shall suffer from the breaking of the law, sir +priest," protested the representative. "By St. Gris! a master-stroke!" +he exclaimed, unable altogether to suppress his soldierly instincts. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle, foreseeing an interruption, had closed with his enemy in a +vigorous skirmish of rapid and clever feints, culminating in a stroke +the admirable technique of which had wrung an involuntary testimony +from the commandant. Van Vuren escaped by a side movement, which to +the onlookers partook of the nature of a lucky accident. But there was +a smear of blood upon the priest's rapier when he pressed again to the +attack. +</P> + +<P> +"Yon Dutchman shall be the only sufferer," said Laroche. "Only +bloodshed can satisfy the Abbé La Salle. Nature must run her course. +There stands a scar upon my brother's back, made by this Van Vuren's +sword four years ago at the corner of a dark turning in Avignon. What +was the cause? Well, commandant, a woman they say is always the cause; +but my friend is, like myself, a priest, and therefore above suspicion +so far as women are concerned. Dutchmen have hard heads and slow +brains. It is also said of them that if they can run from an enemy +with honour they will run. My brother was one night returning home +after administering at a sick bed; beside a corner he heard a step, +and, before he could turn, a sword point went in his back. The +Dutchman's honour was satisfied. He ran, but he was marked as he +escaped. In Avignon during those days Van Vuren was known by another, +and less honourable, name. But the devil may wear a halo and remain +the devil." +</P> + +<P> +While the abbé spoke, some heavy clouds, which had gathered over the +heights, darkening the night, began to discharge themselves in rain, +which presently lashed in so heavy a torrent that the pine torches were +extinguished, and the men holding the lanterns had much difficulty to +maintain the feeble flames. La Salle, with his back to the storm, +drove the Hollander before him through the hissing rain, the people +falling away as the duellists advanced, their blades gleaming and +grating through the silvery lines of water. A muffled shout went up. +Van Vuren had been palpably hit upon the shoulder. La Salle smiled +grimly and still pressed on, lunging repeatedly over the captain's +guard, taking every risk of a wound as he hastened to make his victory +sure. +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac cleared the road, the people only obeying when the soldiers +prepared to enforce their officer's order. +</P> + +<P> +"Gentlemen," cried the commandant, advancing, with an imprecation upon +the rain, "drop your swords, I pray of you." +</P> + +<P> +"The devil seize you!" shouted La Salle, throwing out his left arm. +"His point was not an inch from me." +</P> + +<P> +"Put up your swords," repeated Roussilac, boldly disregarding the +remonstrance. "Sir priest, it is the will of the Cardinal." +</P> + +<P> +These were potent words, and for one moment the abbé hesitated. He +lowered his point with an angry side glance upon his interrupter, and +the affair would then have finished had not a dark figure stopped out +from the shadow under the cliff, and thrown itself into position with +the muffled warning, "En garde!" +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, dog!" cried La Salle, starting forward through the rain with +scarcely a ray of light between him and his adversary. +</P> + +<P> +When a line of lightning broke the sky, an exclamation burst from his +lips and his bold cheek blanched. During that momentary illumination +La Salle beheld his enemy clearly. He saw a mean man clad in a suit of +faded red with torn and stained ruffles; his hair gathered behind and +tied with a piece of grass; his hat broken out of shape and adorned +sadly with half a plume. And when Laroche held up a lantern, the +fighting priest saw further that what he had taken for a negroid skin +was merely a mask which covered the stranger's face, slit with holes +for the eyes and mouth. +</P> + +<P> +"This," muttered La Salle, cold with terror as he warded off an attack +which was far more aggressive than that of Van Vuren, "this is the work +of Satan." +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac touched D'Archand, pointing along the path which bent down to +the river, and whispered, "Wait for the lightning." +</P> + +<P> +When the flash passed, the master saw the big figure of the Dutchman +hurrying to reach his ship, his sword still drawn in his hand. +</P> + +<P> +"Then, who is this?" exclaimed D'Archand, with a frightened oath, +indicating through the beating rain the man behind the mask. +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac signed himself, and said nothing. +</P> + +<P> +Laroche hurried up, his big face streaming, the lantern shaking in his +hands like a will-o'-the-wisp, his attitude grotesque with terror. +</P> + +<P> +"What witchcraft is here?" he shouted. "See you how this Dutchman has +changed body and appearance as well as name?" +</P> + +<P> +"Van Vuren is not here," said Roussilac gravely. "He ran when the abbé +lowered his sword; and so soon as he had gone—nay, before—yonder +figure stepped out of the darkness under the cliff and challenged La +Salle. You see he has covered his face. It is the mad Englishman who +fights for the love of fighting. And the English cover the earth like +flies." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall stiffen his arm, be he heretic or devil," said the stout +priest; and he went and stood near the duellists, and, boldly facing +the stranger, cursed him prolifically in the name of Holy Church and +the King of Rome. +</P> + +<P> +The stranger did not turn, and only acknowledged the anathemas by a +perfectly distinct laugh which issued weirdly from the mask. +</P> + +<P> +No man had ever called La Salle's bravery in question. Facing an +enemy, who had started as it were from the rocks before him in the rain +and the lightning, he met the resolute attack and parried every lunge. +In truth, the priest was a fine swordsman; but his resource in skirmish +and detail was here taxed to the uttermost. All he could do at his +best was to hold out the short sword, which flashed in and out of the +rain, controlled by a wrist of steel and an iron arm. The masked man +gave forth no sound of hard breathing. He was a master of swordcraft, +and La Salle knew that he had met his match. Here was no nervous +Dutchman to be trifled with; no hectoring soldier with a hearty oath +and bluff swagger. La Salle sweated, and his breath came pricking in +hot gasps, and a cold thrill trickled along his back when he allowed +himself to wonder who the enemy might be. +</P> + +<P> +The stranger guarded against treachery, hugging the cliff lest anyone +with hostile intentions might pass behind and reach his back. Had he +moved out, he would assuredly have beaten down the abbé's defence; as +it was, the latter was acting upon the defensive, and doing so with +much difficulty. +</P> + +<P> +The rain stopped on an instant. As suddenly the clouds fell back to +admit the light; and the rugged shadows of the rocks traced fantastic +shapes along the Rue des Pêcheurs. +</P> + +<P> +The strained voice of Laroche broke the stillness. +</P> + +<P> +"A touch!" +</P> + +<P> +"Liar!" shouted back the hard-driven but proud priest, although he felt +warm blood oozing between his fingers. +</P> + +<P> +The masked man feared the light which followed the sweeping away of the +storm clouds. He bestirred himself, feinted with amazing rapidity +within and without the pass, then his limber wrist stiffened for the +second, and his point darted in like a poisonous snake over the hilt +and wounded La Salle upon the muscle of the sword-arm. +</P> + +<P> +"A touch!" shouted the captains together, both too excited to have any +thought for the law. +</P> + +<P> +"An accident," gasped the proud priest. "A misfortune." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, here's a touch!" called a deep English voice; and as the +challenger made his nationality known he lunged beneath the abbé's +blade, thrusting out until the blood spurted upward in a jet. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, yes. A touch—I confess," panted La Salle; and he staggered +back, crossed his legs, and fell heavily. +</P> + +<P> +"By St. Michael!" shouted the fat Laroche, furiously pulling out his +sword and reaching towards the shadow under the cliff. "You shall pay, +assassin, for this." +</P> + +<P> +The mysterious stranger chuckled, disarmed Laroche in a moment, +scratching the stout abbé's wrist with his point, and before the two +officers and the handful of soldiers could bestir themselves, he had +disappeared round the bend of the Rue des Pêcheurs. Roussilac ran to +the ending of the way, but found no sign of the masked man, who had +vanished as mysteriously as he had arrived. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER III. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +CHRISMATION. +</H4> + +<P> +The day following the duel La Salle was under the hands of the +surgeon—who, in the ignorance of that age, treated his patient for +loss of blood by letting yet more—and Roussilac was sending forth men +with the charge to find the hiding-place of the Englishman, and to fail +not at their peril. However, they did at that time fail. Not even the +cunning hunchback Gaudriole had been able to discover the habitation of +the mysterious swordsman who had dared to enter the fortress and openly +defy its officers and men. +</P> + +<P> +Even the Indian might have walked behind the scrub of tangled +willow-growth over the cave-dwelling, and known nothing of it, had his +eyes or his nose failed to discern the thread of wood-smoke often +curling above the blackened crater of a hollow tree which had been +ingeniously converted into a chimney. A grass-covered knoll made the +roof of the dwelling, the entrance to which only became apparent from a +stone causeway, shelving gradually between the roots of pine trees, and +enclosed by massive logs which banked the eastern front of the burrow. +</P> + +<P> +Upon the threshold of this rude home a brown boy was playing with a +wolf-hound, while awaiting his father's return from that daring visit +to the fortress. +</P> + +<P> +Around him Nature thundered like a great organ. The leaden waters of +the great discharge roared where the bush made a screen which no eyes +could pierce; the falls of the Ouiataniche smoked below. Spray flew +above the scrub, bathing the dog's fur and the strong arms of the +child. The one bayed, the other shouted, to the hard north wind that +swept overhead, lashing the branches, tearing the summits of the pines, +snatching the dry wisps of grass and whirling them under the clouds. +The dark bush groaned. The great rocks bore their buffetings with +hollow protests. Ravens croaked as they swung up and down; divers +wailed from the weedy creeks. The boughs chafed, and the plumed +foliage clashed together, loosening a rain of cones and showers of pine +needles. +</P> + +<P> +"I want to grow. I want to be strong," shouted the boy to his panting +companion. "I want to wear a sword and fight. I want to be a soldier +and shed blood. I want to live!" +</P> + +<P> +The dog broke away barking, and rushed through the scrub. The child +ran after him, and they met upon the dripping rocks, which made a +natural fortification to the cave beyond. +</P> + +<P> +A magnificent spectacle rolled away, as full of sound and motion as a +battlefield. Well had the Indians named that place the Region of the +Lost Waters. Islands heaved out of the raging expanse, small and +densely covered with torn vegetation, every ridge of pine-crested rock +moaning under the north wind, splintered and rough and ragged, scarred +like the duellist's arm. About these islands the separate torrents +thundered, seeking outlets for escape. There were a hundred channels, +each striving to be the main, each at war with all others, each leaping +white-crested down to join its rivals at the stupendous fall. Every +separate discharge lifted up its voice to drown the combined clamour of +its rivals. +</P> + +<P> +A canoe shot the rapids between two islands, quivering like an arrow in +its flight. It swept down, a mere feather upon the water, with only a +shell of rough bark between its two occupants and the hereafter. The +steerer, a handsome and pure-blooded woman of the Cayugas, crouched +like a figure of bronze against the cross-piece, wielding her paddle +with an easy carelessness which spoke of perfect confidence. By a turn +of her wrist the shell of bark swept off a projecting rock; by a deft +motion of her body, almost too subtle for the sight, the canoe glanced +from a reef where the waves were wild; another, more determined, +motion, and the fragile thing pierced a sheet of spray and swept to the +shore. The child caught the shell and held fast, while the man who had +conquered the fighting priest jumped nimbly to the sand. +</P> + +<P> +"Brave boy, Richard," he cried. "Your mother and I looked out from +yonder bend between the islands, knowing that our son would be awaiting +us. Tell me now, how have you fared during our absence?" +</P> + +<P> +The boy put out his lean arms, already tight with muscle, to greet his +mother. +</P> + +<P> +"I have been hunting by the moon," he answered. "Last night I shot a +deer, and to-day have cut it up. A portion of the meat is cooking now." +</P> + +<P> +The soldier of fortune reached an arm round the boy's shoulders and +drew him close. "You are a man, my Richard. You shall never know what +it is to lack strength." +</P> + +<P> +Night settled down. The lord of the isles left the cave, and, seating +himself upon a bank, smoked a long pipe, which he had received as a +gift from Shuswap, chief of the Cayugas, with whom he had allied +himself by marriage. Silently he drew the smoke through the painted +stem, then handed the pipe to his wife, and she smoked and passed the +quaint object to her son, who smoked also with a strange expression of +sternness upon his child's features. +</P> + +<P> +"Was the meat good, father?" he asked, as he handed back the pipe. +</P> + +<P> +"Somewhat too fresh, my son," the man answered. +</P> + +<P> +"Was the deer well shot?" +</P> + +<P> +"It was well done, Richard." +</P> + +<P> +"It is not easy to shoot straight in the moonlight," the boy said. +"But I shot no more than once. My arrow went true to the side of the +neck, and Blood followed and pulled the creature down." +</P> + +<P> +The great hound looked up with open mouth, and heavily flapped his tail. +</P> + +<P> +The boy spoke both English and Cayuga, the former more perfectly than +the latter. His father and mother spoke both languages, each having +taught the other the words of a strange tongue. The woman was tall, of +a type which was soon to grow extinct, her features as regular as those +of a Greek statue, her eyes and hair a deep black, her skin a trifle +darker than fawn-colour. Like all the proud daughters of the Iroquois, +she knew well how to handle the axe and bow. Among her own people, in +the days of maidenhood, her name had been Tuschota; but by her English +husband she was called Mary. +</P> + +<P> +He, the lord of the isles, was almost mean in stature, with a lean, +careworn face marked with decisive lines of character, grey-eyed and +thin-lipped. His body was clad in a much mended suit of faded red, an +old hat partly covered by a broken feather, with moccasins and leggings +of his wife's make. A short sword swung behind him by a rough belt of +buckskin, and a hunting-knife, the blade hiding in a beaded sheath, +hung closely to his right hip. It was hard to tell his age; he had the +eager face of youth under the bleached hair of middle-age. His wife +and only child called him Thomas or Father, as did the neighbouring +Indians of the allied Iroquois tribes; but none of them knew him by any +other name, except that of Gitsa, the sun, or, as they intended to +convey, "The strong one who sometimes covers his face." +</P> + +<P> +"Father," young Richard exclaimed nervously, "shall you go away +to-night?" +</P> + +<P> +"Be silent, child," said the mother. "It is not for the young to know +the father's will." +</P> + +<P> +"Nay, Mary," said the grave man. "I love the lad's spirit. Let him +speak his mind." +</P> + +<P> +Richard came nearer and put out his hand, a flush upon his brow. He +patted the hound's back, its head, handled the frayed hem of his +father's cloak, and then his brown fingers passed on to caress the hilt +of the sword upon which his eyes had been fixed while his hand wandered. +</P> + +<P> +"Father," he exclaimed, in a burst of boyish passion, "I want to wear a +sword." +</P> + +<P> +The man's grey eyes kindled as he heard this strong boy speak. Child +as he was in years, the father's spirit was in him, and the father +rejoiced. +</P> + +<P> +"What would you do with a sword?" he said, frowning. "Would you cut +your bread, or make kindling wood for the fire? Have you not your bow +and arrows?" +</P> + +<P> +"I can bring you down the bird flying, or the beast running. I can +shoot you the salmon in the water. Now I would learn the sword, that I +may go out with you, and fight with you, and—and protect you, my +father." +</P> + +<P> +The man did not smile; but he frowned no more. +</P> + +<P> +"Son," he said, in tones that were still severe, "you are yet over +young to join the brotherhood of the sword. The same is a mighty +weapon, never a servant, but rather a tyrant, who shall destroy his +wearer in the end. Know you that the Master of the world said once, +'All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword'? Even as +the tongue is the sword, an unruly member which no man can restrain. +It answers an enemy without thought, even as the tongue throws back an +angry word. It passes a death sentence lightly, even as the tongue +curses an enemy's soul. It strikes a vulnerable spot in one mad +moment; and when the passion sinks, then the hand fails, and the eye +shall close for shame. Only the sword changes not, remaining cold to +the eye, ready to the hand, and responsive to the first evil thought in +the heart. You shall wear the sword some day, my son. Be content till +then." +</P> + +<P> +"I want to fight Frenchmen," the boy muttered. "Father, let me draw +your sword. Let me see it flash in the moon. Let me feel its point." +</P> + +<P> +The father's hand closed upon that of the boy, pressing the little palm +strongly against the hilt. "Do not draw that sword, child," he said. +"The virgin hand should hold a virgin blade." +</P> + +<P> +He rose suddenly and disappeared along the white causeway. The mother +and son were alone on the knoll, the black pines torn by the wind +behind, the spray flying in front. The mother put out her well-shaped +arm to the smouldering pipe, and drew at the mouthpiece, watching the +excited boy over the triangular bowl. She spoke in the liquid language +of the Cayugas, "Remember that you are very young, my son." +</P> + +<P> +Richard turned passionately, and fanned away the tobacco smoke which +wreathed itself between their eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"I have lived fifteen years. I am strong. See these arms! See how +long they are, and mark how the muscle swells when I lift my hand. I +am weary of killing fish and birds and beasts. I would kill men." +</P> + +<P> +"You would be a man of blood, son?" +</P> + +<P> +"Even as my father. He has taught me to hunt. But when he goes down +to the great river he leaves me here. You he often takes; but I am +left. He goes down to fight. I have watched him when he cleans his +sword. There is blood upon his sword. It is the blood of men." +</P> + +<P> +"With whom would you fight?" said the mother, her voice reflecting the +boy's passion. +</P> + +<P> +"With the savage Algonquins in the far-away lands, the enemies of the +Iroquois. And with the Frenchmen whom my father hates." +</P> + +<P> +More the boy would have said, but at that moment the lord of the place +returned with a sheathed sword and a velvet belt. The sword, a short +blade like that which he himself wore, as slight almost as a whip, he +tested on the ground, and in his stern manner pointed out a spot upon +the summit of the knoll where the moonlight played free from shadow, +saying, "Stand there." +</P> + +<P> +The boy obeyed, stretching out an expectant hand. +</P> + +<P> +His father gave him the virgin sword, fixing him with his stern eye, +and suddenly whipped out his own blade, and exclaimed, in a voice which +was meant to strike terror into the child's heart, "On guard!" +</P> + +<P> +The boy did not wince, but threw up his point like an old soldier, and +his face became wild when along his right arm there thrilled for the +first time an indescribable strength and joy as the two blades met. +</P> + +<P> +By instinct he caught the point, and parried the edge. By instinct he +lunged at the vital spots, stepping forward, darting aside, falling +back, never resting upon the wrong foot nor misjudging the distance. +His father, who tested him so severely, smiled despite himself, and +Richard saw the smile, and, confident that he could pass his father's +guard, stepped out and took up the attack in a reckless endeavour to +inflict a wound upon his teacher's arm. +</P> + +<P> +The stern soldier of fortune played with the boy under the rushing +north wind and the swaying light of the moon, while the mother stood +near on the slope of the knoll, her eyes flashing, her nostrils +distended, her bosom heaving with the passion of the sword-play. She +noted how nobly the boy responded to his blood—the enduring blood of +the high-bred Cayuga mingled with the fighting strain of the +Englishman. She watched the sureness of his hand, the boldness of his +eye. She saw how readily the use of the sword came to him, and once +she sighed, because her husband had made her Christian, and she +remembered the warning of the unseen God which her lord had lately +repeated, "All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword." +</P> + +<P> +A cry broke from her lips. Her husband's sword flashed suddenly across +her vision, drew back, lowered, and fell like the falcon which had made +its blow, and the point sprinkled a few drops of blood upon the +bleached grass. +</P> + +<P> +"Thomas," she exclaimed in her native tongue, "why have you wounded +your son?" +</P> + +<P> +"It is his baptism to the sword," her husband answered. +</P> + +<P> +Maddened, not by the pain in his shoulder, which indeed he scarcely +felt, nor by the sight of his blood flicked contemptuously at his feet, +but at the indignity of the wound, the boy rushed at his father, and +hit at him blindly as with a stick; and when the master caught and held +him, and by the act reminded him that he was yet a child, he began to +sob violently with rage. +</P> + +<P> +"You shall pay," he flamed. "I will have your blood for mine. I will +fight you again. I will kill you. I will——" +</P> + +<P> +"Peace, child," interrupted his mother. "He is your father." +</P> + +<P> +"Take him and see to him, Mary. I did but prick his shoulder," said +the father. "So fiercely did he press upon me that I feared he might +throw himself upon my point. The lesson shall teach him prudence." +</P> + +<P> +"I am dishonoured—wounded," moaned Richard. +</P> + +<P> +The father opened his doublet and displayed his chest, which upon both +sides was marred by many a scar. Richard beheld, and blinked away his +angry tears, as the passion departed from him. +</P> + +<P> +"Must I too be wounded before I am a soldier?" he said. +</P> + +<P> +"Ay, a hundred times," his father answered; and the boy turned away +then with his former look of pride, and permitted his mother to wash +and bandage the slight wound upon his shoulder. +</P> + +<P> +Soon they came out together to the knoll where the silent man sat with +the north wind roaring into his ears the song of battle. He looked up +when they were near, and called, "Richard!" +</P> + +<P> +The boy came, subdued and tired, and stood before his father. +</P> + +<P> +"Kneel." +</P> + +<P> +The boy obeyed. The lord of the isles fastened the velvet sword-belt +to his son's waist, secured the coveted sword in its place, then stood, +and drew out his own well-tested blade. +</P> + +<P> +With it he struck the boy smartly upon the shoulder exactly over the +wound, smiling when the child compressed his lips fiercely but refused +to wince, and loudly called: +</P> + +<P> +"Arise, Sir Richard!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +MAKERS OF EMPIRE. +</H4> + +<P> +As the days passed, and Van Vuren's attitude of diffident friendliness +remained unaltered, Roussilac's suspicions began to leave him; and even +La Salle modified his former opinions when he again walked abroad and +discovered that out of the seventy-five fighting men who made up the +military complement of the Dutch man-of-war, no less than thirty had +been sent out upon a hunting expedition in the western forests. These, +and other circumstances, tended to impress the minds of the French +officers that their ally was acting in good faith; thus the commandant +relaxed his vigilance, and Van Vuren was permitted to go upon his way +unwatched. The Dutchman came seldom to the fortress, because he feared +a second meeting with La Salle; but he frequently stole under cover of +night into the forest to the north, where the Cayugas had their camp, +little guessing that these visits were known, not indeed to the French, +but to a company of five Englishmen, who had been thrown upon the coast +to the west of the settlement of Acadie during a storm of the previous +October, and had wintered in a cave among the rugged cliffs some little +distance beyond the falls of Montmorenci, believing themselves to be +the sole representatives of their country in all that land. +</P> + +<P> +These men—the sole survivors of an expedition which had set forth with +the object of establishing a small colony in the north—wasted no time +in repining over their ill-fortune, or considering the hopeless nature +of their position. They engaged themselves in mastering the topography +of the fortress and ascertaining the strength of its garrison; they +watched the river, and noted the coming and going of each ship; they +made themselves friendly with the Iroquois, and from Shuswap, the chief +of the Cayugas, a man who loved the English, they obtained from time to +time much information of value. It was one of their number, Jeremiah +Hough the Puritan, who had followed Van Vuren to the Indian camp-fire; +and when he discovered that the Dutchman was indeed faithless to his +allies and was endeavouring to stir up the Iroquois to strike a blow +against the French position, he returned with the tidings to his +comrades, and the little council of five sat for a long night and +discussed this Dutch policy with the cool shrewdness of their race. +</P> + +<P> +As a result of their debate, one of the little band was deputed each +night to lie concealed upon the shore and watch the Dutch ship. Simon +Penfold, the leader, a spare, grey man of two score years and ten, but +hard and hale as any oak in his home meadows, played spy on the first +night; Jesse Woodfield, a yeoman scarce thirty years of age, did duty +on the second, and handsome young Geoffrey Viner, the boy of the party, +beloved by his comrades for the sake of his long fair hair and comely +face, kept watch on the third. On the fourth night the task devolved +upon George Flower, a middle-aged, sad-featured man, the captain's +faithful friend since the days of boyhood; and the next night found +stern Hough the Puritan lying among the willows above the shingle, with +his cold eyes fixed upon a single star of light which marked the +position of the Dutch ship. +</P> + +<P> +These five men, who made up the little company of Englishmen venturing +into the French colony, were yeomen of Berks, farmers of the valleys +and fields watered by the Thames, men of good repute, who had been +driven to leave their native shore and seek another home in the wide +new world through the oppression of the agents of the greedy English +king. +</P> + +<P> +The man who had discovered Van Vuren's plans had indeed delayed his +flight too long. Scarred and lined as were the faces of Flower and +Penfold, their features had at least escaped the terrible mutilation +which had been inflicted upon Hough as an outward and visible sign of +the royal displeasure. His ears had been cropped close to the skull, +his nostrils slit, his cheeks branded, as a penalty for having stoutly +refused to supply any portion of the necessities of King Charles, +according to the demand of the most honourable Court of Star Chamber. +The strong black hair which spread thickly over the Puritan's face, yet +without hiding the trail of the branding iron and the primings of the +executioner's knife, added a terrible touch to his dehumanised +appearance. +</P> + +<P> +It was on the fifth night after the watch had been appointed that Van +Vuren played for his big stake. From a safe shelter among the willows, +Hough observed a small fire upon the shore, and two men, one of whom +appeared to be a native, watching beside the flames. Presently he +heard a voice hailing softly from the darkness which overhung the +river, and soon a black hulk loomed beside the shore. +</P> + +<P> +Hough counted six men as they disembarked one by one, he saw the boat +drawn up, and the beacon fire extinguished. That fire was still +hissing under the water which had been thrown upon it when the Puritan +crawled out of the thicket of red willow, and stood, leaning forward, +listening attentively. When the sound of footfalls died away, he +scaled the cliff behind, ran over the flat to the little river of +Montmorenci, which was flecked with foam and shivering as it neared its +long straight plunge, pulled a canoe from beneath the bushes, and shot +across that dangerous passage as though it had been no whit more +formidable than some sluggish reach of his native Thames. Had he +dropped his paddle, death would have been inevitable; had he allowed +himself to drift beyond a certain point the current would have dragged +him down to the white bar of foam which marked a phosphorescent line +across the darkness beyond. +</P> + +<P> +Plunging again into the forest, he proceeded in the same headlong +fashion, bearing to the right, always descending, until he struck a +path through the interlacing trees, and finally reached rock-land and a +cave cunningly concealed behind a screen of willow. +</P> + +<P> +He whistled softly, and when his signal was answered pushed inward, +drawing away a sheet of canvas which had been stretched across the +entry to imprison more effectually the light. A fire burnt within, the +smoke escaping from a shaft two hundred feet above; and round this fire +were grouped his four companions, who started up with eager faces when +the Puritan made his entry. +</P> + +<P> +"Good news, I wot," cried old Penfold. "'Tis spoken already by your +eyes, friend Hough." +</P> + +<P> +"My eyes lie not," the Puritan answered. "Comrades, the Dutch have +shown their hand. If we strike at once we shall assuredly kill their +plan, and may perchance seize their leader." +</P> + +<P> +In a few words he disclosed what he had seen. +</P> + +<P> +"They go to hold council with the sachems," said Penfold, adding +thoughtfully, "There will be no light until the dawn." +</P> + +<P> +"Let us lie in wait for them beside their boat," the Puritan advised. +</P> + +<P> +"Nay, let us fall upon them in the forest," cried Wood field. +</P> + +<P> +"Not so," answered the leader. "A man cannot use his sword for the +bush and the splintered growth from the pines." +</P> + +<P> +"An Iroquois guide will accompany them," said Flower. +</P> + +<P> +"The boat! the boat!" shouted young Viner. "That is the place." +</P> + +<P> +"Peace, lads," cried Penfold, stroking his beard. "Let us discuss with +reason. Why has this Dutch vessel made her way up the river? +Roussilac would tell us that she has come to strengthen the hands of +the French. Is it so? I trow not. It has ever been the policy of the +Dutch to dissemble. Holland intends to keep the English from this +coast if she may. Surely she desires also to drive out the French, in +order that she may make herself mistress of the North American land. +She is eager to make colonies, and she knows full well that the +fortress may easily be defended once it be captured." +</P> + +<P> +"She is, then, a privateer," exclaimed Hough. +</P> + +<P> +"Not so. She is commissioned by the Government of the Netherlands to +seize North America. The French are only a handful here. England has +no fleet. Now is the crafty Dutchman's opportunity. Look upon this, +my lads." +</P> + +<P> +Penfold pulled a flaming stick from the fire and walked across the +cave. He stopped where the side sloped as smoothly as a wall, and held +the torch above his head, pointing to a map of the American colonies +traced upon the wall of silica by charcoal. The design was roughly and +incorrectly made; rivers were placed where mountains should have shown, +and the scale was entirely inaccurate; but politically it was correct. +</P> + +<P> +"See!" cried the leader, passing a finger through Chesapeake Bay, and +laying his hand lovingly upon the province of Virginia. "There lies +the fairest of England's colonies. Here, mark you, flows the Potomac, +and here to the north behold the province of Maryland. What country +lies back in the beyond we do not know, because the Mohawks are masters +there; but pass north along the coast and we reach New England, the +provinces of Connecticut and Massachusetts, with the king's towns of +Boston and Plymouth. Between lie our enemies." +</P> + +<P> +He passed his fingers across the words written on the wall, "New +Netherlands," while the four men murmured behind. +</P> + +<P> +"Did the Hollanders acquire their colonies in fair fight?" demanded +Penfold, returning to the fire. +</P> + +<P> +He flung down the brand, and as the sparks showered upward he went on, +"I say it was through deceit. During the glorious reign of our +Elizabeth, of blessed memory, our men of Devon, our Grenville, our +Drake, our Hawkins smoked out the Spaniards, and wrested these colonies +of the new world from the King of Spain in fair fight. Fair do I say? +Ay, surely one tight English ship was ever a match for three popish +galleons. But mark you how the jackals followed the lion, even as +travellers from the Indies tell us they follow to take of that which +the lion shall leave. Where the land was free, where there was no +tyranny of the church to dread, mark you how the Dutch jackals crept +in, to find a home and found a colony under the protection of the +golden lions of England." +</P> + +<P> +"Come, old Simon," broke in Woodfield. "Enough of talk." +</P> + +<P> +"Ay, ay. Put out the fire, my lads. Rub out yon map. We have a plan +which, with God's help, shall perchance furnish us with better quarters +than this poor hole in the rock." +</P> + +<P> +Young Geoffrey stepped back, spat upon the white wall where the words +"New Netherlands" appeared, and obliterated the Dutch colonies with the +flat of his hand. +</P> + +<P> +"Let the map now stand!" he cried, and the others gathered round the +boy whom they loved, clashing their swords, and taking courage from the +thoughtless prophecy which was in God's good time to be fulfilled. +</P> + +<P> +Then the Englishmen went on their way through the dark night. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER V. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +DOUBLE DEALING. +</H4> + +<P> +The Dutch master had played his game of duplicity with no little skill. +His arrogant attitude towards the head men of the fortress, his +outspoken hatred for the wild north land and its uncivilised +inhabitants, his outward indolence and distaste for fighting, were all +subtle moves towards the object he had in view. The culminating stroke +of practically disarming his ship by sending out thirty of his best men +upon a hunting expedition was, he considered, a veritable inspiration +of genius. The plan had indeed succeeded in its purpose of hoodwinking +the French, and Van Vuren was satisfied, because he knew nothing of the +venturers who had discovered his plans and were preparing to strike a +blow against him for the glory of their country and themselves. +</P> + +<P> +Six men were admitted into their leader's confidence, and five of these +only at the last hour. Everything seemed to favour the enterprise. +The night which had been chosen for the council between Van Vuren and +the headmen of the Iroquois was very dark. No sound came from the +sleeping fortress; not a light was showing upon the French ship. The +usual sentries were posted, but the darkness was too impenetrable for +the keenest sight to carry more than a few yards. Van Vuren stepped to +the side of his ship, listened intently for some minutes, and when the +silence remained unbroken whispered an order, and the five picked men +clambered down a ladder and guided their feet into a boat which rode +alongside. The master followed, the boat was pushed off, and floating +down stream swung rapidly round the bend. +</P> + +<P> +"To your oars," muttered Van Vuren. +</P> + +<P> +The black water began to trickle gleefully under the bows, the rowers +dropping their blades cautiously and lifting them high to avoid a +splash. Soon a spark of light broke out upon the shore, at no great +distance from the falls of Montmorenci, where the river of that name +discharges into the mightier stream. Swinging the tiller round, Van +Vuren aimed the boat towards that light. +</P> + +<P> +Beside the fire awaited them a stout Dutchman, who had lived in New +Netherlands among the Indians on the banks of the Schuylkill and there +had learnt the language, and with him was an Indian squatting upon his +haunches. The latter was naked to the waist; a round beaver cap came +low over his forehead, and long hair streamed down his cheeks. His +body shone like polished mahogany as the firelight played across it. +He rose when Van Vuren approached, and remarked upon the exceeding +blackness of the night, and the stout Dutchman answered in the native +tongue, "It is well." +</P> + +<P> +After drawing their boat up the shore and putting out the fire, the men +listened again for any sounds of hostile movements, and when Van Vuren +was reassured as to their safety the party set off along an +imperceptible trail, following their Cayuga guide, who strode rapidly +towards the cover of the forest. +</P> + +<P> +At the end of an hour's march they drew near the camp and perceived the +glow of the council fire. The boles of the trees became ruddy, and +they smelt the acrid smoke which curled upward in wreaths to find an +outlet through the solid-looking roof of foliage, There was no +vegetation below. Splintered stumps projected stiffly from the +conifers; sometimes a fallen trunk lay across the way; the peaty ground +was soft with pine needles. A fox barked monotonously in the distance. +Occasionally a gust of wind passed with a sigh and a gentle straining +at the mast-like firs. +</P> + +<P> +The party stepped into a clearing, and Van Vuren halted nervously, +tightening the sash which secured his doublet at the waist. Nine men +appeared before him, seated under a protection of skins stretched +tightly across a framework of boughs, the whole forming a lean-to which +might readily be moved, either to break the force of the wind or to +afford shelter from rain. The men squatted cross-legged, the majority +naked to the waist and shining with fish-oil, a few wrapped in +blankets, the heads of all covered with fur caps adorned with pieces of +white metal or black feathers. Only one man was painted, and he showed +nothing more than a triangular patch of red upon his forehead, the apex +of the triangle making a line with the bridge of his nose. This man +was smoking, and did not put down his pipe when the strangers arrived. +The smoking was indeed a compliment, being the symbolic pipe of peace. +</P> + +<P> +The nine were sachems of the great Iroquois tribes who in combination +held the north of the continent: the Cayugas, Oneidas, Mohawks, +Onondagas, and Senacas. The smoker was Shuswap, headman of the +Cayugas, father of Onawa and Tuschota, and the chief doctor, one who +professed to understand the language of the beasts, and knew how to +hold communion with the dead. He looked up, drawing the stem of his +pipe from his thin lips, and spoke: +</P> + +<P> +"Do the white men, who come to us from the world where the sun never +shines, speak to us now words of peace or of war?" +</P> + +<P> +Van Vuren moved awkwardly when he saw the grave hairless faces peering +at him through the hot vapour of the fire. At that moment the fat +sailor from New Netherlands reached the clearing, panting like a dog. +He presently interpreted the question, and his leader answered: "Tell +the chief that we come from a world where the days are long, and where +the same sun that warms this country shines from morn till night." +</P> + +<P> +"That were waste of breath," muttered the seaman, who had none to +spare, and he said instead to the council of nine: "The white chief has +come in peace to seek the aid of the sun's children that he may +overthrow his enemies." +</P> + +<P> +"A people have taken my children to be their servants," said Shuswap. +"That people armed the enemies of my race against me. Is the white man +friendly with that people?" +</P> + +<P> +"The French of whom the great sachem speaks are my enemies also," +replied Van Vuren through the interpreter. "I would drive them from +the land, and dwell here in peace beside my allies the great tribes of +the Iroquois." +</P> + +<P> +The crafty Dutchman reflected that, when the flag of the Netherlands +waved over the heights, it would be easy to hold the Indians in the +forest with a warship upon the St. Lawrence and a few cannon frowning +from the cliff. +</P> + +<P> +"The white man has called us into council," went on Shuswap. "What +does he ask of us?" +</P> + +<P> +At that the Hollander played his hand boldly. "I ask you to send your +fighting-men against the French when I give the signal. I will sink +the provision ship which lies upon the river, while your men sweep over +the heights and capture the fortress. So shall you be avenged upon +your enemies, the men who armed the Algonquins against you." +</P> + +<P> +"It is well said," answered the council of nine. +</P> + +<P> +"What signal will you give, that we may know when to make our attack?" +said Shuswap. +</P> + +<P> +"A raft of fire floating down the river." +</P> + +<P> +The headman removed his eyes from the Dutchman and turned to consult +his colleagues. They conferred for some minutes, without passion, +without animation, apparently with no feeling of interest. Their faces +were set, and they spoke with only faint motions of their lips. +</P> + +<P> +"We will bring our children," said the old sachem at last. "When the +fire is seen along the Father of Waters we shall make ourselves ready." +</P> + +<P> +He bent forward, raised a short stick from the centre of the council +fire, and held it out in his brown fingers, then dashed the brand +suddenly upon the ground, and dreamily watched the upward flight of +sparks. +</P> + +<P> +"So let our enemies fly before us," he muttered. +</P> + +<P> +"The sparks fly outward," said the sachem of the Oneidas. +</P> + +<P> +"The Frenchmen shall not be able to stand before the children of the +sun," they muttered with one voice. +</P> + +<P> +The pipe was passed round with terrible solemnity, every Indian and +Dutchman drawing once at the stem and handing it to his neighbour, and +then the Hollanders left the clearing to return, well satisfied with +their night's work. +</P> + +<P> +It wanted yet three hours to the first breaking of the dawn, and the +night was as dark as ever when the seven men came out upon the rocks, +where they could hear the faint whisper of the river. There the Indian +guide left them, and the Dutchmen, flushed with success, laughed and +talked loudly, knowing that they were separated from the hearing of the +French settlement by more than a mile of rock and bush. Advancing in +single file, they came to the thicket of willow beside which they had +left their boat. +</P> + +<P> +"Is all well?" called Van Vuren, who walked at the end of the line. +</P> + +<P> +As he spoke there fell a storm out of the night; a thunder of voices; +the lightning of flashing swords; a rush of dark bodies around the +boat. In the thick darkness all became confusion on the side of the +attacked. +</P> + +<P> +"English!" shouted Van Vuren; and, as the long body of the Puritan +descended upon him, the master turned and fled, without honour, but +with a whole skin. Only the stout seaman shared his leader's privilege +of a run for his life, but him the far-striding legs of Hough pursued, +covering two feet to the Dutchman's one. The wretch sweated and +groaned as he flung out his aching legs, his great body heaving and +staggering as cold as ice. He swore and prayed to God in one breath. +He promised a life of service to the Deity, a treasure in the Indies to +the pursuer; but prayer and promise availed him little. The mutilated +man pressed upon him, and it was only the almost tangible darkness +which prolonged his life for a few more agonised seconds. Then Hough +bounded within reach, lunged fairly, pressing home when he felt flesh, +and the fat Dutchman emitted a violent yell, and his big carcase rolled +upon the rocks, his head settled, his mouth grinned spasmodically, his +limbs twitched, and then he lay at ease, staring more blindly than ever +into the night. Out of the six conspirators who had set forth that +night, Van Vuren was the only man to escape with his life. +</P> + +<P> +"Cast me these bodies into the river," said Penfold, wiping his sword. +"But, stay. It were a pity to waste so much good clothing. Strip them +first, lads. Naked they came into the world, and naked let them go +out." +</P> + +<P> +The bodies were denuded of their clothes and weapons. Five splashes +shivered the face of the river, and then the Englishmen laid hands upon +the boat and drew her down to the water. But an idea had occurred to +Penfold, and he called a halt. +</P> + +<P> +"We have the current to row against, and the night may break before we +reach the ship," he said. "Let us disguise ourselves, so that French +and Dutch alike may regard us as friends in the dimness of the morning. +Here are five suits of Dutch clothing. There are five of us. We shall +fight the easier in such loose-fitting trunks." +</P> + +<P> +"Methinks they that fear the Lord have no need to adopt a cunning +device," protested the Puritan. +</P> + +<P> +"What know we about the ways of the Lord?" said his leader. "Does the +Lord grant the victory to him who runs? Does He not rather send him a +sword into his coward's back? The Lord, I tell you, helps that man who +is the most subtle in devising schemes through which he may overthrow +his enemies. A murrain on these garments! I shall be as a child when +he has put on his father's trappings for the bravery of the show." +</P> + +<P> +Already a grey-dark mist spread along the river where the night clouds +were dissolving at the first light touch of the fingers of the day. +The adventurers had but an hour for their project before the coming of +the first light. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE INTRODUCTION TO A FIGHT. +</H4> + +<P> +Upon the fore-deck of the Dutch ship two sailors were chatting idly +beside a lantern's shaded light. They had tramped up and down, +performing their duty in a listless fashion, until the general silence +had convinced them that the officer in charge was asleep below. The +determination to take their ease, which they thereupon arrived at, +became strengthened by their belief that the vessel could not have been +safer had she been at anchor-hold in the Zuyder Zee. +</P> + +<P> +"Yon French ship has no sentries, I warrant," said Jan Hoevenden, the +younger of the two. "What use, when a man may hardly see his hand when +'tis held in front of him? Your Indian does not attack by water, as +Roussilac well knows. Neither shall he attack in such a darkness, +unless hard put to it." +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis a scheme of the master to deprive us of our hard-earned sleep," +grumbled James Oog. "Come, comrade, let us rest here and smoke. Here +is a parcel of tobacco which I dried yesterday in the sun." +</P> + +<P> +The two sailors filled their pipes, lighted the tobacco at the poop +lantern, and settled themselves aft speedily to forget their +responsibilities. There was not a sound, except the hum of flies and +the swirl of the river. There was nothing to be seen, beyond the +gloomy masts and spectral rigging. The atmosphere remained still and +close. +</P> + +<P> +"This is but a poor country, Jan," observed the older man, after a few +contented puffs at his huge pipe. "There be no treasure of gold or +silver buried here." +</P> + +<P> +"Nought but forest and rock, with a biting wind o' nights," replied +Hoevenden. "'Tis a cold climate. The Indians say this river is thick +with ice for a full half of the year." +</P> + +<P> +"I wish for none of that. Give me the south. Hast ever been in +Florida?" +</P> + +<P> +"Nay. Is that land as fruitful as men say?" +</P> + +<P> +"It knows no winter, and even in the midst of the year the heat is +never so great that a man may not endure to work. The soil is so rich +that grain dropped upon the ground shall spring into harvest in a +month. Sugar and fruit grow there, and much timber for building. +There is also game for the pot, and furs for a man's back." +</P> + +<P> +"There are pestilent beasts, they tell me," Hoevenden grumbled. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, man, there was never a paradise without serpents. True there +are mighty reptiles, twenty feet in length, within the rivers, and +monstrous scorpions upon land. But what of it? There are perils upon +every shore. A man may sit out at night under a big moon, beside trees +covered with white or pink blooms, every bloom as great as his head and +smelling like wine, and he may listen to the Tritons singing as they +splash through the sea, and watch the mermaidens—passing fair they say +who have seen them—lying upon the rocks, wringing salt water from +their hair. 'Tis a wondrous shore. I would rather own an acre of it +than be master of all this country of cold forest where there is +neither fruit nor flower." +</P> + +<P> +"The fog arises yonder," said Hoevenden, pointing down the river. +</P> + +<P> +The grey mass which he indicated ascended rapidly and drenched the deck +with dew. There was as yet no light, but a heavy shadow had taken the +place of the intense blackness, and the river was visible as it carried +its current to the gulf. The two men rose suddenly, and hid their +pipes when they heard the rattle of oars and splash of water. +</P> + +<P> +"Shall be found at our duty," said Oog, with a husky laugh, and his +fellow-seaman chuckled with him. +</P> + +<P> +A boat was making rapid progress against the stream, Penfold, with an +eye upon the fog and his right hand on the tiller, encouraging the +rowers. The muscles sprang out from their arms, the sweat flowed from +their faces, despite the rawness of the air. Hough's mutilated +countenance throbbed terribly beneath his efforts. The ship started +suddenly out of the mist, and Penfold called softly, "Easy, lads. +Spare yourselves now, for we have soon to fight." But immediately the +men stopped rowing, the current dragged the boat down. +</P> + +<P> +"The use of the sword will be as child's play after pulling against +this stream," gasped Hough. +</P> + +<P> +Again the men bent their backs, and the boat sullenly made way. Behind +them the morning was breaking rapidly, the fog gathered in whiter +folds, and some flickering bars of grey light crossed the track of the +river. +</P> + +<P> +"They must not see our faces nor hear us speak," Penfold muttered. +Then he whispered sharply, "Heaven be thanked! A ladder hangs at her +stern." +</P> + +<P> +He drew the borrowed plume over his eyes, and lowered his head because +he was facing the ship. His comrades gave way, driving the heavy boat +upward with great strokes of the clumsy oars, until Penfold muttered +softly, "Easy now." +</P> + +<P> +The two sentries were looking down from above; but they perceived +nothing of a suspicious nature, chiefly because they had no cause to +fear the coming of the enemy. +</P> + +<P> +Young Viner was the first to leave the boat, but Penfold was hard after +him. They scrambled up the ladder, while the others secured the boat +to the steps. +</P> + +<P> +"Five men!" exclaimed Hoevenden, peering through the perplexing light. +"Where is the sixth? Masters, where is the commander?" +</P> + +<P> +"Here!" muttered an English voice, and the sentry fell forward with +Penfold's sword through him. Oog opened his mouth to cry "Treachery!" +but all the sound that issued therefrom was a death gasp, as Viner +finished his career with a pretty stroke which effectually deprived the +Dutchman of his hoped-for heritage in the south. +</P> + +<P> +"A fair beginning," said Penfold, peering forward at the big cabins +which gave the ship a curiously humped shape. "Now to smoke out the +hornets. If we are mastered by numbers, we may yet save ourselves by +swimming to the shore. All silent yet. But see—a gun!" +</P> + +<P> +He rammed his sword up the muzzle-breach. "'Tis loaded. Fetch me +yonder lantern." +</P> + +<P> +Hough brought the lantern from the poop; but hardly had he done so when +a head came out from one of the cabin windows, and a pair of frightened +eyes swept their faces. In a moment, as it seemed, the ship was in an +uproar. +</P> + +<P> +"Now may God deafen the Frenchmen," prayed Penfold, as he swung the +brass gun round and pointed its muzzle at the cabin door. +</P> + +<P> +Viner and Woodfield were fastening down the hatches, while Hough ran +forward, taking his life in his hands, and severed the cable. The ship +quivered, shook herself like a dog aroused from sleep, and very slowly +answered the downward pull of the stream. +</P> + +<P> +But before the Puritan could return the cabin door burst open and the +enemy swarmed forth. Hough dropped the first in his shirt, parried a +blow from the second, turned and ran back, while old Penfold opened the +lantern and brought the flame down to the portfire. +</P> + +<P> +There was light now over the St. Lawrence under masses of wet cloud. +An Indian canoe was flying over the water like a bird, urged by two +pair of arms paddling furiously. She caught the floating ship, and as +she made fast to the side of the steps the gun roared overhead, and +after it an English cheer shook the mist. +</P> + +<P> +"Keep to my side," said the man in the canoe. "Forget not that pass +under the hilt I taught you." +</P> + +<P> +Having thus spoken he bounded up the ladder. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE FIGHT. +</H4> + +<P> +Although the majority of the thirty-six Dutchmen left aboard had been +secured below hatches, those on deck were sufficient to make the odds +heavy against the Englishmen. The unanticipated arrival of the lord of +the isles and his son—who had been returning from their hunting ground +higher up the river, when their ears were startled through the morning +mist by the sound of English voices—brought up the attacking strength +to the fortunate number of seven; but the new-comers were not even +observed by the five adventurers during the excitement of the opening +stage of that struggle in the fog. +</P> + +<P> +That incautious cheer, which followed the noise of the gun, was defiant +rather than triumphant. In spite of Penfold's careful aim the ball had +merely crashed across deck and plunged through the cabin windows. A +couple of hurriedly aimed shots came back in angry reply, but one +passed high, the other low, resulting in a wrecked plank in the deck +and the loss of a portion of rigging. The bark of seventeenth-century +cannon was far more formidable than its bite. +</P> + +<P> +"Have at them, my lads. Drive them over the side," thundered Penfold; +and he rushed forward to clear the deck at the head of his gallant few. +</P> + +<P> +Before the conflicting parties could meet, three Dutchmen, deceived by +the tumultuous English cheer, had gone over the side to swim for shore. +These men believed that at least a boatload of armed men had taken them +by surprise, and they but obeyed the instinct which in certain +temperaments recommends prudence in the form of flight. +</P> + +<P> +"We stand too close together," rang out Penfold's voice. "Friend +Woodfield, I had your elbow twice into my side. Separate a little, but +let us keep in line." +</P> + +<P> +"One rush forward—a strong rush to the cabins," shouted Hough. The +five swords darted through the fog, and every point came back reddened. +</P> + +<P> +Then they broke into a run, hoping thus to sweep the deck, but their +weakness had by this time become evident to the defenders, who in their +turn pressed forward, conquering by sheer weight of numbers. Each of +the adventurers sought shelter for his back, a mast or bulwark, and +each was driven to fight independently. Three men rushed upon Penfold +and pressed him sore. The Englishman cut at the head of the foremost, +but while his arm was uplifted the others took the advantage offered +and ran in under his guard. Penfold drew his dagger and beat at them +with his left hand. The second Dutchman scratched him deeply along the +side. The third caught and held his left wrist, and shortened his +rapier to run the Englishman through the heart. Penfold saw death +before him, but only called grimly, "Fair play, ye dogs, fair play!" +</P> + +<P> +The sword was dashed from his hand. He pressed back to avoid the +plunge of the shortened blade, but the Hollanders had him at their +mercy. Penfold prepared to make a last effort to break aside, when the +foe who threatened him started rigid with a gasp of pain, and the +leader of the adventurers saw the point of a sword dart fearfully from +the Dutchman's chest. Then the man fell forward spitted from behind, +and with him another of the soldiers, while the third of Penfold's +assailants splashed heavily into the St. Lawrence. +</P> + +<P> +The man who had saved the leader's life went on his way fighting with +magnificent confidence in the strength of his right arm, and beside him +went the boy, fighting with all his father's fervour, his brown face +pale with passion, his little brown hands already oozing blood, and his +short sword from hilt to point all bloody too. +</P> + +<P> +"Angels or devils," gasped Flower, who was bleeding heavily from a +wound in the thigh, "they fight upon our side." +</P> + +<P> +"At them again," cried Woodfield. "After the brave stranger." +</P> + +<P> +"He takes too much upon him. I am leader here," grumbled old Penfold +unthankfully. +</P> + +<P> +The valour of the stranger turned the scale. None of the Dutch could +stand before that terrible blade. They gave way, were hunted back to +the cabins, and there brought to bay. +</P> + +<P> +"Yield you, sirs!" called Penfold. +</P> + +<P> +Seeing that they had done sufficient for honour, the men yielded, gave +up their weapons, and sought permission to finish their dressing. +Before this request could be granted, a deep voice exclaimed: +</P> + +<P> +"You grow careless, my masters. Know you not that a bird cannot fly +unless she has wings to carry her?" +</P> + +<P> +It was the stranger who issued this caution as he pointed with his +sword over the stern. +</P> + +<P> +The ship had drifted some eighty yards from her moorings, her keel +grating more than once upon a drift of mud. She had remained close to +the bank, out of reach of the strong central current, and now lay +almost motionless, because she had reached the slack water where the +river commenced its eastward bend. Behind her lay the fortress, +already vested in the golden light of the morning. Between, where the +white mist was stealing upward, came sailing a great hulk, and above +the vapour could be seen the flag of France crushing its golden lilies +against the topmast. At intervals came the indistinct murmur of +voices, the flash of hurried sparks dropped upon touchwood, the rattle +of cannon balls, the ramming home of charges down slim-waisted guns. +</P> + +<P> +"Fool that I am!" exclaimed Penfold. "Fool and forgetful! Up the +rigging, my lads, and set the mainsail. What breeze there is blows +down the river. Drive me yonder fellows up, George Flower. Do you see +that they set all sails, and if they be not ready to obey hurry them +with the sword point." +</P> + +<P> +The sailors were driven into the rigging to plume their ship for the +benefit of a victorious enemy. The canvas flapped out, the ship veered +towards midstream, and, instantly responding to wind and current, +floated to the left of the island, with the Frenchman scarce a hundred +yards from her stern. +</P> + +<P> +A voice came rolling out of the mist, the voice of D'Archand. "Are you +attacked by Indians?" he shouted. The master had undoubtedly made out +the Indian canoe floated beside the steps. +</P> + +<P> +"Let any man answer at his peril," said Penfold, glaring round upon the +unarmed Dutch. +</P> + +<P> +"Do we fear the French?" demanded Viner hotly. "Here are five—nay, +seven—good Englishmen, for surely our stout allies here have fought as +only English can——" +</P> + +<P> +"There are a hundred men upon yonder ship," interrupted the leader, +"men equipped with the newest weapons of Europe. It were madness to +divulge our names and nation. Sir," he went on, turning to the +stranger, "we are much indebted to you. Sir, you have fought like a +brave man, and have helped us to overcome our enemies. What counsel do +you give?" +</P> + +<P> +"Answer Roussilac that Indians have come aboard, but that the crew are +capable of defending themselves, if you will," the stranger replied. +"So may you avoid his fire. Or with your pleasure I will undertake to +answer the master myself, even as an Englishman should always answer a +Frenchman." +</P> + +<P> +"And how is that?" demanded Penfold. +</P> + +<P> +The stranger indicated the brilliant flag, flapping in the sunshine +like a wounded bird trying to fly but falling back. "By defying him so +long as that emblem flies," he said. +</P> + +<P> +Between heavy lines of mist, waved like the bar nebuly upon the shield +of the woolcombers, the black stem and white deck of the enemy had +become partly visible. Heads of watchers were peering over her side, +their bodies hidden, their faces barely above the fog line. Before the +cabins in front of the poop a canopy fluttered; under it a table, and +upon the table six great golden poppies lifted their heads, their +ragged petals flickering under the breeze. The Englishmen saw the bare +head and richly caparisoned shoulders of a tall priest, who swayed +monotonously from side to side, and muttered Latin in a deep voice. +The table was an altar, the poppies were candles, and the priest was La +Salle reciting the inevitable morning Mass. +</P> + +<P> +The better-built Dutch vessel, being easily capable of sailing a knot +and a half to the Frenchman's one, drew away, her main and fore sheets +swelling till they were round as the belly of some comfortable merchant +of Eastcheap who had profited by a successful venture upon the Spanish +Main. Very soon the voice of the militant priest became like the +murmur of an overhead insect. +</P> + +<P> +"Now by my soul!" cried Hough, with a quivering of his slit nostrils. +"It were an everlasting disgrace to Christian men to stand thus idle +and watch a priest of Baal offering sacrifice. Bid us run out the +guns, captain, and drop a good Protestant cannon ball amid yonder +catholic juggling. We have fought for our country this day. Let us +now commit ourselves to the Lord's work, and snuff out yonder stinking +candles, and end these popish blasphemies." +</P> + +<P> +Penfold made no sign of hearing this appeal. He said merely, "They +cram on yet more sail. But they shall not come up to us unless we are +brought upon a bar, and even so they cannot pass us, because the water +becomes narrow beyond. Where is friend Woodfield?" +</P> + +<P> +"Guarding the prisoners at the door of the cabin and keeping an eye +that they do not arm themselves." +</P> + +<P> +"Listen to the men below," said Flower. "Our caged birds become weary +of confinement, and beat their wings to escape." +</P> + +<P> +Hough and the lord of the isles held their eyes upon the Frenchman, who +was now one hundred and fifty yards away, and almost clear of vapour. +When they could see that the guns had been unshipped and were pointing +over the bows, neither man was able altogether to suppress his feelings. +</P> + +<P> +"The curse of God shall surely fall upon us," cried the Puritan +furiously. "When summoned to work in His vineyard we turn a deaf ear +to the call. Did evil come to me when I dragged with mine own hands +from the reformed communion table of our parish church at Dorchester a +Jesuit in disguise, and flung the dog into our little river Thame there +to repent him of his former and latter sins?" +</P> + +<P> +"Peace, friend," said old Penfold. "Here is not England, nor stand we +on English territory. Let yonder papists worship their saints and +idols to their own decay. We are but few in number, though valiant in +spirit, and with every man a wound to show. Remember also that this +ship is not yet our prize." +</P> + +<P> +"Croaker," muttered Hough disdainfully. +</P> + +<P> +"Say rather a man to whom age has brought sound judgment," returned +Penfold, unmoved. +</P> + +<P> +"It is my turn," said the deep voice of the unknown. "Sir Captain, I +have a favour to beg. There is a gun yonder on which I have set my +eye, a brass gun of some twenty pounds weight, loaded with ball. If it +displease you not, I will discharge that gun from the aftmost deck in +such a manner that it shall harm no man. Sir Captain, I have some +small experience in aiming the gun." +</P> + +<P> +Penfold set his rugged face towards his questioner. +</P> + +<P> +"Good sir," he said, "you are English among Englishmen. We are plain +countrymen of the royal county of Berks, village yeomen of small +degree, who have beaten our plowshares into swords; but you, I may +believe, judging from your speech, are somewhat higher. Tell us, if +you will, your name." +</P> + +<P> +"My name is my own, my sword the king's, my life belongs to my +country," said the stranger. "Enough to know that I am a man of Kent. +If now I have answered you, sir, I beg of you to answer me." +</P> + +<P> +"We should but reveal ourselves." +</P> + +<P> +"Every minute widens yon strip of water between ourselves and the +pursuer. She is sailing her fastest, and each minute sends us more of +the wind which she has been taking from us. This breeze may endure for +another hour, by which time we shall have reached the chasm which is +called Tadousac. Sixteen years have I dwelt upon this river, good +master, both in winter and summer, and no servant of King Louis, nor +Indian of the forest, knows its waters better than I." +</P> + +<P> +Penfold turned to the two associates supporting him. "What answer +shall I give?" he asked. +</P> + +<P> +"Consent," said fanatic and youth together; and Penfold gave consent +against his better judgment. +</P> + +<P> +Unaided, the stranger carried the short gun up the steps, rested it in +position upon its crutch on the sloping deck, and arranged the priming, +while the stern boy at his bidding produced knife and flint. The men +below awaited results with a certain curiosity, looking for little more +than an explosion of powder, and the hurling of a defiant missile +harmlessly into space. +</P> + +<P> +It might have been the excellence of the aim, it might have been the +working of Providence, more probably it was sheer commonplace English +luck; but, when the quaint little weapon had howled, kicked viciously, +and rolled over, there came the dull crash of lead with wood, a shower +of tough splinters, and—most glorious sight for the adventurers' +eyes—the top of the French mainmast, carrying the great white and gold +flag, which had been blessed by a bishop upon the high altar of Notre +Dame in Paris, sprang into the air like a pennoned lance, described a +half circle, and plunged to deck, piercing the canopy as though it had +been paper, missing the ministrant by inches only, scattering the +candlesticks and breaking the candles before the eyes of the +scandalised soldiers, who were concluding their devotions to the "<I>Ite +missa est</I>" of the priest. +</P> + +<P> +A great cheer ascended from the Dutch ship, making the cold, pine-clad +hills echo and ring. Hough forgot his sternness, and laughed aloud as +he clasped the gunner's hand. Old Penfold smiled grimly, with more +inward jubilation than he cared to show. +</P> + +<P> +"Now plume her, lads, and let us fly," he shouted. "Steer her around +yonder bend in safety, and we may laugh at her cannon." +</P> + +<P> +"The prisoners, captain! We cannot both fight the ship and hold guard +over them." +</P> + +<P> +"To the river with them," said Hough. "Let them swim ashore." +</P> + +<P> +"There may be some who cannot swim." +</P> + +<P> +"What better chance shall they have of learning? My father cast me +into the Thames when I was but a whipster, and said, 'Sink or swim, my +lad.' And I thought it well to swim." +</P> + +<P> +Protesting, struggling, swearing in an unknown tongue, the prisoners +were brought forth from the cabins and hurried over the side, the +laggards helped by a cuff or kick at starting. The turgid river +splashed with Dutchmen, like a school of porpoises, making with what +speed they could—for the water was exceedingly cold—towards the +rock-bound shore. +</P> + +<P> +Great was the confusion upon the Frenchman when she became so notably +disgraced, but presently D'Archand restored a semblance of order, and +the men trailed off to their duties, probably not a little afraid at +discovering that the ever-dreaded English, whose appearance north of +far-distant Plymouth had become a familiar nightmare, were aboard their +supposed Dutch ally. La Salle, who had immediately rushed into his +cabin and there divested himself of his ecclesiastical finery, speedily +reappeared in secular costume with his redoubtable sword naked in his +hand. The abbé could swear as heartily as any soldier when put to it, +which fact he proved beyond lawyers' arguments then and there. +</P> + +<P> +"Body of St. Denis!" he cried. "See to your priming, knaves. Ah, +hurry, young imp of the pit," kicking a scrambling powder-boy as he +shouted. "By St. Louis, our Lady, and the Cardinal! This is a Dutch +word, a Dutch troth, a Dutch alliance. We shall harry the traitors who +have leagued themselves with our enemies, unless their master, Satan, +lends them wings to carry them to the uttermost parts of the earth. We +shall hang them speedily to the rigging, if the saints be favourable. +Fire, rogues! See you not that she is slipping away from us? Ah, for +a sand bank, or sunken rock, to catch her as she runs! Mark you now, +when I throw a curse over them, how they shall be brought down in their +pride." +</P> + +<P> +Despite the malediction of Holy Church, the trim Dutchman swept on +nearly a quarter of a mile ahead. Sailors manned the rigging, and +crammed on as much additional sail as the masts would bear; the +dishonoured flag was replaced; Roussilac paced the main deck, pale with +rage, his fingers clasping and unclasping his sword-hilt. D'Archand +hurried to and fro, issuing orders with typical French rapidity. +</P> + +<P> +A jet of smoke broke over her bows, and a ball threw up a spout of +water in the wake of the fleeing vessel. +</P> + +<P> +"A most courteous and inoffensive messenger," quoth Flower, bowing to +the enemy. "Captain, shall we not make a suitable reply?" +</P> + +<P> +"I fear me powder and ball are out of reach," said the captain. "The +noisy hornets below guard the magazine. Would that we had a flag to +hoist over us, though it were nothing more comprehensible to our foes +than the five heads of county Berks." +</P> + +<P> +Another gun exploded, and after it another, and so they continued +ringing their wild music, the balls falling astern for the most part, +though more than one whizzed through the rigging, yet without doing +more damage than cutting a rope. +</P> + +<P> +"Take her wide round yonder point, master helmsman," cried the +stranger. "There lies a mud-bank stretching under the water well-nigh +to mid-stream. Mark you the place where it ceases by the ripple across +the river? Steer your passage to the left of that ripple, and all +shall go well." +</P> + +<P> +"Methinks the wind blows more keenly," said Woodfield. +</P> + +<P> +"There is coming upon us that wind which the Indians call the life of +the day, a breath of storm from the west which endures but a few +moments, blowing away the vapours of early morn and the last clouds of +night," said the man of Kent. "We may be sure of that wind at this +season of the year. After it follows calm, and the sun grows hot. +Haul down the lower main-sail, Sir Leader. The heavy mist upon yonder +hills tells us that the wind shall blow full strength this morning." +</P> + +<P> +Even as he spoke a ball from the enemy's bows roared overhead, and +snatched away a portion of the sail he indicated. The loose canvas +began already to flap and the flying ropes to whistle in the wind. +</P> + +<P> +"Let it remain so," said the Kentishman. "We have no need to take in +our sail since they have saved us the work. Didst see how she +staggered then? She shall never carry all that weight of canvas +through the life of the day, and the wind bears more heavily on her +than upon us. Ah, she gains!" +</P> + +<P> +It was as he had said. The unwieldy vessel fell into the breath of the +wind, and, righting herself after a sudden lurch, settled down into the +water, ploughing a deep white furrow, every mast bending and every rope +straining, every inch of canvas bellying mightily. +</P> + +<P> +The Dutchman came out to avoid the mud flat. She began to make the +bend, and her helmsman already saw the wide reach of river beyond, when +a terrible shout ascended from the men who were caged between decks. +At the same moment a pungent odour tainted the free air, and a thin +blue vapour began to leak from the cracks and joinings of the planks. +</P> + +<P> +The Dutchman was burning internally. Soon her deck smoked like a dusty +road under wind, and the shouts of the prisoners became terrible to +endure. The adventurers smelt the choking fumes, saw the curling +vapours, and their faces grew pale with the knowledge that they had to +face a more dangerous foe than the French, knowing well that any moment +a spark or a flame might touch the magazine. +</P> + +<P> +"Unfortunates!" groaned Penfold. "I had hoped to win this ship, and +with her sail to Virginia, there to gather a crew of mine own people, +and return hither to harry the French." +</P> + +<P> +"To the boats," cried Flower. "Better be sunk by a cannon ball than +perish like rats in a corn-stack." +</P> + +<P> +The wind rushed down from the westward rocks with a shout. It smote +the waters of the St. Lawrence, beating them into waves. It penetrated +the womb of the Dutch vessel, and fanned the smouldering fire into +life. It plucked at the cordage, fought with the sails, and bent the +masts until they cracked again. It came in a haze through which the +sun glowed faintly, and behind over the unseen heights the sky cleared +and burst into blue patches, because the passing of the life of the day +was as sudden as its birth. +</P> + +<P> +Down went the mizzenmast of the Frenchman with its crowning weight of +canvas, carrying away the spanker, the shrouds, davits, and quarter +boat; and her sky-sails, which a moment before had raked the breeze so +proudly, spread disabled in the river. She dragged on with her +wreckage, while men with axes swarmed into the poop to cut away the +dead weight of wood and saturated canvas. The mainmast curved like a +bow from the main shrouds to the truck, but remained fast until the +haze broke, and the sky became a field azure, from which the sun shone +out in his might. +</P> + +<P> +Flames were now pouring from the doomed ship, and the poop was a mass +of fire. The Englishmen ran for the boats, into which they flung every +article upon which they could lay their hands: swords and guns, axes, +clothing, provisions, bedding, and even spare sails and ropes. +Everything would serve some useful purpose in their life upon the +shore. The lord of the isles alone took nothing. He entered his canoe +with the boy, and before the adventurers quitted the doomed ship they +had reached the shore and entered the cover of the trees, the man +carrying the light canoe beneath his arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Release the prisoners," cried Flower, as he cast his last burden into +the boat. +</P> + +<P> +"Not so," replied the vindictive Hough. "Let them perish like the men +of Amalek before Israel." +</P> + +<P> +"Nay, we are no cold-blooded murderers," protested Woodfield. +"Unfasten the hatches, and let them save themselves." +</P> + +<P> +"Have they not been delivered into our hands that we may destroy them?" +said Hough. +</P> + +<P> +"Now you would undo the good work, and raise up again a host to be our +destruction in the time to come." +</P> + +<P> +"Let us not argue, lest we be destroyed," said young Viner. "What says +our captain?" +</P> + +<P> +But old Penfold was lying back in the boat, fainting with exhaustion +and loss of blood, and when Woodfield appealed to him he only murmured +the death sentence of the Dutchmen, "Let Jeremiah Hough command." +</P> + +<P> +"Cast off," said the Puritan. "Let the enemies of our country perish. +The Lord do so to me and more also if I spare any of the accursed race +who have sworn to sweep England from the seas." +</P> + +<P> +So the boat pushed off, and came after hard rowing to the shore, beside +the mouth of the little river which enters the main stream midway +between Cap Tourmente and the cleft of the Saguenay. Up this river the +men pulled to find a place for encampment, until the sweet-smelling +pine forest closed behind and hid them from their enemies, whose flag +they had flouted and beaten that day. While they worked their way +inland a mighty explosion shook the atmosphere, the cones rained from +the overhanging trees, the rock land thrilled, the face of the water +shivered, and the birds flew away with screams. +</P> + +<P> +"I fear me," said Hough, as he ceased his nasal droning of a psalm, "I +fear me that the popish dogs have been given time to rescue the +Hollanders." +</P> + +<P> +True it was that the French had been allowed both time and opportunity +for setting at liberty the wretches in the burning ship, but neither +Roussilac nor any of his captains dared to lead the venture, knowing +that any moment might witness the destruction of the ship. The master +took in his sails, cast anchor, and waited for the end. +</P> + +<P> +Thus the undertaking of Holland failed, as her treachery deserved. It +was her one attempt at wresting the fortress from the Cardinal's grip. +And from that day to this no man-of-war from the Netherlands has ever +sailed up the gulf of the St. Lawrence. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +COUCHICING. +</H4> + +<P> +A month went after the failure of the Dutch venture, and the sachems of +the Iroquois still awaited the signal of the raft of fire. Van Vuren +had entered the fortress that morning which witnessed the loss of his +ship, and there remained at the mercy of the French, spending his days +in making friendly overtures to the commandant, avoiding La Salle—who +still refused to believe that it was not Van Vuren who had been his +cowardly attacker that distant night at the street corner in +Avignon—and anxiously inquiring for news concerning the expedition +which he had sent out to the west. The Dutchman was being punished for +his treachery by the knowledge that a sword was suspended by an +exceedingly frail thread above his head, for he strongly suspected that +the dwarf Gaudriole was cognisant of his visits to the council fire. +He was therefore afraid to approach the Indians again; but his mind was +yet occupied with its former plot of seizing the fortress with their +aid. +</P> + +<P> +During that month Roussilac had not been idle. With half his men he +had harried the country to east and west, that he might find and hang +the Englishmen who had dared to occupy his territory and disgrace his +flag. He did not venture into the forests of the north, because the +Iroquois were masters there. Once the adventurers came very near to +being taken, but bravery and English luck opened a way for their +escape. They were, however, compelled to abandon their cave among the +cliffs, and flee for refuge into the district inhabited by the friendly +Cayugas; and there, a few paces from the brink of Couchicing, the Lake +of Many Winds, they built them a hiding-place surrounded by a palisade, +which they ambitiously named New Windsor. To the north they were +protected by the face of the water, to the south by the primæval +forest; on the west the Cayugas held the land, on the east the Oneidas, +both tribes well disposed towards the English and bitterly hostile to +the French. +</P> + +<P> +Finding himself again defeated, Roussilac cast about in his mind for a +sounder policy, and finally resolved to adopt Samuel de Champlain's +cunning and stir up the Algonquins anew to attack their hereditary +foes. Accordingly he despatched Gaudriole with a couple of soldiers to +the north, with a present of guns and ammunition and a message to the +chief Oskelano, praying him to descend straightway to the river, and +view for himself the majesty and power of the representatives of the +King of France. Oskelano, a treacherous and heartless rogue, snatched +at the gifts, asked greedily for more, and consented to return with the +dwarf to the fortress. +</P> + +<P> +This move on the part of the commandant escaped the knowledge of the +men who were busy in their way spinning the web of England's empire, +fighting for their own existence and for supremacy at one and the same +time. At their councils figured the lord of the isles—whose +well-hidden shelter in the heart of the region of the lost waters had +never been suspected by the searching party—and his stern young son. +Since that unlooked-for meeting on the deck of the Dutch vessel the +Kentishman had come into frequent contact with the men of Berks, and +their common nationality, cause, and necessities had quickly forged a +stubborn tie between them. But the geniality of the yeomen never +succeeded in breaking down the reserve of their mysterious colleague. +When asked to recount some portion of his past history he would but +answer brusquely, and when they demanded to know his name he merely +returned his former answer, "I am a man of Kent." +</P> + +<P> +During that month another provision ship, the <I>St. Wenceslas</I> of +Marseilles, had sailed up the St. Lawrence, and so soon as she had made +fast and told the news of the world D'Archand lifted anchor and headed +for home, carrying Roussilac's despatches, and those soldiers and +settlers who, by reason of wounds or sickness, had become unfitted to +fulfil their military obligations. The French Government had taken +advantage of the dissensions which were rending England apart to send +by the <I>St. Wenceslas</I> more emigrants into the new world—all picked +men, destined by the Government to be established, willing or +unwilling, regardless of soil or natural advantages, upon such +districts as might be considered to need strengthening, there to +survive or to become extinct. It would be their duty to form, not a +settlement capable of extension, but a military post; and they would be +sustained by supplies brought over from France by warships. It was a +weak policy, bound by the test of time to fail. The English motto was +settlement and a friendly attitude towards the natives; that of her +great colonial rival, aggrandisement and the destruction of the +aborigines. +</P> + +<P> +These facts were remembered by the venturers, when they beheld the +coming of the one ship and the departure of the other, and, egotists +though they were, the truth that they could not possibly form a +settlement unaided became at last too obvious to be ignored. After +repeated deliberations they decided upon a course which was indeed the +only one open to them. The advice, that one of the party should +attempt to reach the king's loyal town of Boston by overland journey +and there beg for help, proceeded in the first instance from the man of +Kent. He explained that the province of Massachusetts was well +occupied by Englishmen of every grade—soldiers of fortune as well as +artisans, farmers, and titled scions of great houses; and, he added, +there were ships of war in Boston and Plymouth harbours. This advice +found favour in the eyes of the others, and they proceeded to draw lots +to decide which one should make the hazard. The lot fell upon Geoffrey +Viner, the youngest of the party. His seniors at once held forth +objections, grounded upon his youth and inexperience; but the boy as +stoutly held out for his privilege, until the dissentients gave way. +</P> + +<P> +At noon upon the day which had been selected for the young man's +departure, the lord of the isles appeared at New Windsor to bid the +messenger farewell. Geoffrey went out with him, and they stood alone +in the shade of a hemlock, facing the lake and a white cascade which +streamed like a bridal veil over the face of the rocks. After the +Kentishman had imparted what little knowledge he had of the country to +the south, he went on to fix deeply into the mind of his listener the +importance of seeing Lord Baltimore, the Governor of New England, +personally, and of impressing the papist peer strongly with the vital +necessity of sending immediate succour to the north. +</P> + +<P> +"And what if my Lord Baltimore will not hear me, or hearing will not +believe?" asked Geoffrey anxiously. +</P> + +<P> +"Give to him this ring," replied the other, drawing reluctantly from +his left hand a gold circlet set with a stone bearing a coat-of-arms. +"Bid him remember the promise made to this ring's owner one summer +night in a Kentish orchard. Bid him also recall the words of King +Henry the Sixth upon Southwark Bridge, hard by Saint Mary Overies, to +his ancestor the keeper of the privy seal, and to mine the sheriff of +Kent." +</P> + +<P> +"Think you that our plans shall prosper?" the young man asked. +</P> + +<P> +"Have no doubt. Believe that already we have succeeded. Persuade +yourself that the French are driven out of their fastnesses, and the +land from Acadia to Hochelaga gives allegiance to King Charles. As a +man wills so shall it be. And yet be cautious." +</P> + +<P> +"Should I not bid them attack Acadia first? It is but a small colony, +and open to the water they say." +</P> + +<P> +"Nay," said the other. "Let us fight with our faces to the sea. How +shall it profit us to drive our enemy inland and disperse them as a +swarm of flies which rises and settles in another spot? We must drive +them eastward to the sea, where they shall either conquer or die. I +pray you guard that ring." +</P> + +<P> +As they moved away from the hemlock's shade a canoe swept over the lake +and touched the sand, and two stern-faced Cayugas lifted their paddles, +shaking the water from the blades. These brought a brace of +land-locked salmon to the beach. A young woman followed, and after her +an old man, his thick hair adorned with a bunch of feathers. These +were Shuswap and Onawa, his youngest daughter. +</P> + +<P> +The lord of the isles went forward, and met his native relatives upon +the beach. +</P> + +<P> +"Gitsa," cried the old man. "We greet you, Gitsa." +</P> + +<P> +"Is it well, Shuswap?" +</P> + +<P> +"It is the time of the wind of life, the good time," the old man +answered. "The waters are free, and the animals breed in the forest. +Where are the white men of the smooth tongue, Gitsa? Where are the men +who came to us at the council fire and said to us, 'Your enemy is our +enemy. Aid us now when we rise up against them'? Shall they return +with the wind of life?" +</P> + +<P> +"The north wind came upon them and swept them away," his son-in-law +replied, employing the sachem's figurative speech. "You have something +to tell me, Shuswap?" +</P> + +<P> +"There is a strange ship come to the high cliffs, a great ship from the +land of the accursed people," said the old man. "What is this that you +have told us, Gitsa? Said you not that the King of England shall send +many ships and men when the ice has gone, to drive out the men of +France and restore their own to the tribes of the Iroquois? What is +this that we see? The priest of France sends more ships, and more men +who shall kill the beasts of the forest and the fish of the waters, and +drive us back with their fire-tubes into the forests of the north where +the enemies of our race, the Algonquins, lie ever in wait. Is there a +king in England, Gitsa? Has he ships to send out? Has he men to put +into them? Have you lied to the sachems of the Iroquois?" +</P> + +<P> +"Be not afraid, Shuswap," said the white man. "You shall learn whether +there be a king of England or no. But he has many enemies in the +far-away world, and these he must conquer first. Even now we are +sending a messenger to the king's country, and he shall return with +ships and men, and the French shall flee before them." +</P> + +<P> +The man of Kent spoke with a heavy heart. He dared not confess what he +believed to be the truth—namely, that England was already embroiled in +civil war. +</P> + +<P> +"A tribe divided against itself shall be annihilated," said the sachem +sharply, with the clairvoyant power of the primitive man. "The +remaining tribes stand by until it is exhausted, and then fall upon +that tribe, and it is known no more. Is it so with the English, Gitsa?" +</P> + +<P> +"It is not so," replied the Englishman, a flush upon his tanned +features. "England stands above other nations of the world, even as +the sun is greater than all lights. She shines over the earth in her +strength. Were there no England the world would fall into decay, the +creatures who supply us with meat and fur would die, the fish would +fail in the waters, the forests would wither, there would be no rain +and no light by night or by day. The sun would turn black, the moon +would fall into the sea, the very gods would die if England were no +more. She shall take possession of this land in her own time, and +Frenchmen shall have no place in it except as subjects of our king." +</P> + +<P> +The old sachem lifted his cunning eyes and said: "It is well, Gitsa. +But if it be so, why does not your king lift his hand and drive away +his enemies, or blow with his breath and destroy their ships? Surely +that would be a small thing to a king who governs the world." +</P> + +<P> +"It would be a small thing in truth," replied the Englishman, smiling +in spite of his sorrow. "But the ways of the king are not our ways. +He allows his enemies to go upon their course, until a day comes when +he shall say, 'You have gone too far.' It is thus that he shows his +power." +</P> + +<P> +"It is so," said the sachem gravely. "We cannot read the mind of him +who rules. One year there are many animals in the forest, and we live +in plenty. The next we starve. A small tribe overthrows a great one. +A great tribe becomes too prosperous and is plagued with pestilence. +The young men are smitten. The old live on. The wind destroys the +forest, the river breaks its own banks. The lightning strikes down the +totem-pole which we have raised for his pleasure. It is so. There is +a mystery in life. The gods destroy their own handiwork. They remove +the strong, and let the weak survive." +</P> + +<P> +He passed on, an erect figure, in spite of his age, and treading firmly. +</P> + +<P> +Onawa, a silent listener to their talk, stepped out. She was good to +look upon, with her wealth of black hair, her large eyes, her rounded +face, the cheeks and lips lightly touched with paint, her slim muscular +figure. She could run against any man, and aim an arrow with the +sureness of any forester of Nottingham. But she was headstrong, as +changeable as water, and the Englishman did not trust her. +</P> + +<P> +"Where have you been, Onawa?" he said. +</P> + +<P> +"I have come from the camp with my father," she replied. "Where have +you left your son? They say, among the tribes, that he grows into a +great warrior. They say also that he carries wood and draws water and +cuts up the deer which he has killed. Our young men despise a woman's +work." +</P> + +<P> +"I have taught him the duty of helping his mother," came the reply. +"In my country a man lives for his mother or his wife, and her good +favour is his glory." +</P> + +<P> +The girl hesitated, a frown crossing her forehead. "Why are the French +so beautiful, so bold-looking?" she asked suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +"That they may captivate the minds and eyes of women who are weak." +</P> + +<P> +"They are better to look at than Englishmen. They do not wear old +garments marked with dirt. They do not let the hair upon their faces +grow down their bodies. They do not talk deep in their throats. They +are not serious. I love to hear them talk, to see them move. They +walk like men who own the world." +</P> + +<P> +"I have warned you against them," he said earnestly. "They are the +natural enemies of your people. Consider! What Frenchman has ever +married into your tribe and settled down among you?" +</P> + +<P> +The girl laughed scornfully, and turned to go, grasping her long hair +in her hand. +</P> + +<P> +"You hide from them because you know that they are better men than +you," she taunted. "It was a Frenchman who first came Jo our country +from the other world. Perhaps there was no England in those days. The +sun loves to shine upon Frenchmen. The English live in the mists. You +have taken my sister for wife, but I—I, Onawa, daughter of Shuswap, +would marry a Frenchman." +</P> + +<P> +"Never shall I wish you a harder fate," retorted the calm man; and +having thus spoken he turned aside towards the tiny English settlement +to greet his friends and join again his son. +</P> + +<P> +It was the first hour of night when Viner started upon his great +journey. The forest was white with a moon, and sparks of phosphorus +darted across the falls. When the wooden bars were drawn out of their +sockets and the five men emerged from the palisade, the monotonous +chirping of frogs ceased abruptly, and a great calm ensued. +</P> + +<P> +In single file they passed along the dark trail, the wet bush sweeping +their legs, the branches locked overhead. They rounded the red fires +which marked the camping-ground of the Oneidas; they smelt the acrid +smoke, and dimly sighted many a brown lean-to; the dogs jumped out +barking. They passed, the lights disappeared, the silence closed down. +Presently the trail divided; the branch to the left leading to the +river, that to the right bearing inland to the lakes, rivers, and +hunting-grounds known only to the Indians. +</P> + +<P> +"Get you back now," said Viner, halting at the parting of the ways. +"We are already in the country of the enemy. Bid me here God-speed." +</P> + +<P> +There they clasped hands, and in the act of farewell Flower slipped +into Viner's hand a little black stone marked with a vein of chalk. +"Keep it, lad," he muttered. "One spring when I was near drowning in +the Thames by being held in the weeds I caught this stone from the +river-bed. Methinks it has protected me from ill. May that same +fortune be on you, and more added to it, in the work which lies before +you." +</P> + +<P> +A ray of moonlight fell through an opening in the trees, and whitened +the five keen faces. +</P> + +<P> +"Superstition made never a soldier of any man," muttered the stern +voice of the Puritan. "Fling that idolatry to the bush, Geoffrey, and +go your way, trusting rather in the Lord with a psalm upon your lips." +</P> + +<P> +"It is but a reminder of home for the lad," protested Flower gently. +"We have each other. But in the solitudes what shall he have?" +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis but a stone from our river, friend Hough," said Geoffrey timidly. +"I thank you, neighbour," he added. +</P> + +<P> +"Fare you well," said old Penfold sadly. "We shall lack you sore." +</P> + +<P> +They turned away, and instantly became lost from the man who was going +south, because the trail bent sharply. The little band of adventurers, +now reduced to four, walked slowly and sorrowfully towards New Windsor, +until they came out upon the lake, and heard the beavers gnawing the +rushes, and the wind splashing the fresh water up the beach. +</P> + +<P> +"What has come to our nightingales?" said Penfold suddenly. "I like +not this silence." +</P> + +<P> +The frogs about the palisade were songless, and the sign was ominous. +At their leader's hasty remark the others came to a stand, and scanned +the prospect keenly, until silently and abruptly the ghost-like shape +of a woman rose between them and the moon. +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis but the girl Onawa, daughter of Shuswap," muttered Woodfield +reassuringly; but there was a suspicion in his mind which prompted him +to add, "What does she here?" +</P> + +<P> +Even while he put the question Hough cried out, and pointed with a wild +gesture, feeling that same moment for his sword. Gazing in the +direction which he indicated with a quivering hand, his brethren saw +before them the palisade, but not as they had left it. The wooden bars +had been set back into their sockets, as though to forebode the +occupation of their enclosure by an enemy. +</P> + +<P> +"Stay!" called Onawa haughtily, when the men approached her at a run. +"Your tepee has passed from you into the power of the king." +</P> + +<P> +"There is only one king," cried old Penfold. Then he shouted at her, +for all the land to hear, "What king?" +</P> + +<P> +"King Louis," said the girl defiantly. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE GAUNTLET DOWN. +</H4> + +<P> +Oskelano, chief of the Algonquins, that unstable race, false alike to +friend and foe, and doomed to be the first of the savage tribes to be +extinguished, reached the fortress about noon on the day which had been +fixed for Geoffrey's departure to the unknown lands. Roussilac +personally met the treacherous old man upon the heights, and dazzled +his savage eyes with the splendour of a blue surcoat, upon which +gleamed the fleur-de-lys worked in gold. He proceeded to point out the +soldiers in their brave array, the strong huts of wood or stone dotted +about the cliff, the <I>St. Wenceslas</I> riding upon the river, the +glistening guns, and the flashing steel. Finally he bade the old +savage note the impregnable nature of the French position. +</P> + +<P> +"Behold the citadel which my master has ordered me to build for your +protection," the commandant continued, pouring his figments through the +leering mouth of the dwarf Gaudriole. "We have not destroyed your +forests, nor robbed you of your shelters. You may enter our forts in +safety, and obtain whatsoever you desire in exchange for skins and +feathers. We do not mass together in one place. We distribute our +strength. Our forts are dotted along the coast. The tribes of +Maryland and of Massachusetts have shown you how the English congregate +upon the Potomac River. When you go to them for supplies of food, or +demanding recompense for that which they have taken from you, they +threaten you with death. Is it not so?" +</P> + +<P> +"Um," replied the Algonquin, not a muscle of his face stirring. +</P> + +<P> +"The English have their eye upon this north of the continent," went on +the governor. "In the south they rule, but only by permission of our +king. Have you obtained any benefits from them? Have they not rather +hunted you like wild beasts when you have resisted them? Remember how +Samuel de Champlain armed you so that you might fight against the +tribes of the Iroquois. He did not fear the Iroquois, but he saw you +in danger, and reached out his hand to save you." +</P> + +<P> +"Um, um," exclaimed Oskelano, with some symptom of feeling. +</P> + +<P> +"And now the King of France bids you choose between him and Charles of +England. If you accept my master's friendship he shall protect you +from your enemies. But if you refuse him he shall leave you to the +mercy of the Iroquois and the English, who shall rob and kill you until +there is not one Algonquin left." +</P> + +<P> +"The chief desires to know," said the interpreter, "why it is that the +English in the south have brought their wives and families, and why the +French come alone." +</P> + +<P> +"The English desire to take the country that they may make it their +home and abide here for ever," answered Roussilac. "The French are +here to protect the Algonquins, and when danger is over they shall +return to their wives and families in the homeland." +</P> + +<P> +"The chief also desires to know what is the cause of the king's +friendliness to a people whom he has never seen," continued the +interpreter. +</P> + +<P> +"King Louis has forbidden the English to enter this country, and when +they disobey he sends ships and men against them. It is his will that +the Algonquins shall possess this land in peace." +</P> + +<P> +"Um," said Oskelano profoundly, when these fictions had been expounded. +</P> + +<P> +"What says the wooden-faced fool?" asked Roussilac. +</P> + +<P> +"The doctors of his tribe tell him that all white men are liars," +replied the dwarf. "But the English are greater liars than the French." +</P> + +<P> +"Would that I might collect all the savages in this country upon yonder +island in mid-stream, and there exterminate them root and branch," the +governor muttered. +</P> + +<P> +"Import a shipload of bad brandy, commandant," suggested the +interpreter, with an evil grin. "That would spread a disease which +might carry them off in a few generations." +</P> + +<P> +"What say you?" exclaimed Roussilac. "Away, hunchbacked devil!" +</P> + +<P> +But when Oskelano had gone to the quarters which had been prepared for +him, and Gaudriole had followed with a grating laugh, Roussilac +remained to pace the cliff and consider the evil thought. "'Tis a vile +plan," he muttered. "Yet beasts are poisoned when they overrun the +land. By St. Louis, it is a plan which might work." +</P> + +<P> +That poor twisted freak of nature, Gaudriole, had lived formerly in the +gutters of Paris by his wits and the predatory powers of his fingers, +begging by day, stealing by night. Favoured by fortune beyond his +deserts, he had continued to escape the great stone gallows which had +been erected for the dismissal of vagabonds of his kind, and had +finally escaped to the New World, there to fall speedily into the hands +of the Indians. Having saved his life by the performance of some +sleight-of-hand tricks, he robbed the tribe which had taken him captive +and escaped that same night. For years he had lived among the natives, +learning their language, adopting their manner of living, until he had +made himself as much at home in the dense forests as in the slums of +his native city. Indian braves and French soldiers alike stood in awe +of him on account of his impish form and devilish ways. The governors +of the forts found him useful because he brought them information. The +free life suited the unprincipled dwarf, who was little better than an +animal invested with a trick of reasoning; and he knew that, like an +animal, he was liable to be hanged and his body thrown to the crows any +day of his sinful life. +</P> + +<P> +The cabaret in the Rue des Pêcheurs was noisy that evening because the +ship which had lately arrived from Marseilles had replenished Michel's +casks. Soldiers were gaming behind the red curtain which half-blinded +the single window, and fierce songs sounded under the cliff as +Gaudriole shuffled down the pathway. The dwarf had not listened to the +welcome noise of the tavern for many a month, and his crooked heart +heated at the sound. +</P> + +<P> +"Saints of God!" the high voice of La Salle sounded. "If it be true, +as they say, that the devil lends favour to gamblers, then are you +lost, brother, body and soul. Michel, an you sing that lewd song +again—— A plague strike you drunkards! Have the streets of +Marseilles no new song?" +</P> + +<P> +"There is nothing new, my father," bawled a hoarse voice. "His sacred +Eminence holds all France as a man might contain in his hand an egg. +Only strong men, good fighters, be they priests or laymen, find favour +in the Cardinal's eyes, and 'tis said, though with what truth I know +not, that he sways his Holiness as the wind may play with a cornstalk. +Not a brick has been added to Marseilles this year past. The very +mass-bread is mouldy, and the women are hags——" +</P> + +<P> +"Peace, brute!" La Salle shouted. "Laroche, smite me yon babbler +across his mouth." +</P> + +<P> +Standing in the doorway, Gaudriole saw the fat priest heave, and aim a +terrific blow at a half-drunken soldier whose head lolled against the +wall. The dwarf shuffled forward with his malevolent laugh as the +soldier lurched aside with an oath. +</P> + +<P> +"The English are upon you, Messires!" he shouted with all his strength. +</P> + +<P> +Instantly there arose indescribable confusion. Trestles and stools +were flung aside, wine from overthrown goblets soaked black patterns +into the earthen floor, as every soldier made for the outside, grasping +his sword, or swearing because he could not find it. Out of the noise +grated the laugh of the dwarf, who slunk against the log wall, rubbing +his hairy hands. +</P> + +<P> +"A jest! A jest!" screamed Ferraud of shrill voice, his waxen face +regaining colour as he wagged his hand at the dwarf. "Masters, behold +Gaudriole! Liar, hunchback, bastard! Were you used as you deserve you +would hang from the roof-tree. Masters, come back. There are no +English within a thousand miles." +</P> + +<P> +"What found ye outside, my soldiers?" chuckled Gaudriole, as the men of +Mars tumbled disorderedly into the cabaret. "There is the wind. The +west wind, which the Indians say brings all that a man may wish for. +Comrades, did ye find the wind?" +</P> + +<P> +His hideous figure doubled, and his laughter grated again. +</P> + +<P> +"Buffoon of the pit!" cried Laroche, striding up and shaking the dwarf +until his head rolled. "Would make a laughing-stock of his Majesty's +brave men, deformed imp of darkness? Come forth now and sing to us. +Sing to us, I say, lest I beat your crooked shape into a lath." +</P> + +<P> +Because Gaudriole was aware of his value he dared to play such pranks. +He was indeed a capably grotesque comedian, and formerly had garnered +many a capful of sous at the corners of Paris by his antics, songs, and +contortions. His pathetic shape had saved him from the punishment +which often attended the tricks of less daring jesters; and it may be +surmised that his malignant face and cross-seeing eyes not unfrequently +repelled the would-be striker. Men were superstitious in the days when +the world was large. +</P> + +<P> +"Some wine first," the hunchback panted, for the priest's arm was +rough. "The ship moves not till she has wind in her sails. I have +been a drinker of water these months, and my dreams have been red of +wine. Ah, friend! may your beard grow golden, and curl even as your +mistress would have it." +</P> + +<P> +This to a singularly ugly soldier, with a flat, scarred face and +stubbly black beard, who handed him a potful of wine. +</P> + +<P> +"My beard becomes me well enough," the man growled, when a laugh went +against him. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, in faith. It grows out of your skin like bristles from a +chimney-brush." +</P> + +<P> +"Cease your gibes, hunchback, and to your capers. We grow thin for +want of laughter in this accursed country," cried Laroche. +</P> + +<P> +"What shall it be, Messires, a dance, a clever contortion, or a song—a +song of fair ladies, such as one may see upon the streets of Paris, +saving the presence of these most holy and renowned priests?" jeered +Gaudriole, with his intolerable laugh. +</P> + +<P> +"All. Give us all, buffoon, and invent somewhat for the occasion," the +master of ceremonies ordered. +</P> + +<P> +Not loth to practise his talents, Gaudriole took the centre of the +floor. Voice, in a musical sense, he had none. The noise he made was +little better than the screech of wind roaring through the hollow +mouthpiece of some gargoyle of the roof-gutter. Every fresh contortion +of his face was more hideous than the last, as he danced, shouted, and +twisted bonelessly over the wine splashes on the ground, until he +appeared to the spectators as some frightful creature of nightmare, +presenting the evil scenes and actions of their past lives before their +wide-opened eyes. +</P> + +<P> +He concluded his vaudeville amid shouts of applause, in which La Salle +alone took no part. The priest was disgusted at this exhibition of so +much that was brutal, and he was disgusted with himself for remaining a +listener and a watcher. He was, for those days, well-educated, and the +spectacle of the little monster writhing and yelling before him +repelled. It was Paris in truth that Gaudriole recalled; but not, for +him, the Paris of the corners and byways, not the Paris of vagabonds +and free-livers, but the city of the most brilliant court upon earth, +the city of intrigue where Cardinal Richelieu spun his red web to +entangle the feet of kings. The cabaret was but an interlude, a by-way +of the path to power; but the priest realised, as he sat among the +fools, that he had trodden the by-ways frequently and too well. +</P> + +<P> +He left the tavern with its fumes of smoke and wine, and escaped into +the cool, moist wind under the cliff, but a pair of cross-seeing eyes +followed his departure, and Gaudriole wormed his way through a +labyrinth of arms that would have detained him for more folly, and +hopped loosely up the ascent of the crooked path. +</P> + +<P> +"What would you, creature of sin?" demanded La Salle, when he perceived +who it was that followed him. +</P> + +<P> +"A word with you, holiness," panted the dwarf. "The woman Onawa sends +you greeting and prays that you will meet her at the beginning of the +forest where formerly she saw you by chance. She engages to show you +where your enemy may be found. She waits for you now, most renowned." +</P> + +<P> +"Dog!" exclaimed La Salle. "What have I to do with this woman? What +enemy is it of whom she speaks? I have no enemy save Van Vuren, who +lives now under the protection of the governor, and slinks at his heels +like a frightened hound." +</P> + +<P> +Gaudriole could never suppress the malignant grin which escaped from +the ends of his slit mouth whenever he spoke. +</P> + +<P> +"I but repeat the message as it was spoken. Think you that I dare +betray a Frenchman, and that a most holy priest? An I wished to do so, +the game would not be worth the candle. Gaudriole loves life as yonder +crows love carrion." +</P> + +<P> +"See you tell no man of this," the priest muttered, as he moved towards +the cliff. +</P> + +<P> +The way was rough, the breeze cold, as La Salle crossed the heights, +turning once to see the flag beating over the fort and men creeping +like midges about their tasks. He descended, and the swaying wall of +forest broke the wind. The pale purple crocus pushed its furry hood +from the short grass, the songless robins hopped before him, the smell +of fresh water was in the air. The fighting priest felt strong as he +breathed the wind. +</P> + +<P> +Onawa flashed out of the brush and waved her bow to him. +</P> + +<P> +"She has painted her face and looks forth ready for battle," said the +priest. "A comely maid, by St. Louis. What a figure is there, and +what freedom! She has a trick of moving her head which would make a +fashion at court." +</P> + +<P> +"Come!" Onawa called. "Hasten!" +</P> + +<P> +She spoke in English, and hope revived in the heart of the priest. +</P> + +<P> +"English. I show you," she cried. "I have waited a long time. It is +growing late," she went on in her own tongue, hoping vainly that he +might understand. +</P> + +<P> +"I commit my body to this adventure," said La Salle. "If these be the +English who captured the Dutch vessel and mocked us, the reward of +discovery shall be mine. A ship sails for home next week. Tidings +from the New World carry apace throughout Europe. The first step. Ha, +it is the first step that gives confidence. The rest is easy." +</P> + +<P> +He followed Onawa along a trail which bewildered with innumerable +twistings, and after an hour's sharp walking they reached an untrodden +bed of sage brush glistening upon the flats. Onawa picked up a faint +thread, which was invisible to La Salle's eyes, and led him on through +bush where the spikes of dead pines snagged his feet. Then came a cold +ravine down the sides of which quaking asps drooped and moss spread +thickly. More forest, growing every pace denser, until the girl +stopped and motioned her companion to enter what appeared to be a hole +made in the centre of a thicket. She held back the rough bushes to +allow him to pass ahead. For a moment La Salle hesitated. He was +human enough to know that his manliness had made an impression upon +Onawa, but at the same time he feared treachery. The Iroquois were +sworn foes of the French, and here was a daughter of the chief of the +Cayugas abetting a Frenchman. He looked at the girl. She smiled +brilliantly and made an impatient movement, and he advanced boldly into +the cold thicket. +</P> + +<P> +The ground shelved, and under the arched branches a spring freshet, +scarcely seven feet in width, ran hurriedly into the unseen. A canoe +rocked upon the water, held to the crooked root of a pine by a knotted +willow. Onawa motioned him into this canoe, and when he had taken his +place after sundry lurchings and difficulties, the girl stepped in, +unfastened the twig, and struck her paddle into the water. The canoe +swept away under the low branches. +</P> + +<P> +"I would I had Laroche with me," said La Salle, watching the cold trees +and the pale rocks approaching and receding. +</P> + +<P> +"English," said Onawa softly from time to time. "I show you." +</P> + +<P> +The trees went back and the rocks heightened. La Salle heard water +rolling up a beach and the sweep of wind across an open surface. The +freshet widened and grew more shallow; the keel of the canoe scraped +across a ridge of silt. With a deft turn of her paddle Onawa shot the +prow upon a sand bank, and signed to him to land. +</P> + +<P> +She led him along a cliff path, across a flat, again into sage brush, +and finally into more forest. They moved stealthily under cover, until +the trees thinned, and willow scrub sprang thickly out of a grey soil. +At a certain spot the girl halted and motioned her companion to look +forth. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle saw the little settlement of New Windsor nestling in its +enclosure, and needed no longer the information, "English," which the +girl offered with a smile. +</P> + +<P> +They lay in wait while the night grew upon them. La Salle watched when +the bars of the palisade were removed and five men came forth, and +marvelled to learn the weakness of the enemy. A bold scheme instantly +suggested itself. He would engage the enemy single-handed upon their +return, and wear them down one by one. +</P> + +<P> +Here Onawa became an obstacle, because he could not explain to her his +intentions. He did his best by signs and broken English, but the girl +misunderstood him. She believed that he was telling her that he had +taken the settlement, and she was expected to instruct the Englishmen +that their property had passed away from them. +</P> + +<P> +The white moon ascended the sky. The wooden bars sprawled where the +Englishmen had left them. La Salle felt confident that he would be +able to strike down the owners of the place as they passed singly into +the fort. +</P> + +<P> +Suddenly a great hound came out of the forest, sniffed his way to the +palisade, and stopped before the entry, growling and lashing his tail. +Onawa recognised the hound, and called to him. He heard her voice and +turned his leonine head to snarl fiercely. Then he headed for the +forest, giving tongue as he ran. Onawa sprang to the palisade, and +struggled to replace the bars. For a moment she pulled her blanket +over her face, leaving none of it visible except the eyes and forehead, +and the priest shivered. He remembered the mysterious swordsman who +had wounded him upon the Rue des Pêcheurs. He assisted Onawa to put up +the bars. +</P> + +<P> +They heard voices in the forest. La Salle knew that he would require +his full skill in sword-play to save himself that night. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER X. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +PILLARS OF THE HOUSE. +</H4> + +<P> +The moonlight fell softly upon a clearing where a small fire +smouldered, where the lord of the isles and his son sat in silence, and +between them the great hound full-stretched in sleep. They were +resting before returning home to their island among the lost waters. +Only the cracking of the fiery wood, the overhead boughs chafing +fitfully, and the snapping of twigs too brittle to survive disturbed +the silence of the night. +</P> + +<P> +The little group made a stern picture in the light of the moon. The +hound bitten and blemished by many a conquering fight; the lean man +scarred by sword wounds; the boy scarce out of childhood, hungry to +learn—even the boy wore his scars. He was developing in a hard +school. He could not know that the work which his father pointed out +would receive, if accomplished, neither thanks nor reward. The +pioneers of empire might be compared with the insects of the coral +reef, insignificant atoms who have planted a foundation for the sea to +build upon. +</P> + +<P> +"Father," said the boy at length, "shall we not be returning to our +home?" +</P> + +<P> +There was another interval before the stern man looked up. +</P> + +<P> +"Methinks when you spoke that word I saw another home," he said, +raising a hand to his eyes as though he would dispel the vision. "I +saw methinks a grey house, its chimneys wreathed with ivy. Lawns +spread far, divided by paths, bound with close-cropped hedges of yew +and lined with flowers, where peacocks lift their feathers to the sun. +Down a green slope to the little river I see orchards of cherry, snowy +with blossom. A road ends at a church where I may read your name and +mine upon many a stone slab. There lies your grandfather, there my +mother. It is peaceful in that garden of Kent, our home at the other +side of the world." +</P> + +<P> +Young Richard leaned forward over his knees. His father was speaking +in parables. He had seen only the primæval forest, the river torrents, +the lakes with their land-locked fish, the icefields. He had supposed +the world to be made of such. He had heard the clash of swords, the +shouts of war. He had supposed it was so the world over. A place of +peace had never entered into the scheme of his boyish calculation. +</P> + +<P> +"It is a dream of which you speak, father?" +</P> + +<P> +"Ay, my lad, for me a dream. You perchance shall see England with your +own eyes, for when I am gone you shall be the head of a family which +has for its motto, 'Let traitors beware.' Son, have you never wished +to learn your name?" +</P> + +<P> +"My name is Sir Richard," answered the proud boy. +</P> + +<P> +"I, your father, was called once Sir Thomas Iden. Formerly we were a +famous family, but now we wane, wielding an influence only over the +Kentish village which has been ours for centuries. Two hundred years +past the then head of our family, holding the office of sheriff of his +county at the time, slew a traitor named John Cade, who had openly +rebelled against the crown, and for this King Henry the Sixth conferred +upon him the honour of knighthood, presenting him also with a +coat-of-arms. In return for other services his Majesty bestowed upon +our house an unique privilege: right was granted to the head of the +family in each generation to confer knighthood upon his eldest son, if +that son should be deserving of the distinction. My father knighted +me, when I returned from an exploit against the Irish; and I handed the +honour on to you, when I found in you the hereditary longing for the +sword." +</P> + +<P> +The boy looked steadily across the fire, with wonder in his eyes. +"This then is not our home," he said, weighing his words with strange +gravity. "Should we not be in England, fighting for the king?" +</P> + +<P> +"God knows he needs the pillars of our house to help support his +throne," said Sir Thomas. "But no man can serve in two countries. I +have made myself a colonist, have married a daughter of the land, here +I can serve England if not my king, and here shall I die like a man of +Kent, with my face to the foe. I was the first Englishman to make a +home upon this bitter land. I resolved to build about me a colony, to +do for the north what John Winthrop and the papist Lord Baltimore are +doing in the south. I have appealed. I have sent for help. But +England will not hear." +</P> + +<P> +He paced through the wet grass, his hands clenched behind. +</P> + +<P> +"Is the cry of the colonies nothing to them? A handful of good men may +only sell their lives dearly in the trust that their example may fire +better men to deeds of conquest. Here we shall die in exile, and be +sent to haunt the great oblivion of these forests. Two such +ships-of-war as sailed from Devon in the golden days of Elizabeth, two +such ships as the merchant traders of Cheapside could send us without +loss, with another Hawkins to command, manned by our brave sailors of +the east country, would sweep the French out of their forts and clear +the land of them for ever. The Dutch hold the seas. France extends +her arms. England is again divided, the bloody rivalry between the +houses of York and Lancaster having taught her no wisdom. The +Parliament is against the king, and the country must bleed for it. We +are abandoned." +</P> + +<P> +The boy knew nothing of the politics of Europe, neither could he enter +into his father's dream of empire. He hated the French merely because +they were enemies, and because they had betrayed the Iroquois. To go +out and fight against them was more exciting, because more dangerous, +than to engage with the beasts of the forest; but the struggle between +the Powers of Europe for the ownership of North America had injected no +venom into his soul. +</P> + +<P> +"Shall I not live here always?" he asked. "Am I not to choose a maid +from the Cayugas, and settle upon the isles beside you, my father?" +</P> + +<P> +"Talk not of the future, son. Life is to-day, not hereafter. That +lies in the hand of God to give or to withhold. You shall return when +I am gone—return, did I say? You shall go to England with letters to +a notary in Maidstone, and he shall see that you come into your own. +You are dark of face, but English in heart, my Richard." +</P> + +<P> +The boy lifted his head with a sudden sharp movement. "Perchance that +day shall never come." +</P> + +<P> +The hound also lifted his head, and as his eyes sought the haunt of +shadows his jaw dropped in a wild howl. +</P> + +<P> +"Spirits sweep across my burying-place," whispered the youth. +</P> + +<P> +The hound lowered his head and howled again. +</P> + +<P> +"Frenchmen," muttered the boy. +</P> + +<P> +The brute slouched a few feet, broke into a trot, and disappeared. +</P> + +<P> +"He goes in the direction of New Windsor," said the knight. "Hast +heard any sound in the forest?" +</P> + +<P> +"There is no stir," replied the boy, holding his well-trained ear to +the ground. "The smoke from our fire carries. Let us go aside into +the shadow of the bush and watch." +</P> + +<P> +They retreated, flashing glances to right and left. The snap of a +twig, the very crushing of pine needles, sufficed to disturb that calm. +There was no premonitory shiver of the moon-rays, no suggestion of any +human presence upon the chilled air. Their feet sank audibly into the +white moss. Their breath made the semblance of a whisper between +father and son, the lion ready, the cub longing. The rim of the deep +shadow ran behind as they turned to face the clearing they had +abandoned. +</P> + +<P> +"The wind blows from New Windsor," said the knight. "The wind off +Couchicing." +</P> + +<P> +"If Blood takes hold of a man he shall die," went on the boy. "He will +hold at the back of the neck, and there hang until his fangs meet. Ha! +Didst hear that?" +</P> + +<P> +A branch had broken with a dry report. The trees moaned, and a few +distended cones struck the ground like spent bullets. +</P> + +<P> +"The breeze freshens. Methinks I hear the waves breaking upon the +beach." +</P> + +<P> +A raven passed before the moon, knelling violently. +</P> + +<P> +"He smells carrion," whispered the boy. "Already he smells blood upon +my sword." +</P> + +<P> +"Peace, boy," said his father; adding, compassionately, "He is but a +child." +</P> + +<P> +"Nay, father," said Richard, his blood rising. "I am no child. See +the mark of my wounds! Remember that glorious day when we captured the +Dutch privateer. I have prayed for such another day. Did I there +acquit myself as a child? Or did you call, 'Richard, come back! You +are too bold.' Hast forgotten, Sir Thomas?" +</P> + +<P> +His father passed the sword into his left hand, and threw his right arm +about his son's shoulder, drawing him upon his own thin body, and +kissed his cheek. Silence came between them. It was the first time +that the man had kissed the boy, and both for a moment were ashamed; +then young Richard's heart swelled with the pride of having won his +father's love. +</P> + +<P> +As they stood they moved, and their swords clashed. They remembered +their other bond of relationship, the brotherhood of the sword, and +each drew back. +</P> + +<P> +The raven had gone, but his note came upon the wind. +</P> + +<P> +The boy stood leaning forward, his ears drinking in the shuddering +noises of the bush, his face sharp with cold. The smoke stood upright +in the clearing like a swathed mummy. Now and again a spark drifted, +or a flurry of white wood-ash circled. There was yet no voice from the +lungs of the forest. +</P> + +<P> +"Blood smelt no animal," said the resolute Richard. "He does but +tongue softly when he follows a bear. That howl he gives when he runs +on the track of a man." +</P> + +<P> +"A wanderer lost in the forest. A spy from the fortress. One of +Roussilac's creatures," his father muttered. +</P> + +<P> +"They would take possession of the forest," the boy said passionately. +"Along the river I have come upon trees marked by the robbers +with—what is the name of that sign which they bear upon their flag?" +</P> + +<P> +"The fleur-de-lys. They brand the pines with that mark to signify that +the trees have been chosen for ship-masts and are the property of +France. Our hut upon the island is faced with logs which bear their +brand." +</P> + +<P> +"The Cayugas fell such trees and burn them, or cut them in half as they +lie. The Iroquois are yet masters, despite the decrees of King Louis. +How cold is this wind! Let me but warm my hands in the embers of our +fire." +</P> + +<P> +The boy crossed into the moonlight, and knelt within the smoke, rubbing +the palms of his hands upon the warm ground. His father stood in the +shadow, and watched every moving line of his son's body, muttering as +he listened to the outside: +</P> + +<P> +"At his age I was learning how to figure and spell in Tonbridge school. +Quarterstaff and tennis were my sports, with mumming and chess at home. +His sport is to hunt the wild beast, to track the deer, to lie in wait +for men. The sword is his pastime. His pleasure the dream. God +pardon me for bringing him into the world." +</P> + +<P> +The breeze bore along in a gust, bringing the muffled bayings of a +hound. +</P> + +<P> +"He calls me!" exclaimed the boy. "That is Blood's war-cry. Come!" he +shouted. +</P> + +<P> +"Patience, boy. Let the dog guide us. By advancing recklessly we may +fall into a trap." +</P> + +<P> +Each throb of the night brought the wild sounds nearer. Blood was in +full cry, the foam blowing from his jaws, the hackles stiff upon his +back. He was coming down the wind full-stretched. The bush gave, the +dew scattered from the high grass in frosty showers as he leapt the +moss-beds, his foot-tracks far apart. But no sound followed, except +the play of the branches and the murmur of the rising lake. +</P> + +<P> +"Remember how I brought him from the encampment as a puppy," said +Richard appealingly, "how I have trained him from the time that his +eyes opened. Whatever he discovers is mine. Say now that I may go +with him. He and I can cover the ground together. You shall follow in +your own time." +</P> + +<P> +"Perchance they shall be too many for you," said the father. +</P> + +<P> +"Nay, we shall advance with care, and hide if there be danger. The +whole army of France could not follow me in this forest." +</P> + +<P> +"There comes no noise of fighting." +</P> + +<P> +"It is but a spy who has discovered New Windsor. He must not carry +that secret back to the fortress." +</P> + +<P> +The hound broke forth, clouding the cold air with his breath, his eyes +like lamps. He leapt at his master, and snatched his sleeve with a +frothing muzzle, pulling him away. +</P> + +<P> +"Say now that I may go," the boy cried. "The enemy may already have +taken fear, and be retreating as fast as his cowardly feet may carry +him." +</P> + +<P> +The long awaited shout drifted down the wind, and the pale moon +shivered when she heard. +</P> + +<P> +"Go!" granted the stern man. +</P> + +<P> +"St. George!" yelled the maddened child, clutching at the hound's thick +collar of fur. The cry had no meaning. It was but a shout of war, a +valve to his passion. "On, Blood! St. George!" +</P> + +<P> +At full cry they were gone from the moonlight into gloom. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE SWORD IMBRUED +</H4> + +<P> +While the pendulum of a clock might have swayed thrice, the four +venturers stood facing Onawa as though her words had turned them into +stone. Then Hough, forgetting all save rage and lust for vengeance, +broke forward to reach the traitress. Instantly she ran for the bush, +and the voice of Penfold called his follower back. +</P> + +<P> +"Lift not your hand against a woman," he cried. "To the forest, my +lads." +</P> + +<P> +"To the forest an you will," Hough shouted. "I at least shall advance +to smite this woman's partner in sin, be he Frenchman or devil." +</P> + +<P> +"Be it so, neighbour," his captain answered. "Together let us stand, +or together fall. Advance, then, and take the place by storm." +</P> + +<P> +As they rushed out, La Salle braced himself to face the odds. He made +a few passes to free his arm, and trod the beaten ground to make sure +that it would not yield. Then, loosening the top bar, he flung it +forth as the spidery form of Hough descended, and it struck before the +Puritan's feet and stopped him dead. The same moment La Salle sprang +upon the lowest bar, but the support weighed down beneath its burden, +and his blade merely stabbed the air. +</P> + +<P> +"A priest, neighbours," Hough shouted. "Now to avenge our martyrs +burnt at Smithfield by Bloody Mary and the Pope." +</P> + +<P> +Onawa, standing forgotten at the edge of the bush, cast around her a +searching glance. The encampment of her tribe was far distant. The +hound had gone out howling. Danger from that quarter was yet to come. +She stood in shadow, the moonlight whitening the sand in front and +darkening the shapes which hurried to regain their own. No eyes were +upon her. She raised her left hand to her right shoulder and with the +same ominous motion dropped upon one knee, falling unconsciously into +the pose of a goddess of the chase. +</P> + +<P> +The attackers hesitated, knowing the reputation of the man with whom +they had to deal. To attempt to scale the palisade at that point meant +certain loss, and they were not strong enough to take the risk. Hunted +and hunters glared at each other over the pine bars. "Get you round, +Jesse," whispered Penfold. "The dog is bold because he knows his back +is safe." +</P> + +<P> +Woodfield ran beneath the palisading to a place known to him, where he +might scale the fence and so take the priest from behind. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle detected the ruse and taunted his baiters in native French, +while his keen eyes sought an opportunity to strike. He bent +cautiously and gathered a handful of sand. Hough sprang upon the bars, +and for the first time swords were clashed; for the first time also the +Puritan realised the power of the priest's wrist. The point escaped +his forearm by a mere margin, and La Salle laughed contemptuously. +</P> + +<P> +"Brave Lutherans!" he cried. "Four soldiers against a priest. +Advance, soldiers. The point a trifle higher. The elbow close to the +side. Now you stand too near together." +</P> + +<P> +"Wait until friend Woodfield comes up," muttered Flower. "Then he +shall laugh his last." +</P> + +<P> +As he spoke there came a sound through the moonbeams, as it were the +vibrating of the wings of a humming-bird, and to the music of this +disturbance Flower flung up his arms with a choking cough and closed +his sentence with a gasp of pain. His sword darted to the ground. He +swayed to and fro, his eyes wild, his mouth open in a useless endeavour +to appeal to his comrades, and then plunged down, like a man diving +into the water to swim, and sprawled at their feet, with a rough shaft +topped by a crow's feather springing from his back. +</P> + +<P> +A cloud of sand stung the faces of the survivors, and before they could +recover their eyesight, or awaken to the knowledge of Woodfield's +approaching shout, La Salle was across the bars and bearing down upon +them, his cold face branded with its mocking smile. He dashed their +opposition aside, and turned, flushed with success, to renew the +struggle, the taunts still ringing from his tongue. +</P> + +<P> +But help was near at hand. Before the maddened and half stupefied +Englishmen were able to move the night again resounded. Blood had +scented the foe and could no longer be restrained. The priest wheeled +round when he heard those howls, and escaped into the shadows with +Penfold and Woodfield at his heels. +</P> + +<P> +There was indeed one man, and he the most vengeful of his enemies, who +might have outstripped the priest, but it so happened that the +long-striding Puritan had lost his reason. Obeying the first impulse, +he pursued the traitress, mad to avenge the good yeoman who was +stretched to his long sleep at the entrance to New Windsor. Nor did he +realise his mistake until the shadow, after mocking him for a long +mile, flitted into the unknown depths of the bush, and so disappeared. +</P> + +<P> +"Fear not, masters," called young Richard, as boy and dog passed, +running as freshly as at the start. "Do but show my father which way I +have gone. Blood shall hunt the Frenchman down, and I shall slay him. +I shall slay him, friends." +</P> + +<P> +They swept on, flinging the dew across the bars of moonshine. That +triumphant voice came back to the two men as they slackened speed for +lack of breath: "I shall slay the Frenchman. I shall slay him, +friends." +</P> + +<P> +Penfold sank upon a bed of moss and panted into his hands. Woodfield +stood near, his breath coming in white steam, his breast rising and +falling. +</P> + +<P> +"It is God's way, neighbour," he said gently. +</P> + +<P> +The old leader's voice came in a sobbing whisper: +</P> + +<P> +"Through the device of the devil, smitten down foully.... A man of few +words, a good soul, with a smile for all. I knew him as a boy at home, +a gentle boy, who would never join in stoning birds in the hedgerow or +in killing butterflies, because, quoth he, God made them to give us +song and happiness. And yet none quicker than he at ball or quintain, +none braver at quarterstaff. Twice won he the silver arrow in Holborn +Fields, and at home would lead his mother to church a' Sundays, and a' +week-day drive the horses out to field. A sober lad as ever sang with +the lark beside our Thames.... An arrow in the back, an arrow shot by +an Indian witch. It passes all. Call you that God's way? God wills a +man to die in fair fight, with his death in front. And this! Oh, +George! To fall like a beast hunted for the pot." +</P> + +<P> +"Yet 'twas a soldier's end." +</P> + +<P> +"Tell them not at home," cried Penfold. "Let them not know, if ever we +see Thames-side again, how George Flower fell. Ay, like a flower he +came up, and as a grass has he been mown down. Many are the wiles of +Satan. The arrow that flieth by night, the coward arrow of treachery. +'Tis a foul wind that blows out a good man's life. He was a good man. +His old mother, if yet she live, may look upon his past and smile. +Such as George has made our England live. The strong oaks of the land. +From treachery and sudden death, good Lord deliver us!" +</P> + +<P> +"Amen, captain!" +</P> + +<P> +"Where is friend Hough?" asked the old man sharply, rising and groping +like one awakened from sleep. +</P> + +<P> +"I saw him rushing into the forest as a man possessed." +</P> + +<P> +"His zeal consumes him. I fear me while the madness last he will +thrust his sword through that witch and so bring us to trouble with the +Indians." +</P> + +<P> +"She will escape from him in the forest." +</P> + +<P> +"Bear with me," said Penfold brokenly. "To-night I am old. My leg +pains me so that I may hardly rest upon it. What is here? See! Whom +have we yonder?" +</P> + +<P> +The man of Kent came striding through, with the hot question: "Hast +seen my son?" +</P> + +<P> +As shortly Woodfield answered, and the knight hurried on without a word +along the dim trail where the pursued and the pursuers had passed. +</P> + +<P> +"I am but a useless hulk this night," groaned Penfold. "Do you follow +and bring me word, while I stay to keep company with our George." +</P> + +<P> +So Woodfield went. It was but a parting for the hour. He withdrew +himself from his tough old captain and fellow villager, without a grasp +of the hand, with no word of farewell, nor even a kindly look at the +rugged features that he loved, never dreaming that he and Simon Penfold +would speak again no more. +</P> + +<P> +The knight, more skilled in woodcraft, proceeded faster than the +yeoman. The clash of steel reached his ears against the wind, the wild +bayings of a dog, and deep French accents mingled with shrill +counter-blasts in an English tongue. The shuddering forest became +hideous, and the moonbeams came to his eyes red between the branches. +</P> + +<P> +Man La Salle feared not at all, but the fangs and glowing eyes of the +hound appalled. Any moment the brute might spring upon his back. He +could not hope to escape from hunters who covered the ground with the +speed of deer and might not be thrown off the scent. He stopped, +breathing furiously, and set his back against a smooth trunk; but when +his foes swept up, and he beheld the size and innocence of the +sword-bearer, he laughed, even as Goliath laughed when young David came +out against him armed with a sling and a few smooth pebbles from the +brook. +</P> + +<P> +"By the five wounds of God, 'tis but a child!" he muttered, as his +breath returned. "May it never be said that La Salle ran in fear from +a baby and a dog." +</P> + +<P> +He smiled with compassion for the white face which became visible when +a bar of light crossed it. "I will deal lightly with the child," he +said, "but the dog must die, or he shall hunt me through the night." +</P> + +<P> +"Down, Blood!" called the young voice; and the brute crouched like a +tiger, sweeping the grass madly with his tail. +</P> + +<P> +"He bears himself like a veteran," muttered La Salle, with a brave +man's admiration for courage. "The pity that he is so young!" +</P> + +<P> +"On guard, sir!" shouted Richard, stepping up with the challenge which +his father had taught him. +</P> + +<P> +"Back, little one," said the priest in his own tongue. "Put up your +sword until you become a man, and return to your fishing-lines, and be +young while you may." +</P> + +<P> +The boy could not understand one word of the hated language. Saving +his breath, he replied by springing forward, to cross swords with his +renowned antagonist as confidently as on the former memorable night he +had faced his father. A few passes, a turn or so, a quick lunge over +the guard, a rapid bout of skirmishing high upon the breast, and the +astonished Frenchman became assured that his youthful opponent was a +swordsman almost worthy of his steel. +</P> + +<P> +"By St. Denis!" he muttered, playing his sword from side to side with +his inimitable sureness. "What wonder is this! Are these Englishmen +soldiers from their cradle? A doughty stripling! He fences like a +maître d'armes." +</P> + +<P> +But time was passing, others were upon his track, and, though La Salle +was willing to spare, he knew that he was compelled to strike. +</P> + +<P> +He stepped forward, closed with his antagonist, and by a deft turn of +his iron wrist caught the boy's sword at the hilt and wrested it from +his hand. Then he raised his point and lightly pricked the near +shoulder. +</P> + +<P> +"Go in peace, my son," he said in English. +</P> + +<P> +That contemptuous manner, naturally assumed before inferior and +superior alike, stung young Richard to the soul. He ran for his sword, +while Blood sprang up with a deep challenge, and plunged after La +Salle, who again had taken to flight. Richard followed at full speed, +his blood boiling to avenge the insult to his knighthood. +</P> + +<P> +"They come," said La Salle resignedly. "He must have the coup de +grâce. Now God have mercy upon his infant soul." +</P> + +<P> +He came in his flight to a natural opening, one half in deep shadow, +the other lit by the sparkling moon and carpeted by short grass. +Columnar trees stood at regular intervals around this garden in the +forest. A few night lilies opened their sulphur cups. The place might +have been a dancing-ring for elves, and the priest crossed himself when +he stopped, looked round, and swiftly wiped his sword. +</P> + +<P> +"The turf like a rich cloth," he murmured. "The trees falling back, +the moon soft yet sufficient. An ideal spot for sword-play. But +methinks somewhat weird." +</P> + +<P> +The peace of the glade was broken in a moment. Blood dashed out, his +fangs bared, and made two fierce bounds over the turf. La Salle fixed +his eye upon a white spot in the underpart of the flying body, and at +precisely the critical moment stepped aside, catching the hound upon +his point and running him through from the centre of the white patch to +the stiff hackles of his back. He turned sharply, lest his sword +should break, and the dying body passed swiftly from his blade and +crashed into the bush. +</P> + +<P> +"When killing is too easy it carries the mask of murder," the priest +muttered. +</P> + +<P> +He turned again, for Richard was upon him with a sob of rage, and +shouting: "Devil! You shall die for killing my dog, devil that you +are!" +</P> + +<P> +Aware that his time was short, La Salle parried the boy's wild lunges +and replied by his own calculated attack. In that supreme moment of +his life Richard fought, even as his father might have done, with +strength, accuracy, and cunning manoeuvre. The swords played together +for little longer than a minute, and then came the <I>passe en tierce</I> +outside the guard, which put an end to the unequal fight and left a +body bleeding upon the grass. +</P> + +<P> +A cry came from the forest, a near reassuring cry: +</P> + +<P> +"Hold him out, Richard. On the defensive. Do not attack. Remember +the pass I taught you." +</P> + +<P> +The priest's eyes dimmed. Hastily he arranged the warm body, closed +the eyes, straightened the legs and folded the stubborn arms, muttering +a prayer the while. +</P> + +<P> +"Heretic though you are, our Lady of Mercy may yet plead for you," he +said; but his words were inaudible to his own ears, because of the +shout which rang behind his shoulders: +</P> + +<P> +"Hold him off, Richard. I am with you. Keep your eyes upon his point. +I am here." +</P> + +<P> +As the bush gave before the avenger of blood, La Salle ran swiftly from +that spot. And all the forest seemed to be moaning for the child thus +cut down before he was grown, and the winds off Couchicing sobbed above +the hemlocks, and the moon sank down as cold as snow, drawing the +purple shadow closer to that white face and the straight, stiff limbs. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +SPLENDOUR. +</H4> + +<P> +In one short day the hand of fate had divided the little band of +venturers, destroying the physical life of Flower, leading Woodfield +into the trackless forest and losing him there, and driving Viner into +the unknown country of the south. Viner's course, during its early +stages, may first be followed, beside the lakes and across the thickly +wooded plains of the land which was later to be known as the northern +part of the State of Maine. +</P> + +<P> +No event marked his journey during the first day. On the second he saw +in the distance a party of Dutchmen, who also sighted him and gave +chase; but the swift young athlete shook off these slow men with ease. +Later he perceived the smoke of an Indian encampment, and bent off his +course, fearing lest the tribe might be hostile to all of his +complexion. By doing so he lost his bearings, and while attempting to +regain them wandered at evening into a glorious valley, bright with +flowers, and green with high grass undulating gently in soundless +waves. Perceiving a line of trees beyond, Geoffrey determined to gain +their shelter, and wait for the stars to guide him back to his +southerly route. +</P> + +<P> +He came to a shallow stream, a mere brook winding through the valley +amid red willow and wild rice and fragrant beds of brown-topped reeds. +A flight of swans passed overhead, their necks outstretched, their +bodies casting gaunt shadows across the grass. On the near side +patches of bush variegated the plain; beyond, the descending sun cast a +dazzling haze. The wind was murmuring in the reeds, and the whistlings +of aquatic fowl made a plaintive music. The lonely boy relieved his +solitude as he walked, by reciting to the tune of the breeze one of the +poetic fables he had learnt at school: +</P> + +<P> +"And when he was unable to restrain his secret, he crept among the +reeds, and murmured, 'King Midas has the ears of an ass.' But the +reeds betrayed him. When the wind passed they bent together and +whispered, 'Midas has the ears of an ass—the ears of an ass.'" +</P> + +<P> +Stepping among the sedges, where single stalks shuddered in the cold +water, Geoffrey looked for the ripple which would indicate a place of +crossing. The reeds inclined their feathery heads towards him, and the +malicious whisper seemed to follow, "Geoffrey has the ears of an +ass—the ears of an ass." Laughing at the idle fancy, he ran on at the +sight of a line of foam some little way down the stream. Drawing off +his shoes, he passed across the yellow gravel, the keen water nipping +his ankles, the reeds brushing his head. Old Thames had often been as +cold, when as a schoolboy he had waded through its weeds hunting the +dive-dapper's nest. +</P> + +<P> +Viner hesitated where the Indian trail split. That to the left ran +into the sun. He could scarcely see it, so dazzling was the glory. +That to the right was bare and cold, but leading, had he known it, +direct to the south. At the foot of a long bank the brook poured away +its water, and above in the fruit-bushes the wild canaries sang away +the hours. The youth took the bow from his shoulder, held it on end, +and let it fall. The bow pointed as he wished, as perhaps his fingers +had guided it at the moment of release. It fell into the sun. +</P> + +<P> +A breath of fire was in the splendour ahead, an acrid smoke crept down, +he heard the crackling of twigs. It seemed to the traveller that the +sun was consuming the grove before him. A voice began to sing. +Geoffrey tried to persuade himself that some little yellow bird was +sitting in the sun-grove warbling its soul out to him. Then an envious +night cloud swooped upon the lord of day and rolled him up in its dewy +blanket, and immediately a palisade, a grass roof, and a thicket +started out like black upon white. But the song went on. +</P> + +<P> +A log-cabin stood right in the centre of the setting sun, a snaky +palisade winding around, enclosing also a garden planted with corn and +potatoes, where already blade and crinkled leaf pushed from the dark +alluvial soil. Trees surrounded the house. +</P> + +<P> +Amid the smoke the side of an iron pot showed at intervals. The singer +held her head back, the slightest frown creasing her forehead. She was +waiting for the fire to burn clearly, and to encourage it she sang. +</P> + +<P> +Her hair, which hung all about her body, was golden-brown, no one tress +the same shade as another, the whole a bewildering mantle of beauty. +Its wealth became reckless when one crafty ray of sunlight eluded the +cloud and shot across her head. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, oh!" she sighed, breaking off her bird-like song. "The sun will +not let my fire burn, and—this wicked wind!" +</P> + +<P> +The breeze, delighting to flirt with so glorious a creature, veered +slyly, and fanned the bitter smoke around her. She danced away +coughing, her cheeks scarlet, her red mouth gasping for pure air, her +tresses gleaming in their mesh of sunlight. Her movements were as +supple as the swaying dance of the pine-branch over her. She tried to +laugh while she caught at her breath, and, failing, fell back panting, +showing her tiny teeth. +</P> + +<P> +Then the violet eyes moved along the path, and all the pretty laughter +went out. A white hand drifted like falling snow, stole a tress of +hair, and shining pearls began cruelly to bite the silk. +</P> + +<P> +No maid could have desired a fairer vision. +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey, tall, slender, and flushed, stood between the trees, his bow +in his hands, his Saxon blue eyes meeting the violet glances of +timidity with free admiration. The maid of the fire-side beheld his +clear complexion, his fair hair tied loosely at the nape of his neck, +his strong figure; and as she watched for a few moments, which were not +measured by time, her bosom began to rise and fall. Had she not prayed +for such a vision? She had surely wasted her sweetness long enough +upon the unsatisfying things of her daily life in that lone, hard land. +There was that in her young blood which rebelled against her +convent-like environment, where she had indeed her freedom, but where +the tree of knowledge had not been trained to grow. +</P> + +<P> +Viner stepped out and doffed his feathered cap. +</P> + +<P> +"Fair mistress," he said, bending before this beauty of the grove, +"give me your pardon for coming on you so suddenly. I am a traveller +on my way to the south." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine Labroquerie answered him only with her eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Can you tell me how many English miles I am from Plymouth?" +</P> + +<P> +He looked up, and learnt that the sun had not yet left the grove. He +saw the cloud of hair waving iridescent. His gaze wandered over the +beautiful head, until two eyes like purple iris flowers met his. +</P> + +<P> +"But I am not English." +</P> + +<P> +"Yet you speak in English," he protested. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, yes. In England I was brought up. I love England; but I am +French, and a Protestant." +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey looked into the grove as he spoke on softly, mindful of his +duty: +</P> + +<P> +"Tell me, lady, how many days must I travel before I come to the +province of Massachusetts?" +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine Labroquerie had not a word to say. This handsome stranger +had hardly arrived, and already he suggested departure. +</P> + +<P> +"I must not delay," he faltered. +</P> + +<P> +"My fire!" cried Madeleine, stretching out her hands. "It will not +burn. Stranger"—she turned to him with a winsome glance—"will you +<I>make</I> my fire burn?" +</P> + +<P> +She hurried to the smoking pile. He was beside her instantly. +</P> + +<P> +"You shall not soil those hands." +</P> + +<P> +"They are already smoked and soiled. And see—a burn!" +</P> + +<P> +Because Geoffrey dared not look Madeleine pouted at his back. Then she +kicked the smouldering wood, and exclaimed spitefully, "There!" +</P> + +<P> +"Your fire is too closely packed." +</P> + +<P> +"It is not," she snapped, daring him with her eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"You say it is not," he agreed; but loosening the heap. +</P> + +<P> +"I fear that it was," she sighed. "And the wood is damp." +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey rebuilt the fire, placing the hot embers to face the wind, and +fanned the sticks until they burst into flame. +</P> + +<P> +The daylight went out like a failing lamp, and a red glow flung about +them as the fire increased. +</P> + +<P> +"I know that you are weary, sir," said the girl winningly. "Let me +lead you into the house and present you to my mother." +</P> + +<P> +Seeing wonder upon the young man's face, she pointed her shapely hand +through the smoke. +</P> + +<P> +"Down there my father lies," she explained in a hushed voice. "Deep in +the hollow where the beavers bite the bark at night. There the Indians +made his grave. French though we are, the Iroquois have been friendly, +because my father, who was a skilled physician, used them well. Here +my father hid from the world. He found a rest here, and yonder he +rests still hidden. I am with my mother and one native servant, who +loves us because my father saved his life. And I—I have never known a +friend." +</P> + +<P> +"Lady," said Geoffrey suddenly, "I would serve you if I might." +</P> + +<P> +"Rest you here a few days," she said quickly, "and tell my mother what +is doing in the world." +</P> + +<P> +"I must down to the coast." +</P> + +<P> +"Did you say Plymouth just now? Learn how ignorant I am. I did not +know there was a town of that name in all the New World. I have been +to the English Plymouth. There I saw the brave ships in her harbour, +and the red and white flags, and the sailors looking over the sea for +what might come sailing by, watching thus and hoping all the day. That +was a happy time." +</P> + +<P> +"There are yet as good men in Plymouth as ever sailed westward from the +Hoe," said the boy with eager pride. +</P> + +<P> +While he spoke the expression on Madeleine's face altered. She drew +away, murmuring as she moved, "Here is Madame, my mother." She added +hurriedly, and as he thought with fear, "I pray you be gracious to her." +</P> + +<P> +Viner turned, and there in the fire glow walked a little old woman in +black, a white cap holding her thin grey hair, her face pale, her eyes +sunken, and her colourless lips a tight line. She smiled coldly, and +showed no amazement when her daughter presented the traveller. +</P> + +<P> +"You are welcome, sir," she said in English. "We are poor and lonely +folk left to perish in the wilderness. My husband was an atheist, a +philosopher, and every man's hand was against him. He brought his wife +and family to the New World that he might study in peace and learn +somewhat of Nature's secrets. Last summer he was taken, babbling of +the work of his misspent life, careless of our farewells, heedless of +the state in which he left us. Philosophy is of a truth the devil's +work, inasmuch as it hardens the heart of man, loses him his God, and +wraps its slave in selfishness." +</P> + +<P> +The old woman signed herself slowly; then suddenly pushed beside the +traveller and snatched at her daughter's arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Cross yourself, girl! Infidel, cross yourself!" she cried. +</P> + +<P> +"Mother!" Madeleine shrank back, appealing with her lovely eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Lutheran!" screamed the little woman. "Make the holy sign, and so +strive to save your wicked soul from the pit of destruction wherein +your father lies." +</P> + +<P> +"My faith is fixed," murmured the girl. "Ah, ah!" she panted. +</P> + +<P> +Madame Labroquerie struck the girl thrice upon her fair cheek, staining +the white skin red as a roseleaf. +</P> + +<P> +"Madame, forbear!" Viner stood between them, his blood hot with shame. +"This is no sight for a stranger and a man to witness." +</P> + +<P> +The little woman smiled at him and abandoned her daughter, who bent +over the fire to hide her crimson face. +</P> + +<P> +"You are English, sir. Your brave countrymen yield to none in their +respect for a woman, when she be young and fair to see. Let her be +old, they shall call her witch and fling her in the nearest pond. +There be young witches, good sir, better able to seduce the soul of man +than the old, though they keep neither cat nor toad, nor ride at night +across the face of the moon." +</P> + +<P> +Madame Labroquerie made him a low courtesy, and walked noiselessly to +the gate of the palisade. +</P> + +<P> +"That so lovely a daughter should be cursed with such a mother!" +muttered the youth as he watched her go. +</P> + +<P> +He came to the side of Madeleine, and found her crying. +</P> + +<P> +"My mother has a strange temper. She has suffered much," the girl +sighed. +</P> + +<P> +There was a pause, one of those rare intervals when ears are opened to +the music of the spheres, and souls may meet. +</P> + +<P> +"You are not happy here," he said. +</P> + +<P> +Her glorious eyes were two blossoms heavy with dew. +</P> + +<P> +"Friend!" She put out one hand, groping for something to hold. "I am +miserable." +</P> + +<P> +They stood together, hand in hand. +</P> + +<P> +"She struck you." +</P> + +<P> +There was no answer. Divine pity dropped upon his heart, sweet and +dangerous pity out of heaven. +</P> + +<P> +"Stay a little," she whispered. "For the sake of your religion, stay. +If for a day only, stay. Stay, for a woman's sake." +</P> + +<P> +It was dark in the grove outside the circle of the fire. He drew at +her fingers. He bent his head suddenly and breathed upon them. She +placed her other hand—a cold little hand—upon his. +</P> + +<P> +Then the evening breeze flung itself sportingly into the trees, and all +the branches sprang before it, and the foliage danced and shouted in a +laugh, singing noisily the old secret of the river reeds, singing, +"Midas is a king of gold—a king of gold." +</P> + +<P> +So the fire died down into an angry red, and all the birds of the grove +were songless. Madame walked alone from the rude house, her small face +white against dark clouds, and passed into the clearing. The Indian +who worked for the widow and daughter approached with a burden of wood. +</P> + +<P> +"Wind is coming," he said in his own tongue. +</P> + +<P> +"May it blow away heresy and all heretics," muttered the little woman. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +ENCHANTMENT. +</H4> + +<P> +Within the grass-roofed cabin another fire glowed, and beside it +Madeleine entertained the guest, her white hands clasped upon her knee, +her eyes lustrous as she listened to the tale of adventure which her +young companion had to tell. +</P> + +<P> +"And now you would reach the south and bring your countrymen hither," +she said with the sweet practicability of her sex, after hearing his +story of ventures both by land and sea. "You would win territory, +perhaps fame. Then what would you do?" +</P> + +<P> +"Then? Why, I would return home," answered Geoffrey. +</P> + +<P> +"And then?" the girl pursued, the colour rising in her cheeks. +</P> + +<P> +"Then I would fight for the king." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine sank back. +</P> + +<P> +"Would your fighting-days never be done?" she sighed reproachfully. +"Friend, the world gives better things than the sword. Think you," she +went on hurriedly, "we are put upon this world to hate one another and +be always at strife? Ah no. We are here to live! The soldier's day +must pass, his arm grow stiff, and 'tis then he sighs for life—the +sword gives only death. How wretched is that soldier's lonely end! It +is love in life that ennobles the body, and 'tis death in love that +clothes the soul in its flight to God." +</P> + +<P> +Her eyes had been fixed upon him. She cast them down suddenly and sat +trembling. +</P> + +<P> +"My father taught me the use of the sword, and explained to me the +action of the gun," Geoffrey faltered. "He taught me nothing else." +</P> + +<P> +"Your mother?" Madeleine whispered. +</P> + +<P> +"She died when I was a child." +</P> + +<P> +"She would have taught you. She would have told you to take the best," +murmured the girl. +</P> + +<P> +He could see only a rich coil of hair glowing in the firelight. +</P> + +<P> +"But I am untaught," she went on. "My father was ever a stranger, my +mother has never been a friend. I grew up with Jean-Marie, my brother, +who was a follower of your creed. He too believed that life has +nothing better than the sword, so went away to fight, and I have had no +word of him again. Alone I have taught myself to live, to see that +life is glorious, to find joy in drawing each healthy breath. I have +studied the birds and animals, and spoken to them, until they have +answered me so that I could understand. It is so magnificent, this +life!" +</P> + +<P> +A chill crept into the cabin and with it Madame Labroquerie, who peered +at the comely couple, and said in her grating voice: "You are weary, +sir. Daughter, show our guest where he is to rest." +</P> + +<P> +With another courtesy to the Englishman the bitter little woman passed +into her own room, and almost immediately the muttering of prayers and +clicking of beads disturbed the silence which her entry had created. +</P> + +<P> +"Rest you here," Madeleine whispered, pointing to a palliasse partly +covered by a bear-skin. "You shall sleep soundly I promise, for I have +filled that palliasse with the sweet-scented grass which grows in +yonder valley. May you rest there like Endymion, and may his dreams be +yours." +</P> + +<P> +"His dreams were of love—if the old tale be true," said Geoffrey, +flushing at his boldness. +</P> + +<P> +"Soft," she prayed, but she too had flushed. "My mother's ears are +keen. God be with you, my friend." +</P> + +<P> +"And with you also," he murmured, and raising her fair white hand he +pressed it reverently to his lips. +</P> + +<P> +No hostile sound disturbed the silence of the grove throughout that +night, and Geoffrey made no stir upon his scented bed, until the sun +streaming into the cabin and the noisy turk, turk, turk of the wild +bush-fowl rendered further sleep impossible. Having performed the +hasty toilet of that age, when by day and night a man had to be +prepared to fight for his life, he went outside, and was straightway +made welcome to the grove by a brilliant and versatile bluejay, which +obtruded itself upon the stranger and with cheerful chattering +friendliness volunteered to be his guide in return for a little +flattering attention. But when Madeleine came out into the sun, the +fickle bird deserted the man and paid court to the maid. +</P> + +<P> +It had been Geoffrey's honest determination to proceed that morning +upon his journey, but noon, and then evening, came and found him again +a tenant of the grove. All day he and Madeleine wandered in the green +valley, like children of innocence in a garden, the girl pointing out +her favourite haunts, the flowery ridges where she would while away +hours in day-dreams, and guiding him along faint paths which her small +feet, and hers only, had trodden into being; and as they so walked +Geoffrey forgot for the time his mission, and became blind to the path +of duty, because the spell of enchantment was over him, and all the +world went far away while Madeleine was laughing at his side, and her +sweet voice was in his ears, and her fragrant presence stirred before +his eyes. No day had ever been so short, no sun more bright, no +self-surrender ever more complete. +</P> + +<P> +Again the grove was in splendour at the close of the day, and again +Madame Labroquerie met her guest with a grating word of greeting and +her bitter smile; and again the laggard slept upon the scented couch +and had his dreams; and his dreams that night were not of power, nor of +duty, nor of his harassed friends beside Couchicing; but of shaded +bowers, and green valleys, and love in life, and Madeleine. And once +the girl cried out in her sleep, but neither her mother nor her lover +overheard her unconscious utterance, "I cannot let you go." +</P> + +<P> +But during the day which followed Geoffrey's conscience awoke and +reproached him for this love-in-idleness, and as the evening of that +day drew near his higher self conquered. Lying at Madeleine's feet, he +told her with averted face that on the morrow he must depart; and she +merely sighed very softly and made no answer, but longed in her heart +that the morrow might never come. +</P> + +<P> +Once again they returned to the grove, where Madame curtsied as before, +and muttered to her guest: "You are welcome, sir. For the third time I +bid you welcome to my poor home." +</P> + +<P> +Her meaning was unmistakable, and the young man flushed hotly as he +bowed in reply and thanked her for her words. More he would have said, +but Madeleine touched him lightly and motioned him to keep silent. He +turned and followed her to the hut, and they partook of food, and +afterwards sat together and talked on, and yearned for one another; and +in the meantime darkness fell, and the fire outside, which was +maintained at night to keep wild beasts at bay, surrounded the cabin +with a roseate glow. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Alone through that twilight Madame walked, muttering as was her wont, +and started in superstitious terror when she saw a tall figure standing +erect, spectral, beside the leaping fire. A few more steps and the +Frenchwoman recognised a priest. She hurried forward, and a minute +later genuflected to kiss the cloak of that man of blood, the Abbé La +Salle. +</P> + +<P> +In wonder the priest gave her the blessing which she sought and went on +to question her. Eagerly Madame responded, telling him her name and +circumstance, explaining her position, and mentioning her longing to +escape from that lonely spot. Her desires were, like herself, made up +of selfishness. She did not question the priest concerning the son who +had been driven out by her bitter tongue to join the commandant's +little force; nor did she mention Roussilac's name, because—so +entirely isolated was that shelter in the grove—she was not even aware +that the man who ruled the land was indeed her nephew. But La Salle +waived her petulant inquiries aside, and asked whether any Englishman +had lately been known to pass that way. Then Madame shortly acquainted +him with the coming of Viner. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Bring me here something to eat," said the priest wearily, when he had +obtained the information which he sought. "Afterwards I will rest me +by this fire." +</P> + +<P> +"Now the saints forbid," cried Madame. "Shall an infidel lie in my +house, while a holy Churchman sleeps outside? Out the Lutheran shall +go, and you, my father, must honour my poor home this night." +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis not for me to provoke a quarrel," La Salle replied. "I may but +fight in self-defence. Let me have food and a palliasse here." +</P> + +<P> +Madame bent her grey head, and went to do his bidding. +</P> + +<P> +The cabin was in gloom when Madame entered and passed through silently +to procure food for the priest. Madeleine rose, seeking to be of +service, but the grating voice sent her back to the fireside. Viner +had also arisen, dimly suspicious. The girl's head reached his +shoulder, and to put away the thought, which recurred more strongly +when he noted her helplessness, he resorted to selfishness. +</P> + +<P> +"Am I safe?" he asked. +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine gave him a reproachful glance. +</P> + +<P> +"My mother hates all Protestants. The heathen Indians are merely +animals in her sight; but such as you and I are children of the devil." +</P> + +<P> +"The fire beyond the palisade is burning more strongly," he said. +</P> + +<P> +The door was open, and the glow entered the cabin like moonlight. +</P> + +<P> +"It is to keep away the wolves. You do not suspect—me?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, no," he said, in a manner that brought a smile to her mouth. "For +myself I care nothing, but I may not forget my comrades. I must be +upon my guard for their sake." +</P> + +<P> +The dame reappeared, a mantle over her shoulders and her hands. She +smiled grimly, and gently addressed her guest: +</P> + +<P> +"I have my birds to feed. They are the sole companions of my +loneliness, and each night finds them awaiting me beyond the palisade. +They are brighter birds than those of my country, but sadder because +songless. The saints protect you, sir, in your sleep to-night." +</P> + +<P> +"Shall I come with you, mother?" said Madeleine. +</P> + +<P> +"Why upon this night more than others?" answered Madame bitterly. +"Your way is never mine. When you shall learn to pray with me then you +may walk with me." +</P> + +<P> +She left the cabin, drawing the door close. +</P> + +<P> +"Stay you here," whispered Madeleine, detaining Viner with a gentle +hand. "There was that in my mother's manner which makes me fear. I +will follow her and bring you word." +</P> + +<P> +"I would not have you put yourself to danger." +</P> + +<P> +"For me there is no danger." +</P> + +<P> +"I go with you," he said. +</P> + +<P> +"No!" cried Madeleine, stamping her foot. "You shall not." +</P> + +<P> +He gave way and let her have her will. +</P> + +<P> +When Madeleine returned with the tidings that a tall French priest was +without, the young man's first impulse suggested that he should rush +out and attempt to silence the spy, but prudence and a girl's hand +detained him. For the first time Geoffrey shuddered at the thought of +danger. With those two beautiful eyes watching him tenderly he felt +that it was good indeed to live. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall watch over you," said Madeleine's fearless young voice. "See, +I will move your palliasse. Now this thin wall of wattles shall alone +divide us. We shall be so near that I can listen to your breathing, +and shall hear your faintest whisper. I pray you trust in me." +</P> + +<P> +"In the morning I shall see you," he urged. "I shall not depart +without thanking you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, talk not of the morning," she cried. +</P> + +<P> +He seized her fingers, and when he kissed the hand it fluttered like a +bird. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall have my dreams," cried Madeleine, her face uplifted, and her +eyes moistened. "And they may be so happy that I shall not wake. See! +Yonder is my resting-place. The wattle-wall shall separate us. There +my head will lie. Give me your sword." +</P> + +<P> +She grasped the hilt, and thrust the blade through the trifling wall. +Then she spoke with averted face: "When you are lying down to rest I +shall tell you why I have done this." +</P> + +<P> +They separated after a few tender words of commendation. The fire +burnt down, and the north wind played roughly among the trees until the +cabin hummed like a cave. Madame entered, as noiseless as a cat, and +passed into her room. The rattling of her beads sounded at intervals, +before sleep deadened the enmity of her mind. +</P> + +<P> +"My hair is long," whispered Madeleine's sweet voice. "I am passing a +coil through the hole in the wattles. Hold it, and if you hear +disquieting sounds do not speak, but pull." +</P> + +<P> +"I have it," he whispered, seizing the warm silk enviously. +</P> + +<P> +"The holy angels watch over you," she murmured. +</P> + +<P> +"And you. As for me, I am already protected by an angel." +</P> + +<P> +"Angel?" she wondered. +</P> + +<P> +"Sainte Madeleine is her name." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah!" she said. +</P> + +<P> +The sound of uneasy breathing arose between the groans of the wind. +After a long pause Geoffrey spoke: +</P> + +<P> +"In sleep I may lose what I am holding." +</P> + +<P> +"Twist it about your fingers," said a whisper. +</P> + +<P> +"Still, I may lose it. You will draw it away from me when you turn." +</P> + +<P> +"Lie upon it." +</P> + +<P> +"My hair is also long. I am tying yours to mine." +</P> + +<P> +"I had thought of that," she murmured. +</P> + +<P> +Another period of silence. Then, in turning, Geoffrey's lips pressed +upon the rich coil, and left it with a kiss. There came a little +movement and an almost soundless whisper: +</P> + +<P> +"Did you call?" +</P> + +<P> +"You are not yet asleep," he reproved. +</P> + +<P> +"I am watching and listening." +</P> + +<P> +"I would rather you slept while I watched." +</P> + +<P> +"Then I should be the guardian no longer." +</P> + +<P> +"But always the angel." +</P> + +<P> +The glow from without was still over the cabin where Madeleine lay +wide-eyed. A spider let itself suddenly from the roof, and swung +spinning in wild glee at the end of a silver streak. +</P> + +<P> +"Friend," Madeleine murmured. +</P> + +<P> +"I am listening," he said. +</P> + +<P> +"There is a spider spinning from the cross-beam." +</P> + +<P> +"Would you have me destroy it?" +</P> + +<P> +"No. Oh, no! It is so happy in its life. I do not remember why I +called you. I had something more to say." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall not sleep until you think of it." +</P> + +<P> +"Shall you go away in the morning?" she whispered suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +There was no reply. +</P> + +<P> +"And leave me?" +</P> + +<P> +"The present is life," he reminded her. +</P> + +<P> +"The thought of the future may destroy the happiness of the present." +</P> + +<P> +"What would you have me do—obey my conscience or my heart?" +</P> + +<P> +"Both," she sighed. +</P> + +<P> +"Let us talk of it in the morning." +</P> + +<P> +"Now. Oh, the spider is spinning faster—faster." +</P> + +<P> +"The morning," he repeated. +</P> + +<P> +"Now," she breathed. "But soft! Set your lips to this hole, and you +shall find my ear." +</P> + +<P> +A sound of restless movement came from Madame's room, and a grating +voice: "From witchcraft, enchantment, and heresy our Lady and the holy +saints protect us." +</P> + +<P> +It was her lips that Madeleine placed to the hole in the wattle wall. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +FIRESIDE AND GROVE. +</H4> + +<P> +Ambition and not chance had brought La Salle thus far from the beaten +track. He had made it his policy to pursue the Englishmen in that land +until he should have brought about their extermination, knowing well +that any success in that direction would be rewarded by the richest +gift which his master Richelieu had to bestow. From Onawa he learnt of +Viner's departure for the south on the day following that venture +against New Windsor. The girl had discovered the young man's track and +gladly accompanied the priest, pointing out the trail, which was +imperceptible to his untrained eyes, and so bringing him to the grove +where Geoffrey tarried in the enchanted sleep. +</P> + +<P> +After Madame Labroquerie had gone to find him food, La Salle +reconsidered his plans by the light of her information. It was no way +of his to hide his light beneath a bushel, and the slaying of Viner in +that lonely country would, he reasoned, bring him little fame. If, +however, he should return to lodge the information with Roussilac, all +men would know of his agency. Therefore, when Madame returned, he +impressed upon her the necessity of detaining Viner for at least three +days within the grove. +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis easy," the little woman muttered. "I shall be courteous to the +young man, and praise his face and flatter his pride. Madeleine, my +daughter, shall do the rest. I warrant you he shall not stir from here +till the soldiers arrive; and then, I trust, a stake shall be prepared +and a goodly pile of faggots for the proper despatch of his heretic +soul." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall see that execution be done upon him," La Salle replied grimly. +"Now get you gone, for I would be alone." +</P> + +<P> +"Your holiness will remain until the morning," Madame prayed. "I would +then make my confession, and receive the peace of absolution." +</P> + +<P> +"Find me here at the dawn," La Salle answered. Then, uplifting his +blood-stained hand, he bestowed upon her his benediction and sent her +away. +</P> + +<P> +Not fifty yards distant Onawa stood as a guardian over the man she +loved, staring into the night, heeding every sound in the valley, +dreading the approach of some emissary from her tribe. The maid had +become an outlaw. Through her treachery the boy Richard, her own flesh +and blood, had come to his death. With her own hand she had slain a +man friendly to all her race. In the forest beyond the river a cruel +death by torture awaited her; her own father would be the first to +condemn her to the fire. She was thus compelled to stand or fall +beside the priest whom she had aided with that disregard for self which +has ever dominated a woman's actions. +</P> + +<P> +As she stood watching the firelight and the grove, dim ghosts arose and +began her punishment. She seemed to hear a sound of scuffling, and to +see young Richard and his great hound, Blood, wrestling together, as +they had been wont to do among the pine barrens, to the roar of the +wind and the lost waters. Again she heard the boyish voice, gasping +and triumphant, "I have beaten him again. I am stronger than he." And +as she shivered, there came an echo of her own former words from the +line of tossing trees, "He is brave and strong. He shall make a man +before he has grown." +</P> + +<P> +Beside the fire La Salle slept, lulled by the wind. He knew Onawa was +acting as a guard over him, else he had never dared to close his eyes. +Yet his rest became presently broken into by spiritual beings hovering +around in the grove, anxious to point out his future. The chafing of +boughs, the beating of leaves, the gnawing of the beavers around the +philosopher's grave, with more distant sounds from the country beyond, +were the media these beings employed. The disturbances passed into his +ear, which pressed upon the palliasse, and entered the torpid brain to +make a dream. +</P> + +<P> +Through the unlighted streets of a city a way was revealed before the +sleeper by means of lightning flashes. No fellow-creatures were in +sight, and yet the tongues of a multitude shouted as he ran, bells +clashed above, and trumpets blared below. Before him a vast square +opened, empty and wind-swept, and here the shoutings of the unseen mob +became terrific, here also a mountainous building rose into the clouds, +and midway upon a flight of marble steps sat an old man in white, +crowned with the tiara, extending a red hat towards the yelling +solitude. The dreamer rushed out to seize the prize; but between the +principality and power, as represented by the scarlet blot rising in +the gale, the silent lightning cut, and between this fire and Urbano +the Eighth a figure descended, and the lightning was a sword, which his +untiring arms flashed between the aspirant and his soul's desires. +"Cardinal-Archbishop!" cried the white figure. "Bought by blood!" +outcried the man in black, and his sword turned all ways in a flame of +fire. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle awoke with a shudder. That figure seemed to be upon him, +bending, holding him down with the hands of Briareus. Casting off the +terrible sleep, he started upright. A face was indeed over him, and +arms were dragging at his shoulders. The wind-tossed grove cleared, +with its fire glowing, and sparks flickering like a thousand eyes, and +the sleeper awakened recognised Onawa, who was summoning him to action +in her unknown tongue. +</P> + +<P> +"Perdition!" he muttered. "The witch haunts me like an old sin." +</P> + +<P> +Onawa went on pleading, pointing wildly at intervals down the wind. +</P> + +<P> +"You shall lead me into no more death-traps!" the priest cried. +</P> + +<P> +The frightened girl brought a knife from her side, and made as though +she would stab him. Then she pointed again, and, falling to her knees, +indicated her own tracks. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle peered along the glow of the fire and beyond where the sparks +were beaten back, then rose and approached the palisading, Onawa +clinging to him like a shadow. There was no danger there. He advanced +to the wattled door, prepared to receive an attack. When there came no +response to his unspoken challenge he turned back, and Onawa again +pointed along the way she had come. +</P> + +<P> +"Would to God I had spared that child! His face is there!" the priest +shivered. +</P> + +<P> +"Tuschota!" cried the girl. She touched the ground, reading him with +her eyes. +</P> + +<P> +A smothered cry broke from the lips of the priest. Onawa followed his +gaze, which went, not along the trail, nor into the fire-lit grove, but +above where the eastern sky had almost cleared of drift. +</P> + +<P> +"A portent!" moaned the priest. "'Tis the end of the world, and I am +found with the sword drawn in my hand." +</P> + +<P> +There was war in heaven. Across the plane of eastern sky hung a wild +picture of forest and rockland where pigmy men rushed together without +shock, where spectral weapons fell silently, and shadowy smoke burst +and rose. Tiny figures climbed a cliff, and similar grotesques fought +on high and pressed them back. The combatants appeared ant-like and +ridiculous objects as they swayed reflected upon the floor of heaven. +</P> + +<P> +Onawa watched the spectacle unmoved. She had witnessed the mirage +before, and by this present vision merely understood that an attack +upon the citadel was even then in progress. As the weird picture broke +up and scud came flying across a faint grey sky, she prayed in her +treacherous heart that the French might win. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle rose with some shame when he perceived that the sky had +resumed its normal aspect, and light at length dawned upon him as he +sighted a shadowy being stealing within the radius of the fire. +</P> + +<P> +"Tuschota!" warned the voice at his side. +</P> + +<P> +The priest knew then that Onawa had saved him from the knife which +would have avenged the half-breed boy, who had flung himself with such +desperate courage upon death. Casting away the arms which encompassed +him, he passed swiftly into the shadow of the grove, while Onawa +advanced boldly and met the woman she had wronged so grievously, and +dared to face her without shame. For a space they stood, gazing at one +another by the firelight, until the younger cast down her eyes and +began to shiver with the coldness of fear. +</P> + +<P> +"Approach me, sister," said the stern woman. "There is a question I +would have you answer. Refuse you dare not, for we are flesh and +blood; we are daughters of Shuswap the truthful, and the same mother +gave us birth. I seek not to know what brings you here this night, but +tell me now have you seen that proud priest who has slain my son?" +</P> + +<P> +"I have not seen him," cried Onawa fiercely; but she was cold to the +heart beneath the gaze of those colder eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis well. A daughter of the Cayugas lies not, save to an enemy. But +why do you slink thus away? You do not fear me, sister?" +</P> + +<P> +Onawa stared aside speechless. +</P> + +<P> +"After I became wife to the great white man you came often to our home +among the lost waters," Mary Iden went on. "My Richard loved you. +Remember, sister, how often you played with the child, how many times +you carried him in your arms, and told him the old stories of our race. +Hast forgotten how he would laugh at your coming, how he would run down +to meet you with a gift, and draw up your canoe and bring you to our +shelter by the hand? Remember when he had committed a fault how you +pleaded for him, calling him <I>Dear child</I> and <I>Sunlight of the camp</I>. +Sister, I know that you grieve for the boy." +</P> + +<P> +Chilled at her words Onawa passed to the fire, turning from those +pursuing eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall not forget how Richard loved you. When you need me, sister, +come, and I will give you your former place beside the fire. So shall +you rest and forget the strangers in this land. By the love that you +bore for my boy, sister, I will not forget you." +</P> + +<P> +Onawa looked up and saw only the figure of La Salle emerging from the +grove. Her sister had drawn back into the night. +</P> + +<P> +The gale circled the embers in whitening eddies. Onawa wildly snatched +a stick and raked the glowing fragments into a pyramid, upon which she +flung some roots of willow. A yellow fog ascended, torn hither and +thither by the spirits of the wind. +</P> + +<P> +She crept to La Salle's feet and fawned upon them. He spurned her and +still she struggled to approach, to cling as the weed upon a rock. She +had made the sacrifice of her life that she might serve him. She had +discharged the arrow to slay the Englishman solely that she might win +his love. She had relied upon her fierce beauty, her youth, and her +strength to conquer the handsome Frenchman. She had staked her all +upon her heart's desires. +</P> + +<P> +And now he flung her from him, and strode away from the fireside and +the grove. +</P> + +<P> +She followed, crying along the wind. He motioned her back and even +threatened with his sword, but she pursued, setting her feet in the +marks which his had made. When he halted for weariness she stood near +to guard him from her sister. When the grey day came she still +followed him, across open country, and so northward into the hills, and +towards the river, where the wind contained a breath of smouldering +bush. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap15"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +GLORIOUS LIFE. +</H4> + +<P> +When Madame found La Salle gone and the fire black in the early +morning, she frowned until her eyes became hidden and went back to the +palisade, passing her old servant, who was shredding ears of wild rice. +She entered the windy house calling. Soon she came out, shaking a +willow stick in her angry hand, and stopped opposite the old man, who +continued his work, grumbling softly to himself, "Ah, Father Creator! +Father Creator! Why do you send this north wind in summer time? The +day is dark and cold. Send us the west wind, Father Creator." +</P> + +<P> +"Have you heard noises in the night?" Madame's voice grated. +</P> + +<P> +"I slept with the wind in my ears," answered the native. +</P> + +<P> +"Have you seen my daughter, or the young Englishman?" +</P> + +<P> +"I have seen the light struggling to break, and the grey heaven +rushing, and the thick wind beating. I saw a red fox run and a +blue-bird chattering across the wind," said the old man. +</P> + +<P> +"Have you not seen the priest?" urged Madame. +</P> + +<P> +"I was up at the dawn," replied the stolid worker. "The fire was dead +and the sleeping-place white with rain. A bear was seeking warmth upon +the embers." +</P> + +<P> +"I have been blind and deaf," cried Madame in a rage. +</P> + +<P> +At the first glance of light the cabin was as noisy as an ocean cave. +Madeleine's brain became too active for sleep when she knew that the +day was at hand. She rose softly, glowing with her new-found +happiness, and as she stirred she murmured the intensely human line of +that unhappy boy Kit Marlowe, who had perished in a tavern brawl a few +years before her birth, "Whoever loved that loved not at first sight?" +She darted up with that thought, but a coil of her long hair tightened, +and there came a startled movement from beyond the wall. +</P> + +<P> +"Hush!" she whispered, lifting a pink finger, forgetful that he could +not see. +</P> + +<P> +"Is it the day?" said Geoffrey. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, yes. Release me. Let me fly. Do you not hear the wind?" +</P> + +<P> +"I am listening to you," he answered. +</P> + +<P> +"Forget me. Listen! That was like thunder. Are you listening?" +</P> + +<P> +"I am coming out with you," he said. +</P> + +<P> +Reaching the open, Geoffrey discovered Madeleine, her arms +outstretched, her hair rising in ripples above her head as she bathed +in the wind, battling and panting, her lovely face all heather-pink. +</P> + +<P> +"I can smell the pines," she gasped, "and the salt sea, and the +mountains. I can hear the roaring of water and see the soaring of +eagles. Oh, oh!" she panted. "It is glorious to live!" +</P> + +<P> +She cried as she drew him away impetuously: +</P> + +<P> +"The black priest has gone. Let us hope that he has been blown away +into a swamp, where the fairies shall bewitch him into a frog to croak +at the world for ever. Come now away. Tell me whether you had dreams +in the night. But stay!" +</P> + +<P> +She drew away from him suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +"Madeleine!" he exclaimed, wondering at her changed face. +</P> + +<P> +"I must remove this mask," she cried in a stately fashion, frowning and +placing her hands upon her sides. "Sir, who are you that you should +strive to win the heart of Madeleine Labroquerie? Why, I have sworn to +wed a knight, a man of title and estate, and you, a smooth-faced boy, +with long hair and cheeks as pink as mine, you come and speak to me of +love. Sir, how dare you thus to use an innocent maid?" +</P> + +<P> +She passed on ahead of her astonished lover and the trees of the grove +closed round them. +</P> + +<P> +"Madeleine——" he began, protesting. +</P> + +<P> +"Madeleine," she imitated. "Here is free-speech indeed. Now, sir, +stand and let me show you what you are. You are an Englishman, an +adventurer, one of a small band who think themselves strong enough to +attack the power of France in this new land, and you, the enemy of my +people, come to me with a tale of love, believing me to be a maid of +the wilds to be won and cast aside at will. Speak not to me. I will +not hear you. I am no simple provincial maid that I should fall in +love with a soldier's handsome face. Last night, yes, last night, +after an acquaintance of but three days, you dared to own your love, +and to humour you—in truth I was afraid—I confessed that I also loved +you. I, a French girl, such a traitress as to love an enemy of my +people! I was but fooling you. How I laughed to myself at deceiving +you so readily." +</P> + +<P> +She laughed disdainfully and curled her lovely lip. +</P> + +<P> +"I fear I have already tarried here too long," was all that Geoffrey +could say. +</P> + +<P> +"Stay one moment," cried the haughty beauty. "I should be base did I +not warn you. Soldiers are waiting for you upon every side. East, +west, north, and south they lie in wait for you." +</P> + +<P> +"There are no soldiers nearer than the fortress," said Geoffrey wildly. +</P> + +<P> +"You may believe so," replied the traitress. "But you have learnt +little of this country if you do not know that military posts are set +about from place to place. One such post is near at hand, and thither +I sent our servant after your coming. Can you not perceive that I have +betrayed you?" +</P> + +<P> +Had Geoffrey looked he might have seen her shiver as she spoke. +</P> + +<P> +"I thank you for your warning, but I may stay no longer," the young man +said, and he stepped away with his head down. +</P> + +<P> +"Which way do you take?" she demanded. +</P> + +<P> +"I am southward bound." +</P> + +<P> +"You are—brave, friend." +</P> + +<P> +"Friend!" he exclaimed, with a sobbing note of indignation. "Would you +have me trust in you again?" +</P> + +<P> +"I had forgot," she admitted. "Are you going now?" +</P> + +<P> +He moved on through the grove; but he had not made a dozen steps before +she called to him. +</P> + +<P> +"Have you, then, no word of farewell?" +</P> + +<P> +He turned, but did not look at her as he said: "May you live to fortune +and a happy future." +</P> + +<P> +"You said you loved me," said Madeleine, her figure drooping. "Why did +you deceive me?" +</P> + +<P> +"I loved you," he said hotly, moving back a step. "And I love you +still. When I first saw you standing by the fire with the sun falling +on your head I loved you. When I have left you I shall see, not the +girl who desired to betray me, but her who gave me this to hold for my +protection while I slept." +</P> + +<P> +He drew forth a long coil of golden-brown hair and held it in the wind. +</P> + +<P> +"You cut it off," she faltered. Then her manner changed again. "Throw +it down. Stamp upon it. Tread it into the ground." +</P> + +<P> +"I use it," he said, "as I longed to use you." And he put the lock +back into his bosom. +</P> + +<P> +At that she ran forward with the cry: "You love me. Take me there, +Geoffrey. That is my place. I will not be held out. Geoffrey, I love +you. Oh, blind, blind! I love you with all my heart and soul." +</P> + +<P> +She tried to force herself into his arms, warm, loving, and +irresistible. +</P> + +<P> +"I am the wickedest of liars," she breathed, twisting her fingers +within his. "I would not have gone so far, but I thought that you +knew. I thought that you feigned to hate me in return for my cruelty. +Ah, Geoffrey, I loved you when first our eyes met. I did so desire +your love, but, sweetheart—foolish, credulous—I—I feared you might +think I was won too easily. Will you value your prize the more, when I +tell you that my treachery, the story of the soldiers, the +settlement?—Oh, oh!" +</P> + +<P> +He guessed what she would have said, and so had seized her. +</P> + +<P> +"Betray you, blind love!" she whispered. "Dear foolish sweetheart, I +would open my veins and give my blood for you. How I tortured you! +Knowing what a cruel nature your love possesses, knowing it, can you +still love her?" +</P> + +<P> +"Madeleine——" +</P> + +<P> +"Stop," she entreated, lifting her violet eyes. "Repeat that name a +hundred times, and find for it a new attribute of love each time. But +let the first be false and the second fair." +</P> + +<P> +"Sweet Madeleine!" +</P> + +<P> +"Call me so, Geoffrey," she murmured. "And I shall not wish to change." +</P> + +<P> +There was a hill beyond, its sides covered with bleached grass, and +above a few gaunt pines beating their ragged heads together and +stabbing one upon the other with jagged arms where limbs had been +amputated by previous storms. To this place Madeleine led her lover. +</P> + +<P> +It was a strange day. Though long past sunrise there was barely light. +The clouds swept low, grey or indigo masses rushing south with the +speed of rapids. The dark, solid wind of the lowlands came in a +furious succession of great waves. The lovers might have been upon an +island with the ocean roaring round in storm. Out of the gloom the wet +rocks glimmered and the trunks of long-fallen trees described weird +shapes upon the plain. +</P> + +<P> +"This is life!" cried Madeleine. "Glorious life!" +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey held her closely, looking down upon her wet and radiant face. +</P> + +<P> +"We can fight together, you and I," she went on. "No wind shall +conquer while we hold together. It may roar at us, but we are young +and strong, and the wind is old and worn. Think you that you can bear +with me always? I promise you I will never use deceit again. We shall +be together when the winds have all passed under heaven, and the trees +are gone, and the seas have dried. Our souls will live in the same +life and the same love. Together while the old world crumbles, and the +sun becomes cold, and the moon fades. There is no death. We shall +close our eyes one day and change our home. Life will run on for us, +the same magnificent life of love." +</P> + +<P> +"There is no death," he repeated, as though the idea had not occurred +to him before. +</P> + +<P> +"How many thousand years has this wind rushed upon this hill? How many +thousand shall it beat after we have changed our home? We are made to +live, Geoffrey. It is not we who are sick, not we who are oppressed. +We are made of stuff that does not perish, not flesh and blood which +wither, but breath and love. Kiss me, Geoffrey, kiss me with your +soul." +</P> + +<P> +"Sweet, you have more knowledge than I," cried Geoffrey as he kissed +her eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"See that huge cloud! How the monster wishes to smother us! There it +rushes, flinging its rain to spite us." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall see this wild spot for ever," he murmured. +</P> + +<P> +"In years to come," said Madeleine, "a city perchance may grow in this +solitude, and where we now sit a palace or a cathedral may be built, a +king may command, a pastor teach his people, bells may ring for +Christmas, and heralds sound their trumpets. But we shall not see that +city, my Geoffrey. We shall look below the brick and the stir of +people, and we shall see a hill of white grass with old pines atop, and +below streaming rocks and decaying trunks, with beyond a grove all +covered in damp gloom and lashed by wind." +</P> + +<P> +"I can see the faces of my friends," he muttered. +</P> + +<P> +The girl turned upon his shoulder and drew his face lower with her cold +hand, lifting her own until their eyes met. +</P> + +<P> +"Look there," she entreated. "Tell me what you see." +</P> + +<P> +"Heaven opening." He paused. "I see also my duty to my neighbour." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine's head drooped. Presently a small voice whispered out of the +wind, "I would have you obey that message, lest by offending God we +wreck our happiness." +</P> + +<P> +"I live upon your will." +</P> + +<P> +"You must leave me. You shall not see me shed a tear. But I must have +you for this day, and afterwards"—she caught her breath. "Had ever a +young soldier so brave a love?" +</P> + +<P> +He kissed her hands, and her cold face, and her hair, which dripped +like seaweed. +</P> + +<P> +"No ifs," she implored, when her ears caught his broken words. "The +doubter fails. Look upon the deed as done, and God shall pardon the +presumption, because He was once a young man upon earth, and He knows +the longing of a brave heart. Already I think of you, not as going +forth to duty, but as returning to claim me for your bride." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall succeed," he cried, in a voice which defied the winds. +"Madeleine, you have made me strong. Listen, sweet. I have a home in +Virginia, most fair, they say, of England's colonies, and I come to +take you there. I have a house in a garden where the sun never sets, +and where a river runs gently to the sea between banks of flowers. +There is no hard winter or rough wind there, neither enemy nor noise of +battle to terrify your dear heart. There the potato grows, and the +white tobacco blooms scent the night, and there the voice of Nature +sings of peace. Will come with me, sweet?" +</P> + +<P> +"You have learnt your lesson," she sighed, content. +</P> + +<P> +Misty rain smote them, but they strained at each other and laughed at +it. The cold numbed their feet, but their hearts were so warm that +they did not heed it. Nature thundered at them, but the roar of menace +became a triumphal march, and the shriek of the fiends a benediction. +</P> + +<P> +"This one day you shall spare to me," said Madeleine. "Let us spend it +as a day to be remembered. I have a cave down yonder, around which I +have trailed the bushes and taught ivy to grow. There we will build a +fire and I will be your housewife. Come! let us run along the wind." +</P> + +<P> +He bent to assist her, and she feigned to be stiff with cold, the +lovely traitor, so that she might feel his arms about her. Hand in +hand they ran, the rain and wind driven upon their backs, the angry sky +lowering upon the two who thus dared to endure the perils of life so +happily. But the lovers knew that behind the damp gloom and the storm +smiled the kindly sun; and they knew that he would conquer in good time. +</P> + +<P> +So that happy day drew to its end in mist and rain, and the wind died +down, and the storm clouds went out of the sky one by one. The moon +broke wanly into light and a pale star of hope gazed serenely down. +Nature wearied of her tumult, and old Æolus drove the turbulent north +wind back into its cave and set his seal upon the mouth. +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey and Madeleine stood struggling to part. There was no tear in +the violet eyes of brave beauty as she looked up smiling, dwelling +always upon the future to sweeten the bitterness of the present. "Love +must be tested," she murmured with her radiant philosophy. "Hearts +must be tried. Geoffrey, I love you." +</P> + +<P> +"Madeleine, I love you." +</P> + +<P> +She stood alone, swaying weakly, her face as pale as the moon. Then +she laughed to drown the beating of her heart, threw out her hands, and +ran breathlessly up the hill where the ragged pines merely nodded, and +down into the plain towards the grove, crying to the solitude: +</P> + +<P> +"Life is glorious—glorious!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap16"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +CLAIRVOYANCE. +</H4> + +<P> +While Geoffrey Viner was winning the love of Madeleine Labroquerie, and +escaping the snare which La Salle had contrived for his capture, +history was being made around the river and the heights. The priest's +daring venture into the forbidden country acted upon the tribes of the +Iroquois confederacy as a spark upon gunpowder; and when it became +known from one camp-fire to another that George Flower, and Richard, +son of Gitsa, had fallen upon Cayuga territory by the hand of a +Frenchman, the native stoicism was changed into madness and the signal +for a general uprising went throughout the land. It was the eve of +that great assault upon the French position which lives in oral +tradition among those degraded descendants of a once great people who +occupy the maritime provinces of to-day. +</P> + +<P> +Previous to that struggle, one phase of which was shown through the +portent of the mirage to La Salle while he stood in the haunted grove, +many deeds occurred which the chronicler cannot afford to pass over. +The narrative must therefore be resumed upon the second morning +following the dispersion of the venturers, that morning which saw Mary +Iden set forth on her mission of vengeance, and Oskelano returning to +his fastness in the north to prepare his men for battle. +</P> + +<P> +The sun had fought down the mists, and black craft of the fishermen +were already leaping along the river, when Van Vuren abandoned the +fortress and climbed the cliff, hoping, as every day he hoped, to find +some trace of his missing men. The night had been cold with north +wind, and the rock country, was still haunted with wet and flickering +shadows. One shadow, so dark and angular as to attract the Dutchman's +eyes, lurked under a crag, as a patch of sheltered ice might linger in +the midst of a land steaming with sunshine; but when Van Vuren +approached, this shadow moved and took upon itself a semblance of +humanity, and with the dispelling of the illusion the Dutchman beheld +the evil face of Gaudriole. +</P> + +<P> +"Adversity finds hard resting-places, my captain," said the dwarf, as +he crawled forth. "Your rock makes a bed rougher than a paving-stone, +but methinks a safer. Here a rogue may snore in his sleep without +bringing the king's men upon him. I have a message for you, my +captain." +</P> + +<P> +"Hast any tidings of my men?" asked the Dutchman eagerly. +</P> + +<P> +The head of the dwarf was on a level with his elbow; his matted hair +was wet with mist. His habiliments, partly native, partly civilised, +surrounded his crooked body in a ragged suit of motley; and a long +knife was driven into his belt. +</P> + +<P> +"He who answers must be paid," answered the hunchback, grinning. +</P> + +<P> +"Perchance you have already been paid," said Van Vuren suspiciously. +</P> + +<P> +"The honourable captain possesses the gift of Divination," sneered +Gaudriole. "See you how low yonder warship sits in the water?" he went +on, pointing down at the <I>St. Wenceslas</I>, which had lately arrived at +that coast. "Is it true, as I have heard the settlers say, that she is +loaded with gold from the shore of Labrador? 'Tis said that a man may +there see the precious metal shining at his feet, and has but to bend +to gather sufficient for a knight's ransom." +</P> + +<P> +"I pray you give me the message, good dwarf," said Van Vuren +flatteringly. +</P> + +<P> +"The cloak upon my captain's shoulders is of a truth a thing to be +desired," Gaudriole went on, fingering the rich stuff with his grimy +fingers. "Were it upon my back, 'twould handsomely conceal some very +clumsy work of nature. 'Tis the cloth that makes the courtier." He +burst into a raucous laugh, as he danced the cold out of his limbs. +</P> + +<P> +"His Excellency the commandant shall loosen that insolent tongue," +cried Van Vuren hotly. +</P> + +<P> +Gaudriole snapped his fingers in the Dutchman's face as he retorted: +"This is not the old world, my brave captain, and there is no restraint +upon lying here. Gaudriole is now a citizen of the New World. The +Cardinal himself is but a shadow here. Even a mountebank of the gutter +may turn traitor in the wilderness. Gaudriole is a man this side o' +the sea. Were we in Paris I might bow to kiss your garments, and call +you Holiness an you desired it. Here the jester is as good as the +general. Hunt me into yonder forest at your sword-end, bold captain, +and bid me play the will o' the wisp. I should but disappear into a +thicket ahead, rise up at your back, and this knife and a moss-swamp +would settle all your business. Doff your hat to a fool, captain, and +give him pipe and tobacco." +</P> + +<P> +Van Vuren clenched his teeth. He would then have given even his cloak +to effectually silence that biting tongue. But he was a stranger upon +French territory, and he knew that the slender tie of alliance would +not stand a strain. He prudently choked down his anger, and satisfied +the dwarf's more reasonable demand. +</P> + +<P> +"Never was a better gift sent to man than this same tobacco," said +Gaudriole. "See you, captain, how excellent are its qualities. It +shall manage the warrior beyond the arts of woman. No man shall use +the good smoke in anger, because at the first taste peace settles upon +his body and his soul desires to be alone. But 'tis a dangerous drug +upon an empty stomach." +</P> + +<P> +"The message," said Van Vuren impatiently. +</P> + +<P> +"Yonder comes in a good burden of fish," resumed Gaudriole, gazing down +indifferently to indicate a boat grating across the shingle. "I know +the oaf, one Nichet, who at home had not the wit to make a living. +Here he becomes a man with a name. This land is Paradise for those not +wanted across sea. Nichet shall presently leave his boat, to find +himself a stone to anchor her, and then I shall pass that way and take +of his best fish for my breakfast. The knave profits by the fool's +work. Fare you well, brave captain." +</P> + +<P> +"The message, villain," broke in Van Vuren. +</P> + +<P> +"Ah! I grow forgetful. 'Tis said that the Abbé La Salle is to go from +here to the land which the Scotch discovered and the valiant French +took from them, to that country upon the gulf which we call Acadie. A +happy quittance, say I. The abbé is too perilously apt with his long +sword. Let them send the fat pig Laroche after him, and this fortress +shall grow more peaceful than the streets of Versailles. Let there be +trouble, you shall always find a fat priest at the root of it." +</P> + +<P> +"Let La Salle descend into the bottomless pit," cried the Dutchman +violently. "And Heaven be praised if he drags you down with him. +Deliver me the message, hunchback." +</P> + +<P> +"Now Nichet moves away to search for a fitting stone," went on +Gaudriole. "Had I a message for you, captain? Let me consider. My +memory is weak of a morning." He struck out his long arm suddenly. +"Dost see that man signalling from yonder shore?" +</P> + +<P> +Van Vuren turned quickly. "Where?" he exclaimed. +</P> + +<P> +"This is the message," shouted Gaudriole, and as he spoke he rushed +under the Dutchman's arm, and shambled swiftly down the road. "To the +man who has to live upon his wits the Dutchman is a gift from Heaven +itself. Remember, my captain! The tobacco leaf is a brave cure for +ill humour." +</P> + +<P> +Van Vuren hurled a curse after him, and turned to ascend. From the +summit of the heights he scanned the prospect, and quickly learnt what +Gaudriole might have told him had he exercised greater forbearance. +The expedition had at last returned. Almost as soon as Van Vuren +looked out he heard a welcome cry, and presently perceived a figure, +clad in the distinctive dress of Holland, crossing the valley at a +rapid walk. With an exclamation of relief the captain hastened down, +and met Dutoit, his lieutenant and the leader of the exploration party, +upon the plain. +</P> + +<P> +Hurriedly the survivors collated their gloomy experiences. +</P> + +<P> +"Twenty-eight left of our seventy-five," muttered Van Vuren, when he +had heard Dutoit's report of two men lost and one dead of fever, "our +supplies and ammunition gone, our ship destroyed. We have nothing now +to hope for, except a safe passage home. Hast seen any Englishmen?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yesterday we sighted a spy making south, and him we pursued until he +escaped us in the bush," answered Dutoit. +</P> + +<P> +"These men never recognise defeat," went on Van Vuren. "They shall +spread upward from the south, flow into this land, and push the French +back from fort to fort. They have a wondrous knack of gratifying the +savages. Know you if any new expedition has come over?" +</P> + +<P> +"We came upon a man mortally sick, who babbled as he died about a ship +supplied by the wool-staplers, which started from Bristol some nine +months ago and was lost upon the reefs. This fellow had his face set +due north, and believed that he was travelling towards Boston——" +</P> + +<P> +"Who comes here?" cried Van Vuren, breaking in upon the other's story +with a note of fear. +</P> + +<P> +They saw the tall, stern figure of Mary Iden descending towards them, +armed as for the chase. She crossed the ridge and halted when she +sighted the men. Her face was ghastly, and her eyes roved wildly over +the prospect. Presently she put out her hand, and the Dutchmen waited +when they saw her sign. +</P> + +<P> +"Soldiers," cried a wild English voice, "have you seen the French +priest known as La Salle pass into the fortress?" +</P> + +<P> +Van Vuren, who had touched at most of the New World colonies in his +time, knew the Anglo-Saxon well enough to answer; but he started, and +said bitterly to his subordinate: +</P> + +<P> +"The very savages speak English. Where is the Indian who has a +knowledge of French in all this country, which the French rule? Did +not I say to you that it is as impossible to keep the men of King +Charles out of this land as it is to dam the ocean behind a bank of +sand?" +</P> + +<P> +He turned to the Englishman's wife, and demanded further knowledge. +</P> + +<P> +The woman struggled to return the answer which policy advised, but +passion overmastered her. Her eyes flashed wildly as she answered: +</P> + +<P> +"Your race has ever been friendly with mine. 'Tis true you are foes of +the English, but all nations hate England, even as the birds of the +forest hate the eagle because of the strength of his flight. Soldiers, +show me where I may find this priest. I have walked through the night +seeking him. But a few hours ago I was a mother. To-day my son gives +no answer to my voice. He was a great hunter was my son, though but a +boy, and he feared no man. This day we bury him where the waters +shout. He was good to look upon, he was strong like the young bear. +He had brave eyes. Soldiers, it is the priest who has slain my son." +</P> + +<P> +The anguished woman had spoken thus aloud as she walked through the +cathedral-like aisles of the forest, addressing the columnar pines, the +fretted arch of foliage, the dim bush shrines; so she had called as her +heart bled to the climbing tits, the ghostly moths, and the long grey +wolf as he slunk away. +</P> + +<P> +"Who is the father of your son?" pressed the Dutchman. +</P> + +<P> +Awaking to the consciousness that the question was not wholly dictated +by sympathy, Mary Iden drew herself erect, and, pointing over the heads +of the men, indicated the impregnable heights whereon waved the flag +azure a fleur-de-lys or, that emblem which dominated the land from the +islands in the gulf to the country where the foot of white men had +never trod. +</P> + +<P> +"I have learnt the story of the wanderings of the children of England," +she said in a strained prophetic voice. "Of the journey of the man +Cabot, who passed into the places of wind, into the great sea of ice, +and reached the land where the Indians dare not walk. Of the seaman +Frobisher, who touched the iron coast and lived. These men passed out +like spirits into the unknown, and came back with their great story as +men restored from the dead. As the crow follows the eagle, to take of +that which the strong bird leaves, so Frenchmen followed the great +adventurers of England. And now I see the French driven from their +fortress, from Tadousac and St. Croix. Those who dwell in Acadie shall +be driven out, and go as exiles into a strange country. I see soldiers +sweeping the great cliffs, freeing the valleys and plains. I see the +French settled upon their farms, and their flag no longer shines in the +sun, and the people bend themselves to the rule of an English Queen, +whose name is Victory and whose reign is peace. Many moons shall come +and go, many suns shall heat the Father of Waters before these things +shall be, and I shall not live to see that day." She pressed her hands +to her aching eyes, and shivered as she swayed, and once more cried: +"Soldiers, have you seen the priest who has slain my son?" +</P> + +<P> +"A witch!" exclaimed Van Vuren hoarsely. "Let us escape before she +overlooks us." +</P> + +<P> +The superstitious Dutchmen hurried out to rejoin their men, who were +camping in the forest; while Mary Iden made her way across the plain, +and so into the great red eye of the sun. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap17"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +STAMEN. +</H4> + +<P> +That knowledge of forest-craft, which enables the traveller to guide +his feet unerringly through pathless bush, was only in rare instances +acquired by the New World venturers, and then only after years of hard +experience. When Woodfield abandoned his captain to follow the career +of Hough he struck indeed in the right direction, but the native trails +were numerous, and along one of these the yeoman went astray. By +seeking to set himself right he became hopelessly lost in the labyrinth +of the forest; and at last succumbed to weariness and stretched himself +to sleep upon a bed of moss, until a ray of sunlight stabbed through +the dense roof of foliage and smote him across the eyes. +</P> + +<P> +Woodfield arose and looked around in sore perplexity, knowing not which +way to turn. The globes of dew gleamed in opal tints upon the grass, +the big robins passed wreathed in filmy gossamers, the earth smoked +with mist and thrilled with the voice of the glad west wind. But all +the beauty and peace of nature combined made no satisfying meal for an +empty body. Trusting to Providence, Woodfield started out afresh, and +walked strongly for many hours, but always making direct north and away +from the camping-ground of the Iroquois, away from Couchicing and the +little settlement upon its shore. +</P> + +<P> +The yeoman tramped on, until exhaustion came upon him. All around the +great white pines lifted two hundred feet in height, interspersed with +dazzling spruce and gleaming poplars. He smoked to still the pain of +hunger, but the strong tobacco made him dazed. He staggered on, and +presently heard the voices of approaching men. The trail bent sharply. +He passed on, with half-opened eyes and wildly throbbing brain, went +round the bend, and started suddenly as from an evil dream. Half-naked +bodies and painted faces closed round him in a clamorous ring; and +Woodfield awoke fully to the knowledge that he had fallen into the +hands of the Algonquins. +</P> + +<P> +With an effort he drew himself upright, and gazed bravely at an old +warrior with flowing hair, who nodded and smiled at him in a not +unfriendly fashion. +</P> + +<P> +"J'ai faim," the adventurer muttered, trusting that one at least of the +braves might understand the French language. +</P> + +<P> +It was the wily old fox Oskelano who confronted the Englishman. He +stretched out his hand—the etiquette of handshaking he had acquired +from his visit to the fortress—and articulated with difficulty: +</P> + +<P> +"You ... French?" +</P> + +<P> +Woodfield grasped the brown hand and nodded violently. +</P> + +<P> +"Necessity makes hypocrites of us all," he muttered for the +satisfaction of his stubborn English conscience. +</P> + +<P> +Oskelano grinned amicably and gave an order to his men; and straightway +the warriors closed round and escorted Woodfield to their camp, every +step widening the distance between him and his companions. They gave +him food and drink; they provided him with a shelter; they built a +smoky fire before him to keep away the flies. Finally Oskelano himself +came, accompanied by his brother, and the two squatted gravely at the +entrance to the bower and scrutinised their captive with pride and +interest. +</P> + +<P> +"Um," grunted Oskelano, after a long period of silence. +</P> + +<P> +"Ho," muttered the weary Englishman with equal gravity. +</P> + +<P> +The French vocabulary of the Algonquin chief did not extend beyond the +single word <I>diable</I>, a word which he uttered constantly in his +subsequent efforts to converse with his guest, without any +understanding of its meaning, but believing, since he had heard it +issue with frequency from the lips of the soldiers in the fortress, +that it was an expression of possibilities. He endeavoured to convey +by means of gestures that it had come to his knowledge that the +Iroquois were about to attack the fortress at the instigation of the +English. His spies had seen a messenger bearing the symbol of the +headless bird. They had also observed the general movement eastward of +the tribes. The gods had provided him with a rare opportunity for +attacking his enemy. He was the friend of the great French people—he +slapped his insidious old heart with his treacherous hand—he was eager +to fight for his allies, and in return he doubted not that the chief +far over seas, King Louis to wit, would graciously send to his good +Algonquin friends many of the magic fire-tubes, with an abundant supply +of that unholy admixture of saltpetre, sulphur, and charcoal which +possessed such a wondrous property of exploding to the physical +detriment of a foe. +</P> + +<P> +"Diable?" he grunted, staring eagerly at Woodfield. +</P> + +<P> +"Oui," answered the harassed Englishman, though in truth he had +understood nothing. +</P> + +<P> +"Um," grunted Oskelano; and there the interview ended, with nothing +gained on either side. +</P> + +<P> +But as the chief returned to his skin-hut, his brother, a sachem wiser +than he, made the disquieting assertion: "The white stranger is not of +the French tribe." +</P> + +<P> +"How know you so?" cried the perturbed chief. +</P> + +<P> +"He does not lift his hands, nor does he shake his shoulders when he +speaks. He sits without motion. He does not laugh. He is one of the +race they call English." +</P> + +<P> +Woodfield ate the strong bear-meat brought to his shelter by a silent +giant, and turned to compose himself for sleep; but the giant touched +his shoulder and made a gesture which there was no mistaking. The +Englishman rose, and immediately two other figures glided out of the +forest and cut off his retreat. +</P> + +<P> +They led him along a trail where the fireflies were beginning to light +their lamps, between the big trees, and out into short bush and +sage-brush where the cranes swept overhead, crying mournfully. +Rockland appeared presently, streaked granite overrun with poison-ivy. +The captive noticed that the rock was fretted with caves. +</P> + +<P> +Into one of these he was ushered by the custodians, who then gravely +divested him of his weapons. A fire was lighted near the mouth of the +cave, and there the bronze guardians squatted, maintaining an +intolerable silence throughout the night. +</P> + +<P> +A change of sentries took place at daybreak; another at mid-day; a +third the following nightfall. Food and drink were handed in to the +prisoner; but the guards spoke never a word and made him no sign. +</P> + +<P> +Another day went by, but as the time of evening drew near there came +the sound of camp-breaking down the wind. A host of armed men tramped +beside the cave. A group of doctors, attired in the fantastic mummery +of their craft, followed; and last of all came Oskelano and his brother +side by side. +</P> + +<P> +Around a solitary poplar men were at work, chopping down the brush with +their tomahawks. The guard stepped up upon either side of Woodfield, +who watched these preparations with a prisoner's suspicions, and led +him out to the cleared space. +</P> + +<P> +"Um," grunted Oskelano, and shook hands amiably with his victim. +</P> + +<P> +Then the men put aside their tomahawks and bound him to the poplar with +ropes of vegetable fibre. They piled the moss around him and flung the +sagebrush atop. Others brought up pine branches and piled them waist +high. Oskelano watched, his crafty face wrinkled with smiles. +</P> + +<P> +At last the Englishman understood that he was about to be made a +sacrifice to the fierce Algonquin gods. He uttered no useless prayer +and made no cry. "They have spared me the torture," he muttered +bravely. "Let me now show them how to die." As the silent and supple +natives worked around him, he recalled the tales that old men at home +had told him, of the Protestants who had died for their faith, laughing +at the flames and bathing their hands in them. The last scene in the +life of the old vicar of Hadleigh had often as a boy moved him to +tears. He remembered how that the old man had lighted from his horse +to dance on his way to the stake, and he recalled his noble words of +explanation: "Now I know, Master Sheriff, I am almost at home." The +passing into death through fire was merely a sting sudden and sharp. +</P> + +<P> +Water was dashed over the fuel until the pile gleamed frostily in the +fading rays. A fiery death for his captive was no part of Oskelano's +plan. He had discovered that suffocation was more effective and less +rapid than the flames. +</P> + +<P> +Tree and victim became soon hidden in a dense column of cloud, the +doctors resumed their march, the guard followed, the two sachems +brought up the rear, discussing their proposed attack as indifferently +as though that mighty pillar of smoke pouring upward in the still +evening air out of the plain of sage-brush had no existence in fact. +</P> + +<P> +Well-laid as was the cruel Algonquin's plan, he had not the wisdom to +guard against that element of the improbable which rarely fails to +enter into, and mar the working of, the best-contrived plot. +</P> + +<P> +A maid had concealed herself in the bush until the camp became clear. +Then she came forth and ran like the wind, but stopped upon the plain +with a cry of terror when she beheld an old man, who hobbled painfully +through the brush. The ancient turned, suspicious of every sound, but +when he saw the girl his dry face broke into a weird smile. +</P> + +<P> +"Hasten, child," he quavered, leaning heavily upon his staff. "The +Mother of God forgets not the good done by man or maid." +</P> + +<P> +He dropped a knife at her feet. The girl caught it up and sped onward +like a deer. +</P> + +<P> +The old man was a Christian. The maid was heathen. Old mind and young +working independently, the former actuated by the religion of altruism, +the latter wrought upon by nature, had entertained in secret the +self-same plan of rescuing the young Englishman from his terrible +plight. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap18"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +COMMITTAL. +</H4> + +<P> +While Woodfield was a prisoner in the camp of the Algonquins, his +comrades, who had searched for him in vain, made their sad parting from +George Flower upon the Windy Arm where the waters mourn for ever. +</P> + +<P> +This promontory had been so named by the Indians because it thrust +itself far out, like an arm, into Lake Couchicing, meeting the full +force of every wind. It made a suitable spot, thought the survivors, +for an Englishman's grave, being rough and rugged and strong to behold, +like the man whom they had known and loved and lost. +</P> + +<P> +When Hough had done droning his prayers, they heaped the soil into the +form of a mound, which they covered with warm peat. While thus +employed they beheld Shuswap passing down to the beach, where a dozen +long canoes lay ready for a start. One, which was covered with green +branches, had already been launched, and was rocking gently upon the +shallows. The Englishmen hastened to complete their work, when they +discovered that the sachem was awaiting them with impatience. +</P> + +<P> +Then a mournful procession crossed glass-like Couchicing, headed by the +sad canoe where boy and hound slept together as they had been wont to +do at home. It reached the fringed shore opposite, amid the sorrowful +cries of the paddlers. The canoes were carried across the strip of +land and down again to the water where the country was in splendour. +Here Nature struck no mourning note. Only a few stripped trees leaning +out, held from falling by tougher comrades which supported them on +either side, spoke mutely of the presence of death after life; and even +so showed strong green saplings from some living nerve of the +half-decayed roots to proclaim the final triumph of life over death. +</P> + +<P> +So they continued, until wild islets stood out, their banks humped with +beaver mounds, and the lost waters began to shout with the mourners, +and the swelling north wind shook the shore. The paddlers wrenched the +canoes round, chanting as they worked, and the whitecap waves slapped +the frail birch-bark sides. +</P> + +<P> +No man stood beside young Richard's grave. A flock of noisy birds +pecked amid the fresh-turned soil and flung themselves away before the +carriers. Sir Thomas took no part in these last rites. From that +pierced body of his son the jewel of great price had been snatched, and +the setting he left for others to handle. +</P> + +<P> +The mother stood beside old Shuswap, her bosom heaving vengefully as +the warriors consigned her son to the ground. After the heathen rites +had been performed, Hough's stern voice repeated the prayers which he +had but recently offered over his brother of the sword, and when he had +done green branches were flung into the grave, then a weight of stones, +and finally the rich, red clay stopped the mouth of earth which had +opened to devour her own. The Indians swept away, shouting a song of +war. The waters raced on; and wind and rapids met below with the noise +of thunder. +</P> + +<P> +Penfold walked among the trees; and there, scarce a stone's cast from +the sounding water, he came upon the knight, huddled upon the stem of a +fallen pine, his hands spread out across his knees, his head down, and +on the ground between his feet the two parts of a broken sword. +</P> + +<P> +The old yeoman came near and wrecked the silence by a gruff word of +sympathy; but Sir Thomas did not look at him. Presently he made a +blind movement and extended one lean arm towards the ground. +</P> + +<P> +"If you would serve me, friend," he said in a hollow voice, "cast these +fragments into yonder water. My son, whom I should have trained as a +man of peace, took that sword from my hand. My Richard's blood lies +heavy on me now." +</P> + +<P> +"Not so," said Penfold strongly. "The boy was his father's son. Would +you have seen him grow a weakling? Sons bred beside an enemy's camp +must fight or be found unworthy of their name." +</P> + +<P> +"The sword has fallen," said the knight. "Last night I had a dream." +A shiver coursed through him. "Take up the sword with which I killed +my son and bury it in the water. I have sworn to lay hand on it no +more." +</P> + +<P> +"I have lost a friend," muttered the yeoman. "One known to me by +hearth and in field, at work and pleasure. I have buried him this day +in a strange land. I grow old, and my friends drop from me as acorns +shed from the oak, but while my eye is steady and my arm strong I shall +fight for England's empire over sea. Old age, when dotage grows, is +time sufficient to mourn for friends. While strength remains a man +must work. Country, then friends, myself the last. 'Tis the motto of +the Penfolds of County Berks." +</P> + +<P> +"You have no flesh and blood to mourn." +</P> + +<P> +"What is relationship if it be not friendship? Know you not that two +brothers may fall in hatred from one another, and yet either have a +friend dear to his heart as his own soul? Our troubles we carry to our +pastor. Our highest love to the woman who stays for us on our way +through life. Such friendship binds more firmly than any tie of blood." +</P> + +<P> +"Speak not to me," cried the bitter man. "My ambition has fallen to +the ground." +</P> + +<P> +"Stand by yonder mound," cried Penfold. "The boy shall speak." +</P> + +<P> +"Vengeance shall not bring him back." +</P> + +<P> +"Had you fallen he would have gone upon his way stronger than before." +</P> + +<P> +"He was young and I grow old." +</P> + +<P> +"Yet I am older far." And the yeoman shook himself like an old lion. +"There is work for me." +</P> + +<P> +The knight lifted his head, and spoke more bitterly: +</P> + +<P> +"Poison stirs in our English blood, driving us from home, leading us +across seas to fight unthanked for our country's cause. What gadfly of +madness stings us on thus to build the foundations of Empire? What +honour shall be rendered to pioneers? Who shall seek our graves and +pause to say, 'Here lies one who fought to plant the red-cross flag in +the face of its enemies'? Fools, fools, fools! We forsake home and +kindred in pursuit of a dream, rise up for our unrewarded effort, and +fail. So we are gone and our deeds lie buried in our graves." +</P> + +<P> +"One leaf makes not a summer," replied Penfold. "The one cannot be +discerned by the eye, and yet that one does its share in making the +tree perfect. We also have our part to play. Our lives are obscure. +Our deeds shall live, if not our names. Let others reap the harvest." +</P> + +<P> +The knight rose, frowning at the sun-lit scene. +</P> + +<P> +"There is a cave a league away," he said. "There sorrow and myself +shall dwell. Seek not to find me." +</P> + +<P> +He placed a hand upon his breast. +</P> + +<P> +"Something has broken there," he said; and then went with drooping +head, striking the trees in the blindness of his flight. +</P> + +<P> +Hough stood low upon the shore between the islets. He heard the +footsteps of his captain, and spoke: +</P> + +<P> +"See where our friend's wife goes. Closing her ears to my good +counsel, she went into the hut, and returned with bow and arrows and a +knife. These she placed in her canoe, and yonder she goes to find the +track of that papist priest who has brought sorrow to us all." +</P> + +<P> +"Said she as much?" +</P> + +<P> +"Ay. 'Onawa, your sister, has brought this trouble upon you and us,' +said I, as she pushed away. 'She it was who smote down George Flower +by treachery, and she it was who brought the Frenchman to our +hiding-place.'" +</P> + +<P> +"Said she anything?" +</P> + +<P> +"Never a word. But her eyes strained upon the knife." +</P> + +<P> +Then the two lonely men returned to New Windsor, the slow day passed, +and night enwrapped in cloud fell upon the land. The fires of the +allied tribes spotted the forest with scarlet, and between the black +trees the upright figures of warriors, fully painted and feathered, +crossed as they threaded the mazes of the dance. Five thousand +fighters were there gathered, the best and bravest of the Oneidas, +Senacas, and Onandagas, mad to avenge their wrongs. Spies were posted +at every point; a hundred watched the fortress, passing the word from +man to man. In a chain they stretched from the height above the river +to the council fire, where the nine sachems sat muttering in whispers +and drawing omens from the flight of the smoke and the burning of the +logs. +</P> + +<P> +"Shuswap, great chief of the Cayugas, the woman your daughter would +speak to you," a voice sounded. +</P> + +<P> +"Let her come near," answered the old man. +</P> + +<P> +His keen eyes distended. He had looked, prepared to behold his younger +daughter, but instead his eyes fell upon Tuschota, her sister. The +father noted her warlike bearing, the bow slung upon her shoulders, the +arrows and knife thrust through her girdle. He saw also the sternness +of her countenance. +</P> + +<P> +"What would you, daughter?" +</P> + +<P> +"Where is Onawa, my sister?" +</P> + +<P> +"I know not," said the sachem. +</P> + +<P> +"Find her and bring her forth. She led hither the Frenchman who has +slain my son." +</P> + +<P> +The sachems turned and their black eyes glittered upon her. +</P> + +<P> +"It is false," cried Shuswap. +</P> + +<P> +"She desires to win the French doctor for husband. She brought him +therefore to the lake that he might lie in wait to kill the Englishmen. +One man Onawa killed with her own hand. My son is your son. Your +daughter, my sister, must die." +</P> + +<P> +She spoke, and passed away into the glow of the forest. +</P> + +<P> +Shuswap dashed his grey head to the ground. +</P> + +<P> +"She must die," muttered the counsellors. +</P> + +<P> +The news travelled like an evil wind from fire to fire. All the tribes +swore by their gods that the woman who had sought to betray them must +die. Not till then might Shuswap lift up his head among them. They +danced more cruelly, maddened by disgrace. +</P> + +<P> +A runner came from the depths of the forest, spots of blood thrown from +his flying heels. Three hours had he run at that speed. He passed the +warriors and their fires and reached the council. All the sachems sat +erect, save only old Shuswap, who lay forward, his head upon the dust. +</P> + +<P> +"Oskelano comes upon us at the head of the tribes of the Algonquins," +spoke the messenger. "They carry the fire-tubes given them by the +French." +</P> + +<P> +The sachems sat like figures of stone. +</P> + +<P> +"Which way do they come?" demanded Piscotasin, surnamed Son of the +Weasel, the learned chief of the Oneidas. +</P> + +<P> +"From the north." +</P> + +<P> +"They shall find us ready." +</P> + +<P> +The messenger passed back. Straightway the forest shivered with a wild +cry for battle until the leaves were shed like rain. +</P> + +<P> +There came another runner. +</P> + +<P> +"A fire-float passes down the Father of Waters." +</P> + +<P> +"It is well," said the Son of the Weasel. "It is the signal of the +friendly Dutch." +</P> + +<P> +Thereupon commenced that great advance of the confederate tribes which +descendants speak of to this day. The flower and strength of the +Iroquois, that great people which from time immemorial had ruled the +north-eastern land from the coast to the chain of inland seas, went out +to avenge their wrongs. The women rushed to find shelter from their +hereditary enemies the pitiless Algonquins. The army poured away in a +roaring torrent, draining the forest, leaving the fires licking the +sharp breeze with forked tongues, leaving only one man behind: +</P> + +<P> +Old Shuswap, doubled in the dust. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap19"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +ENKINDLED. +</H4> + +<P> +The raft of fire, which had been reported to the sachems as visible +upon the river, had indeed been ignited and started upon its course by +the hands of the Dutch, but without any idea of signalling to their +allies. The man who was chiefly instrumental in giving the signal, +which Van Vuren had arranged for in the time of his power, had never +heard of that secret conspiracy which the action of the English +venturers had brought to nought. +</P> + +<P> +Because the captain shrank from introducing his party into a camp +friendly only in name, where friction between his men and those of +Roussilac might have occurred, the Dutchmen bivouacked upon the +outskirts of the forest, and while darkness surrounded them sat smoking +solemnly and chatting, altogether ignorant of the contemplated native +rising. These men were of all ages and drawn from almost every station +in life. The most prominent character was one Pieter von Donck, an +elderly sailor of immense bulk, attired in the shapeless sack-coat, +white tucker, and immense knee-breeches of the period. This man, so +report went, had touched at every known harbour in the world, had +explored many an unknown tract of country, and was as well acquainted +with the streets of New Amsterdam, its double-roofed church, its +battery upon the hill, its toylike windmills, and its gallows beside +the wharf, as with the old-world town of Holland on the arm of the +Zuyder Zee. He had been sent out with Dutoit to act as guide for the +expedition, and it was well for the lieutenant that old Pieter had been +with him, otherwise the entire party must have been lost. Von Donck +was very nearly as skilful as an Indian in picking up a trail, and to +his more unenlightened comrades his knowledge of locality savoured of +witchcraft. Van Vuren and his lieutenant were conversing at a little +distance from the big circle, the former frequently consulting a scrap +of vellum covered with names and lines, the first map of the great +eastern coast which had ever been designed. +</P> + +<P> +"Yonder is a mighty precipice," observed presently one of the youngest +of the soldiers, nodding his head gravely in the direction of the +heights. "How the folk at home would marvel, could they but see what +we look upon daily in this land." +</P> + +<P> +"What say you, boy? What say you?" cried Von Donck, aroused from his +musings by this criticism. "What! call you yonder hill a precipice? +How would you name the cliffs of Jersey, had you seen them as I, Pieter +von Donck, saw them from the ship <I>Goede Vrouw</I>? Should you but cross +the expanse of Tapaan Bay, as I have done, should you enter the defiles +of the Highlands and see the wigwams of the Iroquois perched among the +cliffs like nests of eagles, should you see the black thunder-clouds +chasing the hobgoblins among the Kaatskills, as I, Pieter von Donck, +have seen them, then methinks, boy, you might sit among old travellers +and talk to them the night." +</P> + +<P> +The old sailor's voice was thick, and he snorted like an ox between his +words. +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis given to few to venture as you have done," spoke a conciliatory +voice from the circle. "Tell us now somewhat of your journey up +Hudson's River, good Piet." +</P> + +<P> +"A weird river, they tell me," said another voice. +</P> + +<P> +"True! true!" snorted the voyageur. "A river of ghosts and devils. A +river which changes the flow of its tide 'gainst all nature. A river +which shoals or deepens in an hour, to hold the explorer back, or to +lure him into the heart of a storm. 'Tis a river which few dare to +tempt. But I, Pieter von Donck, went up it under a master who, despite +his English blood, was the bravest man upon this earth. Ay, but I saw +even his cheek whiten, when we reached the whirlpools at the end of the +known world, and yet saw no sea ahead." +</P> + +<P> +"Who was that master?" asked the young man who had opened the +conversation. +</P> + +<P> +A derisive laugh sounded, followed by Von Donck's booming reproach: +</P> + +<P> +"Young man, have you no pride in the doings of the great? Hast never +heard the name of Hendrick Hudson?" +</P> + +<P> +"I knew not that you had been with him," muttered the youth. +</P> + +<P> +"Before Marie von Toit, your mother, was weaned I crossed the seas," +snorted the old man, smiling into the fire. "What Dutchman has not +heard of the ship which brought me over, the <I>Goede Vrouw</I>, which lies +as I speak a-rotting within the wooden harbour of New Amsterdam? San +Nicolas was her figure-head, the good saint who guided us through all +perils, and to whom upon landing we erected a chapel within sight of +the sea. He is the patron of our first settlement in this new world, +and shall remain so for ever. Now they call him Santa Claus, and the +children of New Amsterdam hang up each one a stocking in the +chimney-side on San Nicolas' Eve, for the good saint is a lover of +children, and rides that night over the houses, his wide breeches +filled with gifts, which he lets fall down the chimneys and so into the +stockings hung to receive them. All the city is a-laughing with +children on the morn of San Nicholas' Day." +</P> + +<P> +"Gives he then nothing to the elder folk?" asked one. +</P> + +<P> +"'Twas once his custom to do so, when he could find an industrious body +who spoke no evil of his neighbour," said Von Donck. "But he has much +ado to find such now." +</P> + +<P> +"Didst ever see the storm ship upon Hudson's River?" a listener +demanded. +</P> + +<P> +The old sailor pulled himself round to face the speaker. +</P> + +<P> +"What story is this?" he muttered. +</P> + +<P> +"There is a ship which haunts that river and comes a-sailing by night +or day, running 'gainst both wind and tide, her deck crowded with +Dutchmen who neither move nor speak. She comes before a storm, and +goes while men gaze, like a flash of light." +</P> + +<P> +Pieter von Donck grinned. +</P> + +<P> +"Will call me a phantom, brave boys? Here you shall find enough sound +flesh to make two men as good as any," he said, slapping his mighty +thighs. "That ship is surely none other than the <I>Half Moon</I> herself. +Know you not that Hudson and his crew haunt the Kaatskills? O' nights +the good ship, which lies sunken at the end of the world, rises, and +the ghosts of my master and my mates pass from the phantom deck to +their revels within the mountains, and back ere morning to their +graves. Peace be to them, brave fellows all! +</P> + +<P> +"Twenty-nine years past," Von Donck went on, in his strident voice, +which brought Van Vuren near to listen, "we cast away from our new city +on the island, and sailed westward to discover the overland passage to +China. In a day we had left the land of the Manhattoes far astern, and +with a favouring breeze had run under the palisadoes, a wall of rock, +young friend, which makes yonder height seem to my eye no greater than +an ant-mound. The solitude unmanned all, save Hudson, who walked the +deck, swearing that he would reach the sea if he had to explore till +Judgment Day. Awful was that silence when our ship entered the shadow +of the Highlands, where the falling of a rope upon deck broke into +echoes among the hills, and over the river came a noise as of demons +laughing. The terror of the New World was upon us, and when we sang +our chanties, heaving the lead or drawing in sail, we would fain have +stopped our ears, so terrible were the voices which answered us from +the shore." +</P> + +<P> +"Was there no talk of turning back?" +</P> + +<P> +"There was no turning back with Hendrick Hudson. He strode the deck +day and night, and at his every order the black rocks pealed and the +precipices shrieked, though the weather would be calm and the wind not +more than a whisper. We held on our course until a storm seized and +flung us upon the shore; and there we made landing, in a place where +snakes darted their heads at us, and having built us a fire under the +basswoods, cooked food and dried our clothes. +</P> + +<P> +"'This mountain country is the place for me,' cried Hudson. 'Here +might we spend a free life, my sailors, hunting by day, and at sport by +night. Bring out our pipes and liquor from the ship, and in this +hollow let us rest until the storm clouds pass.' +</P> + +<P> +"So we remained there three days, chasing bears by light, spending the +dark hours around the fire, smoking our long pipes, and playing at +bowls, the favourite game of our master; and the mountains thundered, +and the goblin voices shrieked with every gust of wind. A fearsome +place, that dripping rock-forest at the end of the world. Upon the +third night came Indians to our camp, two sachems old and cunning, who +demanded by what right we had brought ourselves into their land. I can +see the face of Hudson now, with its straight black beard and hard +black eyes, and the angry twitch of his mouth, a trick of his when +crossed, as he answered them. 'We are Dutch,' quoth he. 'And if there +be any new passage across this world Dutchmen shall find it.' Then the +sachems came down from the rocks, and cursed him and his crew, swearing +to call up spirits of river and wind which should fight against our +ship. Hudson threatened them with the sword—there was methinks too +much hot English blood in our captain—and the next day we remanned the +<I>Half Moon</I>, and sailed away against the stream. +</P> + +<P> +"A wind struck us, and the horse-shoe which had been nailed to the mast +before starting dropped with a fearful clanging upon deck. We sang the +hymn to San Nicolas, and fastened the horse-shoe anew, but again it +fell. The Indian spirits were making mischief in the wind. The day +became dark; the sun went out; but Hudson bade us cram on sail, because +every hour he looked to hear the roar of the sea. 'And then for China, +my men,' cried he. +</P> + +<P> +"We ran into whirlpools and cross currents, and the <I>Half Moon</I> struck +full upon a rock in the middle of the stream. The water roared around, +and I swam for my life through darkness, seeing no man, dreading every +instant lest a hand should seize my heel and drag me down. I reached +the shore, and there found a companion, who had saved himself as I had +done. Of our ship and mates we could find no trace, therefore we set +out together, and made a great journey overland, until by the grace of +God we saw the tower of the church of San Nicolas lit by the morning +sun, and the good folk of New Amsterdam coming out to greet us as men +brought back from the dead." +</P> + +<P> +Von Donck drew a flaming stick from the fire and relighted his rolled +tobacco leaf. A circle of solemn faces was set towards him. +</P> + +<P> +"The <I>Half Moon</I> yet sails upon Hudson's River," remarked the sailor +who had questioned the voyageur concerning the storm ship. "She rides +out of a thunder-cloud, her sails flying against the wind, the men +staring over her side. One Sunday in the morn, when the folk were at +church and the dominie was preaching—such is the tale I have +heard—there sounded a mighty wind, and the building grew creeping +dark. Upon that a man ran in, crying, 'A ship! A Dutch ship sailing +by!' The dominie and all ran into the gloom of mid-day and saw a +vessel riding against the tide, full of men in wide breeches and +sugar-loaf hats, with faces as white as wool. Some of the bolder +youths manned a boat, and rowed out signalling, but the stranger gave +them no heed. Sometimes she would appear so nigh to them that they +could mark the flakes rotting from her beams and the weeds trailing +round her bows, and the same minute she would appear as though half a +mile away. And while they still rowed after her, they heard a noise as +of iron ringing upon her deck and straightway she rode into a cloud and +vanished. And afterwards came a great storm which wrecked close upon a +score of houses." +</P> + +<P> +"The old ship," muttered Von Donck, his eyes astray, his cheeks less +ruddy than their wont. "'Twas the sound of the horse-shoe falling to +deck which the rowers heard. Hudson swore in the face of Heaven that +he would make that passage. Mayhap he still strives, the storm holding +him back from the unknown north-west for ever." +</P> + +<P> +As the old sailor ceased to speak Van Vuren advanced, the strip of +vellum between his fingers, and stood a sharp figure in the firelight. +The men ceased their mutterings and leaned forward to hear what their +leader had to say. +</P> + +<P> +"Our expedition upon this land has failed, my men," he cried. "Our +ship lies burnt, our comrades are lost, we are not strong enough to +withstand the French. Shall we now make a journey through the unknown +land, and so down to our own free colony, through which pours Hudson's +river, of which I have heard you speak? Let us strive together to gain +the island of the Manhattoes, where our city of New Amsterdam smiles +upon the sea." +</P> + +<P> +The Dutchmen did not break into a shout as Englishmen might have done, +nor did they raise a noisy chatter after the manner of the French. +They looked on one another with grave faces, and each man puffed his +smoke more heavily. Finally old Pieter von Donck snorted and spoke: +</P> + +<P> +"I have played the pioneer before to-day, captain. 'Twould gladden my +eyes to see again the tower of San Nicolas by the sea." +</P> + +<P> +"Then let us away before morning," said Van Vuren. +</P> + +<P> +Boats of the fishermen were drawn along the white road of shore, and +these the Dutchmen requisitioned for crossing. They worked warily, +fearful of seeing the flash of torches along the path beneath the +cliff. The river brimmed and the stream flung down with a ceaseless +undertone. +</P> + +<P> +"What have we here?" snorted Von Donck, while he groped under the +gloomy wall. +</P> + +<P> +A number of dry logs, crossed and pinned together by wooden wedges, lay +upon the gravel spit, piled with dry grass and resinous boughs +interlaced. Beside were lengths of pine to act as rollers for +launching. The mass of inflammable material rose high. Torches were +pressed between two stones beside the logs. +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis but the raft made to give signal to the Iroquois tribes," +explained the lieutenant. +</P> + +<P> +"To the water with it," cried a voice. +</P> + +<P> +"Peace, fool. The French have sentries posted." +</P> + +<P> +"Fire it," snorted Von Donck. "Let not so much good work be spent in +vain. Will float it upon the French man-o'-war for a parting message." +</P> + +<P> +Eager hands set in place the rollers, and soon the unwieldy mass +grumbled riverwards. It nosed into the water and settled with a +splash, riding deep because the logs had weight. Flint and steel +struck, a shower of sparks rained upon the catch-fire, the torches were +ignited. At a word the grass flared, and the raft, released, struck +upon a rock, turned slowly, and raced down stream, a red and yellow +sheet of fire under a whirling canopy of smoke, straight for the +lantern which marked the presence of the man-of-war. +</P> + +<P> +"To the boats!" whispered Van Vuren. +</P> + +<P> +A cry was raised above, and soon the answering voices resembled a +chorus of daws frightened round a dark steeple by the shadow of a bird +of prey. While the Dutch were floundering in mid-stream a brass gun +thundered. The column of fire swept on, illuminating the seamed wall, +and throwing into black contrast the trees on the opposite shore. +</P> + +<P> +As the laughing Dutchmen reached land a terrific din from the hemlock +forest shocked the night, and this wild revelry became each moment more +terrible, until the wind seemed to cease to breathe. +</P> + +<P> +The raft was opposite the landing-stage, burning rapidly down to the +water, casting out flakes of fire and wisps of blazing grass. Lights +flashed confusedly upon the heights, and the tramp of armed men carried +solemnly across the river. +</P> + +<P> +"The Iroquois are coming out!" cried Van Vuren. +</P> + +<P> +"Let us wait like vultures for the pickings," muttered the lieutenant +at his side. +</P> + +<P> +"Vultures!" shrieked a malignant voice. "A good word, traitors." +</P> + +<P> +The men swung round and stared into the gloom. Upon a point of rock +they saw Gaudriole, squatting like a toad, his features half lit by the +glow of his pipe. +</P> + +<P> +"The plain of Tophet lies ahead," he snarled at them. "Others may play +at fire as well as ye." +</P> + +<P> +He sprang up and danced furiously upon the rock. +</P> + +<P> +"Slay me that hunchback," shouted Van Vuren in a rage. +</P> + +<P> +His men ran at the rock. Gaudriole spat at them like a cat and +vanished among the scrub. +</P> + +<P> +A wave of smoke fanned over the ridge. A deep glow, waving up and down +like a red rag, grew along the southern sky, advancing storm-like, +deepening in colour. +</P> + +<P> +The bush had been fired. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap20"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +SACRAMENTAL. +</H4> + +<P> +The military routine of the fortress continued that day as usual, and +the approach of night brought no suspicion of the forthcoming assault. +The absence of La Salle was alone commented upon, yet without +apprehension, for the priest was notoriously lax in the performance of +his ecclesiastical duties, and only Laroche was seriously troubled in +mind for his brother priest. Roussilac indeed breathed more freely +when La Salle was not present in the fortress. At eventide two little +bells rang out, that to the east of the citadel being the bell of the +chapel of Ste. Anne, presided over by the junior priest, St Agapit, +that to the west the bell of Ste. Mary Bonsecours upon the hill. Here +Laroche, in the absence of La Salle, officiated to recite vespers and +hear confessions. +</P> + +<P> +Laroche, though a fighting bully lacking in every priestly quality, +was, among the soldiers at least, more popular than St Agapit. The +latter was a scholar, a man too learned, and somewhat too honest, for +his age, an ascetic, and a priest in every sense. It was well known +that he looked with a stern eye upon drunken brawls or vengeful +threats, whereas Laroche, himself a brawler when in his cups, judged +such offences leniently. St Agapit had no ambition, apart from the +faithful performance of his duty, the carrying out of which rarely +brought him into even remote contact with either of his colleagues. +</P> + +<P> +It was good to feel the cool breath of the evening after the heat and +burden of the afternoon. The little stone church of Ste. Mary upon the +brow of the hill darkened, and an aged crone passed into the sanctuary +to light the strong-smelling lamps. Laroche entered to recite vespers, +and rolled away to divest his great body of cope and alb; but as he +appeared again within the church his eyes fell upon some half-dozen +men, who waited to obtain an easier conscience by confession of their +sins. +</P> + +<P> +"A plague on ye," the priest grumbled as he stumbled into his box. +"Why are ye all such miserable sinners? Ha! is it you that I see, +Michel Ferraud? What sin now, you rogue?" +</P> + +<P> +The keeper of the cabaret in the Rue des Pêcheurs fell straightway upon +his knees, and began to whimper: +</P> + +<P> +"The former wickedness. I am driven to the act, my father. Wine is +scarce, as your holiness knows, and great is the demand therefor. I +must eke out the supply against the coming of each ship, and it has +ever been but a little aqua puralis added to each keg; but to-day, +father, the devil jogged my elbow, and that which is blended cannot be +separated. The wine remains a rich colour, holy father, as you shall +see, and none shall know——" +</P> + +<P> +"Vile and shameless sinner that you are," the priest interrupted. "To +dilute a wine which is already too thin to gladden the heart of man and +make him a cheerful countenance—to do so, I say, is to commit a most +deadly sin." +</P> + +<P> +"Exact not so heavy a fine as at last confession, good father. Would +not have me close my tavern? The wine is a good wine," Michel added +professionally, "and the little water added is methinks an aid to +virtue." +</P> + +<P> +"Art so fond of water?" replied the confessor grimly. "Water you shall +have. Go down now to the river, swim across, and return in like +manner, and afterwards come to me again. Go now! I have lesser +sinners to absolve." +</P> + +<P> +"The river will be villainous cold, my father. And I cannot swim." +</P> + +<P> +"Learn," said the inexorable priest. "Come not to me again till you +have crossed the river as I have said. May you take into your evil +stomach an abundance of cold water while learning." +</P> + +<P> +The taverner retired dissatisfied, and when outside the church rubbed +his head and ruminated. "The confession was ill-timed," he muttered. +"His reverence is in an evil humour. The devil shall seize me body and +soul before I set one foot into that accursed river. But there is +Father St Agapit. I will go forthwith and confess to him." +</P> + +<P> +The taverner's propitious star was in the ascendant. When he reached +the chapel of Ste. Anne vespers had not concluded, for the office was +there recited with greater reverence and detail than in the church of +Ste. Mary Bonsecours. Michel pushed himself into a front place and +hastened to make himself conspicuous by various fussy acts of outward +devotion. The office over, he lingered until St Agapit came to him, +and the taverner then repeated the confession which he had already +made, with such disastrous consequences, to Laroche. +</P> + +<P> +"Since the evil nature of man drives him to drink much wine, let him +partake of it as weak as may be, for his soul's health," said the +sincere priest. "But, my son, it behoves you to make known to your +patrons the truth." +</P> + +<P> +"I dare not," said Michel, rejoicing at heart because he saw a prospect +of cheating the devil. +</P> + +<P> +"Then are you guilty of deceit," said the priest. "Mix water with your +wine no more, and for your deceit you shall say the litany of St. +Anthony of Padua six times before the altar of Ste. Anne. But see that +you wash before approaching the holy shrine, because I perceive upon +you the odour of wine-casks." +</P> + +<P> +Having brought his duty to an end, St Agapit drew his cloak round him +and went out. While studying that day the work of a German philosopher +he had been confronted by the startling theory that the brain and +stomach of the human system were possibly connected by means of nerves. +He desired to procure from one of the settler-soldiers a dead rabbit +which he might dissect for his own enlightenment. +</P> + +<P> +As he went a woman met him. +</P> + +<P> +"Father," she cried, "a soldier lies at my house at the point of death, +praying for a priest to confess him." +</P> + +<P> +"Follow me to the church," said St Agapit. +</P> + +<P> +He passed back into the little log-building, took the reserved Host and +the sacred oils from an inlaid case, and wrapping these consolations of +the Church in his cloak accompanied the woman. +</P> + +<P> +Upon a palliasse in one of the cabins on the eastern slope a young man +lay dying of pneumonia, that fell disease which the medical science of +the day could only fight by sage shakings of the head and a judicious +use of the cupping-glass. The commandant's own doctor stood there, a +man with some knowledge of medicinal plants and skilled by long +experience in the treatment of sword-cuts, helplessly watching the +exodus of his patient. +</P> + +<P> +"I resign him to your charge, good father," he said, bending his back +to the priest. "He has passed beyond the help of science. Had I been +summoned earlier"—he shrugged his shoulders—"a discreet use of the +lance might well have relieved the fatal rush of blood to the brain and +saved a life for the king." +</P> + +<P> +"Perchance an incision in the stomach to release the foul vapours——" +began St Agapit. +</P> + +<P> +"Useless, my father. The disease, I do assure you, is in the blood." +</P> + +<P> +The abbé knelt and administered the last sacraments of his Church. The +young soldier remained entirely conscious and his confession came in a +steady whisper. +</P> + +<P> +"Father," he concluded, "I would speak with the commandant." +</P> + +<P> +St Agapit looked at the physician by the flickering light of a pine +torch. The latter shook his head. +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis impossible. Roussilac is at supper. But I may leave a message +as I pass." +</P> + +<P> +"Say that Jean-Marie Labroquerie calls on him with his dying breath," +whispered the soldier. +</P> + +<P> +The physician left; the woman who owned the cabin moved silently in +preparation for the carrying out of the body, because people were +practical in the days when death by violence occurred almost hourly. +St Agapit lowered his thin face to catch the message of the passing man. +</P> + +<P> +"Hidden in the straw you shall find a roll of parchment. I pray you +take it and use it as you will. It is the work of my father, a learned +man. We quarrelled. I stole his work and left my home. I repented +and would have taken it back. It was of no service to me. I cannot +read. If it be of value, let my old father gain the profit." +</P> + +<P> +"Does he live within the New World?" +</P> + +<P> +"Two days' journey beyond the river. In a log cabin surrounded by a +palisade which these hands erected. My father healed some Indians who +were sick, and thus obtained their friendship. There was I brought up +with my sister, my fair sister. Oh, my father, I would see again my +sister. I would feel the touch of her hand, and see her bright hair +that flamed in the sun. I would give these my last moments for the +sight of her eyes, and the sound of her voice, saying as she was wont, +'Jean-Marie, my brother! Life is a glorious gift.' Ah, my father!" +</P> + +<P> +"Peace, son. Set your mind upon this suffering." +</P> + +<P> +The abbé held a crucifix into the glow of the torch. +</P> + +<P> +"Jesus is not so jealous, father, that He forbids us to love our own. +I was going back when I could obtain my congé, like the prodigal, to +seek my father's forgiveness. My mother was to blame for our +unhappiness. Solitude and disappointment had embittered her life. She +had a cruel tongue and her hand was rough. I was a coward. I fled. +My sister's eyes have pursued me. I made myself a profligate, to +forget. But memory is a knife in an open wound." +</P> + +<P> +The minutes passed punctuated by the gasps of the sufferer. The torch +burnt down to its knot, and another was kindled by the pale woman. The +sound without was the wash of the tide. +</P> + +<P> +"He comes not," moaned the soldier. "Bear me a message, father." +</P> + +<P> +The dry rattling of beads broke the silence. +</P> + +<P> +"Speak, my son." +</P> + +<P> +The soldier uttered a piteous cry: "Madeleine! Madeleine!" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, son! Call rather on the name of Mary." +</P> + +<P> +A gust of dark air swept into the cabin, the torch flame waved like a +flag, and a man stood behind muffled to the eyes, breathing as though +he had come with speed. He threw aside his martial cloak, and +straightway stood revealed. +</P> + +<P> +"Jean-Marie," he muttered. +</P> + +<P> +"Arnaud. Stand aside, my father. Let me meet my cousin face to face." +</P> + +<P> +The priest moved back, and the two soldiers, the officer and the +fighting-man, stared into each other's eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Had I known this, Jean-Marie——" began the commandant; but the figure +upon the palliasse, straining from death as a dog from the leash, broke +in upon him. +</P> + +<P> +"Cousin, you knew. When I have passed have you not averted your eyes, +ashamed of the man who has had neither the wit nor the opportunity to +rise? You have made yourself great, and I—but this is no time for +calling up the past. I am spent. Come to me, cousin—nearer. Why, +commandant, art afraid of a dying man?" +</P> + +<P> +"Is he dying?" +</P> + +<P> +"He is in God's hands," the priest answered; and the woman grumbled: +"Yes, yes, and a long time lying there, keeping me from my bed." +</P> + +<P> +"Out!" said Roussilac, turning upon her. "Out, and repeat not what you +may have heard." +</P> + +<P> +The woman slunk away frightened. +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, cousin, that old manner," smiled Jean-Marie. "So spoke you as a +boy. They said you would find greatness. My father would say, 'He is +a Brutus. Would condemn his own son.' I know not who Brutus was, but +my father was a learned man." +</P> + +<P> +He coughed terribly and lay back gasping. +</P> + +<P> +"Say what lies upon your mind and have done," reproved St Agapit. "I +would have you die with better thoughts." +</P> + +<P> +"Cousin," panted Jean-Marie, "I forgive you as I hope for mercy. Place +now your hand on mine." +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac did so, shrinking at the freezing contact. +</P> + +<P> +"Your aunt and uncle and Madeleine your cousin dwell in this land, two +days' journey beyond the river. My father was hunted for his life. +They called him a wizard. You know? Yes, once at home you might have +shielded him, but there was your advancement to be thought on. Swear +to me to find them. Tell Madeleine how I died. Be good to her. Ah, +cousin, be a brother to Madeleine. You shall find her the fairest +sister in all this world. Swear to bring them from their solitude, to +protect my father. Swear before this holy priest to feed and clothe +them if they be in want, to care for them, and be to them a brother and +a son." +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac, who had softened for the moment, grew again stern. His +position was not so sure that it could withstand the attacks of tongues +that might whisper at home that the young governor of the new colony +sheltered a heretic uncle. Jean-Marie was quick to note the change. +He knew the hardness of his cousin's heart. +</P> + +<P> +"Swear to me, or have my shadow cursing you through life." +</P> + +<P> +The priest put out his arm with a word of adjuration. +</P> + +<P> +"The crucifix," the commandant muttered. +</P> + +<P> +St Agapit held it over the dying man. +</P> + +<P> +"Touch not the sacred symbol without a prayer, my son. Beware God's +wrath!" +</P> + +<P> +With one hand grasping the cold fingers, the other pressed fearfully +upon the metal figure thrilling in the priest's grasp, Roussilac took +the oath that was required of him. +</P> + +<P> +"And that I will keep it, I call God, our Lady, and the blessed saints +to witness!" he concluded in a hushed voice. +</P> + +<P> +Hardly had he spoken, and while he still watched his cousin lying white +with the light fading from his eyes, the fortress from end to end +became tumultuous. A gun roared, a din of shouting, the thud of flying +feet, the shriek of women, the cry of his soldiery swept up the slope +in wave upon wave of uproar. +</P> + +<P> +"An attack!" he cried. "And I am from my post!" +</P> + +<P> +"Peace!" said St Agapit, with a frown. "The God of battles is not +here." +</P> + +<P> +"Arnaud," came the hollow whisper out of the tumult, "I have more to +say. My voice goes. I pray you bend your head." +</P> + +<P> +"I came secretly," said Roussilac wildly. "I cannot stay. Father, +duty is calling me. My reputation, my position——" +</P> + +<P> +"Your family," said the priest, pointing sternly. +</P> + +<P> +The night air became a storm with the shout: "The Iroquois! The +Iroquois are upon us!" +</P> + +<P> +"Cousin!" whispered the dying man. +</P> + +<P> +"My position!" cried the commandant; and turning with the confession he +caught up his cloak, saying: "I will return. I will come back to you, +Jean-Marie. My country calls me." +</P> + +<P> +"His ambition!" murmured the lean priest, as the door swung back, and +the tumult rolled in like a raging sea flung upon a cave. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap21"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +IRON AND STEEL. +</H4> + +<P> +The fortress was invested upon three sides: up the precipitous westward +slope swarmed the Senacas and Cayugas; the fan-shaped body of the +Onondagas advanced from the east, where the ground was broken; eastward +and westerly on the valley side, where the attackers hoped to strike +the victorious blow, the confederate bands of the Mohawks and Oneidas +lay hidden, awaiting the signal which had been agreed upon. The river +occupied the line to the south, and between its banks and the enemy +ambushed in the valley an outlet was left in order that the French +might be given the opportunity of vacating their position. Once in +open country, they might be broken up into bands and hunted down. +</P> + +<P> +The attack from west and north had been arranged to draw the French +from the one point where the fortress was vulnerable. It appeared as +though the besieged were tumbling blindfold into the trap, which a +general of experience would have at once suspected. Every fighting-man +in the fortress assembled to hold the almost impregnable heights. In +the absence of the leader this mistake was pardonable. There the noise +of battle was terrific. The wild light of the bush fire beyond the +river flung its shadows over the grass hill and cast into detail +figures and flashing tomahawks. A storm of hissing arrows swept over +the rocks. The bronze-skinned warriors rushed up and climbed the +heights. The bravest of the Senacas, that hardy fighting race of the +highlands, were already within the fortress, tomahawking the gunners +with hideous yells. +</P> + +<P> +The man-of-war was useless. Boats were let down, and the sailors flung +ropes round the ends of the logs which supported the fire-raft, and +towed the flaming peril away. Then the clumsy ship blundered up +stream, only to find herself helplessly cut off from the enemy by the +sheer wall of rock. She drifted back, and the master gave the order +for the guns to be beached and dragged up the slope to strengthen the +resources of the besieged. +</P> + +<P> +"'Fore Heaven!" cried Van Vuren. "The natives win!" +</P> + +<P> +The Dutchmen had perforce returned to watch the progress of the +assault. They saw the Cayugas dealing blows against the summit, +repulsed, but never actually losing ground. Each assault found the +height invested more strongly by the overwhelming host. Similar +success attended the ascent of the Onondagas. The rival factions +swayed upon the distant summit, lit by the fire of the cannon. +</P> + +<P> +The Dutchmen hovered in uncertainty, until the opposition yielded and +the Indians began to burn the huts which looked down upon the river. +At this signal a shout went up from the valley, and the Mohawks and +Oneidas rushed out to complete the work. At the same time Van Vuren +gave the word, and the big men re-crossed the river, gained the level, +and joined the sachems and doctors who were dancing and screaming at +the foot of the hill. +</P> + +<P> +Abruptly a line of soldiers formed upon the crest to the roaring of +cannon, and these trained fighters bore down through the smoke, +sweeping away the opposition as wind carries the snow. Immediately +yells of dismay sounded above, where the Indians who had been trapped +were being put to the sword. The blind repulse had at length given way +to method. +</P> + +<P> +A report had passed about the fortress that Roussilac had been +assassinated, and the body deprived of its brains became thereupon +powerless to act. But Gaudriole came hopping from gun to gun, crying: +"Courage, my comrades! I have seen the commandant. He did but go down +to the chapel of Ste. Anne to confess his sins. See where he comes! +Long live our governor!" +</P> + +<P> +The soldiers caught up his cry and fought with new energy when they +beheld Roussilac's slight figure wrapped in a long cloak. He passed +deliberately from east to north, issuing his orders and rapidly +altering the entire nature of the fight. The besieged became the +attackers; the hunters became the hunted. Roussilac's pale face +restored confidence. His contemptuous coolness brought victory within +sight. Before setting the trap for the Cayugas and Senacas his martial +eye had lingered upon the silent valley. There he concentrated his +best fighters, and despatched an order to the ship, directing the +master to bring up the naval guns. The sailors were soon at their +work, dragging the light guns into position and training the muzzles +upon the suspected valley, while powder-monkeys ran up with charge and +ball, and the gunners arranged their port-fire. +</P> + +<P> +With the attack of the previously ambushed Mohawks, the battle for +possession may be said to have commenced. Skill, holding a position +which subsequent history proved to be practically impregnable, became +opposed by numbers blindly indifferent to death. +</P> + +<P> +The Dutchmen fled at that repulse when the natives about them had been +flung back almost to the forest. They halted upon the beach and +deliberated on the practicability of flight through the smoking country +which hemmed the opposite shore. It was then that Dutoit made the +discovery that two of his men were missing. +</P> + +<P> +"We cannot regain the bodies," said Van Vuren, when the announcement +was made. "The French mayhap have already discovered them, and thus +know that we have taken arms against them. Flight is now forced upon +us." +</P> + +<P> +Dawn was near when Hough reached the scene of action. The din of +battle had carried over the land, driving the birds and beasts +northward in fear, and he and his stout comrade had started out at +once. Scarce a mile had been traversed when Penfold's leg gave way; he +sent his companion on, and hobbled slowly along his track, hoping to be +in before the end. +</P> + +<P> +At a glance the Puritan perceived the flaw in the attack. +</P> + +<P> +"Why do ye waste your men against that wall?" he shouted at the chiefs. +"Bring every man round to the east. Follow me, warriors. Follow, we +shall conquer yet." +</P> + +<P> +He might as profitably have addressed the stones. He ran in among the +fighters, dealing blows with the flat of his sword, and pointing +through the shadows to the fierce conflict upon the edge of the valley. +</P> + +<P> +"There!" he shouted, trying to recall some scattered words of the +language. "There, where the sun rises!" +</P> + +<P> +At length he made himself clear, and a section of the fighters, more +cool-headed than the remainder, professed themselves willing to follow, +and some of the hot-headed chiefs, perceiving method in the +Englishman's madness, turned also calling back their men. +</P> + +<P> +Twice had the Mohawks broken through the front line and been repulsed +before reaching the cannon, which spouted its hail down the valley. A +barrier of French dead piled the space beside the artillery. Roussilac +strode to and fro, withdrawing men from points where they could ill be +spared that he might throw them upon the side where the lines wavered. +Here the flower of the fighting-men struggled. Laroche fought here +like the brave man he undoubtedly was, swearing fearfully, but never +ceasing from the skilful sword-play which freed many a brown warrior +from the burden of the fight. A charm seemed to protect his great +body, the arrows leaving him unscathed, the blows of the tomahawks +seeming to deflect as they descended, until the soldiers fought for the +pride of place at the side of the priest, whom they believed to be +under the special protection of the saints. +</P> + +<P> +"Infidels, unbelieving and unbaptised! Down, down!" shouted Laroche, +blinking the sweat from his eyes. +</P> + +<P> +Repeatedly the Iroquois turned the line at the weak spot which Nature +had overlooked in her plan of fortification, but Roussilac was prepared +always with a band waiting to stem the rush. This could not last. His +soldiers were thinning, and there seemed to be no limit to the numbers +of the Indians. They pressed up in horde upon horde, their shouts +cleaving the moist wind, their arrows inexhaustible, their courage +undiminished. Then the word came that the Cayugas and Senacas were +giving way upon the west with the manifest intention of strengthening +their allies. +</P> + +<P> +"Let them come," cried Roussilac loudly, for his men's benefit. "Only +send me as many soldiers as can be spared from that position." But to +himself he muttered: "The game is up," and he wrung his brain for a +<I>ruse de guerre</I>. +</P> + +<P> +"Send me a dozen men with a cannon yonder to work round and attack +these savages in the rear," he said to one of his captains, who had +been put out of the fight by a wound in the arm. "If they can but +raise sufficient noise they may appear as a relieving force. It +disheartens even a brute to fight between two foes." +</P> + +<P> +"We cannot spare the men, Excellency." +</P> + +<P> +"They must be spared," replied Roussilac. +</P> + +<P> +A messenger rushed up, breathless and triumphant. +</P> + +<P> +"Excellency, the Algonquins are coming to our aid in force," he panted. +</P> + +<P> +For the first time in many hours the commandant smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"You spoke truly," he said to the captain. "We cannot spare those men." +</P> + +<P> +He turned and recoiled with a shiver. St Agapit, a long, black figure, +stood beside him in the wet wreaths of the dawn. +</P> + +<P> +"Your cousin is dead," said the priest. "He died but half an hour ago, +with a curse upon his tongue. You have lost me that man's soul." +</P> + +<P> +He half lifted his hand and moved away, seeing nothing of the great +struggle, heeding the clamour not at all, because the sun was about to +rise and he had his Mass to say. +</P> + +<P> +While light was breaking over the cliffs in the east, where the +fishermen of Tadousac hid themselves throughout that night, Oskelano +brought his men clear of the forest and disposed them upon the plain. +The old man was no mean general. He sent out his spies, and when the +men returned with the information that the French were being crushed by +superior numbers he divided his force into three bands. The first he +sent like a wedge between the Onondagas and the force advancing from +the west under Hough's leadership; the second he flung to the north of +the Mohawks and Oneidas; and, having thus completely separated the +allied forces, he threw his third band upon the rear of the men who +were slowly carrying the position from the valley. +</P> + +<P> +The Cayugas and Senacas were beaten back to the river. The Onondagas, +attacked on two sides and at first mistaking foe for friend, were +shattered at a first charge and fled for the forest. The fighters in +the valley alone held their ground, until the light became strong; and +then Roussilac drew up his entire force and directed in person a charge +which hurled the stubborn Mohawks back upon the axes of the Algonquins +awaiting them upon the lower ground. The survivors fled and were +pursued by the northern tribe. The French flung themselves down +exhausted, while Laroche wiped his sword and streaming face, and panted +a benediction upon dead and wounded and living alike. +</P> + +<P> +Thus the Iroquois Confederacy received a shattering blow from which it +never recovered; and the land was made secure to France for a long two +hundred years. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap22"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +OB AND AZURE. +</H4> + +<P> +After that complete repulse of the Iroquois tribes the French found +themselves so weak as to be practically at the mercy of a foe. Another +resolute attack must have driven them from their position. But the +Iroquois bands were completely disorganised; the few English scattered +about the maritime provinces, including that remnant of Scots in the +east, who had settled Newfoundland and Nova Scotia only to see their +territories wrested from them, were entirely inadequate even in +combination to menace the supremacy of the House of Bourbon; and it may +be questioned whether, at that time, any Scotsman would have stood to +fight side by side with the English. Soon another ship would arrive +from Marseilles, bringing, not only provisions and ammunition, but a +reinforcement of men, prepared to till the ground as settlers should, +but far more ready to continue the French error of attempting to +colonise with the sword. On the heels of the discovery of two Dutch +bodies among the Indian slain, La Salle returned, and conveyed to +Roussilac the information that an English spy was escaping south. +Gaudriole also announced that Van Vuren and his company were bearing in +that same direction. Roussilac's hand was forced. If these men +escaped him the fortress might be called upon to resist, not only an +English, but possibly a Dutch invasion also. He sent out twenty men +immediately to cut off the Hollanders, leaving the garrison depleted to +no more than fifty men available for defence; and the commandant made +haste to reward Oskelano for his services as suitably as his resources +would permit, and sent him home, fearful lest the treacherous Algonquin +might discover, and take advantage of, his weakness. +</P> + +<P> +When La Salle stood before him, and announced that the English spy was +the guest of one Madame Labroquerie, a widow living with her daughter +in the country to the south, the commandant refused to betray himself, +but replied that he would accompany the priest and be a witness to the +hanging of the Englishman. At the same time, he considered, he might +keep the oath which he had sworn to his dead cousin. Having given the +order for a troop of men to attend upon his person, he abandoned the +subject which awoke in him unpleasant memories, and bowing haughtily to +La Salle—for he and the priest were in a manner rivals—congratulated +him upon his appointment to the governorship of Acadie, the +confirmation of which, signed by the Cardinal himself, had lately been +delivered by the hand of the master of the <I>St. Wenceslas</I>. +</P> + +<P> +"This fortress will be the weaker for your loss, Sir Priest," he said, +feigning a sorrow which he could not feel. "May I seek to know when +you propose to set forth to the undertaking of your new +responsibilities?" +</P> + +<P> +"If my work here be finished what time the <I>St. Wenceslas</I> sails +homeward I shall depart with her," La Salle replied, flashing a +disdainful glance upon Roussilac. "But I have yet to rid this land of +its English vermin." +</P> + +<P> +With that implied scorn of the governor, and suggestion of his own +superiority, La Salle departed to make his preparations; and an hour +later a troop of horsemen rode forth, Roussilac at the head, and beside +him Gaudriole jesting for his chief's amusement; on the other side the +two priests—for Laroche accompanied his senior—and behind six +soldiers, riding two abreast on bright bay ponies, their weapons +flashing in the sunlight. +</P> + +<P> +There had been war in the grove. An angry scene passed between mother +and daughter when Madeleine returned after seeing her lover upon his +way. For the first time in her life the girl lost her sweet patience, +and returned word for word so hotly that Madame at length became +afraid, and backed away, yet muttering: +</P> + +<P> +"Men shall stay your pride, girl, if a weak woman may not." +</P> + +<P> +"They also shall find that a resolute mind is not quickly broken," +Madeleine returned. +</P> + +<P> +"The law against heresy is still in being," Madame threatened, made +still more bitter by the knowledge that her daughter and Geoffrey had +together outwitted her. "I have borne with you, because you are my +child. Our Lady punishes me for my lack of devotion. I had speech but +recently with a holy priest. We shall see, when that priest returns. +We shall see!" +</P> + +<P> +"Drive me from you with that bitter tongue, as you drove out +Jean-Marie," cried Madeleine, her fair throat swelling like a bird in +song. "So shall you die without son or daughter at your side, and none +but an Indian shall see you to your grave." +</P> + +<P> +At that Madame put up her hand with a superstitious gesture, and limped +away, her yellow face wrinkled with rage; nor did she speak again to +her daughter until the Indian servant entered the cabin to announce the +coming of a warlike band. Then she croaked at Madeleine: "'Tis the +holy priest. Know you not, girl, how those are punished who conspire +to aid an enemy of their country?" Then she hasted away to don the cap +and gown which she had kept against the coming of a change of fortune. +</P> + +<P> +There came a sound of voices, the troop rode into the grove, and +Madeleine, as she stood trembling at the door, was greeted by +Gaudriole, who bowed and grinned as he announced his Excellency the +Commandant to visit the Madame Labroquerie and the fair lady her +daughter. +</P> + +<P> +"I am Madeleine Labroquerie," stammered the girl, frightened for a +moment by the brave show of mounted men. +</P> + +<P> +"Cousin," cried a half-familiar voice, "hast put a friend and relative +out of memory?" +</P> + +<P> +Dazzled by the sunlight after the gloom of the cabin, Madeleine shaded +her eyes. She saw before her a tall man, sallow and dark, his hair +falling in snaky lines to his shoulders, the golden fleur-de-lys worked +upon his blue surcoat making his face the more sickly by comparison. +Before she could return his salutation he had dropped to his knee and +kissed her hand. +</P> + +<P> +"Years have passed since we parted, cousin," he said. "The present +finds me with position, and you with beauty. I knew not that you were +here until your brother told me." +</P> + +<P> +"Arnaud!" she exclaimed, giddy with amazement at finding the boy who +had been the autocrat of childhood's games grown into a man of power. +Then, because her heart was so tender to all that breathed, she forgot +the character of the man who was looking down upon her with increasing +wonder to find how the plain child with the tangle of flaming hair had +blossomed into this lovely creature, and asked quickly: +"Jean-Marie—what of him?" +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac was not a man to tell ill-news gently. Wasting neither words +nor sentiment, he replied: "Your brother died but recently of fever, +calling upon your name with his last breath." +</P> + +<P> +His final words were intended to show her that he had been by the sick +man's side until the end. +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine turned white and tottered. Then, as her strong heart +recovered, she said: +</P> + +<P> +"Let me call my mother. My father has long been dead. We have +remained poor, Arnaud," she added defiantly. "But if you have +ascended, we have at least not descended." +</P> + +<P> +"To what higher pinnacle can a woman wish to attain than that of +perfect beauty?" he replied gallantly; but he noticed that she left him +with a frown. +</P> + +<P> +"Had I but known that she had grown so fair!" he muttered. +</P> + +<P> +Gaudriole was grinning at his side. The dwarf put up his red hand and +showed his chief a dead butterfly, its bright plumage well-nigh worn +away, its wings crushed and wet. +</P> + +<P> +"Short-lived beauty, Excellency," he leered, with the jester's +privilege. "Yesterday shining in the sun. To-day!" He laughed +hoarsely and dropped the ruined insect. "'Tis a world of change and +contrast," he chuckled. "Mark this philosophy, my captain. When old +age sends me white hairs and a reverend aspect you shall perchance call +me beautiful, if you look not too closely at my hump; but when the +bloom of yonder beauteous lady turns to seed——" +</P> + +<P> +"Off, Bossu!" cried Roussilac angrily. "Learn to turn your jesting +with a better judgment, or your tongue shall be slit and your back +whipped." +</P> + +<P> +"My faith!" the dwarf chuckled. "I have no back. I am like the frog, +but shoulders and legs." +</P> + +<P> +Madame herself appeared in a fresh white cap and an antique gown. It +was not her way to be gracious, nor were her recollections of her +nephew's fidelity of the happiest; so she did but greet him coldly, +asking why he had now come since he had tarried so long. +</P> + +<P> +"Good aunt," came the reply, "I would have sought you earlier, had I +known you were in this land. I have not long held command, and my +hands have been filled in crushing the strength of the Iroquois. I +entreat you both to return with me now and take up your abode at the +fortress, not indeed as my guests, but as an honoured mother and +sister." +</P> + +<P> +"Pretty talk," sniffed Madame. "I said in the old days you would make +a courtier. So you, the governor of the land, knew nothing of this +home of your poor relations a paltry two days' journey beyond the +river. There is no man so blind as he who makes a living by that +infirmity. This girl tells me that my son is dead. Died he in the +faith of the Church?" +</P> + +<P> +"Surely," said Roussilac. "But tell me I pray, good aunt, is it true, +as this Indian says, that the English spy has already escaped?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, he has gone," cried Madeleine, flushing warmly. "He has gone, +Arnaud, to—to the west." +</P> + +<P> +Her deceit was so transparent that even Roussilac could not restrain a +smile. +</P> + +<P> +"And why, fair cousin," he asked, addressing her with marked deference, +"why should this Englishman seek the unknown west, where it is believed +none dwell save Indians? Would he not rather turn towards the south, +and seek New England and his own people?" +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed I know not why he should seek the west," Madeleine replied, +between tears and laughter. "But I do assure you he has gone in that +direction——" +</P> + +<P> +"Peace, girl," her mother cried. "The fool lies to you, Arnaud. She +is a heretic, shame though it be, and her master is the father of lies. +'Tis true the English spy escaped in the early morning, but he knows +not the land, and may yet be secured. I am surrounded all my life long +by wickedness," the bitter woman continued. "My husband was perverted +by the sin of science. Jean-Marie was but a knave. He left me here. +Madeleine is a heretic, and she has threatened to leave me also. Well, +I will come with you, Arnaud, but see that you give me a scented pillow +for my head and a cup of warm wine at evening. Stand not there, +nephew, like a wooden stock, but command one of yonder evil-faced +rogues to bring up a horse fitted for the age and dignity of the first +lady in this thrice-accursed land." +</P> + +<P> +An evil smile curved the thin line of Roussilac's mouth. His aunt had +indeed not changed; but she had yet to learn that he had advanced. He +turned to where the priests were talking loudly in the shade of the +grove, noting La Salle's anger at the failure of his mission, and a few +paces beyond his troopers jesting in the sun. Then he looked upon the +fair face of Madeleine and smiled again. +</P> + +<P> +"Tamalan," he called, dividing his attention between the soldier he was +addressing and his aunt, "prepare your pony for the use of the first +lady in this great colony of France—the lady Madeleine Labroquerie." +</P> + +<P> +He bowed slightly towards the silent girl. +</P> + +<P> +For one instant Madame appeared to stifle. Then she drew back her lips +and snarled at her nephew, yet without uttering a word. +</P> + +<P> +"This is not Normandy, Madame," said Roussilac calmly. "And you have +not here the boy whose cheeks you would smite when the angry fit was on +you. This is the New World, and I am the Representative of his most +sacred Majesty, King Louis the Thirteenth." +</P> + +<P> +Madame started forward, two passionate red spots upon her cheeks, her +bony hand uplifted; but Roussilac indicated the golden fleur-de-lys +upon his breast and said, in the quiet consciousness of power: +"Remember!" +</P> + +<P> +The little woman stood for a moment motionless, grinding her teeth, her +black eyes starting from a ghastly countenance, then flung herself back +into the cabin, tearing at her hair and cap in the madness of her +anger. Roussilac watched with the same quiet smile, and when she had +gone turned to Madeleine and said: +</P> + +<P> +"My aunt forgets that time may work a change." +</P> + +<P> +"Pardon her," murmured the girl. "This solitude has touched her brain." +</P> + +<P> +Then La Salle strode up with angry questionings: "Shall we tarry here +all the day, Sir Commandant, while the heretic escapes? Know you not +that New England swarms with Puritans, who, if they but hear of our +weakness, shall fill this land and compel us forth by their numbers?" +</P> + +<P> +"You speak truly, Sir Priest," Roussilac answered. "We do but waste +our time." +</P> + +<P> +Crossing to the men, he selected the five strongest ponies and the five +most trustworthy soldiers, and charged the latter to ride out, secure +the Englishman, and hang him out of hand. These men set forth +immediately, while Roussilac turned himself to the task of soothing La +Salle, and to the pleasure of flattering the fair lady his cousin. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap23"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE EVERLASTING HILLS. +</H4> + +<P> +After their escape from the dangerous region of the fortress on that +night of battle, Van Vuren and his band made towards the far-distant +country watered by the Hudson, travelling under the guidance of Pieter +von Donck across the unfrequented territory, over balsamic hills of +spruce, through swamps and thickets, and across a desert of dusty +stone, until they reached a range of green mountains which made an +immense backbone along the land. Here they halted, and the note of +argument was raised. Van Vuren had developed a sullen mood, induced by +jealousy of Von Donck, who had taken the office of leader upon himself, +and at this point he turned upon the sailor and a heated battle of +words ensued. The captain indicated the flat district spreading +westward, and confidently declared that the route lay there. His men +obediently turned to follow, with the exception of Von Donck, who, when +his argument failed, separated himself forthwith from the company. +</P> + +<P> +"Take then your inland path," he shouted at them angrily. "You shall +in due time come among the savage Adirondacks, where the Mohawks dwell +unconquered, and where all manner of wild beasts fill the fastnesses. +No white man has preceded you there. This way I smell the sea. Keep +your course, captain, if you will not be ruled by me. I am for New +Amsterdam and the hostel beside San Nicolas." +</P> + +<P> +"Pieter knows the land," urged Dutoit. +</P> + +<P> +"Go then with the stubborn fool," replied Van Vuren hotly. "Follow me, +my men. This way for the sea!" +</P> + +<P> +The rest of the company succumbed to discipline and followed their +leader, though with manifest unwillingness; while Von Donck gave them +over to their fate and travelled alone into the green hills. +</P> + +<P> +What befell Van Vuren and his company history relateth not. It is +certain that they were never taken by the French, because the party +which Roussilac had sent out returned in due course to the fortress, +and reported that they had failed to discover any trace of the +traitors. But at a later date there went a story about Hudson's river, +concerning a party of Dutchmen said to be haunting the spurs of the +Adirondacks, weather-beaten men, wrinkled and long-bearded, their feet +covered with scraps of hide, their clothes eked out by furs, +continually setting out upon a journey, but always returning to their +starting-point. Still later, after New Amsterdam had been conquered by +the English and had received the name of New York, mothers would often +frighten their errant children with the tale of the lost Dutchmen who +wandered about the north, their beards dragging on the stones and +tangling among the bush, watching the sun by day and the stars by +night, and sometimes separating as though in anger, but only to combine +again and renew the hopeless search. Probably Van Vuren and his men +were destroyed by the fierce Mohawks; possibly they fell a prey to the +animals which roamed in their thousands among the Adirondacks, or +perished of want after their ammunition became exhausted; the one fact +is certain that not one of them ever reached the sea-blown country of +the Manhattoes. +</P> + +<P> +While this fatal dissension took place Geoffrey was crossing the plains +upon the further side of the green mountains, only a short distance +ahead. He had made excellent progress, concealing himself cleverly +from bands of marauding Indians, guiding his feet by the constellations +at night, and searching by day for the tree-moss which delicately +furred the north side only of the hemlock boles; but there still +remained over two hundred miles of wild country between him and the +town of Boston. He tramped on, unheeding sore feet, feeling the spirit +of brave Madeleine at his side, averting the perils of night, guiding +his feet accurately southward. As time went on, and he reflected how +great was the distance he had already traversed, the joy of life became +so strong that he could have flung away his sword and dared the world +with bare hands. +</P> + +<P> +Two weeks had passed since that parting from his comrades; and on the +evening of the fourteenth day he broke from the bush and for some +moments stood bewildered at the scene before him, blinking his eyes, +and longing to step back into the greenwood shade. +</P> + +<P> +White masses of mountain glowed ahead, peaks and crags all glittering +in the sun like a huge cascade streaming down from the clouds; ranges +of pure crystal, polished like glass, and edged with rose-pink by the +colours of the western sky; snow-white gorges of milky quartz, and +silver cataracts flung in foam from the whiteness above to the green +below. +</P> + +<P> +"These," he said softly, with a thrill of old-world superstition, +"these must surely be the great crystal mountains where the Iroquois +believe that the gods dwell." +</P> + +<P> +He hurried on, his eyes watering because of the dazzling light +reflected from those crystal walls; and as he went he turned to lover's +thoughts, and determined that, after all, the sun glow upon the white +peaks was not one-half so lovely as the flush upon Madeleine's soft +cheek. Here before him was Nature's finest insentient handiwork. It +was glowing and full of music, but its loveliness lacked life, and its +warmth was borrowed from the sun. It was only beautiful as a part of +the environment of the life of the soul. How he longed for Madeleine +to stand at his side and behold those everlasting hills in splendour +and the sun swimming in red! And with that longing he half +unconsciously breathed the healthful text to which she had attuned her +happy soul, "It is life—glorious, everlasting life!" +</P> + +<P> +Vitality rose to its full height within Geoffrey's body; and when he +felt no more the weight of his heavy kit, he ran over the broken ground +and up the narrow gorge, until two white walls closed him gently into +the panting bosom of the crystal hills. +</P> + +<P> +"Here is the home of fairies," he exclaimed, when he stopped at a great +height, and looked upon three tiny lakes which made a trinity of +motionless mirrors decked by feathers of cloud, the water like white +wine brimming in great bowls of granite. +</P> + +<P> +Immediately a gentle voice was wafted through the air, "Here is the +home of fairies," and after a pause the information was repeated like +the warble of a weary bird, the last notes dying inaudible around the +cliffs. +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey dared not speak again. The genius of the place was over him, +waiting to give a signal to the expectant choir. Footfalls preceded +the traveller, the echo of his own. The many-mouthed King of the +Mountains pattered before him, breathing the stranger a gentle welcome +to the district which he ruled. Geoffrey crept on tiptoe to the edge +of the nearest pool, until he could see the weedless rock-bottom and +the land-locked salmon lying near the surface, gently fanning their red +fins, and watching him with wondering eyes. Seating himself, the +traveller bathed his weary feet and watched the water swallows, darting +and splashing, snatching the fat flies which spotted the surface like +drops of rain, sucking them in and pushing out their little black noses +for more. +</P> + +<P> +The sun went down and a chill crept into the wind. Geoffrey left the +enchanted spot, and the salmon shooting like silver arrows through the +darkening pool, and, again ascending, entered a richly-wooded glen +through which a cascade ran in a white thread; and here, close to a +winding path beaten out by the feet of mountain sheep, he pitched his +camp and ate his frugal meal of dried meat, which he eked out by a few +early berries and some sweet roots of the wood althæa. +</P> + +<P> +The light went out from the long day as he sank into dreams of +Madeleine. He pictured her swaying among the scented grasses of the +lowlands, or breathing a prayer for his welfare while she awaited the +evening star in the faint blue of the sky. He saw her leaning from the +hill-top watching the southern line, and bounding joyously away when +she found the sky all clear. He imagined her lying asleep with her +mind awake for him; and he believed that in his sleep her sweet dreams +would cause his lips to open and his tongue to call her name. +</P> + +<P> +A rustling in the near bush recalled him to the present. He thought +the sound was occasioned by some restless bird, but when the +disturbance became more decided, he rose, alert, and, putting out a +hand for his bow, shrank back into a place of shelter. Hardly had he +done so when a thicket of willow shivered and parted. +</P> + +<P> +The watcher saw two savage eyes aglow like lamps, and as he sank to the +ground and remained motionless as a figure of stone, a great panther +slouched into the open, with its nose upon the ground. +</P> + +<P> +The creature passed, blowing up the dust as though following a fresh +scent. Geoffrey noticed with a thrill of relief that the ground it was +intent upon was not that which he had traversed. When the huge cat had +crawled into the bush, he drew out one of his few remaining arrows and +cautiously followed; but not more than twenty paces had he advanced +into the clinging bush when there came to him for the first time during +his wanderings the exclamation of a human voice. +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey plunged forward recklessly until he saw a circular opening +such as Nature delights to make in her laying out of the densest +forest. The cataract formed the left; a bank of trees rose to the +right; opposite him a big man sat in the half light, holding a +smouldering pipe, his eyes fixed in terror upon the panther, which lay +upon its belly half a dozen yards away, growling and lashing its tail +in its savage cat's joy. The man was unarmed. He had left his pack +and weapons under a shelf of white rock which gleamed behind. +</P> + +<P> +Viner edged nearer, but as he stirred a twig snapped and the panther +looked round, its eyes full of fire and blood. At the same moment the +stout man discovered his rescuer and a flush of colour returned to his +bloodless cheeks. Keeping his eyes upon the enemy, he began to crawl +towards the rock, shouting as he went: "Drive at him, boy. Send a +shaft through his neck, and Pieter von Donck shall stand your friend +for life." +</P> + +<P> +The bolt, well-aimed by the boy's cool hands, sprang that instant into +the beast's shoulder. As it felt the sting of the barb, the panther +roared and leapt mightily into the bush, landing upon the exact spot +which Geoffrey had cleverly vacated in time to save his life. Again +Von Donck bellowed like a bull: +</P> + +<P> +"Let him have one such another, comrade. Then into the bush and dodge +him. I have powder here and ball." +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey hurriedly slipped another arrow along the groove of his +cross-bow and secured the string. Quick as he was, the great cat was +quicker. It hurled itself upon the tree behind which its enemy had +taken shelter, and its iron claws wrenched off great flakes of bark. +Again Geoffrey saved himself by leaping back, but the panther was up at +the rebound and on him. For the third time Geoffrey dodged, and in +doing so released the string, and the bolt, by happy chance, pierced +the demon in the chest as it descended. The next instant Geoffrey was +felled to the moss. But this effort was the panther's last. An +explosion shook the bush, there came a villainous smell of saltpetre, a +whirl of smoke, and the mountain cat fell upon its side, quivered, and +lay dead. +</P> + +<P> +"A brave invention this powder," snorted Von Donck triumphantly out of +the smoke. "But methinks too costly save for an emergency." He broke +off and muttered into his beard: "A thousand devils! The boy is +English." +</P> + +<P> +"A strange meeting, friend," said Geoffrey, as he rose somewhat blindly +to his feet. +</P> + +<P> +"Adventure makes many an alliance," quoth the Dutchman. "Were you +black, or brown, or yellow man, I would take your hand and swear to +stand your friend. You have saved my life, boy. Nay, deny it not, and +at the further risk of your own. By my soul, the brute has clawed your +shoulder. This must be seen to. Come, lie you here, while I bring +water and wash the wound and bind it up as best I can. A pestilence +destroy these same unholy animals. They strike a man like lightning." +</P> + +<P> +"If I have saved your life, you have done as much for me," said +Geoffrey. "Let us divide the honours." +</P> + +<P> +"A hand-shake upon that," cried the hearty Dutchman. "We are enemies +by blood, boy. You have fought against my people before this night, +and are like, I doubt not, to do so again. The Puritans of +Massachusetts have their eyes upon our New Netherlands. You and I may +yet meet upon opposite sides in the battle; but may God forge a +thunderbolt for my destruction if I do not seek to preserve the life of +one who has shed his blood for me. I suspect, boy, you are no true +Englishman. I dare swear your father or mother came of a good Dutch +stock." +</P> + +<P> +"I am English born and bred," said Geoffrey. "I could wish you were +the same," he boldly added. +</P> + +<P> +"Out, jester!" said the big man as he went down to the cataract. "It +is your envy speaking. Black never made itself whiter by longing." +</P> + +<P> +The Dutchman returned with his hat half filled with water and attended +to the injuries of his new friend, with podgy hands which were but a +little less rough than the nature of the man who owned them. Every +protestation on the part of his patient he silenced by a growl. When +the slight flesh-wound had been bandaged, he replenished the fire to +keep other mountain cats at bay, and they sat together under the white +wall, Von Donck occupied in skinning the defunct panther, chatting +noisily the while. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you wonder that I speak your language when I have been brought up +to a better?" he observed as the soft night grew upon them. "A soldier +of fortune must needs pick up all he can, grains and chaff alike. Many +years past, before that yellow hair of yours had grown to trouble a +maiden's heart—Ah, that blush was good. Shall repeat the phrase. +Before that yellow hair had grown to win a Dutchman's heart—see how I +spare your blushes to hurt your pride—I served under Hendrick Hudson, +who called himself English, though plague me if I could ever tell what +was English in him save his oaths. I promise you he could ring an +English oath to drown the best of yours. To-morrow will tell you how I +sailed with him up the Mohican river which now bears his name. 'Tis a +happy day for you, young comrade. Your future wife and children shall +bless this day—when you and old Pieter met. Plague the lad! His face +is like a poppy in a corn-field. Shall stand together, young +yellow-head, till the end of this journey. I do not seek to learn your +business, but you shall know mine. I am going home, boy, back to San +Nicolas by the sea, and there shall grow a yet rounder belly, and tell +travellers' tales, and toss my neighbours' children upon my knee. We +shall part in New England, enemies if you will, but until we reach the +fields of the Puritans we stand together, and the Indians that burn you +shall burn me also." +</P> + +<P> +"How come you to be travelling alone?" asked Geoffrey. +</P> + +<P> +"When you reach my age, young whipster, you shall learn that questions +are like thistle-seed, tossed here and there, serving no better purpose +than the sowing of a fresh weed-crop. I ask no question, but I know +that you carry a despatch to your Puritans in the south. See how +shrewdly I have hit it. Until two days back I travelled with my +company, but when they chose the way which leads to destruction I left +them. They have gone to the devil, and I am for the sea. At this +present time I am for sleep. When the moon touches yonder ridge, wake +me and I will take my watch. This panther's family may be on the +prowl." +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis a fine skin," said Geoffrey, indicating the striped coat which +Von Donck was stretching along the rock. +</P> + +<P> +"Will look well upon my shoulders," said Pieter complacently. "'Tis +mine by hunter's right. Shall swagger about New Amsterdam in it and +shame the burgomaster. At nights will sit in the hostel and say how I +killed him with mine own hand. The folk shall not believe, but I shall +have the hunter's satisfaction of making a brave show. By San Nicolas, +the brute shall not die so easily when I come to tell the story." +</P> + +<P> +The garrulous old sailor made a bed of grass and moss, and prepared to +sleep. Suddenly he broke into a deep laugh, and lifted his hand to +indicate a crystal ridge towards which the moon was drawing. "See you +how yonder granite is shaped into a man's face?" he said. "And, as I +live to sin, a likeness of mine own. See there my crooked nose and +flabby forehead and my hanging lips? Behold my beauty, boy, and bear +in mind that Pieter von Donck and yourself are the first travellers in +these crystal mountains. Ah, Pieter von Donck! Pieter von Donck!" he +continued in a shout, lifting himself upon his elbow, and shaking his +fist at the massive face of granite. "You sleep well yonder, Piet von +Donck. May you sleep as soundly for ten thousand years. Now, boy, +remember me in your prayers, but see that you put me not before your +sweet maid. God forbid that you should put an ancient rogue before +her. Forget not to shake me by the shoulder when the moon snuffs the +nose of yonder old man of the mountains." +</P> + +<P> +He fell back and soon began to snore, while Geoffrey watched the stern +stone profile and the moon rolling serenely over the crystal heights; +and as he watched he drifted away into dreams. +</P> + +<P> +These aerial castles toppled and fell when there came to his ears from +the adjoining valley a disturbance, which might have been occasioned by +mountain gnomes beating the rock with hammers of iron. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap24"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXIV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +ART-MAGIC. +</H4> + +<P> +Throwing off his sleep with a deep breath so soon as Geoffrey touched +his shoulder, Von Donck stared up at the moon, and then upon the +equally pale face of the watchman, who knelt over him and exclaimed: +"Hear the sounds along yonder valley?" +</P> + +<P> +In a moment the Dutchman was on his feet, alert and listening. +</P> + +<P> +"So," he snorted, when the steady tap-tap of the fairy hammers reached +his ears. "We are first here by only a little. How is that shoulder, +young fighter? Too stiff to draw a bow, or cross a sword?" +</P> + +<P> +"What mean you?" asked Geoffrey. +</P> + +<P> +"Frenchmen are upon us. The knaves to ride o' night when honest folk +sleep! They have forgot that the blessed echo carries far beyond them. +Now 'tis for me to contrive some snare for your executioners." +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey quaked at the ugly emphasis which the big man gave to his +words. A new feeling of security had come to him with the sealing of +his partnership with the stout Hollander; and it appeared as though his +dream of safety was to be dissipated before it had taken a concrete +form. +</P> + +<P> +"What else think you?" went on Pieter, with his snorting laugh. "Shall +Roussilac allow a spy to reach New England, there to make known his +weakness, without striking a blow for his capture? See you that +straight limb on yonder pine? I tell you that slim body of yours would +have swung there ere sunrise, had you not by good luck fallen in with +Pieter von Donck." +</P> + +<P> +"They shall never hang me," said Geoffrey defiantly. +</P> + +<P> +"Spoken like a Dutchman," said the sailor. "But now to work. I have +as little mind as you to die out of season, for my shrift shall be as +short as yours if yonder little men pull me down. Scatter the fire, +and remove all traces of our camping-place, while I pull at my pipe and +think. The soldiers have a hard climb before them yet." +</P> + +<P> +Von Donck screwed the pieces of his wooden pipe together, filled the +bowl, and taking a brand from the fire, removed to the edge of the +cataract. There he sat, puffing great clouds, his eyes settled upon +the ravine, his face stony in thought, while Geoffrey swept the fire +into the cataract and obliterated all traces of the recent struggle +with the wild cat. +</P> + +<P> +"Bring me my panther hide," called Von Donck, rising with leisurely +movements. "We shall win a bloodless victory, and enjoy a laugh to +boot. Yonder lies the man to fight for us." +</P> + +<P> +He pointed with the stem of his pipe into the middle of the moon. +</P> + +<P> +Refusing to divulge more of his plan, Von Donck threw the pelt across +his shoulder and strode into the bush. Geoffrey followed, and the two +men struggled on for upwards of a mile, until the ground went away +sharply and the cataract thundered far below through a neck of rock +scarcely more than four feet in width. Here Von Donck halted and +steadied his body upon the brink. +</P> + +<P> +"If I fail to make this jump, reclaim my body from yonder depths, and +say that I fell like a soldier," he jested. +</P> + +<P> +Crossing the chasm, they descended, letting themselves from rock to +rock, and running whenever a sheep walk became visible. As they +entered the ravine the noise over the hills became more definite. +</P> + +<P> +"How is it they have tracked me?" asked Geoffrey as they ran. +</P> + +<P> +"I have no breath for idle talk," gasped his comrade. "They bring with +them an Indian, one of the cursed Algonquins, who shall tell when even +a bird has hopped across a stone." +</P> + +<P> +The climb began, up the face of the hills to the region of the moon. +The crystal wall was nowhere precipitous. When the summit had been +attained, Von Donck flung himself between the mighty lips of the +granite face and gasped heavily. Some minutes elapsed before speech +returned to him. +</P> + +<P> +"I would as soon carry a man upon my back as this weight of flesh," he +growled. "By San Nicolas, I did never so sweat in my life." +</P> + +<P> +"This is open rock, without tree or shelter," said Geoffrey +wonderingly. "We could have made a better stand in the bush." +</P> + +<P> +"Hasten yonder," ordered Von Donck. "Bring me as much dry wood as you +can bear, and ask no question, or I shall heave you down the face of +this cliff, which it has well-nigh killed me to climb." +</P> + +<P> +When Geoffrey returned with a few dry pine sticks, Von Donck was +collecting some moist moss from the underpart of the rocks. The moon +stood above the granite nose of the colossal face, and by her light the +Dutchman drew an imaginary line from the twin projections, which became +invested by distance with an exact similitude of the human mouth, to a +hole in the rock some twelve yards away. Here he built a fire, placing +above the grass and dry sticks a pile of white moss. Then he sat down +and well-nigh choked with laughter. +</P> + +<P> +"Prepare to strike a spark," he whispered. "But let no smoke arise if +you would escape hanging. The troop shall carry away with them a tale +to make these crystal mountains feared for ever." +</P> + +<P> +"What plan is this?" said Geoffrey irritably. "We stand upon the most +exposed spot of these mountains, and do you propose to light a fire so +that all who are concerned may know where we may be found?" +</P> + +<P> +"Control that voice and temper," whispered Von Donck. "Every sound +carries over yon ravine. Come, sit near me, and watch as pretty a +piece of art-magic as brain of man ever devised. Show not yourself +above the great face, or we are undone, and drop no spark into that +fire if you love your life." +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey crawled along the side of the face and lay flat beside the +Dutchman's knee. The latter proceeded: +</P> + +<P> +"The Indians have great fear of these mountains. I promise you yonder +Frenchmen are driving their guide at the point of the sword, and +feeling none too secure themselves at entering the devil's country. A +man who fights a good sword shall sweat when a bird screams o' night. +So soon as they show themselves the old man of the mountains shall lift +up his voice, and you shall find, boy, that his tongue is mightier than +our swords." +</P> + +<P> +When Von Donck had spoken a breath of wind swept the exposed ridge. As +it passed a faint groan arose from the rock, and passed, leaving them +staring at each other fearfully. +</P> + +<P> +"It was but the wind," Geoffrey muttered. +</P> + +<P> +"San Nicolas!" stammered the Dutchman. "This comes of playing with the +powers of darkness. 'Twas the groan of a lost spirit." +</P> + +<P> +"Stay!" whispered Geoffrey. "I thought that the sound proceeded from +yonder stone." +</P> + +<P> +His comrade regarded the round mass which had been indicated with +starting eyes, but when he saw nothing supernatural, crawled near and +examined it nervously, asking: +</P> + +<P> +"Think you some spirit is imprisoned within?" +</P> + +<P> +"See this hole?" exclaimed Geoffrey, pointing to a small aperture +visible at the base. "'Tis what they call a blow-stone, if I mistake +not. Here the wind enters and so makes the noise that we heard." +</P> + +<P> +"Soft," said Von Donck, vastly relieved. "Soft, or you spoil my plan." +</P> + +<P> +Setting his lips to the hole, Geoffrey sent his breath into the womb of +the rock. A subdued murmur beat upon the air and settled the matter +beyond dispute. Von Donck rocked himself to and fro, chafing his legs +with his podgy hands, scarlet with excitement. +</P> + +<P> +"A hundred thousand devils, but they shall run," he chuckled. "I had +purposed to use my own voice, but this is better far." +</P> + +<P> +The sound of other voices came in a murmur across the ravine. +</P> + +<P> +"To the fire," whispered the Dutchman. "Nurse the flame, and let it +not burst forth until I give the word." +</P> + +<P> +He scrambled up the side of the rock and looked over the giant's nose. +The opposite cliffs were bathed in moonlight, and the watcher saw two +men standing above the cataract. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, boy," he muttered deeply. "Let the fire burn, and when the +flames dart up choke them with the moss." +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey complied with the mysterious command; but as he pressed the +moss down and a cloud of smoke ascended, a mighty bellowing shook the +air, and he started round to behold Von Donck lying flat along the +rock, his grotesque face and bulging cheeks pressed against the +blow-stone, his body heaving like a gigantic bellows as he pumped his +breath into the hole. +</P> + +<P> +"More fire," came a choking whisper. "A strong flame, then smoke as +before." +</P> + +<P> +The flames darted up and whipped the moonbeams, the smoke followed, and +again the bellowing shocked the night. Then Von Donck scrambled up, +and his triumphant voice came down: +</P> + +<P> +"They run! They run!" +</P> + +<P> +The trackers were fleeing wildly from the crystal hills. Had they not +seen fire and smoke belched up from the mouth of that terrible face of +granite, and heard the giant's awful roars of anger? Headlong they +went, mad with terror, leaving their ponies in the bush. +</P> + +<P> +"Here is a brave victory," snorted Von Donck; and he gave vent to his +delight by turning a caracole upon the forehead of the giant. +</P> + +<P> +"Now for New Netherlands and Hudson's River!" he chanted, drawing at an +imaginary cable as he danced along the great stone face. "'Tis scarce +a hundred miles down to the sea. We have but to keep clear of Indians, +and all shall be well. Yonder are ponies for us to ride, and, I doubt +not, bags of provisions hanging to the saddles. We may laugh at +pursuit, boy. The French shall not dare to return. Take now my hands +and let me see you make a holiday caper. Higher! San Nicolas, the boy +shall make a dancing-master. Ha, Pieter von Donck! Pieter von Donck! +'Tis as cunning an old rogue as ever wore shoe-leather!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap25"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +NOVA ANGLIA. +</H4> + +<P> +Good fortune and fair weather smiled upon the two travellers during the +remainder of their journey, and not another notable adventure befell +them before they rode from the forest during the fall of day, and saw +the fenced fields of the Lincolnshire farmers stretching before them +down the Atlantic slope. Melancholy stumps of trees dotted the +prospect as far as the eye could travel; beyond, the thatched or wooden +roofs of small houses glowed in the strong light; and from the far +distance came the inspiring wash of the sea. +</P> + +<P> +Von Donck reined in his pony and fell from the saddle. "Dost now feel +at home?" he cried. +</P> + +<P> +Somewhat sadly Geoffrey shook his head. He was indeed grievously +disappointed to find New England so different from the old. He had +hoped to see neat hedgerows, compact farms, and sloping meadows, such +as he might have looked on in his native county of Berks. He had hoped +to see a wain creaking over the fields, to hear the crack of a whip and +the carter's cheery song. He saw nothing but poverty, small +beginnings, and the signs of a hard struggle for existence. Some men +were working in the distance. He could see the quick flash of their +axes and hear the solemn blows as steel bit the wood. Between dreary +lines of fencing, jagged stubs, patches of corn, showing yellow here +and there, springing from every cultivated foot of ground; beyond, some +acres of burnt ground, and those cold wooden houses with their enormous +chimneys, so altogether unlike the warm brickwork of Old England homes. +</P> + +<P> +"This is not Virginia?" he asked. +</P> + +<P> +"Virginia lies five hundred miles to the south, very far beyond +Hudson's River," replied Von Donck. "'Tis a fairer province than this, +and better settled, because older. Be not downcast, boy. Here thought +is free, and here a man may reap the full reward of his labours. You +shall find no tax, nor persecution, nor kingly oppression in this land. +Here the people rule for the people; and here you may worship God after +your own inclining, and dwell in peace all the days of your life." +</P> + +<P> +"It is a barren land," protested Viner. +</P> + +<P> +"What would you look for in the new world? That island of yours was +once a land of forest and swamp. The first man was put into the garden +to till it. Labour shall conquer here as elsewhere. Mark you the +richness of the soil and the purity of the air. Here you shall fear no +pestilence, and if your hands be not afraid to work you shall raise two +crops of corn in one season. Gold and silver there are none; but he +who owns an ox and has no corn may exchange with him who has corn but +wants for meat. In our settlement we use strings of wampum for +currency. A shell from the beach becomes gold when it shall buy a man +that which he lacks." +</P> + +<P> +The comrades drew back into the forest and waited for evening, because +Geoffrey would not advance alone, and Von Donck dared not risk his life +among the Puritans, who were at war with the people of New Netherlands. +They partook of their last meal together, and when the shadow of night +grew heavy upon the fields, Pieter rose and shook himself. +</P> + +<P> +"We have now come to the parting of our ways," he muttered. "You are +among your people. We will together cross yonder fields, and then you +shall wish me God-speed. The town of Boston lies upon your right hand. +I shall beat inland at the base of Connecticut, until I reach the bank +of Hudson's River, and there I am upon my own territory where no man +shall lead me. I shall ride beside the river until I come to the +little city of the Manhattoes, where William Kieft rules. San Nicolas! +How old Will the Testy shall stare and blow at his pipe when he sees +Pieter von Donck on the steps of his bowerie!" +</P> + +<P> +They set out upon the last stage along a trail between the whispering +corn. Von Donck had grown suddenly silent. He plucked at the panther +skin, snorting occasionally, and casting side glances at his companion, +who rode close to his side, intent upon the prospect of low houses and +broken bush. When Geoffrey at length leaned over with a warning to +point out the figure of a man, who was proceeding down a side path with +a dog at his heels, the old Dutchman replied by touching the shoulder +nearest him and saying: +</P> + +<P> +"Dost feel the smart of that wound yet?" +</P> + +<P> +"It is nothing," Geoffrey answered. "See you not that man advancing?" +</P> + +<P> +"The marks shall remain," went on Pieter solemnly. "The scar will be +there to remind you of a good friend in New Amsterdam. My lad, I shall +seek to hear of you. Each time I look on this skin I shall breathe a +wish for the happiness of the boy who saved my life in the crystal +hills. When you come to make your home in Virginia, send to Pieter von +Donck at the hostel by San Nicolas, and if he be alive, and not grown +too fat to walk, he will come out to meet you. Will not forget the old +rogue who tricked the French?" +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey put out his hand and grasped the podgy fingers. "May I meet a +traitor's end if I forget my friend," he answered. "Had it not been +for you my dry body would now be swinging in the wind of the mountains. +I wish you well, Pieter; I shall ever wish you well. Now ride! You +would not have me fight for you against my own people." +</P> + +<P> +"There is no English blood in him," snorted Von Donck. "A Dutchman, I +say, a Dutchman to the ends of his hair." +</P> + +<P> +The dog was bounding towards the travellers, and the farmer put up his +hand and hailed them. +</P> + +<P> +"We are Englishmen," Geoffrey called back. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, by the sack of San Nicolas, out upon you," shouted Von Donck. "I +am no Englishman. I am a Hollander, fellow, Hollander from head to +heel." +</P> + +<P> +"Ride!" exclaimed Geoffrey, smiting his comrade's mount. "God be with +you, Pieter." +</P> + +<P> +"And you, boy." +</P> + +<P> +Von Donck lashed his pony and the nimble animal bounded off to the +west, while Geoffrey dismounted, and, holding the savage dog at bay +with his sword, advanced to meet the owner of the land. +</P> + +<P> +"Do not fear, friend," he said, as they drew together. "I am no spy, +but an Englishman from the north. He who rides yonder is a friendly +Dutchman who has accompanied me upon the way. I pray you tell me is my +Lord Baltimore within the town?" +</P> + +<P> +The settler, a tall man in a quaker hat and black cloak, which fell +from his neck almost to the ground, regarded the speaker with cold, +unfavouring eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"You know little of this country, young sir, if you believe that Lord +Baltimore governs here," he replied at length. "You stand within the +province of Massachusetts beside the town of Boston, and the lord you +seek rules over the province of Maryland and that country to the west +of the bay of Chesapeake." +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey's heart sank at this chill reception, and he lowered his eyes +despondently before the stern gaze of the Puritan as he answered: +</P> + +<P> +"I come to pray for a ship and men to be sent against the French, who +hold the north. He who sent me, charging me to deliver this ring in +his name to Lord Baltimore, believes that his countrymen and mine will +not fail to help us in the time of need." +</P> + +<P> +"Put not your trust in Massachusetts," said the listener dourly. "We +have much ado to defend ourselves against the Mohicans and the pinch of +famine. We know not ourselves where to turn for aid, and your cry is +ours also. You have reached the valley of dry bones, young stranger." +</P> + +<P> +"The dry bones stood up in an exceeding great army," returned Geoffrey +boldly. +</P> + +<P> +"Even so. If it be God's will, we also shall stand up. What is the +name of him who sent you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Sir Thomas Iden." +</P> + +<P> +"Of county Kent?" +</P> + +<P> +"The same." +</P> + +<P> +"I have heard of that family as most loyal to the Crown. Arms, a +chevron between three close helmets, if my memory mistake not. I also +am from the south, driven out, like many a better man, by the hand of +persecution. Come now! I will lead you to the house of John Winthrop, +our governor." +</P> + +<P> +The town of Boston was then a mere village of distressful huts crowded +within a great palisade; the single street, which led to a quay of +closely-packed logs covered by stones with earth atop, was rough ground +over which the tyreless wheels of primitive carts jolted woefully. The +candle-light from a few windows shed a dreary gleam across the way, +where men closely muffled drifted along with a stern "Good-e'en." +There was neither laughter nor tavern-singing nor play-acting in that +cheerless town, no throwing of dice nor rattle of cups. The Puritan +mind was dominant; and the only sound of music that disturbed the +unhappy silence was the lugubrious droning of a psalm or sad-toned hymn. +</P> + +<P> +A lamp flickered near the entry, and beside the watchman, who kept the +light burning at the gate, stretched a board; and upon the board +appeared in short black letters the notice:— +</P> + +<P> +"No person within this province, professing to believe in Jesus Christ, +shall be in any ways troubled, molested, or discountenanced for his or +her religion, or in the free exercise thereof." +</P> + +<P> +"See!" said the guide, without a smile. "Here we have liberty!" +</P> + +<P> +At the entrance to a low house near the end of the street they stopped, +and the guide knocked. After a long interval a shutter was pushed back +and a voice demanded to know who it was that knocked. +</P> + +<P> +"A stranger from the north to see the governor," said the guide. +</P> + +<P> +The voice grumbled and lessened gradually, still grumbling, until it +sounded more loudly and the door opened. An old man stood on the +threshold, a lighted candle in his hand, the thick grease running upon +his fingers. He looked from one to the other, and cried in a shrill +voice: "The governor is with his reverence. The stranger must wait." +</P> + +<P> +"I am content to wait," said Geoffrey. +</P> + +<P> +Hearing a sound, he looked back, and saw the man who had brought him so +far already receding in the gloom of the street. The porter bade him +enter, and when he had done so provided him with a seat, and there left +him for a good hour, at the end of which time he reappeared in darkness +and said shortly: "Come!" +</P> + +<P> +The room into which Geoffrey was ushered contained all the marks of +extreme poverty. The light came from one great log glowing in the big +fireplace, for the night was chill with the breath of the sea and a +sharp north wind. Two figures occupied this comfortless room, one on +either side of the fire, the older man attired in the simple gown and +bands of a minister of religion; the other, dark, with luminous eyes +and white forehead, leaned forward, the long fingers of his right hand +trifling with his wig. Both were well-known in their generation. The +layman was John Winthrop; the minister Roger Williams. +</P> + +<P> +"You are welcome to Boston, sir," said Winthrop, without rising, but +merely lifting his head in the firelight to scan the face of the +visitor. "Come you to our town by chance?" +</P> + +<P> +"I come from the far north to seek aid," said Geoffrey, with a boyish +pride which caused Williams to frown. +</P> + +<P> +"<I>Terra incognita</I> indeed," he murmured. "A cold land where Popery is +rampant. How great is the distance, and how came you thence?" +</P> + +<P> +Geoffrey told his story and delivered his message. The two men watched +him intently, Winthrop always playing with his wig, Williams leaning +out with hands clasped over a massive Bible held upon his knee. When +Geoffrey had finished his tale, there was a moment of silence, broken +only by the spitting of the fire. Then the Puritans looked across the +hearth and smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"The poor man is the helper of the poor," murmured Williams. +</P> + +<P> +John Winthrop laughed bitterly. +</P> + +<P> +"When a poor man begs of me he has my all, and that I give to our poor +brethren in the north. They have my prayers. Young man," he went on, +rising and confronting the messenger, "you have nobly performed a noble +duty; but in coming to us you confront poverty indeed. Here night and +day we struggle for existence. I myself have gone to rest, knowing not +how to face the morrow. We have our wives and little ones to feed and +protect, and these are our first charge. Daily the cry goes out to us: +'We want.' Nightly we dread to hear the shout of 'Mohican invasion.' +We fight, not for fame nor for honour among nations, but for a foothold +upon this continent, where we are striving to plant a home for the +free, to the glory of God, and the shame of England who has cast us +out. Young man, you have done your duty." +</P> + +<P> +"And your help shall come from Heaven," murmured the divine deeply. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall proceed to Lord Baltimore. To him I was sent," said Geoffrey. +</P> + +<P> +"Go to him if you will, but the answer you shall there receive will be +that you have heard already," said Winthrop. "Virginia is in sore +straits, being unable to convey her tobacco crop to the Old World, +since there are no English ships to cross the seas." +</P> + +<P> +"Nevertheless I shall go," said Geoffrey. +</P> + +<P> +John Winthrop bowed his head. "You shall sleep under my roof this +night and accept what poor hospitality I have to offer. My friend and +servant shall minister to your needs." +</P> + +<P> +He made a slight movement of his hand to signify that the interview was +ended, and the messenger retired, sorely depressed at the manner of his +reception. The old man who had opened the door gave him food and +drink, asking no question and imparting no information; but continually +droning through his nose a hymn, or muttering in gloomy tones some sad +portion of the Scriptures. He was one of the most zealous of +Winthrop's company, all of whom were Nonconformists, but not +separatists. Indeed, they esteemed it an honour to call themselves +members of the English Church, and openly admitted that they had +emigrated in order that they might be divided from her corruptions, but +not from herself. For all his devotion, the old servant was not a +cheerful companion for a man who was already cast down in mind, and +Geoffrey was glad to be rid of him and alone in a cold, bare room, +which was as sad in all its details as the men who occupied the town. +</P> + +<P> +It was long before sleep came to the traveller. He had become so +accustomed to the open air that the atmosphere of his room stifled him. +When at last he succeeded in finding unconsciousness the boom of the +sea shook the house and occupied his brain. +</P> + +<P> +Morning came, and with it a heavy tramp of feet. A rough hand struck +the door, and the sleeper awakened with a start, to behold at his side +three men, cloaked and stern, the foremost holding a scrap of paper, to +which was affixed a red official seal. +</P> + +<P> +"Sir stranger, surrender yourself," he said. +</P> + +<P> +"What means this?" exclaimed Geoffrey. "I am an Englishman in a colony +of the English." +</P> + +<P> +"The charge against you is that of treason," replied the stern Puritan. +</P> + +<P> +"Treason!" repeated the young man; and rose dumbfounded. +</P> + +<P> +"It is suspected that you are a spy, in the employ of our enemies the +Dutch." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap26"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXVI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +STIGMA. +</H4> + +<P> +Thus Geoffrey became a prisoner among his own people, owing to the +friendliness of Von Donck, the honest Dutchman having failed to reckon +with the intense suspicion of the Puritan mind. When the manner of his +guest's arrival had been explained to John Winthrop, that pious +governor raised his eyebrows in astonishment, and did not hesitate to +give instructions for the new-comer to be held in close confinement, +pending an inquiry into the movements of the Dutch. While this +investigation was being pursued, justly and in good order as the +governor directed, or, in other words, with extreme slowness, many +notable events occurred in the disordered country of the north. +</P> + +<P> +The <I>St. Wenceslas</I> had slipped from her moorings and drifted down the +St. Lawrence, bearing La Salle towards Acadie, and certain despatches +which were destined for the chief minister of France. Unwillingly +Roussilac had been compelled to record the services rendered to Church +and State by the proud departing priest. +</P> + +<P> +"You have well served yourself, Sir Commandant," La Salle had said, +after insisting upon his right to peruse the detailed history of the +Iroquois defeat, which contained no word of reference to the assistance +rendered by the Algonquins. "And now, by Heaven, you shall serve me." +And Roussilac, for all his ill will, was not strong enough to dare +resist the priest. +</P> + +<P> +There yet remained in that district the Kentish knight, old Penfold, +and the Puritan; and when the man of Kent came to learn of La Salle's +departure, he left his solitary cave, and buckled on his sword, and +returned to action, though the dream of his life had vanished. His +younger brother, the fool of the family, who from boyhood had spent his +days in idleness, trolling for pike or chasing with his dogs, would +continue to occupy the old mansion which the elder had abandoned, and +leave it, as he had been empowered to do failing news from the New +World, to his son, when the days of fishing and the chase should be +accomplished. +</P> + +<P> +The knight came to his home beside the lost waters, and his wife, who +had visited him each day with food in the lonely cave, received him +with her proud silence and stood to hear his will. She it was who had +told him of the sailing of the ship and the going of La Salle. +</P> + +<P> +"Let us also travel to this land of Acadie," the knight said. "My +Richard haunts me with reproaches. I go to make ready our canoe for +the long journey. My mind shall find no rest till I have avenged our +son." +</P> + +<P> +He went out and built a fire upon the beach, and while the lumps of +pitch, prepared from native bitumen mixed with pine resin, were +melting, he peeled soft sheets of bark from the snowy birch trees and +patched the canoe, caulking every seam with pitch. About the time of +the evening shadow his work was done; but as he was returning to his +home a voice called, and the Puritan hastened to his side. +</P> + +<P> +"Welcome, friend," said the knight. "How fares it with you and your +brave comrade?" +</P> + +<P> +"We suffer who sojourn in Mesech," said Hough. "Old Penfold lies +grievously sick of a fever." +</P> + +<P> +"Dwell you far away?" the knight asked. +</P> + +<P> +"Nigh upon two miles by land and water. We have returned to the cave +which we occupied before our taking of the Dutch ship." +</P> + +<P> +"My wife shall prepare a medicine. She is well skilled in the arts of +healing," said the other. "You shall bring us to your cave with all +speed." +</P> + +<P> +"The disease has already taken hold upon his mind," said Hough. "One +time he is holding his mother's gown, old man though he be, and +wandering in water-meadows to pluck long purples and clovers, muttering +as he picks at his blanket. 'Here is trefoil, good for cattle, but +noisome to witches.' Another time he reaches for his sword, and +swears—the Lord forgive him—at the weakness which holds him down. +'The French are upon us, comrades,' he calls. 'Let me not lie like an +old dame with swollen legs.' Then he falls a-crying, and shouts, +'England! England!' Methinks if his mind were healed he would stand +up again." +</P> + +<P> +Mary Iden being summoned, and having made her preparations, the three +set forth and came to the cave, which the adventurers had hoped to +exchange for the Dutch vessel, then lying fathoms deep beneath the +cliffs of Tadousac. There they found Penfold stretched along a heap of +grass, babbling incessantly at the cold walls and the shadows. When +the figures darkened the entrance, he screamed at them and sprang up, +only to fall back upon the rude bed, a fever-held body agitated by +stertorous breath. +</P> + +<P> +"Build me here two fires," said the quiet woman, as she passed to the +sick man's side. +</P> + +<P> +"Witch!" shrieked Penfold. "Flower! Woodfield! Comrades, where are +ye? Save me now from sorcery. Hough! Go bring the villagers, and bid +them fling this hag into the Thames and pelt her with stones when she +rises. To me, comrades! Leave not your old captain to perish by +witchcraft." +</P> + +<P> +"Canst heal him from this madness?" muttered Hough. "Myself I dared +not let his blood, fearing lest I might do that which should hasten his +end." +</P> + +<P> +"Our people let no blood," came the answer. "We bring great heat into +the body, so that the evil spirit shall come forth to seek water. Then +we strengthen the body, so that it may be able to resist his return." +</P> + +<P> +Already Penfold ceased to struggle beneath her soothing hands. The +fires blazed fiercely, the smoke and hot vapours being drawn upwards +into the natural chimneys. Obeying instructions, the men placed their +sick comrade between these fires and covered him closely, while the +skilful healer moistened his brow and lips with water in which she had +steeped the young pink bark of the bitter willow, thus wringing the +fever out of his body like water from a sponge. +</P> + +<P> +"I am saving the old man," she whispered in a confident voice. +</P> + +<P> +At the end of another hour the limp rag of humanity was steeped in +sleep. By then the night was strong and the stars little orbs in +splendour among the clouds. The breathing which the men heard when +Mary Iden rose from her knees might have been that of a little child. +</P> + +<P> +"The evil spirit has been driven forth to find water. Lift the man +quickly; for the foul creature travels faster than the moonlight." +</P> + +<P> +Obedient to superior knowledge, the men reconveyed the sleeper to the +grass bed, and there the healer roused him to administer a decoction of +bruised herbs: serrated calamintha, the perfoliate eupator, later more +popularly known as the fever-wort of North America, and the white-rayed +pyrethrum, which lifted its bitter bloom upon the heights. The sick +man gasped as he swallowed the powerful tonic, and sank back into +untroubled rest. +</P> + +<P> +Presently the knight and his wife departed, and Hough accompanied them +upon the first stage of their return journey; and when they reached the +lake-side, where the canoe sprawled along the shingle, the knight +acquainted his fellow-countryman with his plan of departure. Hough +listened, gazing dimly over the scintillating surface, where a silver +ribbon of moonlight led away to the Isle of Dreams. +</P> + +<P> +"Where lies that land whither you go?" he asked at length. +</P> + +<P> +"In the far east where Sebastian Cabot first touched," the Kentishman +replied. "There I may sight the great ocean, which we islanders love, +and scent the good brine and watch for an English sail." +</P> + +<P> +"Here there is nothing we may do," said Hough, removing his eyes from +the dreamy lake. "There surely we may look for the ship which Lord +Baltimore shall send when Viner comes down to Virginia. I too would be +near the sea and smell liberty." +</P> + +<P> +With that they parted, and Hough returned to his hole among the rocks +with visions of the sea. Within that cave, where Penfold slept during +his guardian's absence, the fires darted, tincturing with red the +silver of the moonbeams against the sable wall of cliff. Between the +granite and the forest of pines a stream of moonlight spread like a +glacier. A figure stole from the black belt, stepped cautiously into +the white road, and waded, as it were, through the rippling beams. It +was Onawa, who had watched the two men and her sister making west; she +knew that one of the men would return after a little interval; and she +understood that the work which she had undertaken must be done quickly. +</P> + +<P> +No croaking bird aroused Penfold from his sleep to warn him of the +she-wolf. It was one of those ironies which run through life that one +sister should have cast the sick man into healthy slumber in order that +the other might stab him as he lay. +</P> + +<P> +A cloud of blood-sucking insects trumpeted around Onawa. Their thin +noise seemed to her a tumult, and she stopped and looked back along the +cold white stream. A lean wolf was slinking in her direction, his +muzzle snuffling the dust. She shivered when she remembered that the +murderess was doomed to become a werewolf after death to prowl about +the scene of her former sin. The creature howled. The pale girl +started and ran into the cave. +</P> + +<P> +Her belief remained constant that she might still win the love of La +Salle by destroying his enemies. She knew that he had gained renown by +her betrayal to him of the English settlement. Now he had gone in the +great ship to Acadie. She was about to follow, having neither home nor +people, being indeed hunted for her life; but first she might destroy +another of his enemies. Then she could learn to say: "I have killed +the old Englishman who stirred up my people to attack yours." And she +thought that he might welcome her at last for the sake of her good +deeds. +</P> + +<P> +A frightened howl broke upon the night. The wolf, disturbed by some +enemy of its species, was hurrying for cover. The crisp snapping of +twigs, succeeded by a rattling of small stones, were caused, not by the +pads of the black loup-garou, but by a body weightier and less +cowardly. These sounds were deadened by the walls of rock, and Onawa +did not hear them. Swiftly she drew away the coverings from the +white-faced sleeper, and old Penfold smiled innocently at her in his +drugged sleep. Onawa drew in her breath, unsheathed her knife, and +felt its point; then leaned back, measuring the distance by the faint +glow, and her arm went up to strike. That next moment she screamed +with terror, turned, struck wildly at the air, and was carried back to +the granite floor with Hough's iron fingers driven round her throat. +</P> + +<P> +Step by step the grim Puritan dragged the girl back to the mouth of the +cave, and there pinned her to the rock with one arm, while reaching +with the other to the corner, where he had piled a rope taken from the +deck of the privateer. He bound her hand and foot; and thus helpless +she stared up, and read her death upon his face. +</P> + +<P> +For over an hour Hough paced the floor of the cave, listening to his +captain's gentle breathing, and recalling the violent death of +Athaliah, slain by order of Jehoiada, and the fate of Jezebel, cast +from an upper window at the command of Jehu; for such a man as the +Puritan regulated all the actions of his life by the light revealed to +him from the Bible. There was, he reasoned, the highest authority to +justify the act which he contemplated; only the manhood in him recoiled +from the slaying of a woman. At length his mind became fixed. He bent +and drew together the scarlet embers of the fire. +</P> + +<P> +Onawa made no sign of terror, and no appeal for mercy; but her eyes +followed every movement of her stern captor, as she sought to learn her +sentence without betraying her fear. +</P> + +<P> +"The witch is fair," the Puritan muttered, standing over and regarding +her fawn-coloured skin, her even features, and large dark eyes. "A +woman takes pride in her beauty. May the Lord punish me if I act now +unjustly and for vengeance alone." +</P> + +<P> +He pushed a stick into the fire and watched it grow red, then turned +sharply upon his victim. The girl's eyes flashed defiance when they +met his. +</P> + +<P> +"Behold!" he exclaimed, drawing a thin hand across his terrible face, +upon which the Court of Star Chamber had written its unjust judgment. +The girl saw the slit nostrils, the cropped ears, the branded cheeks, +and the scarred forehead. Her tongue became loosened at that sight, +and she prayed for instant death, because she knew it was vain to plead +for mercy. +</P> + +<P> +Outside the cave the long black wolf, which if native testimony were +accepted, contained the soul of some sorcerer, or of some vile man who +had slain his friend, crept back to search for scraps of food. As a +cloud drifted over the moon the brute dropped a bone which it had +snatched, and scurried away like a human thief into the shadows, +terrified by a wild scream from within the granite cave. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap27"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXVII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +REVELATION. +</H4> + +<P> +Had Madame Labroquerie continued firm in her resolve never to approach +the fortress while her nephew ruled, all might have been well; but +unfortunately for her daughter, and, as it was to prove, for herself, +the bitter little woman permitted her longing to enter again into the +affairs of the world to prevail over her hatred for the commandant, and +so suffered herself to be brought to the citadel, railing savagely +throughout the journey. Before a week had passed she revealed herself +fully as an unnatural mother and an implacable foe. Yet, to do justice +to even a worker of evil, it must be admitted that Madeleine, with all +her sweetness, was a sore trial to a fanatical Catholic and bigoted +patriot, for she refused to be ashamed of her heresy, and was never +weary of singing the praise of her English lover. +</P> + +<P> +Left to themselves, neither Laroche, now the head of the Church in that +district, nor Roussilac would have taken action against the lovely +sinner; but Madame, in one of her fits of ungovernable anger, publicly +preferred two charges against her daughter, accusing her of heresy and +treason, and calling upon the Church to punish her for the one offence +and the State to exact a penalty for the other. +</P> + +<P> +These were grave indictments, but both priest and layman closed their +ears, the former not wishing to be troubled by unpleasant duties, the +latter hanging back, not on account of the tie of relationship, but +because of Madeleine's beauty. But when Madame, in another fit of +fury, openly denounced the commandant before D'Archand, who for the +second time had arrived at that coast, as a Lutheran at heart, and a +protector of the enemies of the Church, he was driven to act for the +sake of his ambition. So Madeleine was arrested and confined in a +small stone hut high upon the cliff, and before her door a sentry paced +both by day and night, while Laroche, with many deep grumblings, was +compelled to undertake the uncongenial task of saving the fair girl's +soul. +</P> + +<P> +To the credit of the priest, be it said that he was charitable. He +believed Madeleine had been perverted from the right way by some spell +of witchcraft, and this belief was strengthened by the fact that, when +he adjured the girl by the tears of the Saviour to weep, she merely +laughed at him. It was notorious that a guilty witch was unable to +shed tears. Accordingly Laroche attended himself to the obvious duty +of exorcising the evil spirit which had taken up its abode in her; but, +in spite of all his efforts, the girl remained as wickedly obstinate as +before. +</P> + +<P> +"The Church acts towards her children with wondrous love, and because +of that love may chasten," the abbé preached. "'Tis the duty of the +faithful within the fold to bring in the wandering sheep, either by +suasion or by force. Being bewitched, my daughter, you stand in great +peril, and we, by the powers entrusted unto us, may remove that danger, +when reasoning fails, by bodily torment. Be converted, and your soul +shall live. Remain in your unbelief, and punishment shall follow, +because a living heretic is a danger to the world and a dishonour to +the holy saints." +</P> + +<P> +Even such sound doctrine as this failed to move the heart of Madeleine, +and each day Laroche grumbled louder at his failure, and Roussilac +shrank yet more from bringing his cousin to trial, and Madame became +more stinging in speech and more furious in her awful passions, because +of the suffering of her mind during lucid moments, when she could see +herself in sunny Normandy once more young and sane. Her hatred for +Roussilac increased, until she would spit and snarl at him when he +passed, and scream: "Infidel! This shall be known in France. Power +shall fall from you, and the people shall curse your name." And when +the men who had been sent after Geoffrey returned afoot with their tale +of failure, Madame Labroquerie made it known from the ship to the +citadel that it was the commandant who had secured the spy's safety for +the love of his heretic cousin. +</P> + +<P> +Coward as he was in many ways, Roussilac at length saw that he must act +or be dishonoured; he must either release Madeleine or bring her to +trial for treason. The former alternative was impossible, because the +girl was an ecclesiastical prisoner. The lightest sentence he could +pass for treason was banishment, and he could not endure the prospect +of losing Madeleine. Besides, when he had sentenced her, she still +remained to be judged by the clerical court. It needed a wiser brain +than Roussilac's to solve so tangled a problem. Nevertheless, he +resolved to attempt it. After some speech with Laroche, who was +heartily weary of the whole business, the commandant passed from the +church of Ste. Mary, after the hour of vespers, and ascended the +winding path which led towards the hut where the impenitent was +imprisoned. The sentry saluted as the governor approached, then +resumed his march along the brown scar which the constant tread had +made. +</P> + +<P> +"Withdraw yonder," Roussilac ordered. +</P> + +<P> +A happy voice broke out, as he put up his hand to the door: +</P> + +<P> +"There is the sun upon the side of the wall. So it is already evening. +Time flies as fast in prison as elsewhere. I pray you, sun, shine upon +Geoffrey rather than on me!" +</P> + +<P> +Cribbed and confined as the girl was, she steadily refused to be cast +down, because she was assured that life had far better things in store. +Her lover was pursued, but then she knew he would escape. Her body +might be held in prison, but her spirit was free, flying over forest +and hill, and singing like a lark against the clouds. +</P> + +<P> +Her note changed when Roussilac flung open the door and stood before +her in a flood of light. +</P> + +<P> +"Cousin," Madeleine said coldly. "You break upon me suddenly. I had +better company before you came. Why do you drive my friends away?" +</P> + +<P> +The commandant closed the door and stepped forward, his sallow face +working. +</P> + +<P> +"You are alone," he said. "None dare visit you without permission." +</P> + +<P> +"I am never alone," she declared. "My friends left me when you +entered; but they shall return when you depart." +</P> + +<P> +"Am not I a friend? Nay, more—I am a relation," began Roussilac; but +she checked him with the reproof: "I have no family now that Jean-Marie +is dead." +</P> + +<P> +"Your mother," he reminded her. +</P> + +<P> +"She has delivered me into the power of the Church." +</P> + +<P> +"Because it is best for you. I would care for your body, Madeleine, as +your mother cares for your soul. Cousin, think not unkindly of me. I +would release you; but what power have I to remove the judgment of the +Abbé Laroche? He has sentenced you to close confinement, until——" +</P> + +<P> +"My lover returns to release me," she finished, and backed from him +with a laugh. +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac clenched his fingers tightly, and jealousy venomed the words +which then left his lips: +</P> + +<P> +"Foolish girl, would you rouse all the evil in me? Bear with me, +cousin," he went on quickly. "It is not in me to endure patiently. +Since that day when I stood before you in the grove I have not known +the meaning of peace. My nights have been long, my days dark, my +position unprofitable——" +</P> + +<P> +Again she interrupted him, to simplify what she knew must follow: +</P> + +<P> +"Because you think that you love me." +</P> + +<P> +He stepped forward to seize her hands; but she drew back and steadied +herself against the wall. +</P> + +<P> +"I do love you, sweet cousin." +</P> + +<P> +"You do not love me. Need I give you the lie when your own tongue +gives it you? Is it love when the nights become long, and the day +dark, and position brings no pleasure? Arnaud, I love, and am held in +prison; but my nights are short, my days warm, and my position is a +happiness. Believe you that love, however unrequited, takes away from +life? I tell you it adds, it enriches, it beautifies. It is a crown +which makes a humble man a king, and the halo which makes the +singing-girl a saint. Love gives a man strength to use his power, to +defy superstition and false religion, to snap his fingers in the face +of a fat priest who believes that a strong will may be bent and broken +by holding the body in bondage. Had I my heart to offer I would scorn +your cowardly love." +</P> + +<P> +He had faced her while she spoke, but when she stopped he turned, and, +feeling the sting of her eyes, savagely pulled at the cloak which had +drifted from his shoulders. +</P> + +<P> +"My mother has sent you," said Madeleine. +</P> + +<P> +"She and I are bitter enemies," came the sullen answer. "I have but +borne with her for your sake. She seeks to stir up mischief all the +day long." He turned abruptly. "Have you no kind word for me, little +cousin?" +</P> + +<P> +He looked worn and old, and the girl pitied him; but she was too honest +to deceive by fair speech. +</P> + +<P> +"You brought me to this place against my will," she reminded him. "I +was happy in our cabin beyond the river. You have played into the +hands of my mother, who desires to see me punished because I have +abjured her faith. Would you have brought me here had you found the +plain country maid you had looked to see?" +</P> + +<P> +"I swore to your brother to protect you." +</P> + +<P> +"Do not recall that death scene, I pray you," she said firmly. "If the +spirit of Jean-Marie looks down upon us now, he finds you—protecting +me!" +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac winced as that shot struck him. "Blame me not," he said more +submissively. "Were you a civil prisoner only, I would open this door, +and you should go as free as air. My purpose in coming to you is to +urge you to free yourself." +</P> + +<P> +"Never at the price demanded. Arnaud, I put your courage to the test. +I trow that the man who loves a woman will for her sake perform what +she may demand, even though he lose position for it. Open the door, +and lead me to Father Laroche, and say to him: 'Father, I have taken it +upon myself to release your prisoner, since it shames me to see flesh +and blood of mine confined against her will in the fortress over which +I rule.' Do so, Arnaud, and I shall believe in you." +</P> + +<P> +"It is madness to ask it," said Roussilac loudly. +</P> + +<P> +"Let us have the truth. You dare not." +</P> + +<P> +"It is so," he confessed. "I dare not set myself against the Church, +which has the power to consign a man's soul to hell." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine smiled contemptuously. +</P> + +<P> +"If you would search your heart and read truly what there you find, I +should hear a different answer. You do not fear Father Laroche. He +does not wish to hold me here. Rather would he cast me from his mind, +that he might have more time to spend at the tavern and his brawls. I +will tell you what you fear: your actions are watched, your words +criticised. If you let me free, it would be rumoured that you were +false to the faith. That rumour would be wafted across seas, and your +enemies at home would see to it that you were recalled and relegated to +the obscurity from which you have arisen. You would rather treat your +cousin as a courtesan than abate one fragment of the pitiful power +which shall some day fall from your body like a rag. Now, my +commandant, are you answered?" +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac said not a word when he saw the scorn in those violet eyes. +He merely put out his hand, and opened the door, muttering, as though +to himself: "That pride shall break when she knows." +</P> + +<P> +"Know?" cried Madeleine. "What should I know?" +</P> + +<P> +He looked at her savagely, feeling that it was in him to make her +suffer. +</P> + +<P> +"That your lover is hanged at my command." +</P> + +<P> +He closed the door quickly and fastened it, half hoping, half dreading, +to hear the scream of anguish which he believed must follow. But there +came to him as he waited a peal of joyous laughter, and the happy words: +</P> + +<P> +"Geoffrey, Geoffrey! would that you could hear that! Dead! Why, my +love, you are full of life. Were you to die, which God indeed forbids, +your dear spirit would fly at once to me. Dead! Have I not seen you +in my dreams? Do not I see you now walking within sight of the New +England fields? Oh, Geoffrey! Near—how near! Who is that great man +riding beside you, a panther skin across his shoulder? How noisily he +talks ... and now leans over, and pats you on the arm. Ah, gone—gone! +And he would have me think that you are hanged!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap28"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXVIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +BODY AND MIND. +</H4> + +<P> +Roussilac strode towards the river, and in that hour found it in his +heart to envy the meanest settler in the land. Like many a man who has +risen from the ranks, he found himself destitute of friends. He had +cut himself off from his own relations, lest they should hinder his +ascent, and none had come to take their place; the captains of noble +birth, his official equals, having refused to receive into friendship +the son of a Normandy farmer. The home government was but using what +military talents he possessed to their advantage; and when his services +had been rendered, he would be cast aside by the proud priest who ruled +the destinies of France, and another chosen in his stead. +</P> + +<P> +"Courage!" he muttered. "'Tis but imagination which makes a weakling +of me. I will to D'Archand, and inquire of him whether or no my name +be yet in favour. Then to stand up like a man, and sweep away my +enemies, let them be priests, relations, or demons." +</P> + +<P> +D'Archand was idling upon deck, but at a word from the commandant +entered his curtained cabin and produced a flask of Burgundy as an aid +to conversation. First Roussilac sought to hear more particularly the +news of the world, and induced the master to expatiate upon the +revolution of the Scottish Covenanters, the struggle of Charles for +money and ships, the resolute stand of John Pym for just law, the +prosperity of France under Richelieu, and the breaking of the short +treaty between that country and Holland. D'Archand warmed to his +discourse under the influence of the wine and a thrill of patriotism, +as he concluded: "I have but recently crossed the high seas without +sighting a hostile vessel. The Dutch privateers have gone home empty. +The English coffers are bare. France now holds the world. I drink to +the Cardinal and our King." +</P> + +<P> +Abstractedly Roussilac lifted his glass. When the master leaned over +and emptied the flask between them, the commandant observed, with an +assumption of indifference: "Didst hear any word of praise for my work +in this land?" +</P> + +<P> +"My stay was short," D'Archand answered. "I heard no talk of you, +commandant—at least, not upon the streets, and to be spoken of in the +street is the only fame, I take it. But there were rumours afloat +regarding the Abbé La Salle." +</P> + +<P> +"Perdition!" muttered Roussilac. "Shall these priests never confine +themselves to their own affairs?" +</P> + +<P> +"Your princes of the Church are statesmen now rather than priests," +said the master. "The Abbé La Salle comes of a renowned family. 'Twas +said that he is wasted in this colony. I also heard it said—accept +the rumour as you will—that his Holiness has set a cross against his +name." +</P> + +<P> +"What means that?" asked the commandant hastily. +</P> + +<P> +"Urbano the Eighth, who, I may tell you, has recently bestowed the +title of Eminence upon his Cardinals, having suitably enriched his +family and acquired the Duchy of Urbino, now seeks strong men, priests +who are fighters rather than scholars, to aid him in the execution of +his plans, and he who has the cross set against his name may be assured +of sudden promotion. A canon of Notre Dame, who is much in favour with +Cardinal Richelieu, informed me that La Salle may immediately be +recalled. His Holiness will raise a parish priest to the cardinalate, +through the grades of canon, dean, and bishop, in a month or less, +according to his necessity for that man's help." +</P> + +<P> +"The <I>St. Wenceslas</I> now bears for home with my despatches," said +Roussilac moodily. "I have mentioned the abbé as instrumental in +holding heretics at bay." +</P> + +<P> +"His Holiness loves a fighter," muttered D'Archand significantly, as he +opened another flask of Burgundy. +</P> + +<P> +A light glimmered here and there when Roussilac made his way homeward, +and the murmur of the forest brushed his ears as he passed. The news +of another man's advancement hurt his selfish nature as though it were +a premonition of his own failure. He hesitated where the path split, +then hastened to his house, entered, and immediately found himself in +the presence of his aunt, who awaited his coming, knitting her fingers +in the lamplight. +</P> + +<P> +"So!" she snapped, her little face hard and wrinkled like a sour apple. +"We have now open treachery at headquarters. Treachery against Church +and State. You, the representative of the King, the upholder of the +faith! You shall be stripped of your power and be disgraced. And I +will walk a hundred miles barefoot, if there be need, to see sentence +executed upon you." +</P> + +<P> +Her attack was ill-timed. The commandant was then in no mood to bear +with a mutinous subject, though she had been his own mother. +</P> + +<P> +"Out of my sight," he said fiercely. "Out, I say. Madame, my +forbearance is at an end, and I will be obeyed. Would you have me +forget that you are a woman and a relative?" +</P> + +<P> +"Since you have forgot your duty to God and the King, forget that +also," screamed the little woman. "Seducer, what have you done with my +daughter? Where have you hidden her? Abductor! You shall learn what +it means to defy Holy Church. Tell me, where have you taken her?" +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac's anger cooled at that, and he lowered his voice as he +answered: "I left my cousin not three hours ago in the place where she +is confined as an impenitent by the judgment of the Abbé Laroche. +There you shall find her." +</P> + +<P> +"Arnaud," shrieked Madame, "deceive your men, cheat a priest, you may, +but you shall not so prevail upon me. I know your deeds and the +vileness of your heart. As a child you were ever false; as a man you +hated your own people, because you had risen and they remained obscure; +and now you stand before the mother of the girl whose heart you have +helped to harden, whom you have taken and hidden for your own purpose, +and ask her what she means when she demands to know the truth." +</P> + +<P> +"If you have information, I will in my official capacity hear it," +Roussilac answered. "But forget not that my nature can be fiercer than +yours, and do not tempt my power." +</P> + +<P> +"Your power!" sneered Madame. "It has already departed from you. I +thank you, Arnaud, for having disowned your honest family. How ill the +cloak of innocence lies upon your shoulders! Madeleine's cell stands +empty, as you know well. Beside the door the sentry lies stabbed +through the heart, murdered by your hand as surely as though you +yourself had driven home the dagger. I have but come from there, and +none know what has been done, save you the doer, and I the accuser." +</P> + +<P> +Roussilac caught up his cloak, and wrapped it about his shoulders. +"What took you to her prison?" he demanded, his own nature being no +less suspicious than hers. +</P> + +<P> +Madame laughed furiously. +</P> + +<P> +"You are a brave rogue, Arnaud. You plot, and murder, and seduce, and +smile through it all, and act the innocent like a mime. Know that +Father St Agapit came to me—a haughty priest, with no respect for +age—to recommend that Madeleine should be entrusted to his care, that +he might obtain her conversion by a new method. 'Let her not be +crossed,' quoth he. ''Tis human nature to offend more deeply in the +front of opposition. I would let her go free, and win her by gentle +persuasion to the fold.' What does a priest know of the pride of a +girl's heart? 'Is the branch broken by persuasion for the fire?' said +I. 'No, you shall take it in hand strongly and break it by force.' To +that the abbé said, 'You shall not compare the inanimate thing with the +living creature whom God has gifted with free-will. Go now to her and +be gentle. Try her with mother's milk rather than with the strong meat +of human nature. I have bidden the sentry admit you.' So I went to +win my erring child as the priest taught me, for I never yet have +disobeyed a Churchman, and what I found you know." +</P> + +<P> +"You are right, Madame, if what you say be true," said Roussilac +sternly. "There is treachery here." +</P> + +<P> +"Behold my hand! It points at the traitor," screamed the pale woman, +her fury surging back upon her. "You shall not escape with your +fellow-sinner. You shall not go from me until I hear from your own +lips where you have placed Madeleine, my child." +</P> + +<P> +"Woman, I know nothing," he snarled. "Is my position nothing to me +that I should play so loosely?" +</P> + +<P> +A cry of animal rage broke that instant from his throat. Madame had +dashed upon him, and, before he could beat her back, had clawed his +face like a maddened bird from cheek-bones to chin. +</P> + +<P> +At that terrible indignity the pusillanimous spirit of the commandant +was sobered into resolution. He hurled her back screaming, and put up +a hand to his burning face. The finger-tips came away reddened. +</P> + +<P> +He shivered from head to foot. Madame was raving. Roussilac steadied +himself, then walked from that place, a cold, sinister figure, the +howling of the mad woman pealing into his ears. +</P> + +<P> +Scarce a minute had elapsed before he returned, accompanied by two +soldiers; and again facing Madame Labroquerie, whose bloodless face was +distorted with the fury of her terrible nature, issued his orders in a +pitiless voice: +</P> + +<P> +"Secure that woman, and keep her in ward this night." He raised his +hand, and smiled vengefully at the marks on his fingers, as he drew off +his ring, which he extended to the man nearest him with the words: +"Take your authority. Spare not force, if force be wanted. Restore +this ring to me after sunrise, when you shall have hanged this woman +upon the eastern side of the fortress." +</P> + +<P> +Again Roussilac smiled, and, turning quickly, passed outside. One +terrible scream made him lift his hands to his ears, then he hurried up +the steep path, to see with his own eyes the cold body of the sentry, +and the empty cell, and to learn that Madame had not lied. +</P> + +<P> +For a few moments he stood, like a man in a trance, seeing indeed his +problem solved, but knowing that Madeleine was lost to him. He turned +to the dead body, and commanded it to speak; and when he understood +that the spirit had passed for ever from his discipline, he spurned the +cold matter with his foot, and in a fury cried: "I would give my +position and all I have to hear this dead man speak." +</P> + +<P> +"Listen, then," said a cold voice. "The dead are not silent." And +Roussilac cried out with superstitious fear, then started, when he +beheld a tall figure proceeding from the shadow of the doorway, and +recognised St Agapit, the priest. +</P> + +<P> +"Who has done this?" he demanded. "What lover of this girl has dared +to enter the fortress, to stab one of my guards, and carry her off +beneath my eye?" +</P> + +<P> +"I am no reader of riddles," said St Agapit. "I came here to reason +with the maid, because it seemed to me that her heart, young as it is +and tender, must surely respond to the message of love. Why she +refuses the only faith by which mortals may be saved passed my +understanding. But now I know that she has been driven into heresy by +the neglect of a father and the unnatural spirit of a mother, and +strengthened in her sin by the persecution of a cousin." +</P> + +<P> +"Father, I loved her." +</P> + +<P> +"Not so. You shall find at your heart passion, but not the warmth of +love. It is not the ice which produces the plant and the flower. It +is the warm rain and the sunshine. You offered her the storm, and +wondered because she desired the sun." +</P> + +<P> +"Where has she gone?" cried the blind man. +</P> + +<P> +"To freedom. My blessing follows her, unbeliever though she be." +</P> + +<P> +The ascetic moved forward, thin and stern, and made the sign of the +cross over the fallen sentry. +</P> + +<P> +"Bless me also," cried Roussilac, catching at his skirt. "Father, I +have done much evil. Bless me before you go." +</P> + +<P> +"I may pity where I may not bless," said St Agapit, and passed with +that same dignified step which awed the Iroquois into silence when on a +distant day they led him out to die. His shadow flickered once upon +the slope, went out, and the governor was alone with the dead. +</P> + +<P> +The soldiers who had been left to execute their commander's unnatural +order glanced fearfully at one another, and he who held the ring +muttered a charm against the evil eye. That cry of impotent rage, +which had caused Roussilac to stop his ears, fell from the lips of +Madame Labroquerie so soon as her mind caught the meaning of her +sentence; and when the men at length advanced to take her, she writhed +and bit the air, and hurled after her nephew words of execration which +caused the soldiers to draw back and cross themselves in terror. All +the hate and madness of the unhappy woman's ruined mind poured forth in +one awful torrent, until she sank to the floor and settled there to +silence. +</P> + +<P> +Then the men took courage to seize her, believing that the blood which +they saw issuing from her mouth was produced by the wounds which her +own teeth had inflicted; but when the body fell limp in their arms they +realised that nature had intervened. +</P> + +<P> +One at the head, the other at the feet, they carried through the night +the silent shape of Madame Labroquerie, who was never to move, never to +rave, again. Yet so blindly obedient to their officer's word of +command were these men in the ranks, that they carried the body out and +executed sentence upon it an hour after sunrise in the valley of St. +Charles. +</P> + +<P> +At that same hour rumour went about the fortress—set in motion by a +sentry, who had seen the governor rushing down to the forest during the +night—to the effect that Roussilac was lying under a spell of +witchcraft. This rumour became an established fact when the Abbé +Laroche was seen proceeding from the church upon the hill with asperges +brush and a shell of holy water. +</P> + +<P> +"Such is the end of ambition," murmured St Agapit, when they had +brought him the evil tidings. "Can a clay body resist free spirits of +the dead?" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap29"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXIX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +WOMAN'S LOVE IS LIFE. +</H4> + +<P> +Before we leave the fortress, to return thither no more, a glance must +be taken at Madeleine, evading the power of the Church and the secular +arm, escaping from the mother who had grown to hate her and the cousin +who had not courage to shield her. Her rescuer was not a man—if it be +true that man was made in the image of God—yet his actions upon that +night went far to prove that he owned a human heart. +</P> + +<P> +So soon as Roussilac had gone from his cousin's sight for ever, the +tramp of the sentry's feet began again beating out the seconds like a +clock. The girl was unable to see the soldier, but at regular +intervals his shadow blackened the cracks along the door, and sometimes +she heard him growl when a mosquito pricked his neck. Life became +strangely mechanical as she lay half-asleep, her eyes opening and +closing at intervals, her ears half unconsciously admitting the sounds +of the outer world, her body subdued for the time and yielding to +languor. But soon she stirred, hearing voices outside her cell. A +grating laugh hurt her nerves, and after it came the order of the +sentry calling on some unwelcome visitant to depart. Then the heavy +tramp sounded monotonously again. +</P> + +<P> +"Would rather be a toad gnawing the root of a tree, than a machine to +pace a dozen yards of grass," taunted an ugly voice. "Admit me into +the hut, Sir Sentry. Know you I have this day been ordained a priest +of Holy Church, and 'tis my duty to reason with the fair impenitent. +Shall defy me, rascal? I can mutter a spell that shall knock the sword +from your hand and shake your body with ague." +</P> + +<P> +"Begone!" muttered the soldier. "I talk with none while on my duty." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine stirred uneasily. Something fell lightly against her arm, +and she looked up to the aperture which made a window. Nothing unusual +met her eyes; but when she moved again a soft odour brushed her face, +and her delighted hand caught up a bunch of wild bush roses. +</P> + +<P> +"I go." The fully aroused girl felt that the hideous voice was +intended for her ears. "There is no moon to-night, and after dark, +when none shall see, I will be here to ease your duty by a song of +roses and woman's love, brave comrade. Mayhap I shall then meet with a +less churlish welcome." +</P> + +<P> +"That may be," answered the soldier sullenly. "Another shall have +taken my place. Sing to him if you will." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, the lovely flowers!" murmured Madeleine. The blooms had opened +since noon and their yellow hearts were wet, because the gatherer had +dipped each one into the river, before tying them together with a blade +of scented grass. +</P> + +<P> +She brushed these sweet companions against her cheek, wondering who +could have dared to show himself her friend. The time passed happily +while she waited in tingling expectancy for the coming of dark. +</P> + +<P> +First came Laroche, full of bluster and talk of the wickedness of +self-will, of the fate of the unbeliever in the next world, and the +punishment of the heretic in this. The abbé had employed the afternoon +in putting an edge to his sword with his own clerical hands, and his +mind was fully occupied with the fineness of the bright steel and the +excellence of the point while he talked. +</P> + +<P> +"We must save a soul from the everlasting burning," he said with +menace, as he made to depart. "When the body is put to pain the mind +is said to yield with wondrous readiness, and there is joy in Heaven +over the sinner that repenteth. Impenitence in one so young is surely +the work of the devil. The power of exorcism has been conferred upon +the priests of Holy Church. Pray to our Lady and the saints, daughter, +that they strengthen you for the ordeal." +</P> + +<P> +Laroche swaggered out conscious of having well performed an unpleasant +duty, and hurried down to the street of fishermen, to convince himself +that Michel had not again dared to adulterate his wine. +</P> + +<P> +After vespers came St Agapit. He had spent the day over his +manuscripts, endeavouring to unravel some of the perplexities of the +human mind. The ascetic was liberal beyond his time. He regarded +Madeleine as rather an object for pity than for punishment. Her brain +had been worked upon and her mind possessed by some spirit of darkness; +and it became his duty to deliver her from the benumbing influence and +to point out to her the way of life. +</P> + +<P> +But when he came to leave the stone hut, he was for the first moment in +his life a doubter. Madeleine had spoken with such happiness of the +joy of life; had held out to his colourless face her blushing rosebuds, +bidding him note that their smell was as fragrant to her the Protestant +as to him the Catholic; had dwelt upon her faith, which was pure and +perfect even though it excluded the aid of saints and the help of the +Mother of God. And thus had she answered his final argument: +</P> + +<P> +"In the free country birds would surround me, and each one had its own +way of showing me affection. One would peck at my gown, another caress +me with its wings, another, too shy to approach, would sit on a bough +and sing as best it could. But I loved them all, and the shyest the +best. Father, if the birds have each a different way of showing us +love, may not we, who are better than many sparrows, be allowed to +worship God after our own different promptings?" +</P> + +<P> +St Agapit blessed her less sternly than usual, and returned perplexed +to his studies, there to search for proof of what Madeleine had said, +praying like the holy man he was for light and understanding. +Reluctantly he was compelled to admit that it was an evil spirit which +had spoken to him out of the mouth of Madeleine. So he went into his +little chapel and prayed for her and for himself that the doubt of his +heart might be forgiven him. +</P> + +<P> +But in years to come, after those days when the Islanders had stirred +up the Iroquois to avenge their wrongs, a sachem of the Oneidas would +narrate the story of the death of the white doctor, dwelling upon those +last moments when the priest had turned to him to say: "Tell me, is it +true that you worship the sun?" +</P> + +<P> +"Surely," answered the sachem. "For the sun is our life." +</P> + +<P> +"In worshipping the sun," cried the exultant priest, "you have surely +worshipped the one God." +</P> + +<P> +And over the horde of bloodthirsty natives, who were preparing his +fiery torment, St Agapit made the sign of the cross. +</P> + +<P> +Evening came, soft and fragrant, with a rush of sweet wind when the +door opened to admit food and drink for the prisoner. Madeleine caught +a glimpse of the sentry who took up his post after the proclamation of +the evening gun; a thick-set man, swarthy and black-bearded, a Cyclops +in appearance, but a Cerberus for watchfulness, as the girl knew; for +once, when she had timidly tried the door, the brute had growled at her +like a dog. +</P> + +<P> +Darker grew the air. Madeleine stood against the wall, listening to +the rush of water far beneath, the drone of beetles, and the scarcely +audible murmur from the heart of the fortress. The last beam went out, +the tired day was asleep, and Cerberus tramped, growling out his +thoughts. +</P> + +<P> +It became so dark that the walls disappeared. Clouds hung low, dark as +the under-world; the stars were blotted out; not a gleam of phosphorus +nor a smoky ray shot upward from the north. The land whirled blackly +into space. +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine moved her forehead from the cold stone and sighed softly. +She crept to her bed and sat shivering gently, holding fast her +treasured blooms. The night damp had revived the flowers and drawn out +their odour, so that the girl pleased herself with the fancy that she +was sitting in a rose-bower. +</P> + +<P> +She heard the screech of an owl far away, the rattle and splash of +oars, the running out of a chain, the snap of a belated locust. She +heard the ticking of an insect in the walls; and she heard the growl of +Cerberus: +</P> + +<P> +"A plague upon that ghost-light!" +</P> + +<P> +She heard a sound which made her shiver, though it might have been +nothing more than a heavy foot struck sharply upon the turf; but hardly +had the thrill passed when a gasp and a great groan made the dark night +wild, and the hill-top and every stone in the building seemed to jar as +the ground was smitten. The silence that followed was unbroken by the +solemn tramp which had become a part of the girl's life. The human +clock was broken. +</P> + +<P> +Then a subdued voice began to sing, harsh and unmusical, straining to +be sympathetic, and its song was of peace and love in an old-world +garden. Harsher grew the voice, though the effort to be tender +underlay each note. +</P> + +<P> +"Friend," whispered Madeleine +</P> + +<P> +The song was stilled. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, friend, open the door and let me feel the air." +</P> + +<P> +"Prepare your eyes for a hideous sight," muttered the voice, dull and +grating like a saw. +</P> + +<P> +"My deliverer cannot make me fear," she murmured. +</P> + +<P> +The iron bolt grated, the door opened, and Madeleine beheld in the +gloom the shapeless outline of the dwarf. +</P> + +<P> +"Thank the night, lady," he said. "It is kind because it hides one of +nature's failures. A spider, they say, once saved a Scotchman. A +hunchback may do as much for a queen." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine stepped out to the balmy night. +</P> + +<P> +"What made you come to my aid?" she murmured. "It is death for you." +</P> + +<P> +"Lady," said Gaudriole, "I bow to the Church, because hypocrisy drives +many a sinner to play the saint. When the fat Laroche calls me to my +duty, I confess with my tongue in my cheek and burn a rushlight. That +is for policy. Before you I am a Protestant. By myself I am a +believer in living long and cheating the gallows. That again is +policy. I hate the Church and its priests, therefore I have released +you. Also, by some strange mischance, nature has placed a man's heart +within this contemptible body. But let us hasten." +</P> + +<P> +"The sentry!" exclaimed Madeleine. +</P> + +<P> +"Look not in that direction," said Gaudriole. "Lady, which way? I +will guide you to safety, stay by your side while I can serve you, and +when you say, 'Back, dog!' I disappear." +</P> + +<P> +"You have done murder," cried the girl. "Let me see. Stand aside. +Ah, poor wretch! He was but doing his duty, and his blood is on my +head." +</P> + +<P> +"The deed is mine, both in this world and the next," said Gaudriole. +"I had a grudge against the knave. He stunned me once with his fist +when I stumbled by mischance across his foot. Lady, you must come +quickly. I see lights moving yonder. There is no time to lose." +</P> + +<P> +"Geoffrey!" murmured Madeleine softly to her self. +</P> + +<P> +"For his sake," urged the dwarf. Then he paused and ground his teeth. +</P> + +<P> +"But you?" she exclaimed. +</P> + +<P> +"I!" Gaudriole uttered his malevolent chuckle. "To-morrow I shall be +hopping about the fortress, full of wild fancies which shall mightily +impress the superstitious. I shall say how, as I lay on the hillside, +I saw lightning strike the sentry dead, and how at the roll of thunder +the door of this hut burst open and you passed out in a flame of fire. +Laroche shall worship you as a saint to-morrow, if he worship aught but +his belly and his sword, and shall keep the day holy in honour of +Sainte Madeleine. Fear not for me. I have a clever tongue, lady, and +a brave imagination, and if I am pushed can devise twenty men to do +this deed. Come!" he whispered sharply. "The lights approach." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine permitted herself to be hurried away, and the ill-matched +pair made no stop until the forest had closed behind. Not a sound came +from the heights; only the watch-fires flickered gently in the wind. +</P> + +<P> +"Which way?" cried Gaudriole. +</P> + +<P> +"The sea," said Madeleine. +</P> + +<P> +"There lies your path. 'Tis a mountainous country yonder. If you hide +to-night, I will after dark to-morrow bring down a boat, and in that +you may escape." +</P> + +<P> +"I know how to find food, and the Indians will not harm me," she +replied. "I have made myself friendly with them, and carry a marked +stone which one of their sachems gave me." +</P> + +<P> +"Say now the words, 'Back, dog!' and I leave you." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine turned reluctantly to the dwarf. +</P> + +<P> +"Go, friend," she said, with her pitying smile Gaudriole went down on +his sharp knees, and his crooked shoulders heaved. +</P> + +<P> +"Lady, I am no man, but a beast who has done you what little service it +might. My life shall continue as nature has fitted me, but when I come +to die on the gallows, as such as I must end, I would have one blessed +memory to carry with me into hell. Suffer me to kiss your hand." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine hesitated, her lips parting pitifully, her eyes wet as the +grass which brushed her skirt. Then, as the poor villain raised his +hideous face, she bent and swiftly kissed his grimy brow. Her glorious +hair for a moment streamed upon his elfin locks, then she was gone, +breathing a little faster, while Gaudriole lay humped upon the ground. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap30"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXX. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +LAND-LOCKED. +</H4> + +<P> +With the life of Master William Grignion, alderman, and subsequently +sheriff, of the City of London, these annals are not concerned. The +merchant's existence cannot, however, be altogether ignored, owing to a +certain venture on his part, which resulted in an English ship being +cast upon the shore of Acadie at the beginning of winter. Master +Grignion was an austere man, who, by dint of miserly practice and sharp +dealing, had amassed what in those days was a considerable fortune. +After marrying his only daughter to an impecunious peer, he occupied a +shameful old house upon Thames bank, the greater part of which was +stocked with bales of merchandise. From the single window of the +living-room, which was furnished below the degree of discomfort, the +old man could view the overtoppling houses upon London Bridge; and here +Master Grignion counted his gains each night, while his starved dog +slunk from corner to corner sniffing uselessly for a scrap of food. +</P> + +<P> +Owing to the scarcity of English ships, no valuable cargo of tobacco, +and none of the products of New World grist-mills or tanneries, had for +many months crossed the seas. For weeks the alderman had been +engrossed by an idea, which grew in strength upon him—namely, that if +he built for himself a ship and despatched her to Virginia, he might +very possibly add materially to the already considerable store of gold +pieces which were secreted about his house from cellar to attic. But +Master Grignion knew well that the seas were held by England's foes, +and the nightmare of failure held him back from his project month after +month. One evening, however, while he watched the muddy Thames after a +good day of business, the finger of inspiration touched him, and, +gazing up into the London sky, which was not murky in those days, he +remarked: "Hitherto ships have been constructed for strength. Dutch, +French, and Spanish vessels are alike slow and cumbersome. It has +occurred to no man to build a ship for speed." +</P> + +<P> +Having solved the problem, Master Grignion knew no rest until he had +found an enterprising shipbuilder, who was clever at his business and +at the same time weak in bargaining. Discovering in Devon the man he +required, the alderman divulged his plan; and from that day forward +until the <I>Dartmouth</I> stood fully decked before Barnstaple the miser's +talk was of sailcloth and sailmaking, with masts, yards, gaffs, booms, +and bowsprits. The <I>Dartmouth</I>, when completed even to the +satisfaction of her avaricious owner, was undoubtedly ahead of the time. +</P> + +<P> +One Silas Upcliff, an old sea-dog with a face red and yellow like a +ripe apple, and a fringe of snow-white whisker below the chin, a native +of Plymouth, and a man well salted by experience, volunteered to raise +a crew and sail the <I>Dartmouth</I> to the Potomac; and, after a vast deal +of haggling over the questions of provisioning and wages, his offer was +accepted. And one fine day the brigantine shook out her wealth of +canvas and skimmed away westward, over the track of such brave vessels +as the Pelican, the little <I>Discovery</I>, and the Puritan <I>Mayflower</I>. +Trembling with pride and excitement, and a certain amount of fear lest +at the last moment his ship might be seized for the service of the +king, Master Grignion stood by while the anchor was heaved, shouting +his final injunction: "Fight not with your guns, Master Skipper. +Should an enemy attack you, let out more sail and fly." Silas Upcliff +nodded in stolid English style, and, as he drew away, turned to his +mate and muttered: "From the French, the storm, but most of all from +misers, good Lord deliver us." +</P> + +<P> +From the French the <I>Dartmouth</I> was indeed delivered, but not from the +storm. Hostile vessels were sighted, but the brigantine's speed +enabled her to show a particularly dainty stern to these privateers; +and all went well with her until the line of the American coast lifted +ominously distinct above the horizon before being blotted out by a mass +of fiery cloud. Then came the storm, which flung the little vessel far +from her course, carried her northwards, and finally cast her upon the +coast of Nova Scotia, after failing in its effort to wreck her on the +western spurs of Newfoundland. When the storm ceased, a freezing calm +set in, and for two days snow descended without intermission. Upcliff +gave the order to build a house out of pine logs, where he and his men +might take shelter while they repaired the ship; for the little +<I>Dartmouth</I> had been terribly strained by the storm and pierced by the +sharp-toothed rocks. The skipper believed that he was near his +destined harbour, and was sorely puzzled by the snow and bitter cold; +but, when a sailor came hurriedly to report that he had seen the smoke +of a distant settlement and a tree stamped with the fleur-de-lys, the +captain began to greatly fear that the miserly alderman had lost his +venture, and he bade his men bring out their cutlasses and to see that +they were sharp. +</P> + +<P> +When the snow ceased and the atmosphere became clear, a tall figure +came down among the pines, and gave a hearty welcome to the skipper and +his men. The visitor was Sir Thomas Iden, and he came not alone to +greet the master of the <I>Dartmouth</I>, for none other than Madeleine was +at his side. +</P> + +<P> +The brave girl had travelled far that night of her release, and for two +days hurried eastward, keeping near the river, existing on butternuts +and the different kinds of berry which flourished in abundance at that +season of the year, until on the eve of the second day she saw the +smoke of a camp-fire rising from the beach. Descending, she revealed +herself boldly to the campers, who were none other than Sir Thomas and +his native wife; and when the former heard her story, and knew that she +was English at heart, if French in name, and further learnt that she +was the affianced of Geoffrey Viner, who had gone out to bring them +help, he bent with knightly grace and kissed her hand, and besought her +to accompany him to the land above the sea. Madeleine joyously +consented; and from that hour her troubles ceased. +</P> + +<P> +Afterwards Jeremiah Hough came to the land beside the gulf, and with +him Penfold, fully recovered from his fever; and these men also took +Madeleine to their hearts—though the stern Puritan refused to trust +her—when they heard how she had served their comrade. In the pathless +land above the sea, a little to the east of Acadie, they settled +themselves; the knight, his wife, and Madeleine in one log-cabin in a +hollow; Hough and Penfold in another, placed in the heart of a dense +pine-wood. No marauding band had been abroad to trouble the land. The +only danger which appeared to threaten the Englishmen, now that winter +had set in, was the possibility that some Indian spy might carry the +news of their hiding-place into the town; and this danger was a very +real one, for, though they did not know of it, Onawa had followed La +Salle to Acadie. +</P> + +<P> +It was Madeleine who sighted the <I>Dartmouth</I> snowed up beside the +beach. She had gone out into the storm to run along the cliff and +fight against the mighty buffetings of the wind which had upset the +plans of Master Grignion. She sped back over the spruce-clad hills, +and coming first to the adventurers' hut stopped to tell them the +tidings. They ran forth, flushed with the hope that Geoffrey had +succeeded, and, standing upon a hill-top, argued concerning the +stranger's nationality, until they came regretfully to the decision +that she could not be from English shores. +</P> + +<P> +"I saw never a ship so light in build," said Penfold. "See you the +number of her masts? She is made to run and not to fight, whereas our +English ships are made to fight and never to run. She is, if I mistake +not, a Dutch vessel." +</P> + +<P> +"Peradventure the Lord shall deliver her also into our hands," quoth +Hough fervently. +</P> + +<P> +The captain shook his grizzled head, and answered sadly: "Recall not +that day of our triumph. Then were we five good men. Now George, our +brother, lies on the Windy Arm, and friend Woodfield is no more, and +young Geoffrey has gone out into a strange country. Only you and I +remain, and my arm now lacks its former strength." +</P> + +<P> +In the meantime Madeleine had run for her protector; and before the day +was done both Penfold and the Puritan knew of their error, and had +joined hands once again with men from their native land. +</P> + +<P> +When Silas Upcliff learnt that he stood upon the perilous Nova Scotian +coast, he felt more shame than fear—shame to hear that the land was +mastered by the French. Had not those bold sea-brothers of England the +Cabots discovered it over a century earlier, and had not James the +First conferred his crown patent of the whole of Canada upon Sir +William Alexander, his Scottish favourite? The honest skipper well +knew that the magnanimous Charles had confirmed the bestowal of that +prodigious gift, acting, it must be assumed, under surprising +ignorance, seeing that the land was no more his to give than were the +New Netherlands or Peru. And at that time, when Roussilac held the St. +Lawrence and La Salle the priest ruled Acadie, the Scottish peer, who +was nominal lord of all the land, was peacefully engaged in writing +mediocre poetry in his castle of Stirling! Between the ostensible and +actual ownership spread a vast gulf of difference, as the men upon that +shore were to learn to their cost. +</P> + +<P> +Silas Upcliff gave his compatriots a sailor's hearty handshake, and the +men who knew the land and its occupants rendered the new-comers what +assistance they might, while Hough lost no time in begging them to join +in an attack upon Acadie. To that Upcliff could only make the reply: +"My services are bought, my ship is armed for defence only, and my men +are sworn to run rather than to fight." +</P> + +<P> +Then Madeleine offered her services as housewife to the crew, and when +the men knew that she loved an English lad, that she was a Huguenot, +and had formerly trodden the streets and lanes of Somerset and Devon, +that she even knew the familiar names above merchants' doors in Bristol +and Plymouth, and could quote them with a pretty accent, they fell in +love with her forthwith, from Upcliff himself to the rogue of a boy +before the mast. From that time forth she ruled them with a velvet +discipline, joining the workers engaged in repairing the ship's +injuries, and helping them by her happiness and approval. +</P> + +<P> +"Hurry! hurry!" she would cry. "Ah, but you talk too much. She shall +float to-morrow. Then to break the ice and flee away!" +</P> + +<P> +"Art in such hurry to lose us, lass?" said Upcliff on the second day +after the snow. +</P> + +<P> +"But I shall not lose you," cried Madeleine. "I am going to sail away +with you. I shall bring good fortune and favouring winds; and if any +man be sick I will nurse him back to strength. None ever die whom I +watch over. The sick are ashamed even to think of death when they see +me so full of life. You will take me to my Geoffrey, in the land of +the free?" +</P> + +<P> +"Ay, and to England if you will," cried the hearty skipper, who had +already heard her story. "But, my lass, your Geoffrey may be on his +way back, and you may but get south to find him gone." +</P> + +<P> +"No," replied Madeleine, shaking her head decidedly. "He is not on his +way back. I think he is in trouble. I cannot understand, but I feel +that he is being punished for what he has not done, and I know that I +can help him. No one can help a man like the woman who loves him. +Geoffrey wants me, and I must go." +</P> + +<P> +"You shall go, girl," promised the sea-dog; and, turning half aside, +muttered: "If the boy have played her false, I shall have it in my mind +to run out a line from the cross-tree and see him hanged." +</P> + +<P> +"False!" cried Madeleine, with a scream of laughter. "Is the sun false +when the clouds will not let him shine? Why, I would slap your wicked +face, and cook you no supper to-night, if I believed that you spoke in +faith." +</P> + +<P> +She ran away, kicking up the dusty snow, and throwing back a laugh +which filled the winter air with the breath of spring. +</P> + +<P> +Each calm morning the boats of the deep-sea fishermen put out from +Acadie, and returned before evening with their frozen freight. The +Englishmen stifled their fires and stilled their voices when these +boats drew near. Their shelter was well hidden among the pines; the +snowed-up brigantine resembled nothing so much as a rock bearing a few +dead and stripped firs. Every night the sailors laughed at danger; but +each morning found them on the watch. +</P> + +<P> +A week passed without event, until the evening of the eighth day +arrived and found the sailors packed within their log-hut at the back +of the ice-bound bay awaiting the call to supper. The three +adventurers were also present as the skipper's guests. The cabin was +warm and well lighted, equipped by the men's handiness with nautical +furniture from their ship. From the region beyond a curtain, which +divided the interior, came the smell of cookery and the joyful roaring +of a fire. A feeling of security was upon the company, because +snow-clouds were rolling up outside and the gulf was filled with fog. +As night drew on these grey clouds appeared to melt into feathers +innumerable, and the pines became snow-steeples, and the rocks huge +beds of down. The brigantine was locked within a sheet of ice, and +that mysterious silence which had so terrified Cabot the pioneer held +all the land in thrall. But the Englishmen cared for none of these +things. They knew that the colony of Acadie was being buried in the +snow; the unknown coast had no terrors; nor did they fear the black +winter sea which southwards groaned and tossed. So they gave each +other good cheer, and listened to Upcliff, who beguiled them with +reminiscences of his seafaring life until his throat was dry. Then he +paused to refresh himself with a rolled tobacco-leaf, and his sailors +broke the silence which ensued by singing melodiously a soft musical +chanty, which recalled to the mind of each his free and happy life upon +the main and the rollicking days ashore. This song also stirred into +activity a memory which lay latent in the skipper's mind. +</P> + +<P> +"I saw the man who made that verse," he said, leaning over the circle, +and putting out his hand for silence. "Will tell you where I saw him. +'Twas on London street beside Globe Theatre, coming by Blackfriars, and +he stood with another honest gentleman watching us wild fellows roll +past. We were singing like boys on the road from school and making the +fat watchmen run. London town was a brave place for us young sailors +up from the West Country, and we were bent on having our pleasure, +though we had to pay for it before my Lord Mayor." +</P> + +<P> +"What was the name of master?" asked one of the men. +</P> + +<P> +"A comely gentleman," went on the captain, disregarding the questioner. +"Though methinks as pale as any wench who had lost her lover. Not a +wrinkle on the face of him, and the forehead of him wide and smooth, +ay, and as cold looking as any slab of stone from Portland cliff. But +the eyes of man! I caught the look of them, and they seemed to pass +through my brain learning in one glance more about me than ever I knew +myself. And the smile of man! Can see it now as he turned to his +fellow and said: 'The sailor is the man to drive our care away, good +Burbage.' And then he said softly those words you have now been +singing, 'One foot in sea and one on shore, To one thing constant +never.' A Christian gentleman, they told me. A great actor, and a +poet who made money, they told me. Should watch his 'Tempest' played. +Would make you feel on shipboard, and hold on to a pillar of the pit to +steady your feet withal." +</P> + +<P> +"He loved a mariner," said a voice. "The Englishman smells of salt +water, say they in France. 'Tis better, so honest Will did say, than +to smell of civet." +</P> + +<P> +"How goes the weather?" demanded the captain suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +"Snowing. Our little barque is but a drift." +</P> + +<P> +The sailor who had sought to learn the poet's name repeated his +question, and while the information was being driven into his obtuse +head by half a dozen of his mates in concert, the curtain dividing the +cabin became suddenly agitated, a white hand fluttered for an instant, +and a bright voice called: +</P> + +<P> +"Your food is ready, children." +</P> + +<P> +The sailors rose, laughing as heartily at the pleasantry as though they +had not heard it before, and obeyed the summons gladly. To every man +was set a great bowl of stew, and the fair cook, resting her hands upon +her sides, watched them as they set to work. +</P> + +<P> +"You are idle," she declared. "I have but little meat left, and you, +great children that you are, require so much feeding. In the morning I +shall turn you out to hunt. The snow shall have stopped by then, and +you may follow the deer by their fresh tracks." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine nodded severely at the sailors as she thus made known to them +her mind. +</P> + +<P> +The crew were still over supper, and Silas was telling one of his sea +stories to ears which had already heard it a score of times, but +listened patiently because it was the master speaking, when a deep +sound broke among the hills and rolled onward through the snow, making +the rough coast throb. +</P> + +<P> +The skipper's mouth was open to laugh at his own excellent wit, but +that sound brought his lips together, as it caused all his listeners to +start for the door. The same cry was upon every tongue, as their hands +dragged away the sail which stretched across the entrance: +</P> + +<P> +"A gun!" +</P> + +<P> +They poured into the terrible whiteness, huddling as close as sheep. +Nothing was visible, except the steady masses shed from the clouds like +wool. Not a sound, nor any sign of life. They waited, straining their +eyes out to sea, but the gun did not roar again. +</P> + +<P> +"Cast your eyes over to the west," called a voice, and the master found +Sir Thomas at his side. +</P> + +<P> +A glow in that direction filled the sky, making the surroundings weird, +and from time to time a red tongue of fire leapt up. +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis a French ship bringing provisions," said the knight, pointing +into the unfathomable mass. "She has signalled, and yonder fire burns +to guide her in." +</P> + +<P> +"Wreck her!" cried a Cornishman. "Let us build another fire on the +cliff to the east. With fortune, she shall steer for our beacon +instead of theirs." +</P> + +<P> +"We should but make ourselves known," growled Upcliff. +</P> + +<P> +A terrified shout broke upon his speech, and one of the men jumped +against the huddled party, shrieking in fear. +</P> + +<P> +"What ails you, Jacob Sadgrove?" cried the skipper. +</P> + +<P> +"God save me! A foul spirit close at my side. She grinned out of the +snow and floated away, her feet never touching ground. A warning—a +death warning, and I a miserable sinner." +</P> + +<P> +The man grovelled upon his knees up to his waist in snow, flapping his +hands and groaning. +</P> + +<P> +"Speak up, man!" said Sir Thomas. "What is that you saw?" +</P> + +<P> +"He has seen a wyvern," spoke the master contemptuously. "Was always a +man to see more than other folk." +</P> + +<P> +"Stood at my side and grinned in a fearsome manner," whined the sailor. +"The nose of her was slit like man yonder, and the ears of her were +like a dog's, and she breathed fire out of her mouth." +</P> + +<P> +"Stay!" cried Hough, stepping out. "Say you that her face was marked +like mine?" +</P> + +<P> +"The same," panted the man. "But dead and cold, and her eyes like +fish——" +</P> + +<P> +The Puritan drowned his wailings by a bitter cry. +</P> + +<P> +"Forgive me, friends," he cried. "The Lord delivered me that woman to +slay, and I, weak vessel that I am, drew back, and now am punished, and +in my punishment you must share. We are discovered." +</P> + +<P> +"The name of that woman?" demanded Sir Thomas. +</P> + +<P> +"The sister of your wife." +</P> + +<P> +"I knew it," groaned the knight. "The agent of my son's death. Which +way went she?" he cried at the terrified sailor. +</P> + +<P> +"She flew there—there," stuttered the man. +</P> + +<P> +"Follow the tracks!" +</P> + +<P> +"Nay, there are none. The snow already covers them." +</P> + +<P> +"Her feet ne'er touched the snow," wailed the man. "Her feet were hot +from the everlasting fire." +</P> + +<P> +"Peace, fool," said Upcliff. He turned to Hough. "Are our lives in +danger?" +</P> + +<P> +"Never in greater. The woman is an Indian spy, who is now on her way +to the settlement, where rules a hot-headed priest who has sworn to +kill every Englishman in the land. They will be on us ere morning." +</P> + +<P> +"There is only one way," said the master. "We must break the ice, +release our barque, and put out. The sea is calm." +</P> + +<P> +"She will not float." +</P> + +<P> +"She shall float." +</P> + +<P> +Upcliff gave his orders coolly, and the sailors hastened to obey +through the muffling mists. The greater number attacked the ice with +axe and saw, while the minority dismantled the shelter and reconveyed +its contents to the ghostly ship. Every man worked his hardest, +longing for the sea. The blow of axes and the snarl of a long saw +sounded along the hidden coast. +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine came down, all white with snow like a bride, and cheered them +on, and presently brought each man a bowl of soup to renew his +strength. A narrow lane opened through the ice, an ink-black passage +in the colourless plain, but beyond stretched a long white field before +the jagged edge where the snow wave curled in a monstrous lip. +</P> + +<P> +The brigantine righted herself with a flutter and a plunge, casting the +snow from her yards, and the grinding of her keel made joyful music. +The toilers, sweating as though they had been reaping corn in summer, +laboured to open the path to the stagnant sea. +</P> + +<P> +"The rent in her hold is plugged by solid ice," called the skipper. +"She shall carry that cargo bravely through this calm." +</P> + +<P> +The big feathers of snow became spots of down, which lessened to the +degree of frost points before morning. The country began to unroll, +all padded with its monstrous coverlet; the trees masqueraded as +wool-stuffed Falstaffs; the cliffs seemed to have increased in the +night; the heavens were nearer the earth. The coast appalled in its +cold virginity. +</P> + +<P> +"One more hour, and then for the sea," sang Upcliff. "Is everything +aboard?" +</P> + +<P> +"All but the stove, captain. We wait for it to cool." +</P> + +<P> +"Bring it out into the snow." +</P> + +<P> +As Upcliff gave the order, a man crossed the brow of a western hill and +floundered knee-deep towards the bay. It was Hough, and he shouted as +he ran: +</P> + +<P> +"The French are coming out!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap31"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXXI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +IN THE FALL OF THE SNOW. +</H4> + +<P> +Because the Father of Waters was frozen over and its track buried in +snow, despatches from Quebec could only be conveyed by the hand of +overland couriers. Winter had set in early that year, and with more +than usual severity; and this was probably the reason why no messenger +had lately arrived from the heights to inform the governor of Acadie as +to what had taken place in and around the modest capital of New France. +</P> + +<P> +The priest was not concerned by this silence. He had indeed lost much +of his interest in the doings of the New World, since D'Archand had +informed him of his popularity at home. He felt that he had made his +advancement sure. During the weeks which followed autumn, when the +maples were resigning their gorgeous vestments of red and gold, he had +occupied himself in setting the affairs of his charge in order, looking +to shortly receive a command to proceed to Rome, there to receive the +reward of his stewardship. Onawa had passed out of his memory, and +with her the brave young boy whom he had smitten in the forest by +Couchicing. He sent no expedition out to search the land. He had done +sufficient for glory. He was not the man to waste his energies upon +works of supererogation. No slip could lose him that spiritual +principality towards which he had pressed by word and act since the day +of his ordination. As he strode through the snow the settlement seemed +to shrink from him, and the trees to bow, as though foreseeing the +power which was about to pass into his hands. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle reached his chapel, recited vespers in the arrogant voice +which made him feared, and returned to his quarters. A spirit of +restlessness was over him, and when he could resist no longer he rose, +and, taking his sword, lunged repeatedly at a knot in the wall, +striking it full until his body began to sweat. +</P> + +<P> +"No falling off," he muttered, as he examined the pricks in the wood. +"No sign of weakness yet." He lowered the sword, and mechanically +wiped the point in the tail of his skirt, then passed his firm hand +caressingly down the blade, murmuring, with a self-conscious smile: "I +have finished my fighting. Henceforth my wrist must stiffen and my arm +rust, while the power which has controlled the sword shall pass into +the use of tongue and pen." +</P> + +<P> +A knock fell upon the door, and in response to his reply a personal +attendant entered, and with a low reverence announced: +</P> + +<P> +"A messenger to speak with you, Excellency." +</P> + +<P> +At the governor's word a man was ushered in, clad in furs, his beard +heavy with icicles, a pair of long snow-shoes slung upon his back. He +made a profound genuflection and stood with bent head awaiting +permission to speak. +</P> + +<P> +"Come you from the upper fortress?" asked La Salle. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, Excellency, with despatches for France and a letter for your +Holiness." +</P> + +<P> +La Salle put out his hand for the communication, broke the thread, +unfolded the sheet, and, holding it in the lamplight, bent over to read. +</P> + +<P> +"Ha!" he exclaimed, his eyes lifting. "Laroche. What means this +signature?" +</P> + +<P> +"The noble commandant Roussilac has been stricken with sickness," +hesitated the messenger. +</P> + +<P> +"What ails him?" asked the priest. +</P> + +<P> +The man faltered, but finally gained courage to reply: "It is said, +Excellency, that the noble commandant acts strangely, as a man +possessed by some unholy influence." +</P> + +<P> +La Salle brought the letter again to his eyes, and hurriedly scanned +the ill-written lines. +</P> + +<P> +"It is explained here," he said indifferently. "La tête lui a tourné. +Was never an able man," he muttered to himself. "Was ambitious, and +thought himself strong enough to stand alone. 'Tis but justice." He +looked across coldly, and sharply ordered the messenger to withdraw. +</P> + +<P> +The emissary retired, bowing as he backed out, while La Salle ran his +eyes over the remainder of the letter, muttering his comments aloud. +</P> + +<P> +"Gaudriole hanged for murdering a soldier. So, so! Was but a brute. +The little Frenchwoman dead of a fit, and her daughter escaped. A +weeding-out, in faith. The traitorous Dutch gone beyond capture. The +English spy also escaped. The men sent after him returned afoot, and +swore that they had been set upon by demons among a range of white +mountains. Would have hanged the fools. The Iroquois tribes gone into +winter hunting-grounds. The country altogether clear. The Algonquins +still friendly. This colony is now settled to France beyond question." +</P> + +<P> +La Salle dropped the letter, and fell into musings. Once he put his +hand to his brow, as though he could already feel a mitre pressing +there; he fingered his ring, and moved his foot, to frown when his eyes +sighted a rough boot instead of the scarlet shoe of his dreams. Then +he was awakened by a noisy rattling and a shock. +</P> + +<P> +The crucifix which had hung upon the log wall—more as a sign of +profession, as the gauntlet outside the glove-maker's shop, than as a +symbol he revered—lay broken upon the floor. +</P> + +<P> +The priest rose, muttering a frightened imprecation, and as he +nervously gathered up the shattered symbol his ears became opened to a +hurrying of feet over the fresh snow. All the soldiers and settlers +appeared to be rushing past afoot, shaking the ground and the walls of +his house. It was doubtless this disturbance which had detached the +crucifix from its nail. La Salle pulled a beaver cap over his forehead +and made for the outer door, and there encountered a messenger who came +to inform him that a ship's gun had been heard at sea. +</P> + +<P> +"Bid them fire the beacon," said La Salle. +</P> + +<P> +"It has been done, Excellency. There is not a breath over the water. +But the snow pours down." +</P> + +<P> +The priest's official bodyguard awaited him; and when he appeared every +man saluted and fell into place, and so accompanied him to the cliff, +where a huge fire was making the sky scarlet. This fire was a centre +towards which all the settlers were hastening like flies towards a +lantern. The coming of a ship from the Old World, with supplies, fresh +faces, and news of friends, was a red-letter day in the monotonous +calendar of their lives. The white figures hurried through the night +like an inferno of chattering ghosts. +</P> + +<P> +"She shall not be in till morning light," quoth a wiseacre. "There are +rocks, see you, in the gulf, and her master shall run no risk after +escaping the perils of the ocean." +</P> + +<P> +"Will wager to-day's haul of fish that she lies up here before three +hours are gone," cried another. +</P> + +<P> +"And I my fishing-net that we shall not see her before day," retorted +the confident first speaker. +</P> + +<P> +"That net is mine. Didst not hear the gun?" +</P> + +<P> +"Sounds carry far through the winter air." +</P> + +<P> +"The snow muffles. She is scarce a mile out." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, that is indeed a fire! The light of it shall reach far out at +sea." +</P> + +<P> +The excitable folk laughed loudly whenever a fresh load of wood was +flung upon the flames, and carried away by their feelings danced an +ambulatory ballet in the red mist, a dance, like the Prosperity of the +Arms of France to be given before Richelieu a few months later, not +altogether without political significance. These settlers danced to +the tune of their song; and their songs were Success to the Ships of +France and Destruction to the English. While these revels lasted no +one observed a soldier hurrying up behind, with a woman at his side. +The woman was Onawa, breathing quickly as though she had been running +at the top of her speed. +</P> + +<P> +"Yonder stands his Holiness," said the man, stopping to point out La +Salle surrounded by his little band of attendants. +</P> + +<P> +Onawa abandoned her guide and rushed out, maddened and witless with her +foolish passion, until she reached the side of the man she loved and +was warmed by his dark eyes, which yet flashed angrily upon her, as he +turned to shake off the parasite, ejaculating: +</P> + +<P> +"Whom have we here?" +</P> + +<P> +"It is I," she cried wildly in French, having at length acquired some +little knowledge of that language. "Let me speak." More she would +have said, but her store of the language failed in the time of need. +</P> + +<P> +"Uncover her face," ordered La Salle. "Take her into the firelight +that we may see with whom we have to deal." +</P> + +<P> +"Let me speak to you here," prayed the girl, drawing back into the +snow-lit gloom; but she was seized and dragged upward close to the +dancing ring, and rough hands drew the covering from her face. +</P> + +<P> +"Tête de mort!" exclaimed La Salle, and started back when he recognised +the face that had once been handsome set towards him in the wild +firelight, fearfully branded, the nostrils slit, the ears cropped, a +letter seared upon each cheek. "Cover that horror, and drive her out +lest she bewitch us." +</P> + +<P> +"Hear me," the unhappy girl moaned, holding out her hands in an agony +of supplication. "Yonder your enemy cover the shore. Many men and a +ship held in the ice." She panted forth the syllables in the best +French she could muster, throwing out her hands along the eastern shore. +</P> + +<P> +La Salle's expression altered as he turned to his subordinates with the +old fighting passion in his eye and heart. +</P> + +<P> +"My men," he said, "this woman is but an Indian, but she is +trustworthy, I know. An English vessel has been cast ashore, and the +sailors seek to make shelter. What say you? Shall we warm our blood +and relieve this tedious time of waiting by venturing out to +exterminate the vermin?" +</P> + +<P> +"Should we not first send out a spy?" suggested an old officer. +</P> + +<P> +"It is well thought on. Choose you a man, and bid him take this woman +for a guide. Let him stab her if she prove false. Do you gather +together our fighters," went on the priest, turning to another, "and +bid them make ready to sally out immediately." +</P> + +<P> +"Shall you venture yourself, Excellency?" +</P> + +<P> +"Shall I not!" cried La Salle, his hot blood afire for one more fight +and one more triumph. "I fear we shall find but poor sport, but such +as it is I shall take my share. Break up yonder circle of madmen, and +order them to make ready. Hasten, so that we may have our hunt, and be +ready to receive the ship when she sails out of the fog." +</P> + +<P> +"I go not," cried Onawa, furiously resisting the soldiers who would +have forced her away. She broke from them, ran to La Salle, and fell +upon her knees, panting: "I go with you, that I may fight with you, and +die for you." +</P> + +<P> +"The woman has yet to learn a soldier's discipline," said La Salle +coldly. "Secure a rope round her, and if she prove obstinate let her +feel the end of it." +</P> + +<P> +Onawa flung herself forward to grasp his feet, but two soldiers stepped +out and dragged her away. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, my brave comrades! To arms!" shouted the fighting priest. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap32"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXXII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +ARMS AND THE MAN. +</H4> + +<P> +Silas Upcliff groaned bitterly when he heard the Puritan's shout. +Being a brave man, his spirit inclined towards lending aid to his +compatriots, but being honest also, his sense of duty impelled him to +observe the oath which he had made to his niggardly owner. While he +was thus halting between two opinions, the three venturers left him +upon the shore, the blood tingling in their veins at the prospect of a +glorious death. +</P> + +<P> +Penfold led the way and took command, carrying his burden of years as +lightly as any man upon that coast. Striking upward from the bay, +where the sailors were fighting the ice, he brought his companions to a +height of three hundred feet above the sea, where the cliffs were +divided by a narrow defile down which in summer coursed a stream. +</P> + +<P> +"I have kept this place in mind," said the old man, when they halted at +the extremity of the pass. "Here we shall make our stand." +</P> + +<P> +So contracted was the way that the snow, massed heavily upon the sides, +in places nearly touched. Some pines clung to the rock, hanging over +the defile, straining at their rope-like roots. At these the old +yeoman pointed with the order: +</P> + +<P> +"Fell me two trees so that they shall fall along the pass." +</P> + +<P> +The others scrambled up the cliff and cut at the snaky roots, while +Penfold occupied himself below in treading the snow into a firm bed. +Soon the tough pines began to crack and sway. First one crashed down, +then another, and after that Upcliff came running, short of breath, +into the defile, having at length made up his mind that Master Grignion +must lose his ship. +</P> + +<P> +"The enemy show black against the snow yonder, a hundred men if there +be one," he shouted. "Tell me now, how shall I dispose my men?" +</P> + +<P> +"Return to your ship, Master Skipper, and cut her free with what speed +you may," replied Penfold gruffly. "We stand here to hold back the +enemy so long as life remains." +</P> + +<P> +"Mayhap they shall not come this way?" suggested Upcliff. +</P> + +<P> +"If they do not, then are ye doubly safe. Before they can pass round +you shall be away, for I know of no easy path up yonder wall, and on +the south the sea guards us. See you not that they must here advance +singly, and that one good fighter may hold them all at bay?" +</P> + +<P> +"They have guns," said Upcliff, cocking his ear to listen to the axes +ringing keenly in the bay. +</P> + +<P> +"They shall not use them. The snow must drench their priming." +</P> + +<P> +The skipper made a step back, but halted again. +</P> + +<P> +"I cannot desert you, comrades," he said hoarsely. "My owner is also +an Englishman, an alderman of London town, and, close-minded though he +be, I wot he would lose his venture and his ship rather than see +England shamed. Bid me call my men to the far end of this pass, and +there let us stand together until the end." +</P> + +<P> +"See you not that this is our affair?" replied Penfold. "We are +fighting for our own hands, having blood of comrades to avenge. Go, +for you do but waste your time and ours." +</P> + +<P> +"Away," added Hough, pushing the skipper gently back. "The Lord being +on our side, how should we be afraid? They come about us like bees, +and are extinct even as the fire among the thorns, for in the name of +the Lord shall we destroy them. Go, good master, and while we smite +these worshippers of idols do you release your ship." +</P> + +<P> +Thus compelled to observe his oath, Upcliff gave way, though with great +unwillingness, and ran to the end of the pass, where his eyes were +gladdened by the sight of the <I>Dartmouth</I> riding in the black channel, +dressed out in all her canvas. His sailor's heart warmed at the +spectacle, but sank again when he contemplated the wide white field +which still spread between the deep sea and his ship. He staggered +down, blowing like a whale, and snatching an axe from the tired hands +of one of his sailors wielded it furiously. +</P> + +<P> +The men in the pass twisted the pine-boughs and snagged the trunks to +form a rough chevaux-de-frise. Before an hour had passed they heard +footfalls crushing the snow, and then Penfold smiled and rose to his +feet. The old man had been resting beneath a tree. +</P> + +<P> +"Comrades," he said, "I lead by the privilege of age. Not more than +one can make a stand in this narrow pass. Do you ascend the cliff, one +on either side, and as the enemy attempt to climb the barrier cast snow +into their faces. The rest you shall leave to me." +</P> + +<P> +"Out on you, old Simon," said Hough strongly. "I am younger than you +by many years, and thus shall last the longer." +</P> + +<P> +"You may fill this place after me," said Penfold. "But while I live I +rule." +</P> + +<P> +Hough was not satisfied, and the argument was only brought to an end by +the sight of a cap lifting above the ridge. +</P> + +<P> +"To your places," whispered Penfold, stepping quickly to the barrier. +</P> + +<P> +The knight was already upon the cliff, sheltering his spare body behind +a pine. He awaited the one man who, he felt assured, would not lose +the opportunity of a fight, and he did not desire to risk his life +until he and that man could meet. +</P> + +<P> +"Captain!" called a French voice startlingly, "a barrier is thrown +across the way." +</P> + +<P> +"Over it," ordered the officer. +</P> + +<P> +The man jumped upon the fallen trunk and threw up his hands to grasp +the higher branches; but his fingers merely clutched the air, he gave a +groan, and fell back, pierced through the heart by Penfold's sword, +which had darted from the interlacing branches. A shout went up from +the pass, which was now a struggling mass of soldiers. +</P> + +<P> +"Information ever costs a man," said the officer coolly. "Storm the +barrier." +</P> + +<P> +Two soldiers rushed out and flung themselves upon the locked trees, +jostling each other in the constricted space. A lump of snow hit the +foremost between the eyes, he gasped, and would have turned, but a +sword-thrust sent him to his doom, and his comrade, blinded in the +self-same manner, shared his fate. +</P> + +<P> +"There are men in hiding yonder," rang a voice. "The villains shelter +behind the trees." +</P> + +<P> +"Find me a way round," roared an angry voice, and La Salle pushed along +the pass. "Are we to be held here by one man behind a fallen tree?" +</P> + +<P> +"There is no way up, Excellency," said an officer, gazing up the face +of the rock. "The heretics have well chosen their place." +</P> + +<P> +"Send men round," shouted the priest. +</P> + +<P> +A detachment was sent instantly to find a way over the cliff, while +woodmen with axes went out and laid furiously upon the pines. Penfold +disabled the first, but another advanced, and after him another, each +unwilling to obey, but unable to hang back. +</P> + +<P> +Three dead bodies were dragged out, and La Salle tried the expedient of +sending his men in rapid succession against the barrier. The wet snow +dashed upon their faces, one by one they dropped before that stinging +sword, man after man fell back, but another always stood ready to rush +into the gap, to make the attempt, and give way to someone more +confident than he. Penfold's dogged old tongue counted off the strokes +to the ringing of the ice-axes from the bay. The soldier-settlers came +faster, each man more fierce than the last, because their blood was +heated by the shame of this defeat. The old man's misty breath came +streaming between the branches where his untiring sword flickered in +and out. +</P> + +<P> +Two at a time came the Frenchmen, until at length, profiting by a +mis-stroke, a couple gained the summit of the barrier. The first to +jump down fell a prey to the stout yeoman, but the second reached the +ground unharmed. A shout of triumph went up, and the soldiers swarmed +the obstacle. +</P> + +<P> +"Excellency, the Indian woman has shown us a way over the cliff," +exclaimed a voice beside La Salle. "That way, says she, we shall +encounter no opposition." +</P> + +<P> +"I will myself make the trial," La Salle answered. "Do you in the +meantime win this pass." +</P> + +<P> +"She says also that we must hasten, because these men are holding the +pass while their comrades free the ship from the ice." +</P> + +<P> +Penfold fought on, grim to the end, but his sword had lost its +deadliness and his arm was growing numb. His comrades aided him as +best they could, but they too were acting upon the defensive, because +some of the more daring soldiers had scaled the slippery sides of the +pass in a futile endeavour to drag them down. The old man groaned and +tottered as the light failed gradually from his eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Let it be said of me," he gasped, "that I gave them half an hour." +</P> + +<P> +Voices roared in his ears, like the waves of a stormy sea about to +close over his head. +</P> + +<P> +"Strike! He is spent. Strike him down." +</P> + +<P> +There followed an onward rush. Over the old man's failing body sped +the bitterness of death. +</P> + +<P> +He felt a sword in his side, another in his shoulder, and at the pain +he revived like an old lion, and roared and plunged forward, feeling +his way with his point, until he found his striker's heart, and then he +shouted with all the strength that was left: +</P> + +<P> +"Stand up in my stead, comrade! I have made a good fight, and +accounted for the best. They shall run before us yet. To me, comrade! +Ha! St. Edward and St. George!" +</P> + +<P> +With that last shout he fell, deep into the red snow, his old body +spouting blood, and so died like a valiant man of Berks, with his sword +fast held, and his grey head set towards the foe. +</P> + +<P> +Hough hurled back a soldier, who had clambered up the cliff to dislodge +him, and would have flung himself down to stop the way, when on a +sudden a tall figure slid down the side opposite him, and stood +immediately to defy the body of men sweeping through like an inundating +wave, wielding his sword with calm, nervous strength, his keen eyes +starting from a thin, brown face. +</P> + +<P> +Then Hough's courage gave way, and sinking to his knees, while the +enemy rushed through, he cried aloud. Death had no terror for him; but +the spectacle of that cold man, whom for an instant he had seen, +fighting in the raw light of the dawn, then thrown down and trodden +under foot, made him shiver to the heart. +</P> + +<P> +"The Lord encompasses us with the spirits of our friends," he cried, +knowing that it was Jesse Woodfield who already lay hacked and bruised +and buried in the snow of the defile. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap33"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXXIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED. +</H4> + +<P> +The Acadians swept towards the bay, but their governor was not with +them. La Salle had gone alone over the cliffs, along the way which +Onawa had revealed, and he went not unseen. The Kentishman followed, +searching out each footprint in the snow. Once again the priest was +destined to take up the sword, before assuming the mantle of spiritual +power. As he passed among the pines the loneliness of the place began +to make him fear, and when he stopped with a curse, because he knew not +which way to turn, he seemed to behold the sword of his dream flashing +like lightning between the mitre and himself. And while halting he +heard perplexing shouts, lessening, receding, and growing faint, as his +men rushed down upon their foes. +</P> + +<P> +Hearing those shouts Upcliff looked up from the field of ice, and his +heart for an instant ceased when he saw that the enemy had gained the +pass. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, men of Somerset," he shouted, "let our bird fly right soon, or we +shall never sight England again." +</P> + +<P> +"We can do no more than our best, captain," growled the sailor Jacob +Sadgrove. "My arms are near dead with work." +</P> + +<P> +"Out!" cried Madeleine, sweeping forward. "Out, and make room for a +woman." +</P> + +<P> +She caught up the axe which the grumbler had dropped, and, lifting her +brave arms, attacked the barrier of ice with never a thought of fear, +until the sailor returned glumly to his work for shame. +</P> + +<P> +"Only a few more yards," the deceiving girl cried, throwing back her +flushed face. "Look not behind. To regard work closely is to fear it. +Attack boldly, and it is done. See how the ship struggles to be free! +Soon we shall fly through the open water, with the wind in our sails. +Then shall you rest, and it shall delight you to remember the work." +</P> + +<P> +So she called, laughing and singing at intervals, and running here and +there to encourage the toilers, a faithful angel of hope, while the +axes rang more strongly and the men cast side-glances towards the foe +and swore breathlessly at their impotence. +</P> + +<P> +"Get you aboard, lass," said Upcliff, loosening his cutlass. "Here is +work for men. My lads, we shall make a good fight for country and +faith, and die, if God will, like true men facing odds. Now we are +taken on both sides." +</P> + +<P> +He pointed to the north-west. Out of the gloom of dawn and the +fog-wreaths, which ever haunt the Nova Scotian banks, sailed a +full-rigged man-of-war beating against the breeze. It was the +provision ship making for the settlement now that the helmsman could +see to steer between the rocks. +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing but a miracle can serve," quoth the skipper. "And the age of +miracles is past." +</P> + +<P> +"Have but faith, and the miracle shall yet be wrought," cried +Madeleine, her magnificent confidence strong within her, even in that +hour when a less bold spirit would have seen the doors of a heretic's +prison reopening. "God shall yet make a way for us to escape. I know +we are not doomed. Help me, captain, and you sailors, with your faith. +We are never to be taken. We are to escape from our enemies, and God +shall give to us the victory." +</P> + +<P> +Upcliff smiled sadly as he gazed at the radiant face of the prophetess, +shaking his grizzled head as he muttered: +</P> + +<P> +"May the good Lord bless you, girl. You send us forth strong to fight." +</P> + +<P> +Then again he faced his men and formed them in line; and when they +stood ready to receive the enemy, every man his cutlass in hand, the +master cried out strongly: +</P> + +<P> +"Let no man surrender. For such the French have a gallows. Lads, we +shall, by God's grace, leave a deep mark on yonder little army before +the ship comes nigh. See you how slowly she labours down? She can +scarce make headway against the tide, and the breeze freshens every +minute. Now for a bold stand, a stern struggle, and may the Lord have +mercy on us all." +</P> + +<P> +Stout Somerset throats answered him with a cheer. They had exercised +their privilege of grumbling over the uncongenial work of cutting a way +for their ship through the ice-field while their compatriots fought +upon the cliffs; but not a man drew back from the prospect of that +hopeless battle. +</P> + +<P> +The Acadians struggled down the long hill, floundering in the soft +snow, and, halting upon the flat, drew up in the form of a crescent. +There were signs of unwillingness among the settlers, due in part to +the reputation gained in those days by Englishmen of never shrinking +from a struggle to the death. They were also perturbed by the absence +of La Salle, whom they had not seen since Woodfield had been +overwhelmed and left for dead in the defile. +</P> + +<P> +While the French thus hesitated, Upcliff and his impetuous men were for +advancing to the attack; but Madeleine came before them, and in a +strained voice, altogether unlike her usual tones, implored the skipper +not to move towards the shore. +</P> + +<P> +"Do not leave the ice," she cried. "I charge you go not beyond the +ice." +</P> + +<P> +"The maid has surely lost her wits," muttered Upcliff. +</P> + +<P> +"See the eyes of her!" whispered Jacob Sadgrove to his nearest +companion. "Have seen a horse look so, when he knows of somewhat +coming, and would speak of it if he might." +</P> + +<P> +A roar broke the morning fog. The ship had fired to encourage her +allies. The ball splashed into the black water far from the gallant +<I>Dartmouth</I>, which quivered and shook her sails in furious helplessness. +</P> + +<P> +"Swear to me that you will not leave the ice-field," cried Madeleine. +</P> + +<P> +"Ay, if you wish it," said Upcliff; adding bluntly: "May die as well +here as yonder. Stand together, lads. They come!" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, why so long?" prayed Madeleine, bending upon the snow. "It is +time for the miracle. I know we are to be saved, but it is terrible to +wait. I know that not a hair upon the head of any of these men shall +be harmed; but they know it not, and they prepare for death because +they cannot see. Oh, God, send us now the miracle!" +</P> + +<P> +"Stand firm!" shouted Upcliff. "Let them make the charge, and we shall +smite them as they stumble in the snow." +</P> + +<P> +He spoke, and straightway a mighty report rang along the shore. The +ice on which the men planted their resolute feet quivered and heaved. +The attackers halted and drew back; the attacked stared at one another +in superstitious wonderment. No smoke drifted behind. The guns upon +the ship had not spoken. But the echoes of that dry, sharp sound still +crashed among the cliffs. +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine rose, and sent her rapturous voice singing into the ears of +all: "The miracle! The miracle!" +</P> + +<P> +Already a channel of black water frothed and bubbled between the +English sailors and the French settlers, a channel which widened each +moment, as the ice-floe which the change of temperature had parted so +suddenly from the shore drifted seawards, drawn out by the strong gulf +current, bearing the men snatched from death, the little ice-locked +ship, and the girl who had trusted so firmly and so well. +</P> + +<P> +They flocked round her, the rough sailors, crying like children, and +knelt to kiss her hands. +</P> + +<P> +"To work!" she cried, pointing to the silver strip which held the floe +united. +</P> + +<P> +But before the men could again use their axes the strain told. The ice +cracked again and the field was divided into two parts. There was a +momentary danger lest the brigantine should be crushed between the +floes, but this peril was averted by the regularity of the current. +The men swung themselves aboard, lifting Madeleine up the ladder of +ropes and so upon deck. The enemy already had become grotesque black +spots upon the shore. +</P> + +<P> +"Clear the decks for battle!" the captain thundered as the little ship +ran free of the ice. +</P> + +<P> +The Frenchman had altered her course, and was bearing down upon the +<I>Dartmouth</I>, roaring with all her guns. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap34"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXXIV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE THIRST. +</H4> + +<P> +Onawa, daughter of Shuswap, vagrant and traitress, she who had brought +disaster upon her own people, continued to reap the reward of all her +constancy to the enemy of her race. Famished and parched, she sank +into a bed of snow, and rested her wildly throbbing head against a +frosted tree. She had not eaten for many hours, her shelter was more +than a league away, and her strength was gone. Her reward also was a +maddening thirst. +</P> + +<P> +After tracking down the Englishmen, watching them in the fall of the +snow, enduring every privation until she had learnt their strength, she +had gone at full speed to the settlement, madly hoping even then that +La Salle might look on her with favour, despite her branded cheeks and +mutilated face. His reward was to give her over to the soldiers, who +had mocked her because she was of the hated race, a savage in their +eyes, and had bound her with a rope and scourged her with the end of +it, and had even struck her with their fists when she halted from +exhaustion, and would have stabbed her to death had she refused to +obey. Thus she received her full reward. And now she could do no more. +</P> + +<P> +Neuralgic pains coursed through her head, until the weight of her hair +became a torment. Feverishly she sucked a handful of snow, but the +awful thirst remained unquenched. The sounds of the chase entered her +ears dimly from that half-lit region ahead, until drowsiness passed +into her body, and her head dropped, and her eyes closed, and the sleep +which moves imperceptibly into death came upon her. Her passionate +heart lowered its beat, her pulses throbbed more sluggishly, as she +drew close to the threshold which separates life and its object from +the world of dreams. Her body collapsed, her head slid down; the soft +snow sucked her in like quicksand. +</P> + +<P> +A figure passed among the slim terebinth columns. Though the sleeper +had brought down her father into dishonour, had betrayed her tribe, and +called the shadow of death across the home of her kindred, her sister +had not forgotten her. The figure approached, bent over the huddled +shape, and shook it roughly back to life. +</P> + +<P> +"Tuschota!" muttered the girl, as her eyes opened upon the immobile +brown face. +</P> + +<P> +"Rise," said the woman. "Lean on me, and I will take you to my hut." +</P> + +<P> +"Leave me here," moaned Onawa. "I would lie until the great sleep +comes." +</P> + +<P> +"I am your sister. I may not leave you thus to die. Yonder food +awaits you, and drink, and the warmth of burning logs." +</P> + +<P> +She assisted Onawa to rise. The girl staggered and clung with dead +hands. Together they passed down the slope, and so came to the cabin +cunningly hidden amid snowy bush. A fire burnt redly, and hard by +stood a stone vessel filled with rice-water. Towards this Onawa +reached her hands, with the cry: +</P> + +<P> +"I am tortured with thirst." +</P> + +<P> +Without a word her sister gave her drink, and watched her while she +gulped at the tepid liquor. Suddenly she put out her hand, and grasped +the vessel, saying: +</P> + +<P> +"See! I have meat ready for you." +</P> + +<P> +Onawa partook of the food like a famished beast, and as strength +returned the former love of life awoke, and she longed to go forth to +renew the hopeless quest; but she felt her sister's eyes reading her +thoughts, and presently she heard that sister's voice: +</P> + +<P> +"It is good to live, Onawa." +</P> + +<P> +She made no reply, but leaned forward, thrusting her hands against the +scarlet wood. +</P> + +<P> +"Even when son and husband are taken away, and the light fails, and all +the ground is dark, it is still good to live," went on the voice. "Why +the good God gives this love of life we may not know." +</P> + +<P> +"Give me more drink," the girl panted. +</P> + +<P> +"Our father shall soon pass into the spirit land," went on the stern +woman, unheeding her request. "He is old, but 'tis not age that saps +his strength. Honour has departed from him. He has lost the headship, +and another fills his office." +</P> + +<P> +Onawa stared sullenly into the leaping heart of the fire. +</P> + +<P> +"As this life continues we find trouble. You have lost beauty, and I a +son. We shall not regain that which we have lost. Sisters in blood we +are, and sisters in unhappiness also." +</P> + +<P> +"I have brought sorrow into your life," muttered Onawa, less in +penitence than defiance. +</P> + +<P> +"And shall do so again. This night you have brought the enemy of my +people out from Acadie. There was a time when you betrayed my son into +the hands of him who now spurns you from his side. That which is done +cannot be undone, and God shall punish." +</P> + +<P> +"Why, then, have you brought me here?" cried Onawa fiercely. "Why did +you not leave me to perish, that you might be rid of me for ever?" +</P> + +<P> +"Remember you not the words that I spoke to you in the grove? I bade +you have in mind that in the time when you should hunger and thirst you +might turn to me. I have not forgotten, though you turned against me +when your heart followed its own longing. +</P> + +<P> +"I grieved for your Richard." +</P> + +<P> +"So the hunter grieves when he by mischance has slain the bear cub +which has strayed. And so he avoids the mother if he loves his life." +</P> + +<P> +At that moment there rang in her steady voice a threat. Onawa looked +up and met a suffering brown face and large quiet eyes. There was no +menace there, nothing but longing for the dead and charity for the +living. +</P> + +<P> +She pressed a hand upon her burning throat. "Give me drink," she +gasped. +</P> + +<P> +Her sister poured some of the rice-water into a smaller vessel. This +she stirred gently with a stick, watching the ruined face of Onawa with +the same patient eyes. Outside the hut a flight of snow birds whirred +from side to side. +</P> + +<P> +"When you have drunk you shall go forth," said Mary Iden deliberately. +"You shall seek to aid my enemy when he strives to strike down my +husband." +</P> + +<P> +Onawa gave a cry. In wondering over her sister's forgiveness she had +forgotten La Salle. +</P> + +<P> +"They may already have met," she muttered. +</P> + +<P> +A stern smile crossed her sister's face. +</P> + +<P> +"Can you not hear?" she whispered. "Yet you say you love the white +priest. I have heard this long while the noise of sword striking +sword. I listen without fear, knowing that no man can conquer my +husband when no treachery hangs behind. Can you not hear the sounds of +the fight?" +</P> + +<P> +"My ears burn," cried Onawa. "I hear only the cold wind passing among +the pines." +</P> + +<P> +"They fight!" exclaimed her sister triumphantly. "My Richard shall +rest to-day." +</P> + +<P> +"The water," gasped Onawa for the third time. "My throat is on fire." +</P> + +<P> +"Drink and go forth." +</P> + +<P> +Grasping the vessel in both hands, Onawa drained it to the dregs. +Then, as her arms fell, and the taste in her mouth became exceeding +bitter, and a strange exaltation visited her brain, and her body began +to burn, and numbness came into her feet, she bent with one terrible +groan, to hide her fear and her shame, and—if it were possible—her +awful knowledge of the wolfsbane poisoning that draught, from the calm +black eyes which stared at her across the fire. +</P> + +<P> +"Aid whom you will," said the steady voice, which was scarce audible +above the furious beatings of the listener's heart. "The day breaks." +</P> + +<P> +A lifeless winter sun was struggling into the hut. +</P> + +<P> +The pride of her race remained with Onawa to the end. She would not +show fear, nor useless rage, in the presence of her sister. She would +not confess what she knew, nor acknowledge that she had met with the +punishment which she deserved and the laws of their race demanded. +Passing into a sad beam of light, she drew herself erect and panted: +</P> + +<P> +"I shall go forth." +</P> + +<P> +"Go, sister," said the poisoner. "I too go forth, but we shall not +walk together. For you the west and the forest, for me the south and +the sea." +</P> + +<P> +"I go among the pines." +</P> + +<P> +"Farewell, sister." +</P> + +<P> +"Farewell." +</P> + +<P> +Erect and proud, Onawa passed out with her awful sorrow, through the +opening morning, and so among the trees, still dignified and unbending +because she knew those calm black eyes followed all her movements. On +she went into the increasing gloom, until the snow carpet appeared to +grow hot, and opalescent colours fringed the trees, and sounds of +sleepy music hummed around her head. The red and green lights flashed +up and down; solitude closed behind her; the pine-barrens were on fire. +The world was gone. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap35"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXXV. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +SWORDCRAFT. +</H4> + +<P> +The path taken by La Salle ascended and brought him finally to the +crest of a hill. Here a wood of storm-beaten pines stood motionless in +the white calm of the long winter sleep. Between the dimly lighted +trees spread a narrow scar of black earth, which had been protected +from snow by the funereal boughs above. The spot was as silent and as +sad as a burying-place. It seemed to the priest that the balsamic +pines might have been planted to neutralise any noxious odours +emanating from the ground. He shivered at the thought, turned to +retrace his steps and find an outlet which might lead him to the shore; +but straightway a restraint fell upon his feet, and a thrill raced +through his body, when he perceived that the place whereon he walked +was haunted ground. +</P> + +<P> +Before him stood a figure, white-faced and worn, clad in ragged +garments, a man to all outward seeming no more sentient than the pines, +for he moved not at all, nor did he speak, nor make a sign. As though +rooted and frozen, he stood across the way, showing life and feeling +only in his eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"By all the saints!" the priest muttered. "'Tis but a half-starved +Englishman." +</P> + +<P> +Then he shouted his ready challenge to the silent man, who passed +immediately with swift movements to the strip of bare ground, and, +halting within touch of his enemy, addressed him sternly in the Gallic +tongue: +</P> + +<P> +"That you may learn, Sir Priest, with whom you have to deal, know that +before you stands Sir Thomas Iden, a squire of England and a knight of +Kent, a man moreover who has sworn to fight you fairly to the death. +Remember you that night on which you put to death a boy in the forest +beside Couchicing? That boy was my son, my only child. Sir Priest, +you and I have crossed swords before this day. I was then a better man +than now; but, with the help of my God and the spirit of my child, I +shall lay out your body in this lonely spot for the winds to howl upon, +and leave your eyes open for the crows to peck at. I pray you answer +only with your sword." +</P> + +<P> +Hot words came to La Salle's tongue, but he did not utter them. He +found himself daunted by the horror of the place and the unyielding +attitude of the knight. As he brought up his renowned right arm, it +shivered and the hand was cold. But so soon as their blades met, his +fighting spirit arose and conquered the superstitious fear, and a +fierce light shone again in his eyes, and the knowledge was borne back +upon him that he was in truth the finest swordsman in the New World, +and with that he shouted out, "Have at you, heretic dog!" and attacked +with all his might. +</P> + +<P> +Not a bird moved through the air, not an insect lived upon that hill +top, not an animal passed that way. The two men had the gloomy wood to +themselves. Not even a breath of wind passed to wave the pines, or +scatter into motion last autumn's rusted leaves, which spotted with red +the sable rent in the great white sheet which Nature had drawn across +the ground. The rhythm of the swords rang monotonously, as the two +weird figures drifted to and fro, from side to side of the dusky bluff, +struggling the one against the other, with life as the winner's prize. +Before the abbé spread his splendid career of power as a prince of the +Church. He had but to emerge triumphant from this last taking of the +sword to assume the dignity of his new office and realise the ambition +of his heart. While the avenger saw neither priest, nor governor, nor +fencer of renown, but merely a fellow-being who had extinguished the +light of his young son's life. +</P> + +<P> +So the momentous minutes passed. When the sound of quick and furious +breathing began to pulsate around the hill, Mary Iden ascended from the +hollow, after playing her part in the avenging of her son's death, and +watched with bosom heaving rapidly every movement of her husband, sure +in her faith that he was the strongest man alive. Yet she aided him +with her counsel; and when the passion of the fight had entered also +into her she cast contempt and hatred upon La Salle, and mocked his +skill, though he was on that day the finer swordsman of the pair. +</P> + +<P> +"Wait not, husband," she cried warningly. "He is more spent than you." +</P> + +<P> +Sir Thomas heard and rushed out. La Salle, standing sideways, parried +the thrust with a slight motion of his iron wrist, and, rounding, took +up the attack, which ended in a feint and a lunge over the heart. His +sword glanced under the knight's arm and the point struck a fir and was +almost held. +</P> + +<P> +"Perdition!" he muttered. "I must use greater caution." +</P> + +<P> +For a few seconds the blades were dazzling as they darted together with +the malignity and swiftness of serpents; then La Salle feigned to +stumble, lowering his point as though he had lost his grip, an old +trick he had often employed successfully, and as the knight leaped +forward to take his opening, the priest recovered and sent the blade +into his opponent's side. Life had never appeared to him so good as at +that moment, but before his laugh had died the Englishman leaned +forward, grasping the sword and holding it firmly in his side, lunged +out, and ran the priest through the chest, after La Salle had saved his +life by throwing up his arm and deflecting the point from his heart. +</P> + +<P> +They fell apart, gulping the keen air for a taste of new life. The +watcher advanced, her brown face ghastly, but her husband put out his +hand and motioned her back. +</P> + +<P> +"Away, Mary. There is life in me yet." +</P> + +<P> +Unwillingly she retired, and a flush of pride crossed her face when her +husband staggered across the snow, his eyes still clear and fierce. La +Salle, no whit less dauntless, came up also and stood swaying like one +of the trees behind. +</P> + +<P> +"You are brave, Englishman, and a worthy foe," he gasped. "We have +shed each other's blood. Let us now cry hold and part." +</P> + +<P> +"There can be no truce between you and me," came the deep reply. "This +fight is to the death." +</P> + +<P> +"Life has its pleasures," urged La Salle. +</P> + +<P> +"Of such you deprived my son." +</P> + +<P> +"Your blood be upon your own head!" +</P> + +<P> +Again their swords clashed. No signs of weakening yet upon either +drawn face. The balance swayed neither to the one side nor to the +other. +</P> + +<P> +Again the watcher started out, appealing to her husband. It would be +an easy matter to attack La Salle from the rear; to trip his foot with +a stick; to blind him by a handful of snow. But the knight would not +hear her; and even threatened when she made as though she would disobey. +</P> + +<P> +The priest listened for the tramp of feet and the call of voices. He +would then have called the meanest settler in Acadie his brother. +Shoutings came to him from the bay, the roar of the ship's gun, and the +splitting of the ice. He groaned and cursed the folly which had driven +him into this snare. +</P> + +<P> +Courage revived when he scored by a clever stroke; but again his +triumph was short-lived. The knight answered by driving his point hard +into the open side. Darkness dropped upon their eyes. They reeled +like drunken men, fighting the air, feeling for each other, falling +body to body, and pushing apart with a convulsive shudder. +</P> + +<P> +"Where are you?" gasped the abbé. +</P> + +<P> +"Here," moaned the Englishman, striking towards the voice. +</P> + +<P> +"It is enough," said La Salle, the voice gurgling in his throat. +"Flesh and blood can endure no more. Put up your sword." +</P> + +<P> +"Only in your heart." +</P> + +<P> +They held at each other with one hand while fighting with the other. A +wound on one side was answered by a wound on the other. It appeared as +though neither had another drop of blood to shed, not a muscle left +unspent, nor a breath to come. The chill of the winter was in the soul +of each, and it was also the chill of death. They crawled at each +other like torn beasts, upon hands and knees. +</P> + +<P> +"You are spent," pulsated La Salle. +</P> + +<P> +"My sword has gone through you twice." +</P> + +<P> +"Husband, bid me strike him," implored the watcher. "He is scarce able +to lift his arm." +</P> + +<P> +"Back, woman," panted the dying man. +</P> + +<P> +Once more they stood upon their feet, and again their points were +raised, but now against bodies which had lost all consciousness, save +the ruling passion of ambition in the one and vengeance in the other. +</P> + +<P> +"Down!" snarled the abbé, knowing not it was the last word which his +tongue should utter; and, closing with his enemy, threw his remaining +life into one lunge. +</P> + +<P> +The sword left his hand for ever. By a glimmer of light through the +red darkness he saw the body of the knight stretched black along that +ghastly carpet; he saw the woman running forth with a great cry to +raise it by the shoulders. Then night fell upon the victor as he +stumbled on among the trees, with a small sane voice of consciousness +singing in his departing soul: "You have fought your last fight. You +shall win the red hat yet." +</P> + +<P> +So he was found by his defeated soldiers, feeling his way from pine to +pine, leaving in his wake two dotted lines more ruby-red than the +cardinal's soutane. They bound up his wounds as best they could, and, +raising him upon their shoulders, bore the dead weight of unconscious +matter into Acadie. +</P> + +<P> +At noon the ship came to the landing-stage. During the excitement +which accompanied and followed her arrival even the governor became +forgotten. A cadaverous priest was the first to step ashore, casting +around him glances of intolerable pride. Others were quick to follow, +and soon it became noised abroad that Roussilac was to be recalled and +that Pope Urbano had need of La Salle the priest. Even such momentous +matters were put aside by the settlers in their anxiety to hear tidings +of home and friends. +</P> + +<P> +In the meantime the pale-faced priest had set forth for the governor's +abode, muttering imprecations upon the bitter country in which it had +become his evil lot to settle. +</P> + +<P> +"His Excellency?" he inquired shortly at the door; and the seneschal, +awed by his morose manner, merely made a reverence and pointed as he +said: "He lies within, Holiness." +</P> + +<P> +More he would have said, but the nuncio passed on quickly and entered +the room, holding forth a missive tied with scarlet thread, calling in +a jealous voice: +</P> + +<P> +"Your Excellency! A letter from Rome. A call for your return." +</P> + +<P> +La Salle was lying along the bed. The messenger came nearer. +</P> + +<P> +"Awake, your Excellency! His Holiness Pope Urbano sends to you——" +</P> + +<P> +There the strange priest stopped at beholding a broken crucifix beneath +the sleeper's right hand; and a sneering smile curved his lips, and he +shrugged his thin shoulders, as he callously observed: +</P> + +<P> +"Methinks his Holiness has sent in vain." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap36"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXXVI. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +SETTLEMENT. +</H4> + +<P> +It has now been shown how the golden lilies prospered in the north, and +how the red lion, who should in time tear those gay lilies down, was +laughed at and despised. The paths of ambition, of treachery, of +vengeance, have brought direct to the same terminus, where that "fell +sergeant death" stood forth to cry "Halt" to soldier and to priest. +The name of La Salle has ever been held in honour, but chiefly to +memorise Robert the explorer, not the ambitious priest his uncle. The +name of Iden is still revered by Kentish folk; but that respect is won, +not by Sir Thomas, who—if the tradition in his family be true—married +an Indian wife and flung away his life to avenge his son, but to Sir +Alexander, who slew the rebel Cade in a Sussex orchard. The name of +Onawa is held in memory by none, though for many generations the wood +wherein she died of the poisoned draught administered by her sister was +shunned by the Iroquois, because there sounded amid the pines at night +the howling of a werewolf. +</P> + +<P> +The old chronicles mention two Englishmen who escaped from the French, +and Jesse Woodfield and Jeremiah Hough are the names recorded. When +the Acadians swept down the defile to secure Upcliff and his men, the +Puritan was ignored, and the yeoman, who had made so startling an +appearance, was left for dead. So soon as they had gone Hough made for +his companion, and discovered that he was indeed material and alive, +though sorely wounded. Presently Woodfield revived, and when he was +able to stand the Puritan led him away up the white hills to find a +place of shelter. The hut in the pine-wood being too far away, they +proceeded by slow stages towards the home of the knight, knowing +nothing of what had occurred, and scarce guessing it when they gained +the bush-filled hollow, which was stirred to its depths by the wailing +of a death-song. +</P> + +<P> +"A fitting welcome for broken-hearted men," said the Puritan. "By the +waters of Babylon we sat down and wept. The children of Edom have +smitten us full sore. Happy shall he be that rewardeth them as they +have served us. Take courage, old lad. We are even now at home." +</P> + +<P> +"Home without friends," broke from the pale lips of the man within his +arms. +</P> + +<P> +"Where the graves of comrades are, there is the brave man's home. In +England we are gone out of mind, and broken like a potter's vessel. +Here amid the snows old Simon and old George lie sleeping well." +</P> + +<P> +The song stopped when they entered the hut and stood between the living +and the dead. Immediately Woodfield sank down in unconsciousness, and +after one glance upon the sad scene and a few bitter words, Hough knelt +at his comrade's side and searched for his wounds. +</P> + +<P> +"Let a woman perform a woman's work," said the pale watcher, rising +from her husband's side. "For him"—she inclined her head to the +silent figure—"the light is gone. He sees no longer the sparkling +air. His eyes shall not burn again. The great God knows how well he +lived and how he died." +</P> + +<P> +Seeing the question on the Puritan's lips, she went on: +</P> + +<P> +"The hand that smote our son smote him. I saw the man go, and death +with him like a cloud above his head. Give me the water that stands +yonder that I may wash these wounds." +</P> + +<P> +"Who brought him hither?" the Puritan asked. +</P> + +<P> +"These arms carried him. While he lived he would have me bear no +burden. The wood for the fire he took from me, saying, 'This is no +woman's work. A woman shall smile for her husband, prepare him food, +and keep a home for his return.' These arms carried my son to his +grave. My husband was not there, or surely he would have said, 'This +is no work for you.' These arms carried my husband from the place +where he fell. His eyes looked up to mine, as though again he would +say, 'This is no work for you.' Once more they shall carry him. +Afterwards I will wait for the coming of the south wind, which carries +the souls of the dead." +</P> + +<P> +She applied her skill in healing to the restoration of the white man. +She cleansed his wounds and cooled his fever, leaving him at length +sleeping with a wan smile of triumph on his face. By then Hough also +was asleep, his face terrible in its mutilation and sternness. +</P> + +<P> +When he revived, Woodfield told his comrade how he had been captured by +the Algonquins and how they had sought to put him to death. +</P> + +<P> +"I awoke from unconsciousness," he said, "to find myself within a cave, +attended by the maid who had loosed my body from the tree. An old man +watched the entry and brought me food. These two had saved my life, +the maid because she loved my white skin, the man because he was +Christian and had lost a son who would have been of my age had he +lived. I remained in that cave many days, gaining vigour, and on a +certain evening, when left alone, ran out into the shadows and hid +myself in the forest, covering my tracks as best I could. +</P> + +<P> +"The maid pursued and besought me in her own manner to return. Many +times I escaped from her. Often she brought me food, or I must have +perished of hunger during my long wanderings through the forest. I +would hear her calling after me in the still night. I would from some +hill-top see her following my track, and when she found me she would +hold me by the feet and strive to move my heart. But resisting the +wiles of Satan, who would have me to forget my own country and my +father's house, I ran from her again." +</P> + +<P> +"We thought you dead these many months." +</P> + +<P> +"It was the will of God that I should seek for you in vain," went on +Woodfield. "Once I lay in a swamp to hide myself from a band of French +explorers. Once I was attacked by six men. One I killed, and the +remainder fled, frightened by lightning which struck down a tree +between us. Another time I concealed myself in a hemlock while the +soldiers made their camp beneath its branches. So I fought my way on +towards the east with an Englishman's longing for the sea, and when +winter drew on I made me a shelter in the pine woods on the westward +side of Acadie, and there mourned for you and for Simon Penfold as for +comrades who had fallen in the battle." +</P> + +<P> +"How came you so suddenly to our aid?" +</P> + +<P> +"In the darkness of the falling snow I ventured to approach the +settlement. Nay more, I entered at the open gate, careless of my life, +and followed the soldiers out, my heart rejoicing when I learnt from +their shouts that countrymen of mine were near at hand. I climbed +among the cliffs, and, looking down, beheld old Simon fighting in the +defile. I was descending to give him help when he fell." +</P> + +<P> +"The Lord gives and the Lord has taken away," said the Puritan solemnly. +</P> + +<P> +While the words were on his lips the wattle door was shaken and a soft +voice called. Another moment a white figure entered with a rush of +smoky air, and Madeleine stood before them, wrapped in a sail which she +had assumed to render her progress across the snow invisible. She +threw away the covering and laughed triumphantly. +</P> + +<P> +"Say not that the ship is taken?" cried Hough. Then he muttered: "A +man may tell nothing from the maid's manner. Sorrow or joy—'tis the +same to her. She laughs through it all." +</P> + +<P> +"The ship is safe," said Madeleine. "We were attacked by the +man-of-war, but when we drew clear of the ice we soon left her +lumbering astern, until she gave up the chase and sailed for shore. We +have not lost a man." +</P> + +<P> +"Then what do you here?" +</P> + +<P> +"Think you that Silas Upcliff would desert friends?" cried Madeleine +indignantly. "So soon as he knew himself to be safe, he changed his +course and beat up the coast eastward until darkness fell. Then he +dropped down, and now has sent a boat to bring you off. I have come +for you, and must take no refusal, else I am sure they shall hang me +upon my return. I would bear the message myself. The master at first +crossed me, but, being a wise man, he gave way to a woman's whim. +Come! The boat waits, and liberty lies beyond." +</P> + +<P> +She moved across the earth floor and grasped the Puritan's arm. +</P> + +<P> +"What maid is this?" asked Woodfield, as he gazed at the vision of +beauty; and when Hough had told him the good soldier's heart swelled, +and he raised his stiff body that he might take her hand, while she +smiled at him through a mist of pity. +</P> + +<P> +"I want you, wounded man," she said. "There are none sick aboard, and +I must have one to care for, or my hands will hang idle all the day. I +have thrown in my lot with your people, because mine own have driven me +forth. You shall call me sister if you will, and you shall be brother +to me, because he who is to be my husband is your true comrade, and +'tis friendship that makes brotherhood rather than blood. Rise, +brother, and lean on me." +</P> + +<P> +"Girl," said Hough, with his stern smile, "this spell you cast over us +is more potent than witchcraft." +</P> + +<P> +"We come," cried Woodfield, drawing himself upright. "Say, comrade, +let us flee to Virginia, and settle among our own, that we may hear the +blessed English tongue again." +</P> + +<P> +"We go," answered Hough gloomily. "Here is no English colony, but we +seek one in the south." +</P> + +<P> +"Go," said Mary Iden, now again Tuschota, daughter of Shuswap, to the +three. "Take what you desire for your journey, and go forth. Here are +furs, and here strong medicines. Take all. The great God guard you +upon the seas and upon the land whither you go to dwell." +</P> + +<P> +So the two Englishmen and the French girl went forth under the winter +sky, where a shy moon peeped through laced clouds like a fair maid +looking between the curtains of her bed. A dull glow of firelight +showed when they looked back into the hollow; and once, when they +paused for breath, their ears became filled with the wild sound of +singing for the dead. +</P> + +<P> +Morning dawned, and the brigantine was well away, running with a fresh +breeze from the colony of France, all hearts aboard as light as the +frosty waves which kissed her sides. Through fog and snow she went, +like a bird flying to the warmth. Little wonder that the men sang at +their tasks; that Upcliff repeated his old stories of the main with a +fresh delight, none grudging him a laugh; that Woodfield gathered +health at every hour; that Madeleine laughed from morn to night. They +were as children released from school, playing on the happy home-going. +</P> + +<P> +So the <I>Dartmouth</I> drew down to Boston quay, after one delay on the +unfrequented shore to make repairs, the men clanking at the pumps to +keep the leaking barque above the line of danger. The citizens flocked +down to meet her, and Hough's approving gaze fell upon Puritan faces +among whom he could feel himself indeed at home. +</P> + +<P> +Winthrop himself was called to give the sailors welcome to New England. +He stepped aboard, and grasped the master's hand; but not a word could +he utter before Madeleine came between them, her beauty all in +splendour, her mouth quivering, as she cried: +</P> + +<P> +"Tell me, sir—tell me quickly, where is my Geoffrey?" +</P> + +<P> +She had forgotten that other men bearing her lover's name walked the +earth. Winthrop stared in some bewilderment, and the more stern of his +following frowned at so much glorious life and impetuous loveliness. +The majority repeated the name with ominous shakings of bearded chins. +</P> + +<P> +"'Tis our comrade, young Geoffrey Viner, of whom the maid speaks," said +Woodfield in explanation. +</P> + +<P> +"Yea," exclaimed Madeleine. "Let me off the ship." +</P> + +<P> +"Stay," said Winthrop. "The young man is here indeed." He turned to +Hough with the demand: "Is he beyond doubt a true Englishman?" +</P> + +<P> +"True!" exclaimed Madeleine, her violet eyes two angry flashes. "You +suspect him? Oh, you false man!" +</P> + +<P> +It was the first time that John Winthrop had been accused of falseness; +and the novelty of the accusation brought a smile to his face. +</P> + +<P> +"The boy is loyal to the faith, and as true an Englishman as yourself, +brother Winthrop," broke in the voice of Hough. +</P> + +<P> +"Let justice prevail where I rule," said the pious governor when he +heard this. "I thank God that you have come in time. It has been +proved to our satisfaction against this boy that he has conspired with +the Dutch for the capture of our town, and as I speak he lies under +sentence of death. Thus the wisest judges err, and the humble of us +ask Heaven to amend our faults." +</P> + +<P> +Madeleine had paled very slightly while Winthrop spoke. Then she drew +her small dignified self upright, and said very confidently: "I knew +that we should arrive in time." +</P> + +<P> +"Methinks we shall scarcely find any swifter messenger to bear the good +news to the young man——" commenced the quiet voice of Roger Williams, +who had joined his friend and governor upon the quay. +</P> + +<P> +The end of the pastor's sentence became drowned in a shout of hearty +laughter such as had never been heard before in Boston; for immediately +he began to speak Madeleine picked up her skirt, and was already +running like Atalanta, breathlessly demanding from those who stood by +whether her feet were carrying her in the right way. +</P> + +<P> +"Send a cheer after her, men of Somerset," shouted Silas Upcliff. +"For, by my soul, a braver lass ne'er loved an Englishman!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap37"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXXVII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE PLOWSHARE. +</H4> + +<P> +It was summer in the year 1647, and over all the colony of Virginia +there was peace. Fortunate were its settlers to be cut apart from +their brethren in the isle of strife, where the deceitful king was +imprisoned in his palace of Hampton Court, and the London citizens +filled their streets with cries of "Parliament" and "Privilege." New +England remained untouched by this wave of feeling, of which indeed it +knew nothing, and its people went on planting their crops and gathering +the increase, happy to be removed from the oppression of a king and the +persecution of the Church. +</P> + +<P> +Upon the south side of the Potomac, at no great distance from the sea, +stood a two-storey house overhung with wild vines, and approached by a +ladder-like flight of steps which rose between two borders of flowers. +Behind a plantation stretched in a straight mile, fringed on either +side by sweet-smelling bush, where purple butterflies played through +the long day and a silver stream laughed on its way to the sea. +</P> + +<P> +The Grove, as this homestead was named, had quickly identified itself +among the successful colonial ventures. The day of small things was +rapidly nearing its close. Not only were the joint owners of the +plantation able to supply the neighbouring village with wheatmeal and +cheeses, but their export business to the Old World was growing more +profitable each season. The Virginian exporters, Viner and Woodfield, +were well-known to import merchants of Bristol, and faded invoices of +that firm were to be seen in more than one dusty counting-house a +century later, when change and chance demanded a winding-up of the +business of certain old-time traders across the seas. +</P> + +<P> +This success was due not altogether to the energy of the partners who +gave their names to the undertaking. It was commonly reported that the +Lady of The Grove was in the main responsible for much of her husband's +prosperity. According to rumour, Mistress Woodfield was an excellent +housewife, clever at her needle, and with a better knowledge of simples +than any woman in the New World, if methinks somewhat over-inclined to +play the grand dame and careful against soiling her hands. With +Mistress Viner it was otherwise. She was never to be found taking her +ease in idleness, or retailing gossip concerning neighbours. Sloth, as +once she said when rebuking the governor—for she feared no man—is an +epidemic which claims more victims than the plague. Early in the +morning she walked her garden, inhaling the sweet air, noting what +progress had taken place during the night, ordering and arranging all +things; and should her husband long delay joining her, how +reproachfully she would call: "Geoffrey! Oh, slug! You are losing an +hour of life." At fall of evening she would walk in the plantation +beside her fair-haired lad, as she loved to call her lord and master, +planning fresh improvements, and never failing to note the beauty of +the life which slept around. Seldom did she speak of the past; never +did she trouble her mind concerning the future. All would be well she +knew. There could be no time so good as the present. "What do we want +with past or future?" she would exclaim, when she caught her Geoffrey +in retrospective or anticipatory mood. "Cold mirrors in which we see +our silent selves like blocks of wood or stone. It is this minute +which is our own glorious life." The cruellest, and falsest, thing +that any woman could say concerning Madeleine Viner was that the fair +mistress of The Grove had been seen wearing a sorrowful face. +</P> + +<P> +The simple inscription, "An American Woman," was carved by her own +desire over Mistress Viner's burying-place at the dawn of the +eighteenth century;' and at a later date an unauthorised and unknown +hand cut upon the shaft of the wooden column which stood upon her +resting-place, and was destroyed by fire before Canada was wrested from +the French, the not unsuitable motto, "Ride, si sapis." +</P> + +<P> +Over the fireplace of the principal room in The Grove a ring was set in +the hard oak woodwork. This ring contained a sigil engraved with the +arms of the Iden family, a chevron between three close helmets, and was +given a place of honour in the home because through its power Geoffrey +obtained a letter of recommendation and a subsequent patent of land +from that liberal-minded papist, Lord Baltimore, to whom the ring had +been delivered upon the safe arrival of the <I>Dartmouth</I> in the Bay of +Chesapeake. +</P> + +<P> +"Better men never bled for England than the men of Kent," said the +peer, when he had listened to Geoffrey's story. "Braver men ne'er fled +from her shores to save their loyal lives. The owner of this ring was +once my honoured friend. His name has for long been most famous for +devotion to the crown." The lord sighed and sadly added: "This Charles +shall learn to rue the day when he first cast aside the help of his old +loyalist families, and by oppression and persecution most intolerable +drove them from their homes. But now, with God's help, we purpose to +build up upon this continent a new people, greater and more +clear-sighted than the old, and the motto of that people shall be, +'Liberty of thought and freedom in religion.' Tell me now, how shall I +serve you?" +</P> + +<P> +"I would settle, either in Maryland or in Virginia, and help to build +up that new American people of whom you speak," the young man answered. +</P> + +<P> +So Geoffrey Viner obtained favour in the eyes of Lord Baltimore by the +power of the ring; and when the patent for the land issued, he and +Woodfield forgot their former dreams of power, and, exchanging sword +for axe, felled the big trees and cleared away the bush, that they +might plough the virgin soil and plant their seed. As for stern Hough, +he remained in Boston, to fight Satan, since he might no longer fight +the French, and to preach the gloomy doctrine that he loved; and there +he lived to a great age, and there suddenly died one winter morning in +a bitterly cold church—for the religious feeling of the community +would allow no physical comfort to the worshipper—with a Bible between +his hands and a strained smile upon his face, as the preacher dilated +upon a psalm-singing Heaven reserved for the elect, and a burning fiery +furnace for all else. Hough had been a good man, according to the +light which he had received, and doubtless the psalm-singing Heaven was +his. +</P> + +<P> +It was evening. Geoffrey and Madeleine walked hand in hand through +their plantation, inhaling fragrance from the dewy blooms. Rain had +fallen during the afternoon, but when the sun broke out, to bid the +settlers good e'en, the country became a fairy-land. A sleepy bird +piped on a distant branch. A pale evening star rose in the east where +warm vapours were swimming in a silent sea. The peace was perfect in +that true Arcadia. Wars were yet to horrify the province, but the +shadow was not yet. For the present the sword was buried, and the +earth brought forth fruit plenteously. +</P> + +<P> +"If only I might have my wish!" exclaimed Madeleine, breaking a long +silence. +</P> + +<P> +Her husband looked at her, pressing her fingers within his, but +answered nothing. +</P> + +<P> +"I would have the whole world like this," she went on. "Geoffrey, we +would not, if we could, seek to conceive a world more beautiful than +ours. Yet how we spoil it by not knowing how to live! Were it my +world I would banish all hypocrisy, all disputings over religion, all +lust for power, and try to teach my people how to love—how to love, +and nothing else." +</P> + +<P> +"Making us perfect before our time," said Geoffrey, watching tenderly +the evening lights playing across her hair. +</P> + +<P> +"No, husband. We shall not attain perfection here. But it is from +this country that a light shall proceed to spread throughout the world. +Are we not already showing others how to live? What people before us +have ever dared to permit independence in thought and freedom in +religion? We have already stripped the Church of its mysteries. We +believe that a man may rise to God without a priest. We are going to +grow very great on this side of the seas, and fly very high, and our +motto shall always be Peace. Then we shall destroy all weapons of war, +and break up armies, and settle down in brotherly love, each man upon +his own plot of ground——" +</P> + +<P> +"Envying that of his neighbour," broke in her husband gently. +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, Geoffrey! Scoffer! But mayhap 'tis a foolish dream. Could we +but live in love, it might follow that the wolf would be ashamed to +hunt the lamb, and would feed upon grass, and thus it might happen that +our kine would lack. It is best as God ordains. The panther must +remain fierce, the bind-weed choke the flower, the rose grow its thorn, +and the berry retain its poison. But would you walk in my garden, +husband?" +</P> + +<P> +"And see the devil changed into a monk?" asked Geoffrey, with a smile. +</P> + +<P> +"There is no devil in my garden," cried Madeleine joyously. "The snake +has no bite, and the devil is dead of idleness. The angels show +themselves among my roses." +</P> + +<P> +"They are here," said Geoffrey simply. "Madeleine, sweet wife, before +we met I followed the promptings of the body; but through your eyes I +have seen the soul. It is not the soldier who wins life with his +sword. He does but strive in a vain shadow, until that happy day—ill +for him if it comes not—when there dawns upon his heart the light of +love, and his mind is inspired, and his ears hear the stirring of +wings, and his eyes are opened." +</P> + +<P> +"What does he see, husband?" she asked caressingly. +</P> + +<P> +"The sweet spirit of the woman who is sent to be his star." +</P> + +<P> +They returned to their home in the sunset, and Madeleine was singing +softly as she swung her husband's arm. The young matron ran forward, +to be entranced and transfigured by the last sunrays, and kissed her +fingers to the departing orb with a blithesome cry: +</P> + +<P> +"Wake us before the morning bell, bright sun, and come not in clouds as +you came to-day." +</P> + +<P> +Upon entering the flower garden a resonant voice, alternating with +tremendous bursts of glee, destroyed the stillness of the evening. +Husband and wife looked at each other in complete understanding, and +Madeleine held a finger to her lips, and motioned Geoffrey to advance +on tip-toe. They pressed through a bower of roses, beneath a tangle of +creepers, through tall rye-grass, and as they advanced the great voice +came more strongly to their ears. At length they stood unseen within +sight of their house front, and, drawing close together, laughed +restrainedly. +</P> + +<P> +Upon the topmost step, in a line with the entrance, sat a man of +immense bulk, holding a pretty fair-haired child upon his mighty knee; +and this child he was dancing up and down, shouting a quaint +accompaniment meantime. Around his head trailed the luxuriant vines, +covered with their fluffy white blooms, and the dainty humming-birds +went whirring by, chasing in sport the hivebound bees. +</P> + +<P> +Leaning back, and heaving his knee up and down, the big man continued +to serenely bellow his nursery refrain: +</P> + +<P> +"Ha! Pieter von Donck! Pieter von Donck! 'Tis as cunning an old +rogue as ever wore shoe-leather!" +</P> + +<P> +"Funny man! Do it again," chirruped Geoffrey Viner the younger. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap38"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXXVIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +VALEDICTORY. +</H4> + +<P> +And now in the days when the world is small, and ships of iron rush to +and fro upon the seas, and the sword has become a burden, and the +mightier plowshare ripples the plain, gone are the golden lilies, gone +the power of the soutane rouge, gone the House of Bourbon; and two +small islands of the gulf, St. Pierre and Miquelon, bound by their +rocks and beaten by the waves, gather the harvest of the sea under the +lion's protection, and mourn in their loneliness over that proud +supremacy which has passed away for ever. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="t4"> +PRINTED BY CASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED,<BR> +LA BELLE SAUVAGE, LONDON, E.C.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Plowshare and the Sword, by +Ernest George Henham + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PLOWSHARE AND THE SWORD *** + +***** This file should be named 35141-h.htm or 35141-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/5/1/4/35141/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + +</BODY> + +</HTML> + diff --git a/35141-h/images/img-cover.jpg b/35141-h/images/img-cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..6be9e99 --- /dev/null +++ b/35141-h/images/img-cover.jpg diff --git a/35141.txt b/35141.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c8ff5ac --- /dev/null +++ b/35141.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10619 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Plowshare and the Sword, by Ernest George Henham + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Plowshare and the Sword + A Tale of Old Quebec + +Author: Ernest George Henham + +Release Date: February 22, 2011 [EBook #35141] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PLOWSHARE AND THE SWORD *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +[Illustration: Cover art] + + + + + +THE PLOWSHARE + +AND + +THE SWORD + + +A TALE OF OLD QUEBEC + + + +BY + +ERNEST GEORGE HENHAM + + + +"Empire and Love! the vision of a day."--_Young_ + + + +TORONTO: THE COPP, CLARK CO., LIMITED + +LONDON: CASSELL AND COMPANY, LIMITED + +MCMIII. All Rights Reserved + + + + +A Toi + + + + +CONTENTS. + + +CHAPTER + + I.--THE FATHER OF WATERS + II.--AN ENEMY IN THE CAMP + III.--CHRISMATION + IV.--MAKERS OF EMPIRE + V.--DOUBLE DEALING + VI.--THE INTRODUCTION TO A FIGHT + VII.--THE FIGHT + VIII.--COUCHICING + IX.--THE GAUNTLET DOWN + X.--PILLARS OF THE HOUSE + XI.--THE SWORD IMBRUED + XII.--SPLENDOUR + XIII.--ENCHANTMENT + XIV.--FIRESIDE AND GROVE + XV.--GLORIOUS LIFE + XVI.--CLAIRVOYANCE + XVII.--STAMEN + XVIII.--COMMITTAL + XIX.--ENKINDLED + XX.--SACRAMENTAL + XXI.--IRON AND STEEL + XXII.--OR AND AZURE + XXIII.--THE EVERLASTING HILLS + XXIV.--ART-MAGIC + XXV.--NOVA ANGLIA + XXVI.--STIGMA + XXVII.--REVELATION + XXVIII.--BODY AND MIND + XXIX.--WOMAN'S LOVE IS LIFE + XXX.--LAND-LOCKED + XXXI.--IN THE FALL OF THE SNOW + XXXII.--ARMS AND THE MAN + XXXIII.--THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED + XXXIV.--THE THIRST + XXXV.--SWORDCRAFT + XXXVI.--SETTLEMENT + XXXVII.--THE PLOWSHARE + XXXVIII.--VALEDICTORY + + + + +THE PLOWSHARE AND THE SWORD + + + +CHAPTER I. + +THE FATHER OF WATERS. + +It was an evening of spring in the year of strife 1637. The sun was +slowly withdrawing his beams from the fortress of Quebec, which had +been established some thirty years back, and was then occupied by a +handful of settlers and soldiers, to the number of 120, under the +military governorship of Arnaud de Roussilac. The French politicians +of the seventeenth century were determined colony builders. However +humble the settler, he was known and watched, advanced or detained, by +the vigilant government of Paris. The very farms were an extension, +however slight, of the militarism of France, and a standing menace to +Britain. Where, further south, Englishmen founded a rude settlement, +the French in the north had responded by a military post. The policy +of peace taught by that intrepid adventurer, Jacques Cartier, exactly a +hundred years before, had become almost forgotten. "This country is +now owned by your Majesty," Cartier had written. "Your Majesty has +only to make gifts to the headmen of the Iroquois tribes and assure +them of your friendship, to make the land yours for ever." + +But Samuel de Champlain, the colony-maker who followed Cartier, was a +man of pride who understood how to make war, but had left unlearned the +greater art of bidding for peace. In 1609, acting under what he +believed to be a flash of genius, Champlain brought against the +Iroquois the Algonquins, their bitter hereditary enemies; and with +their aid, and the use of the magic firearms which had never before +been heard in the country of the wild north, he had utterly defeated +the proud and unforgiving people who had won the admiration and respect +of Cartier the pioneer, thus making the tribes of the Iroquois +confederacy sworn enemies of France for ever. Had Providence been +pleased to make Samuel de Champlain another Cartier, had the latter +even succeeded the former, Canada, from the rough Atlantic seaboard to +the soft Pacific slope, might well have been one great colony of France +to-day. + +It was, however, not the past history of that land, nor even its +present necessities, which occupied the mind of the Abbe La Salle, +great-uncle of the future Robert of that name, who, half-a-century +later, was to discover the mighty river of Mississippi--which was to +deprive the St. Lawrence of its proud birth-title, the Father of +Waters--and explore the plains of Michigan. The abbe was lying, that +spring evening, on the heights, smoking a stone pipe filled with coarse +black tobacco from Virginia, and watching a heavy ship which rocked +upon the swift current where it raced round the bend in the shore. He +was building up a future for himself, a fabric of ambition upon +foundations of diplomacy and daring. This senior priest of the +fortress--there were two others, Laroche the bully, and St Agapit the +ascetic--was a handsome man, powerfully built, of fair complexion +marred only by a sword-cut above the left eye. Although priest in +name, he was more at his ease flicking a rapier than thumbing a +breviary; an oath was habitually upon his tongue; a hot patriot was he, +and above all a fighter. He had fought a duel before his early mass, +and had left the altar to brag of his prowess. He was, in short, one +of the most notorious of that band of martial Churchmen, imitators of +Armand du Plessis Richelieu, for which colonial France at that age was +noted. Far from the eye of the mighty Cardinal and the feeble mind of +Louis the Just, they swaggered through life, preaching the divine +mission of the Church to the natives one hour, drinking deeply, or +duelling in terrible earnest, the next. The lives of the fighting +priests of Quebec make not the least interesting page of that romance +which three centuries have written around the heights. + +Wooden huts were dotted thinly along the slopes, which ended where the +forest of hemlocks began, about half a mile from the edge of the cliff; +and below, where a log landing-stage jutted into the stream, a +man-of-war flying the flag of France rode at her ease, a party of +turbaned men, no bigger to the abbe's eyes than children, gambling at +dice upon her fore-deck. Anchored beside the shore opposite appeared +another vessel, more rakish in build, less heavy at the stern, and +showing four masts to the Frenchman's three. A pine branch fluttered +at the main truck, and a great bough of hemlock depended over her bows, +completely draping the heavy and grotesque figure-head. + +It was this latter ship which La Salle was watching with suspicion, as +attentively as the distance would permit. The abbe mistrusted all +foreigners, even when, as in this case, they came bringing gifts. He +had recently been informed of that hasty alliance patched up between +France and Holland, and the policy found no favour in his eyes; he +frowned to think that a Dutch man-of-war should be permitted to sail up +the St. Lawrence and cast anchor beneath the heights. Was there any +genuine desire on the part of Holland to strengthen the hands of her +new ally, or were the crafty Dutchmen playing some deep game of their +own? The Indians, who surrounded the fortress as closely as they +dared, were entirely hostile to the holders of the land. Rumours of at +least one band of Englishmen, friendly with the natives, hiding in the +forest or among the clefts in the rock, waiting to strike a blow when +opportunity offered against the servants of King Louis, had been +circulated by a French dwarf known by the name of Gaudriole, a +malevolent, misshapen creature, who passed unharmed about the country, +and escaped hanging merely because of his value as an interpreter of +the various native dialects. The Dutch ship, which had arrived only +that afternoon, might well have sailed northward with some plan of +joining for the time with either Indian or English to wrest the mastery +of the maritime provinces from the clutch of France. + +While La Salle thus meditated with a mind to his own advancement, his +keen ears detected the fall of footsteps over the crisp grass, and he +pulled himself round to discover a priest, like himself wearing a +sword, a stout man, panting after his long climb. + +"What news, Laroche?" called the smoker, indicating the distant warship +with the stem of his pipe. + +"Corpus Domini!" gasped the new comer. "The sun strikes across yonder +rocks like the fire of Gehenna. What news, ask you, of yonder +piratical thief of a Dutchman? She is under commission, mark you, to +pick a quarrel and fight us for this coast, for all the fair talk of +alliance and the chopping up of the Spanish Netherlands between Paris +and Holland----" + +"What of Roussilac?" broke in La Salle. + +"The commandant is now aboard the floating gin-tank, and there you may +swear he shall impress upon the mind of Van Vuren, her master, the +certain fact that Louis the Thirteenth is lord here, from the sea +outward to wherever this endless land may reach. But we know the +Hollander. A smooth rascal, who flatters to a man's face, and when his +back is turned--Proh stigmata Salvatoris! Dost remember the Dutchman +who pinked you in the shoulder at Avignon?" + +He broke off with the question, and his fat body shook with laughter. + +"A priest must remain a priest in Avignon," said La Salle sourly; "but +he may here be a man. What news has this Hollander brought?" + +"Why, that England is in revolt from end to end," answered Laroche +gladly. "We shall find none of their clumsy ships, nor any of their +barbarian fist-using soldiers here. The people have risen against the +king. A man named John Hampden has refused to pay ship-money, a new +tax levied to raise a fleet to defy the Pope, the Dutch, and the +Cardinal, and this man carries the people with him. Also this Charles +has made himself hated in the north by forcing some new form of heresy +and insult to his Holiness in the shape of a prayer-book down the +throats of the Scotch. All but a handful have fallen away from him, +says Van Vuren, even the lords temporal have begun to despair, and many +are preparing to set out for the West." + +La Salle's martial spirit flamed up. "Here?" he questioned eagerly. + +"They would no more dare seek a home here than in Rochelle," went on +Laroche. "They go south to take up the lands where the last of their +mariners harried the Spaniards. It is reported that Lord Saye and Sele +proposes to transport himself to Virginia, Lord Warwick to Connecticut, +and the yeomen, weary of heavy taxes and fearing the extortions of the +Star Chamber, seek information concerning New England now that the star +of the old has set. We hold the seas, France or Holland unaided is +strong enough to sink the rotten barques which the English call their +fleet. There is no money forthcoming for new ships. Richelieu shall +soon rule the world! Come down. We shall perchance obtain a bottle of +wine along the Rue des Pecheurs before vespers." + +"I join you at Michel's after sundown," said La Salle. "At this +present time I remain in the wilderness." + +He stood up, brushed the dry grass from his almost entirely secular +costume, and gazed landwards under the wide brim of his hat, until a +crow came presently flapping out of the valley where the great forest +began. The black bird soared over the heads of the martial priests, +and dropped slowly to drink of the river. + +"There are finer birds in yonder forest," muttered La Salle, a smile +about his mouth. + +"Ha! An assignation?" exclaimed the stout priest, and at the +suggestion wiped his moist forehead and laughed loudly. Then he turned +and rolled away down the slope, shouting a song of the cabaret which +had been popular among the soldiers of Paris two years before. La +Salle followed his progress with a cynical smile, before he also +turned, and descended upon the opposite side out of sight of the river, +and crossed the plain where the French were to rule for two centuries +more and then to fly with the kilted men of Scotland at their heels. +Here the cool hemlock forest murmured, the dense forest which stretched +northward to the mud flats of the salt bay named after the adventurer +Hudson, whose lost bones were somewhere tossed in its cold and lonely +waters. The sun was hidden by the hills, big golden lilies stared at +the priest, an indigo-winged butterfly tumbled into shelter to die at +the ending of the day. The dew sweated out of the ground, and the +foliage smelt like wine. + +"This is better than the gutters of Paris," muttered the priest. + +The bushes parted at the sounding of his voice, and a radiant vision +stood before him, backed by the greenwood shade. A young woman, but a +few years removed from childhood, stepped forth, hungrily regarding the +abbe with a splendid pair of eyes, brown-red and full of fire, and +burning with the health and passion of life. + +This young maid was Onawa of the Cayugas, that boldest of the tribes of +the allied Iroquois, who held the interior under their confederacy, all +the plains, backwoods, the river and seaboard, with the exception of +those spots where military posts had been established--the small +palisaded farm, and even the trader's hut, being marked upon the map as +military posts, and made so by the simple order, "_Le roi le veut_." +This girl had been present at the council fire when Roussilac had +endeavoured to heal the breach between French and Indians by specious +promises, none of which he intended to fulfil; La Salle also had been +present, accompanying the commandant as the representative of the +Church. The council had been a failure, owing, said the soldiers, to +the trickery of Gaudriole, the only interpreter available; but in fact +due to the overbearing manner of Roussilac, who fell into Champlain's +error of relegating an uncivilised people to the level of animals; and +to the innate hatred entertained by the Indians for their conquerors. +The Iroquois sachems answered the representative smoothly that they +would consider his offer of peace and the terms accompanying the same, +and subsequently resolved that, though they might tolerate English and +Dutch in their midst, their final answer to the white race who had +armed the Algonquins against them could only be made by arrow and +tomahawk. Onawa, who because of her sex was allowed to take no part in +the discussion, held aloof, and regarded the figure of La Salle +standing haughtily in the yellow glow of the fire. When the deputation +withdrew she followed and caught the priest's attention with a smile; +and when night fell she was still watching the lights of the rude +little town upon the cliffs. + +La Salle was no woman's man. He was too healthy a soldier; but he was +ambitious, and had moulded his policy upon that of his master, the +character which did not shame to describe itself in the unscrupulous +terms, "I venture upon nothing till I have well considered it; but when +I have once taken my resolution I go directly to my end. I mow down +and overthrow all that stands in my way, and then cover the whole with +my red mantle." The daughter of an Iroquois chief had great power +among her own people, and the priest reflected that he might add some +fame to his name and win perhaps the red hat for his head, if he could +secure the withdrawal of the hostile tribes; or, better, inflame them +against the English, who were, so said report, but awaiting an +opportunity to strike at the north. But a difficulty lay in his path; +neither he nor Onawa could speak the other's tongue. + +But this was not an overwhelming obstacle, because then, as now, the +language of signs might make a dumb tongue eloquent. Thus it was not +altogether by accident that the handsome abbe came to the fringe of the +forest at evening, and it was not chance alone which brought Onawa from +the camp into the enemy's country. + +She held between her fingers a flower, a lily as golden as that +emblazoned upon the royal standard; and while standing before him she +placed the flower to her forehead, and then gave it him, without +turning away her eyes, and without shrinking from his. + +La Salle understood that she was expressing her willingness to give +herself to him, with or without the will and consent of her people. + +"By St. Anthony!" he muttered. "How shall I tell the jade that I have +abjured women? Does she then desire me to strip and paint, that she +may make of me a heathen husband?" + +He shook his head, and the light changed in the eyes of the girl, and +her brow wrinkled. He saw the sudden gleam of her teeth and heard her +sigh. + +"Jezebel of the forest," he cried, "name me this flower!" + +He extended it with a sign, and the ready girl spoke softly a +dissyllabic word. La Salle repeated it, again indicating the flower, +and Onawa nodded vigorously. + +"Ah!" exclaimed the priest. "Here is light out of darkness." + +He came nearer and took the girl's hand, making the same sign. She +spoke again. He touched her hair. Again she spoke. Then her cheek, +her nose, her lips, her ears, and Onawa answered him every time, +laughing delightedly as the priest pronounced each soft Iroquois word +at her dictation. + +"A few such lessons, and Gaudriole may be hanged," said La Salle. + +Then, with a quick gesture, Onawa put out her fawn-coloured hand, and +touched his right eye with the tip of one finger. + +"L'oeil," answered La Salle. + +She patted his cheek. + +"La joue," he said. + +She tweaked his nose, with a laugh. + +"Le nez," he gasped. + +She slapped his mouth. + +"La bouche," he growled, adding, "I might have said, 'La grimace.'" + +The girl was very near. He caught her and drew her up to him, and +pressed his lips powerfully upon hers. + +"C'est le baiser," he said carelessly. + +The salutation of the kiss was unknown among the Iroquois. Onawa +started, thrilling with a feeling altogether strange; then turned to +him, putting back her head as a Parisienne might have done to receive +her lover's salute. + +"Le baiser _again_," she demanded, clinging to the word which had made +life a new thing. "Le baiser _again_." + +"By all the wiles of Satan!" exclaimed La Salle, thrusting her back. +"She is in league with the enemy." + +Again he held her before him, his arms slightly bent, and said +haltingly in the tongue of the hated race, which he knew little better +than the Cayuga: "You speak the English?" + +Onawa's face lighted. "A ver' little words," she answered. Then she +drew up to him, her eyes more eloquent, and softly repeating her +bilingual request: + +"Le baiser again." + +It was dark when La Salle reached the group of huts planted upon the +cliffs. The warships were invisible and unlighted, because lamps would +have revealed figures patrolling upon deck, and there were keen-eyed +enemies watching from either shore. The priest stumbled along the +rocky path, his long boots kicking the stones before him, until he came +near the waterside and the Rue des Pecheurs, situated immediately below +the main cliff on the site occupied to-day by Little Champlain Street. +The way was inhabited, as its name implied, by fisher-folk who swept +the wide river when times were fairly peaceful, and served as soldiers +in war. There was no street in the accepted sense of the word. A few +cave dwellings burrowed out of the rock; huts here and there, a tent, +or a simple erection of sticks and stones plastered over with mud, were +barely visible, sprinkled irregularly, out of the darkness along the +high shore. + +Where a worn pathway went round and curved towards the landing-stage, a +square log-hut occupied some considerable portion of space. A very +dull lamp smoked over the entry, below a board bearing the inscription, +"Michel Ferraud, Marchand du Vin." A grumbling noise of conversation +and the rattle of dice sounded within. + +"Deuce and three for the third time!" shouted the high-pitched voice of +the Abbe Laroche. "I'll throw you again, Dutchman--one more throw for +the honour of the Church; and the devil seize me if this box plays me +the trick again." + +La Salle bent his head and entered the cabaret. He made two steps, +then stood motionless, his fingers feeling for his sword-hilt. + +Laroche looked up, the dice-box poised in his fat right hand, and a +smile wandered across his face at beholding the attitude of his +fellow-priest. + +"The master of the Dutch man-of-war," he called, indicating the player +who sat opposite him. "Sieur," he shouted over the table, with a burst +of unctuous laughter, "the renowned swordsman, L'Abbe La Salle." + +Then Van Vuren looked up. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +AN ENEMY IN THE CAMP. + +At sunset Roussilac, the commandant of Quebec, after receiving +reassuring reports from the sentries and thus closing his official +duties for the day, went aboard the man-of-war. Having personally +superintended the shipping of the gangway, to satisfy himself that +immediate communication with the shore was cut off, he withdrew to his +cabin, which he occupied in preference to his hut upon the slope. +Before retiring to his hammock, he mentally reviewed his position, the +difficulties of which had not been lessened by the unexpected arrival +of the Dutch ship. + +It had never been the way of Holland to go out of her course to be +friendly. The commandant could not forget that she had colonised large +tracts of country further south; he knew that, like England, she +aspired to extend her influence beyond the seas; and what more probable +than that, snatching at the opportunity afforded by this alliance, her +government should have commissioned Van Vuren to spy out the land and +report upon its possibilities? + +Already sufficient dangers threatened the fortress. Disquieting +rumours had reached Roussilac of late. The Indians, it was said, were +growing more restless and bolder because they had discovered the +weakness of the French. It was certain that a band of five Englishmen +had been seen in the district by Gaudriole, and these were probably the +precursors of more formidable numbers. The islanders, Roussilac knew, +had a knack of appearing when least expected; and Agincourt had long +since shown the world that they were never so formidable as when few in +numbers, short of supplies, and worn after heavy marching. It was this +fear which had induced the commandant to adopt the plan of retiring to +the ship each night, so that, whatever might befall his men upon the +mainland, he at least would be in a position of comparative safety. + +By this it will be perceived that Roussilac was not altogether of that +stuff of which heroes are made. Nor was he a man of exceptional +ability. He had fought his way up to his present post of +responsibility with the aid of fortune and a natural capacity for +obeying orders, although, while he had been ascending, he preferred to +forget his Norman parents and connections, merely because they happened +to be poor and humble folk. His mother's brother and her husband, the +latter driven out of France for heresy, were living upon a small +holding, little more than a day's journey from the fortress; Jean-Marie +Labroquerie, their only son, had lately joined the ranks of his small +army; but the commandant was too proud, or perhaps too cowardly, to +acknowledge these kinsfolk, and in his heart he found the hope that +Madame Labroquerie, his aunt, a woman of bitter memories, with a sharp +tongue and a passionate nature, would never seek to reach the fortress +and shame him before his men. The selfish spirit of Richelieu was +working on in Arnaud de Roussilac, as indeed it worked through the +character of almost all the creatures of the Cardinal. + +Still perplexed by the problems of his position, the commandant recited +the prayers without which no soldier of the age could have deemed +himself safe from the perils of the night, placed his sword ready to +his hand, and retired to his hammock, although darkness had scarcely +settled over the land. In a few minutes he was asleep. + +These early slumbers were rudely broken by a heavy hand which seized +and shook him by the shoulder. The glare of a torch hurt his eyes, +when he opened them to discover the tanned features of D'Archand, the +master of the ship, between the folds of the netting spread to exclude +the ever-hostile insects. + +"An attack," muttered Roussilac, in the first moment of consciousness. +"A plague upon these English." + +"Hasten!" cried D'Archand. "The fortress is in an uproar. La Salle +has insulted the Dutch master, and a duel is imminent." + +At that Roussilac awoke fully, and, stretching out his arm, drew the +square port-hole open, admitting the sound of the tidewater under the +ship's counter, and beyond, a sharp murmur of excited voices. Craning +his neck, he discovered an intermittent flashing of lights along the +pathway under the cliff. + +"Now may the saints help me!" the commandant exclaimed, as he felt for +his cloak. "I have no shadow of power over these priests. More +willingly would I oppress a witch than cross a Churchman. Magic can +only rot a man's body, but excommunication touches his soul. What is +the cause of this quarrel?" + +"I know not," answered D'Archand. "But duelling has been forbidden +altogether----" + +"By Church and State alike," the commandant interrupted testily. "The +Cardinal might as well forbid the plague to strike his army. When the +Church itself breaks the law, how is the head of the army to act?" + +The captains speedily left the ship, ascended the winding path, and +entered the street of fishermen. + +All the inhabitants appeared to be gathered together upon the low +ground, to witness the by no means unprecedented spectacle of a duel +between priest and layman. They stood six deep under the cliff, with +as many more upon the side of the river; old and young, women in soiled +stiff caps, ragged settlers, and soldiers in faded accoutrements side +by side. A ring of men, holding spluttering pine torches, or oil +lanterns, the flames of which smoked and flickered up and down the horn +sides, enclosed an open space where two shadowy figures swayed almost +noiselessly, facing one another, each right arm directing a rapier +which flashed continually in the confused lights. + +"I would the challenger were any other than the Abbe La Salle," +muttered Roussilac. "He would cut off my hopes of Heaven as readily as +he shall presently run through yonder Dutchman." + +"There is no finer swordsman in the new world than the abbe," whispered +D'Archand in his ear. "If Van Vuren be killed, the Cardinal shall +account you responsible, and I too shall not escape blame. This new +alliance may not hold if the deed be known in Paris." + +Roussilac started forward, and scattered the people, who were too +excited to recognise him. + +"Put up your swords!" he shouted. "I charge you, sir priest, in the +King's name to cease fighting with this man, who is my guest and our +common ally." + +"Corpus Domini!" cried Laroche, staggering towards the commandant, his +big face flushed with excitement and liquor. "Order the wind to cease, +commandant, or yon river to stop its flow. Attempt to restrain La +Salle when his blood is hot! Know you, sir, this is an affair of +honour." + +"It is not you who shall suffer from the breaking of the law, sir +priest," protested the representative. "By St. Gris! a master-stroke!" +he exclaimed, unable altogether to suppress his soldierly instincts. + +La Salle, foreseeing an interruption, had closed with his enemy in a +vigorous skirmish of rapid and clever feints, culminating in a stroke +the admirable technique of which had wrung an involuntary testimony +from the commandant. Van Vuren escaped by a side movement, which to +the onlookers partook of the nature of a lucky accident. But there was +a smear of blood upon the priest's rapier when he pressed again to the +attack. + +"Yon Dutchman shall be the only sufferer," said Laroche. "Only +bloodshed can satisfy the Abbe La Salle. Nature must run her course. +There stands a scar upon my brother's back, made by this Van Vuren's +sword four years ago at the corner of a dark turning in Avignon. What +was the cause? Well, commandant, a woman they say is always the cause; +but my friend is, like myself, a priest, and therefore above suspicion +so far as women are concerned. Dutchmen have hard heads and slow +brains. It is also said of them that if they can run from an enemy +with honour they will run. My brother was one night returning home +after administering at a sick bed; beside a corner he heard a step, +and, before he could turn, a sword point went in his back. The +Dutchman's honour was satisfied. He ran, but he was marked as he +escaped. In Avignon during those days Van Vuren was known by another, +and less honourable, name. But the devil may wear a halo and remain +the devil." + +While the abbe spoke, some heavy clouds, which had gathered over the +heights, darkening the night, began to discharge themselves in rain, +which presently lashed in so heavy a torrent that the pine torches were +extinguished, and the men holding the lanterns had much difficulty to +maintain the feeble flames. La Salle, with his back to the storm, +drove the Hollander before him through the hissing rain, the people +falling away as the duellists advanced, their blades gleaming and +grating through the silvery lines of water. A muffled shout went up. +Van Vuren had been palpably hit upon the shoulder. La Salle smiled +grimly and still pressed on, lunging repeatedly over the captain's +guard, taking every risk of a wound as he hastened to make his victory +sure. + +Roussilac cleared the road, the people only obeying when the soldiers +prepared to enforce their officer's order. + +"Gentlemen," cried the commandant, advancing, with an imprecation upon +the rain, "drop your swords, I pray of you." + +"The devil seize you!" shouted La Salle, throwing out his left arm. +"His point was not an inch from me." + +"Put up your swords," repeated Roussilac, boldly disregarding the +remonstrance. "Sir priest, it is the will of the Cardinal." + +These were potent words, and for one moment the abbe hesitated. He +lowered his point with an angry side glance upon his interrupter, and +the affair would then have finished had not a dark figure stopped out +from the shadow under the cliff, and thrown itself into position with +the muffled warning, "En garde!" + +"Ah, dog!" cried La Salle, starting forward through the rain with +scarcely a ray of light between him and his adversary. + +When a line of lightning broke the sky, an exclamation burst from his +lips and his bold cheek blanched. During that momentary illumination +La Salle beheld his enemy clearly. He saw a mean man clad in a suit of +faded red with torn and stained ruffles; his hair gathered behind and +tied with a piece of grass; his hat broken out of shape and adorned +sadly with half a plume. And when Laroche held up a lantern, the +fighting priest saw further that what he had taken for a negroid skin +was merely a mask which covered the stranger's face, slit with holes +for the eyes and mouth. + +"This," muttered La Salle, cold with terror as he warded off an attack +which was far more aggressive than that of Van Vuren, "this is the work +of Satan." + +Roussilac touched D'Archand, pointing along the path which bent down to +the river, and whispered, "Wait for the lightning." + +When the flash passed, the master saw the big figure of the Dutchman +hurrying to reach his ship, his sword still drawn in his hand. + +"Then, who is this?" exclaimed D'Archand, with a frightened oath, +indicating through the beating rain the man behind the mask. + +Roussilac signed himself, and said nothing. + +Laroche hurried up, his big face streaming, the lantern shaking in his +hands like a will-o'-the-wisp, his attitude grotesque with terror. + +"What witchcraft is here?" he shouted. "See you how this Dutchman has +changed body and appearance as well as name?" + +"Van Vuren is not here," said Roussilac gravely. "He ran when the abbe +lowered his sword; and so soon as he had gone--nay, before--yonder +figure stepped out of the darkness under the cliff and challenged La +Salle. You see he has covered his face. It is the mad Englishman who +fights for the love of fighting. And the English cover the earth like +flies." + +"I shall stiffen his arm, be he heretic or devil," said the stout +priest; and he went and stood near the duellists, and, boldly facing +the stranger, cursed him prolifically in the name of Holy Church and +the King of Rome. + +The stranger did not turn, and only acknowledged the anathemas by a +perfectly distinct laugh which issued weirdly from the mask. + +No man had ever called La Salle's bravery in question. Facing an +enemy, who had started as it were from the rocks before him in the rain +and the lightning, he met the resolute attack and parried every lunge. +In truth, the priest was a fine swordsman; but his resource in skirmish +and detail was here taxed to the uttermost. All he could do at his +best was to hold out the short sword, which flashed in and out of the +rain, controlled by a wrist of steel and an iron arm. The masked man +gave forth no sound of hard breathing. He was a master of swordcraft, +and La Salle knew that he had met his match. Here was no nervous +Dutchman to be trifled with; no hectoring soldier with a hearty oath +and bluff swagger. La Salle sweated, and his breath came pricking in +hot gasps, and a cold thrill trickled along his back when he allowed +himself to wonder who the enemy might be. + +The stranger guarded against treachery, hugging the cliff lest anyone +with hostile intentions might pass behind and reach his back. Had he +moved out, he would assuredly have beaten down the abbe's defence; as +it was, the latter was acting upon the defensive, and doing so with +much difficulty. + +The rain stopped on an instant. As suddenly the clouds fell back to +admit the light; and the rugged shadows of the rocks traced fantastic +shapes along the Rue des Pecheurs. + +The strained voice of Laroche broke the stillness. + +"A touch!" + +"Liar!" shouted back the hard-driven but proud priest, although he felt +warm blood oozing between his fingers. + +The masked man feared the light which followed the sweeping away of the +storm clouds. He bestirred himself, feinted with amazing rapidity +within and without the pass, then his limber wrist stiffened for the +second, and his point darted in like a poisonous snake over the hilt +and wounded La Salle upon the muscle of the sword-arm. + +"A touch!" shouted the captains together, both too excited to have any +thought for the law. + +"An accident," gasped the proud priest. "A misfortune." + +"Well, here's a touch!" called a deep English voice; and as the +challenger made his nationality known he lunged beneath the abbe's +blade, thrusting out until the blood spurted upward in a jet. + +"Yes, yes. A touch--I confess," panted La Salle; and he staggered +back, crossed his legs, and fell heavily. + +"By St. Michael!" shouted the fat Laroche, furiously pulling out his +sword and reaching towards the shadow under the cliff. "You shall pay, +assassin, for this." + +The mysterious stranger chuckled, disarmed Laroche in a moment, +scratching the stout abbe's wrist with his point, and before the two +officers and the handful of soldiers could bestir themselves, he had +disappeared round the bend of the Rue des Pecheurs. Roussilac ran to +the ending of the way, but found no sign of the masked man, who had +vanished as mysteriously as he had arrived. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +CHRISMATION. + +The day following the duel La Salle was under the hands of the +surgeon--who, in the ignorance of that age, treated his patient for +loss of blood by letting yet more--and Roussilac was sending forth men +with the charge to find the hiding-place of the Englishman, and to fail +not at their peril. However, they did at that time fail. Not even the +cunning hunchback Gaudriole had been able to discover the habitation of +the mysterious swordsman who had dared to enter the fortress and openly +defy its officers and men. + +Even the Indian might have walked behind the scrub of tangled +willow-growth over the cave-dwelling, and known nothing of it, had his +eyes or his nose failed to discern the thread of wood-smoke often +curling above the blackened crater of a hollow tree which had been +ingeniously converted into a chimney. A grass-covered knoll made the +roof of the dwelling, the entrance to which only became apparent from a +stone causeway, shelving gradually between the roots of pine trees, and +enclosed by massive logs which banked the eastern front of the burrow. + +Upon the threshold of this rude home a brown boy was playing with a +wolf-hound, while awaiting his father's return from that daring visit +to the fortress. + +Around him Nature thundered like a great organ. The leaden waters of +the great discharge roared where the bush made a screen which no eyes +could pierce; the falls of the Ouiataniche smoked below. Spray flew +above the scrub, bathing the dog's fur and the strong arms of the +child. The one bayed, the other shouted, to the hard north wind that +swept overhead, lashing the branches, tearing the summits of the pines, +snatching the dry wisps of grass and whirling them under the clouds. +The dark bush groaned. The great rocks bore their buffetings with +hollow protests. Ravens croaked as they swung up and down; divers +wailed from the weedy creeks. The boughs chafed, and the plumed +foliage clashed together, loosening a rain of cones and showers of pine +needles. + +"I want to grow. I want to be strong," shouted the boy to his panting +companion. "I want to wear a sword and fight. I want to be a soldier +and shed blood. I want to live!" + +The dog broke away barking, and rushed through the scrub. The child +ran after him, and they met upon the dripping rocks, which made a +natural fortification to the cave beyond. + +A magnificent spectacle rolled away, as full of sound and motion as a +battlefield. Well had the Indians named that place the Region of the +Lost Waters. Islands heaved out of the raging expanse, small and +densely covered with torn vegetation, every ridge of pine-crested rock +moaning under the north wind, splintered and rough and ragged, scarred +like the duellist's arm. About these islands the separate torrents +thundered, seeking outlets for escape. There were a hundred channels, +each striving to be the main, each at war with all others, each leaping +white-crested down to join its rivals at the stupendous fall. Every +separate discharge lifted up its voice to drown the combined clamour of +its rivals. + +A canoe shot the rapids between two islands, quivering like an arrow in +its flight. It swept down, a mere feather upon the water, with only a +shell of rough bark between its two occupants and the hereafter. The +steerer, a handsome and pure-blooded woman of the Cayugas, crouched +like a figure of bronze against the cross-piece, wielding her paddle +with an easy carelessness which spoke of perfect confidence. By a turn +of her wrist the shell of bark swept off a projecting rock; by a deft +motion of her body, almost too subtle for the sight, the canoe glanced +from a reef where the waves were wild; another, more determined, +motion, and the fragile thing pierced a sheet of spray and swept to the +shore. The child caught the shell and held fast, while the man who had +conquered the fighting priest jumped nimbly to the sand. + +"Brave boy, Richard," he cried. "Your mother and I looked out from +yonder bend between the islands, knowing that our son would be awaiting +us. Tell me now, how have you fared during our absence?" + +The boy put out his lean arms, already tight with muscle, to greet his +mother. + +"I have been hunting by the moon," he answered. "Last night I shot a +deer, and to-day have cut it up. A portion of the meat is cooking now." + +The soldier of fortune reached an arm round the boy's shoulders and +drew him close. "You are a man, my Richard. You shall never know what +it is to lack strength." + +Night settled down. The lord of the isles left the cave, and, seating +himself upon a bank, smoked a long pipe, which he had received as a +gift from Shuswap, chief of the Cayugas, with whom he had allied +himself by marriage. Silently he drew the smoke through the painted +stem, then handed the pipe to his wife, and she smoked and passed the +quaint object to her son, who smoked also with a strange expression of +sternness upon his child's features. + +"Was the meat good, father?" he asked, as he handed back the pipe. + +"Somewhat too fresh, my son," the man answered. + +"Was the deer well shot?" + +"It was well done, Richard." + +"It is not easy to shoot straight in the moonlight," the boy said. +"But I shot no more than once. My arrow went true to the side of the +neck, and Blood followed and pulled the creature down." + +The great hound looked up with open mouth, and heavily flapped his tail. + +The boy spoke both English and Cayuga, the former more perfectly than +the latter. His father and mother spoke both languages, each having +taught the other the words of a strange tongue. The woman was tall, of +a type which was soon to grow extinct, her features as regular as those +of a Greek statue, her eyes and hair a deep black, her skin a trifle +darker than fawn-colour. Like all the proud daughters of the Iroquois, +she knew well how to handle the axe and bow. Among her own people, in +the days of maidenhood, her name had been Tuschota; but by her English +husband she was called Mary. + +He, the lord of the isles, was almost mean in stature, with a lean, +careworn face marked with decisive lines of character, grey-eyed and +thin-lipped. His body was clad in a much mended suit of faded red, an +old hat partly covered by a broken feather, with moccasins and leggings +of his wife's make. A short sword swung behind him by a rough belt of +buckskin, and a hunting-knife, the blade hiding in a beaded sheath, +hung closely to his right hip. It was hard to tell his age; he had the +eager face of youth under the bleached hair of middle-age. His wife +and only child called him Thomas or Father, as did the neighbouring +Indians of the allied Iroquois tribes; but none of them knew him by any +other name, except that of Gitsa, the sun, or, as they intended to +convey, "The strong one who sometimes covers his face." + +"Father," young Richard exclaimed nervously, "shall you go away +to-night?" + +"Be silent, child," said the mother. "It is not for the young to know +the father's will." + +"Nay, Mary," said the grave man. "I love the lad's spirit. Let him +speak his mind." + +Richard came nearer and put out his hand, a flush upon his brow. He +patted the hound's back, its head, handled the frayed hem of his +father's cloak, and then his brown fingers passed on to caress the hilt +of the sword upon which his eyes had been fixed while his hand wandered. + +"Father," he exclaimed, in a burst of boyish passion, "I want to wear a +sword." + +The man's grey eyes kindled as he heard this strong boy speak. Child +as he was in years, the father's spirit was in him, and the father +rejoiced. + +"What would you do with a sword?" he said, frowning. "Would you cut +your bread, or make kindling wood for the fire? Have you not your bow +and arrows?" + +"I can bring you down the bird flying, or the beast running. I can +shoot you the salmon in the water. Now I would learn the sword, that I +may go out with you, and fight with you, and--and protect you, my +father." + +The man did not smile; but he frowned no more. + +"Son," he said, in tones that were still severe, "you are yet over +young to join the brotherhood of the sword. The same is a mighty +weapon, never a servant, but rather a tyrant, who shall destroy his +wearer in the end. Know you that the Master of the world said once, +'All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword'? Even as +the tongue is the sword, an unruly member which no man can restrain. +It answers an enemy without thought, even as the tongue throws back an +angry word. It passes a death sentence lightly, even as the tongue +curses an enemy's soul. It strikes a vulnerable spot in one mad +moment; and when the passion sinks, then the hand fails, and the eye +shall close for shame. Only the sword changes not, remaining cold to +the eye, ready to the hand, and responsive to the first evil thought in +the heart. You shall wear the sword some day, my son. Be content till +then." + +"I want to fight Frenchmen," the boy muttered. "Father, let me draw +your sword. Let me see it flash in the moon. Let me feel its point." + +The father's hand closed upon that of the boy, pressing the little palm +strongly against the hilt. "Do not draw that sword, child," he said. +"The virgin hand should hold a virgin blade." + +He rose suddenly and disappeared along the white causeway. The mother +and son were alone on the knoll, the black pines torn by the wind +behind, the spray flying in front. The mother put out her well-shaped +arm to the smouldering pipe, and drew at the mouthpiece, watching the +excited boy over the triangular bowl. She spoke in the liquid language +of the Cayugas, "Remember that you are very young, my son." + +Richard turned passionately, and fanned away the tobacco smoke which +wreathed itself between their eyes. + +"I have lived fifteen years. I am strong. See these arms! See how +long they are, and mark how the muscle swells when I lift my hand. I +am weary of killing fish and birds and beasts. I would kill men." + +"You would be a man of blood, son?" + +"Even as my father. He has taught me to hunt. But when he goes down +to the great river he leaves me here. You he often takes; but I am +left. He goes down to fight. I have watched him when he cleans his +sword. There is blood upon his sword. It is the blood of men." + +"With whom would you fight?" said the mother, her voice reflecting the +boy's passion. + +"With the savage Algonquins in the far-away lands, the enemies of the +Iroquois. And with the Frenchmen whom my father hates." + +More the boy would have said, but at that moment the lord of the place +returned with a sheathed sword and a velvet belt. The sword, a short +blade like that which he himself wore, as slight almost as a whip, he +tested on the ground, and in his stern manner pointed out a spot upon +the summit of the knoll where the moonlight played free from shadow, +saying, "Stand there." + +The boy obeyed, stretching out an expectant hand. + +His father gave him the virgin sword, fixing him with his stern eye, +and suddenly whipped out his own blade, and exclaimed, in a voice which +was meant to strike terror into the child's heart, "On guard!" + +The boy did not wince, but threw up his point like an old soldier, and +his face became wild when along his right arm there thrilled for the +first time an indescribable strength and joy as the two blades met. + +By instinct he caught the point, and parried the edge. By instinct he +lunged at the vital spots, stepping forward, darting aside, falling +back, never resting upon the wrong foot nor misjudging the distance. +His father, who tested him so severely, smiled despite himself, and +Richard saw the smile, and, confident that he could pass his father's +guard, stepped out and took up the attack in a reckless endeavour to +inflict a wound upon his teacher's arm. + +The stern soldier of fortune played with the boy under the rushing +north wind and the swaying light of the moon, while the mother stood +near on the slope of the knoll, her eyes flashing, her nostrils +distended, her bosom heaving with the passion of the sword-play. She +noted how nobly the boy responded to his blood--the enduring blood of +the high-bred Cayuga mingled with the fighting strain of the +Englishman. She watched the sureness of his hand, the boldness of his +eye. She saw how readily the use of the sword came to him, and once +she sighed, because her husband had made her Christian, and she +remembered the warning of the unseen God which her lord had lately +repeated, "All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword." + +A cry broke from her lips. Her husband's sword flashed suddenly across +her vision, drew back, lowered, and fell like the falcon which had made +its blow, and the point sprinkled a few drops of blood upon the +bleached grass. + +"Thomas," she exclaimed in her native tongue, "why have you wounded +your son?" + +"It is his baptism to the sword," her husband answered. + +Maddened, not by the pain in his shoulder, which indeed he scarcely +felt, nor by the sight of his blood flicked contemptuously at his feet, +but at the indignity of the wound, the boy rushed at his father, and +hit at him blindly as with a stick; and when the master caught and held +him, and by the act reminded him that he was yet a child, he began to +sob violently with rage. + +"You shall pay," he flamed. "I will have your blood for mine. I will +fight you again. I will kill you. I will----" + +"Peace, child," interrupted his mother. "He is your father." + +"Take him and see to him, Mary. I did but prick his shoulder," said +the father. "So fiercely did he press upon me that I feared he might +throw himself upon my point. The lesson shall teach him prudence." + +"I am dishonoured--wounded," moaned Richard. + +The father opened his doublet and displayed his chest, which upon both +sides was marred by many a scar. Richard beheld, and blinked away his +angry tears, as the passion departed from him. + +"Must I too be wounded before I am a soldier?" he said. + +"Ay, a hundred times," his father answered; and the boy turned away +then with his former look of pride, and permitted his mother to wash +and bandage the slight wound upon his shoulder. + +Soon they came out together to the knoll where the silent man sat with +the north wind roaring into his ears the song of battle. He looked up +when they were near, and called, "Richard!" + +The boy came, subdued and tired, and stood before his father. + +"Kneel." + +The boy obeyed. The lord of the isles fastened the velvet sword-belt +to his son's waist, secured the coveted sword in its place, then stood, +and drew out his own well-tested blade. + +With it he struck the boy smartly upon the shoulder exactly over the +wound, smiling when the child compressed his lips fiercely but refused +to wince, and loudly called: + +"Arise, Sir Richard!" + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +MAKERS OF EMPIRE. + +As the days passed, and Van Vuren's attitude of diffident friendliness +remained unaltered, Roussilac's suspicions began to leave him; and even +La Salle modified his former opinions when he again walked abroad and +discovered that out of the seventy-five fighting men who made up the +military complement of the Dutch man-of-war, no less than thirty had +been sent out upon a hunting expedition in the western forests. These, +and other circumstances, tended to impress the minds of the French +officers that their ally was acting in good faith; thus the commandant +relaxed his vigilance, and Van Vuren was permitted to go upon his way +unwatched. The Dutchman came seldom to the fortress, because he feared +a second meeting with La Salle; but he frequently stole under cover of +night into the forest to the north, where the Cayugas had their camp, +little guessing that these visits were known, not indeed to the French, +but to a company of five Englishmen, who had been thrown upon the coast +to the west of the settlement of Acadie during a storm of the previous +October, and had wintered in a cave among the rugged cliffs some little +distance beyond the falls of Montmorenci, believing themselves to be +the sole representatives of their country in all that land. + +These men--the sole survivors of an expedition which had set forth with +the object of establishing a small colony in the north--wasted no time +in repining over their ill-fortune, or considering the hopeless nature +of their position. They engaged themselves in mastering the topography +of the fortress and ascertaining the strength of its garrison; they +watched the river, and noted the coming and going of each ship; they +made themselves friendly with the Iroquois, and from Shuswap, the chief +of the Cayugas, a man who loved the English, they obtained from time to +time much information of value. It was one of their number, Jeremiah +Hough the Puritan, who had followed Van Vuren to the Indian camp-fire; +and when he discovered that the Dutchman was indeed faithless to his +allies and was endeavouring to stir up the Iroquois to strike a blow +against the French position, he returned with the tidings to his +comrades, and the little council of five sat for a long night and +discussed this Dutch policy with the cool shrewdness of their race. + +As a result of their debate, one of the little band was deputed each +night to lie concealed upon the shore and watch the Dutch ship. Simon +Penfold, the leader, a spare, grey man of two score years and ten, but +hard and hale as any oak in his home meadows, played spy on the first +night; Jesse Woodfield, a yeoman scarce thirty years of age, did duty +on the second, and handsome young Geoffrey Viner, the boy of the party, +beloved by his comrades for the sake of his long fair hair and comely +face, kept watch on the third. On the fourth night the task devolved +upon George Flower, a middle-aged, sad-featured man, the captain's +faithful friend since the days of boyhood; and the next night found +stern Hough the Puritan lying among the willows above the shingle, with +his cold eyes fixed upon a single star of light which marked the +position of the Dutch ship. + +These five men, who made up the little company of Englishmen venturing +into the French colony, were yeomen of Berks, farmers of the valleys +and fields watered by the Thames, men of good repute, who had been +driven to leave their native shore and seek another home in the wide +new world through the oppression of the agents of the greedy English +king. + +The man who had discovered Van Vuren's plans had indeed delayed his +flight too long. Scarred and lined as were the faces of Flower and +Penfold, their features had at least escaped the terrible mutilation +which had been inflicted upon Hough as an outward and visible sign of +the royal displeasure. His ears had been cropped close to the skull, +his nostrils slit, his cheeks branded, as a penalty for having stoutly +refused to supply any portion of the necessities of King Charles, +according to the demand of the most honourable Court of Star Chamber. +The strong black hair which spread thickly over the Puritan's face, yet +without hiding the trail of the branding iron and the primings of the +executioner's knife, added a terrible touch to his dehumanised +appearance. + +It was on the fifth night after the watch had been appointed that Van +Vuren played for his big stake. From a safe shelter among the willows, +Hough observed a small fire upon the shore, and two men, one of whom +appeared to be a native, watching beside the flames. Presently he +heard a voice hailing softly from the darkness which overhung the +river, and soon a black hulk loomed beside the shore. + +Hough counted six men as they disembarked one by one, he saw the boat +drawn up, and the beacon fire extinguished. That fire was still +hissing under the water which had been thrown upon it when the Puritan +crawled out of the thicket of red willow, and stood, leaning forward, +listening attentively. When the sound of footfalls died away, he +scaled the cliff behind, ran over the flat to the little river of +Montmorenci, which was flecked with foam and shivering as it neared its +long straight plunge, pulled a canoe from beneath the bushes, and shot +across that dangerous passage as though it had been no whit more +formidable than some sluggish reach of his native Thames. Had he +dropped his paddle, death would have been inevitable; had he allowed +himself to drift beyond a certain point the current would have dragged +him down to the white bar of foam which marked a phosphorescent line +across the darkness beyond. + +Plunging again into the forest, he proceeded in the same headlong +fashion, bearing to the right, always descending, until he struck a +path through the interlacing trees, and finally reached rock-land and a +cave cunningly concealed behind a screen of willow. + +He whistled softly, and when his signal was answered pushed inward, +drawing away a sheet of canvas which had been stretched across the +entry to imprison more effectually the light. A fire burnt within, the +smoke escaping from a shaft two hundred feet above; and round this fire +were grouped his four companions, who started up with eager faces when +the Puritan made his entry. + +"Good news, I wot," cried old Penfold. "'Tis spoken already by your +eyes, friend Hough." + +"My eyes lie not," the Puritan answered. "Comrades, the Dutch have +shown their hand. If we strike at once we shall assuredly kill their +plan, and may perchance seize their leader." + +In a few words he disclosed what he had seen. + +"They go to hold council with the sachems," said Penfold, adding +thoughtfully, "There will be no light until the dawn." + +"Let us lie in wait for them beside their boat," the Puritan advised. + +"Nay, let us fall upon them in the forest," cried Wood field. + +"Not so," answered the leader. "A man cannot use his sword for the +bush and the splintered growth from the pines." + +"An Iroquois guide will accompany them," said Flower. + +"The boat! the boat!" shouted young Viner. "That is the place." + +"Peace, lads," cried Penfold, stroking his beard. "Let us discuss with +reason. Why has this Dutch vessel made her way up the river? +Roussilac would tell us that she has come to strengthen the hands of +the French. Is it so? I trow not. It has ever been the policy of the +Dutch to dissemble. Holland intends to keep the English from this +coast if she may. Surely she desires also to drive out the French, in +order that she may make herself mistress of the North American land. +She is eager to make colonies, and she knows full well that the +fortress may easily be defended once it be captured." + +"She is, then, a privateer," exclaimed Hough. + +"Not so. She is commissioned by the Government of the Netherlands to +seize North America. The French are only a handful here. England has +no fleet. Now is the crafty Dutchman's opportunity. Look upon this, +my lads." + +Penfold pulled a flaming stick from the fire and walked across the +cave. He stopped where the side sloped as smoothly as a wall, and held +the torch above his head, pointing to a map of the American colonies +traced upon the wall of silica by charcoal. The design was roughly and +incorrectly made; rivers were placed where mountains should have shown, +and the scale was entirely inaccurate; but politically it was correct. + +"See!" cried the leader, passing a finger through Chesapeake Bay, and +laying his hand lovingly upon the province of Virginia. "There lies +the fairest of England's colonies. Here, mark you, flows the Potomac, +and here to the north behold the province of Maryland. What country +lies back in the beyond we do not know, because the Mohawks are masters +there; but pass north along the coast and we reach New England, the +provinces of Connecticut and Massachusetts, with the king's towns of +Boston and Plymouth. Between lie our enemies." + +He passed his fingers across the words written on the wall, "New +Netherlands," while the four men murmured behind. + +"Did the Hollanders acquire their colonies in fair fight?" demanded +Penfold, returning to the fire. + +He flung down the brand, and as the sparks showered upward he went on, +"I say it was through deceit. During the glorious reign of our +Elizabeth, of blessed memory, our men of Devon, our Grenville, our +Drake, our Hawkins smoked out the Spaniards, and wrested these colonies +of the new world from the King of Spain in fair fight. Fair do I say? +Ay, surely one tight English ship was ever a match for three popish +galleons. But mark you how the jackals followed the lion, even as +travellers from the Indies tell us they follow to take of that which +the lion shall leave. Where the land was free, where there was no +tyranny of the church to dread, mark you how the Dutch jackals crept +in, to find a home and found a colony under the protection of the +golden lions of England." + +"Come, old Simon," broke in Woodfield. "Enough of talk." + +"Ay, ay. Put out the fire, my lads. Rub out yon map. We have a plan +which, with God's help, shall perchance furnish us with better quarters +than this poor hole in the rock." + +Young Geoffrey stepped back, spat upon the white wall where the words +"New Netherlands" appeared, and obliterated the Dutch colonies with the +flat of his hand. + +"Let the map now stand!" he cried, and the others gathered round the +boy whom they loved, clashing their swords, and taking courage from the +thoughtless prophecy which was in God's good time to be fulfilled. + +Then the Englishmen went on their way through the dark night. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +DOUBLE DEALING. + +The Dutch master had played his game of duplicity with no little skill. +His arrogant attitude towards the head men of the fortress, his +outspoken hatred for the wild north land and its uncivilised +inhabitants, his outward indolence and distaste for fighting, were all +subtle moves towards the object he had in view. The culminating stroke +of practically disarming his ship by sending out thirty of his best men +upon a hunting expedition was, he considered, a veritable inspiration +of genius. The plan had indeed succeeded in its purpose of hoodwinking +the French, and Van Vuren was satisfied, because he knew nothing of the +venturers who had discovered his plans and were preparing to strike a +blow against him for the glory of their country and themselves. + +Six men were admitted into their leader's confidence, and five of these +only at the last hour. Everything seemed to favour the enterprise. +The night which had been chosen for the council between Van Vuren and +the headmen of the Iroquois was very dark. No sound came from the +sleeping fortress; not a light was showing upon the French ship. The +usual sentries were posted, but the darkness was too impenetrable for +the keenest sight to carry more than a few yards. Van Vuren stepped to +the side of his ship, listened intently for some minutes, and when the +silence remained unbroken whispered an order, and the five picked men +clambered down a ladder and guided their feet into a boat which rode +alongside. The master followed, the boat was pushed off, and floating +down stream swung rapidly round the bend. + +"To your oars," muttered Van Vuren. + +The black water began to trickle gleefully under the bows, the rowers +dropping their blades cautiously and lifting them high to avoid a +splash. Soon a spark of light broke out upon the shore, at no great +distance from the falls of Montmorenci, where the river of that name +discharges into the mightier stream. Swinging the tiller round, Van +Vuren aimed the boat towards that light. + +Beside the fire awaited them a stout Dutchman, who had lived in New +Netherlands among the Indians on the banks of the Schuylkill and there +had learnt the language, and with him was an Indian squatting upon his +haunches. The latter was naked to the waist; a round beaver cap came +low over his forehead, and long hair streamed down his cheeks. His +body shone like polished mahogany as the firelight played across it. +He rose when Van Vuren approached, and remarked upon the exceeding +blackness of the night, and the stout Dutchman answered in the native +tongue, "It is well." + +After drawing their boat up the shore and putting out the fire, the men +listened again for any sounds of hostile movements, and when Van Vuren +was reassured as to their safety the party set off along an +imperceptible trail, following their Cayuga guide, who strode rapidly +towards the cover of the forest. + +At the end of an hour's march they drew near the camp and perceived the +glow of the council fire. The boles of the trees became ruddy, and +they smelt the acrid smoke which curled upward in wreaths to find an +outlet through the solid-looking roof of foliage, There was no +vegetation below. Splintered stumps projected stiffly from the +conifers; sometimes a fallen trunk lay across the way; the peaty ground +was soft with pine needles. A fox barked monotonously in the distance. +Occasionally a gust of wind passed with a sigh and a gentle straining +at the mast-like firs. + +The party stepped into a clearing, and Van Vuren halted nervously, +tightening the sash which secured his doublet at the waist. Nine men +appeared before him, seated under a protection of skins stretched +tightly across a framework of boughs, the whole forming a lean-to which +might readily be moved, either to break the force of the wind or to +afford shelter from rain. The men squatted cross-legged, the majority +naked to the waist and shining with fish-oil, a few wrapped in +blankets, the heads of all covered with fur caps adorned with pieces of +white metal or black feathers. Only one man was painted, and he showed +nothing more than a triangular patch of red upon his forehead, the apex +of the triangle making a line with the bridge of his nose. This man +was smoking, and did not put down his pipe when the strangers arrived. +The smoking was indeed a compliment, being the symbolic pipe of peace. + +The nine were sachems of the great Iroquois tribes who in combination +held the north of the continent: the Cayugas, Oneidas, Mohawks, +Onondagas, and Senacas. The smoker was Shuswap, headman of the +Cayugas, father of Onawa and Tuschota, and the chief doctor, one who +professed to understand the language of the beasts, and knew how to +hold communion with the dead. He looked up, drawing the stem of his +pipe from his thin lips, and spoke: + +"Do the white men, who come to us from the world where the sun never +shines, speak to us now words of peace or of war?" + +Van Vuren moved awkwardly when he saw the grave hairless faces peering +at him through the hot vapour of the fire. At that moment the fat +sailor from New Netherlands reached the clearing, panting like a dog. +He presently interpreted the question, and his leader answered: "Tell +the chief that we come from a world where the days are long, and where +the same sun that warms this country shines from morn till night." + +"That were waste of breath," muttered the seaman, who had none to +spare, and he said instead to the council of nine: "The white chief has +come in peace to seek the aid of the sun's children that he may +overthrow his enemies." + +"A people have taken my children to be their servants," said Shuswap. +"That people armed the enemies of my race against me. Is the white man +friendly with that people?" + +"The French of whom the great sachem speaks are my enemies also," +replied Van Vuren through the interpreter. "I would drive them from +the land, and dwell here in peace beside my allies the great tribes of +the Iroquois." + +The crafty Dutchman reflected that, when the flag of the Netherlands +waved over the heights, it would be easy to hold the Indians in the +forest with a warship upon the St. Lawrence and a few cannon frowning +from the cliff. + +"The white man has called us into council," went on Shuswap. "What +does he ask of us?" + +At that the Hollander played his hand boldly. "I ask you to send your +fighting-men against the French when I give the signal. I will sink +the provision ship which lies upon the river, while your men sweep over +the heights and capture the fortress. So shall you be avenged upon +your enemies, the men who armed the Algonquins against you." + +"It is well said," answered the council of nine. + +"What signal will you give, that we may know when to make our attack?" +said Shuswap. + +"A raft of fire floating down the river." + +The headman removed his eyes from the Dutchman and turned to consult +his colleagues. They conferred for some minutes, without passion, +without animation, apparently with no feeling of interest. Their faces +were set, and they spoke with only faint motions of their lips. + +"We will bring our children," said the old sachem at last. "When the +fire is seen along the Father of Waters we shall make ourselves ready." + +He bent forward, raised a short stick from the centre of the council +fire, and held it out in his brown fingers, then dashed the brand +suddenly upon the ground, and dreamily watched the upward flight of +sparks. + +"So let our enemies fly before us," he muttered. + +"The sparks fly outward," said the sachem of the Oneidas. + +"The Frenchmen shall not be able to stand before the children of the +sun," they muttered with one voice. + +The pipe was passed round with terrible solemnity, every Indian and +Dutchman drawing once at the stem and handing it to his neighbour, and +then the Hollanders left the clearing to return, well satisfied with +their night's work. + +It wanted yet three hours to the first breaking of the dawn, and the +night was as dark as ever when the seven men came out upon the rocks, +where they could hear the faint whisper of the river. There the Indian +guide left them, and the Dutchmen, flushed with success, laughed and +talked loudly, knowing that they were separated from the hearing of the +French settlement by more than a mile of rock and bush. Advancing in +single file, they came to the thicket of willow beside which they had +left their boat. + +"Is all well?" called Van Vuren, who walked at the end of the line. + +As he spoke there fell a storm out of the night; a thunder of voices; +the lightning of flashing swords; a rush of dark bodies around the +boat. In the thick darkness all became confusion on the side of the +attacked. + +"English!" shouted Van Vuren; and, as the long body of the Puritan +descended upon him, the master turned and fled, without honour, but +with a whole skin. Only the stout seaman shared his leader's privilege +of a run for his life, but him the far-striding legs of Hough pursued, +covering two feet to the Dutchman's one. The wretch sweated and +groaned as he flung out his aching legs, his great body heaving and +staggering as cold as ice. He swore and prayed to God in one breath. +He promised a life of service to the Deity, a treasure in the Indies to +the pursuer; but prayer and promise availed him little. The mutilated +man pressed upon him, and it was only the almost tangible darkness +which prolonged his life for a few more agonised seconds. Then Hough +bounded within reach, lunged fairly, pressing home when he felt flesh, +and the fat Dutchman emitted a violent yell, and his big carcase rolled +upon the rocks, his head settled, his mouth grinned spasmodically, his +limbs twitched, and then he lay at ease, staring more blindly than ever +into the night. Out of the six conspirators who had set forth that +night, Van Vuren was the only man to escape with his life. + +"Cast me these bodies into the river," said Penfold, wiping his sword. +"But, stay. It were a pity to waste so much good clothing. Strip them +first, lads. Naked they came into the world, and naked let them go +out." + +The bodies were denuded of their clothes and weapons. Five splashes +shivered the face of the river, and then the Englishmen laid hands upon +the boat and drew her down to the water. But an idea had occurred to +Penfold, and he called a halt. + +"We have the current to row against, and the night may break before we +reach the ship," he said. "Let us disguise ourselves, so that French +and Dutch alike may regard us as friends in the dimness of the morning. +Here are five suits of Dutch clothing. There are five of us. We shall +fight the easier in such loose-fitting trunks." + +"Methinks they that fear the Lord have no need to adopt a cunning +device," protested the Puritan. + +"What know we about the ways of the Lord?" said his leader. "Does the +Lord grant the victory to him who runs? Does He not rather send him a +sword into his coward's back? The Lord, I tell you, helps that man who +is the most subtle in devising schemes through which he may overthrow +his enemies. A murrain on these garments! I shall be as a child when +he has put on his father's trappings for the bravery of the show." + +Already a grey-dark mist spread along the river where the night clouds +were dissolving at the first light touch of the fingers of the day. +The adventurers had but an hour for their project before the coming of +the first light. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +THE INTRODUCTION TO A FIGHT. + +Upon the fore-deck of the Dutch ship two sailors were chatting idly +beside a lantern's shaded light. They had tramped up and down, +performing their duty in a listless fashion, until the general silence +had convinced them that the officer in charge was asleep below. The +determination to take their ease, which they thereupon arrived at, +became strengthened by their belief that the vessel could not have been +safer had she been at anchor-hold in the Zuyder Zee. + +"Yon French ship has no sentries, I warrant," said Jan Hoevenden, the +younger of the two. "What use, when a man may hardly see his hand when +'tis held in front of him? Your Indian does not attack by water, as +Roussilac well knows. Neither shall he attack in such a darkness, +unless hard put to it." + +"'Tis a scheme of the master to deprive us of our hard-earned sleep," +grumbled James Oog. "Come, comrade, let us rest here and smoke. Here +is a parcel of tobacco which I dried yesterday in the sun." + +The two sailors filled their pipes, lighted the tobacco at the poop +lantern, and settled themselves aft speedily to forget their +responsibilities. There was not a sound, except the hum of flies and +the swirl of the river. There was nothing to be seen, beyond the +gloomy masts and spectral rigging. The atmosphere remained still and +close. + +"This is but a poor country, Jan," observed the older man, after a few +contented puffs at his huge pipe. "There be no treasure of gold or +silver buried here." + +"Nought but forest and rock, with a biting wind o' nights," replied +Hoevenden. "'Tis a cold climate. The Indians say this river is thick +with ice for a full half of the year." + +"I wish for none of that. Give me the south. Hast ever been in +Florida?" + +"Nay. Is that land as fruitful as men say?" + +"It knows no winter, and even in the midst of the year the heat is +never so great that a man may not endure to work. The soil is so rich +that grain dropped upon the ground shall spring into harvest in a +month. Sugar and fruit grow there, and much timber for building. +There is also game for the pot, and furs for a man's back." + +"There are pestilent beasts, they tell me," Hoevenden grumbled. + +"Well, man, there was never a paradise without serpents. True there +are mighty reptiles, twenty feet in length, within the rivers, and +monstrous scorpions upon land. But what of it? There are perils upon +every shore. A man may sit out at night under a big moon, beside trees +covered with white or pink blooms, every bloom as great as his head and +smelling like wine, and he may listen to the Tritons singing as they +splash through the sea, and watch the mermaidens--passing fair they say +who have seen them--lying upon the rocks, wringing salt water from +their hair. 'Tis a wondrous shore. I would rather own an acre of it +than be master of all this country of cold forest where there is +neither fruit nor flower." + +"The fog arises yonder," said Hoevenden, pointing down the river. + +The grey mass which he indicated ascended rapidly and drenched the deck +with dew. There was as yet no light, but a heavy shadow had taken the +place of the intense blackness, and the river was visible as it carried +its current to the gulf. The two men rose suddenly, and hid their +pipes when they heard the rattle of oars and splash of water. + +"Shall be found at our duty," said Oog, with a husky laugh, and his +fellow-seaman chuckled with him. + +A boat was making rapid progress against the stream, Penfold, with an +eye upon the fog and his right hand on the tiller, encouraging the +rowers. The muscles sprang out from their arms, the sweat flowed from +their faces, despite the rawness of the air. Hough's mutilated +countenance throbbed terribly beneath his efforts. The ship started +suddenly out of the mist, and Penfold called softly, "Easy, lads. +Spare yourselves now, for we have soon to fight." But immediately the +men stopped rowing, the current dragged the boat down. + +"The use of the sword will be as child's play after pulling against +this stream," gasped Hough. + +Again the men bent their backs, and the boat sullenly made way. Behind +them the morning was breaking rapidly, the fog gathered in whiter +folds, and some flickering bars of grey light crossed the track of the +river. + +"They must not see our faces nor hear us speak," Penfold muttered. +Then he whispered sharply, "Heaven be thanked! A ladder hangs at her +stern." + +He drew the borrowed plume over his eyes, and lowered his head because +he was facing the ship. His comrades gave way, driving the heavy boat +upward with great strokes of the clumsy oars, until Penfold muttered +softly, "Easy now." + +The two sentries were looking down from above; but they perceived +nothing of a suspicious nature, chiefly because they had no cause to +fear the coming of the enemy. + +Young Viner was the first to leave the boat, but Penfold was hard after +him. They scrambled up the ladder, while the others secured the boat +to the steps. + +"Five men!" exclaimed Hoevenden, peering through the perplexing light. +"Where is the sixth? Masters, where is the commander?" + +"Here!" muttered an English voice, and the sentry fell forward with +Penfold's sword through him. Oog opened his mouth to cry "Treachery!" +but all the sound that issued therefrom was a death gasp, as Viner +finished his career with a pretty stroke which effectually deprived the +Dutchman of his hoped-for heritage in the south. + +"A fair beginning," said Penfold, peering forward at the big cabins +which gave the ship a curiously humped shape. "Now to smoke out the +hornets. If we are mastered by numbers, we may yet save ourselves by +swimming to the shore. All silent yet. But see--a gun!" + +He rammed his sword up the muzzle-breach. "'Tis loaded. Fetch me +yonder lantern." + +Hough brought the lantern from the poop; but hardly had he done so when +a head came out from one of the cabin windows, and a pair of frightened +eyes swept their faces. In a moment, as it seemed, the ship was in an +uproar. + +"Now may God deafen the Frenchmen," prayed Penfold, as he swung the +brass gun round and pointed its muzzle at the cabin door. + +Viner and Woodfield were fastening down the hatches, while Hough ran +forward, taking his life in his hands, and severed the cable. The ship +quivered, shook herself like a dog aroused from sleep, and very slowly +answered the downward pull of the stream. + +But before the Puritan could return the cabin door burst open and the +enemy swarmed forth. Hough dropped the first in his shirt, parried a +blow from the second, turned and ran back, while old Penfold opened the +lantern and brought the flame down to the portfire. + +There was light now over the St. Lawrence under masses of wet cloud. +An Indian canoe was flying over the water like a bird, urged by two +pair of arms paddling furiously. She caught the floating ship, and as +she made fast to the side of the steps the gun roared overhead, and +after it an English cheer shook the mist. + +"Keep to my side," said the man in the canoe. "Forget not that pass +under the hilt I taught you." + +Having thus spoken he bounded up the ladder. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +THE FIGHT. + +Although the majority of the thirty-six Dutchmen left aboard had been +secured below hatches, those on deck were sufficient to make the odds +heavy against the Englishmen. The unanticipated arrival of the lord of +the isles and his son--who had been returning from their hunting ground +higher up the river, when their ears were startled through the morning +mist by the sound of English voices--brought up the attacking strength +to the fortunate number of seven; but the new-comers were not even +observed by the five adventurers during the excitement of the opening +stage of that struggle in the fog. + +That incautious cheer, which followed the noise of the gun, was defiant +rather than triumphant. In spite of Penfold's careful aim the ball had +merely crashed across deck and plunged through the cabin windows. A +couple of hurriedly aimed shots came back in angry reply, but one +passed high, the other low, resulting in a wrecked plank in the deck +and the loss of a portion of rigging. The bark of seventeenth-century +cannon was far more formidable than its bite. + +"Have at them, my lads. Drive them over the side," thundered Penfold; +and he rushed forward to clear the deck at the head of his gallant few. + +Before the conflicting parties could meet, three Dutchmen, deceived by +the tumultuous English cheer, had gone over the side to swim for shore. +These men believed that at least a boatload of armed men had taken them +by surprise, and they but obeyed the instinct which in certain +temperaments recommends prudence in the form of flight. + +"We stand too close together," rang out Penfold's voice. "Friend +Woodfield, I had your elbow twice into my side. Separate a little, but +let us keep in line." + +"One rush forward--a strong rush to the cabins," shouted Hough. The +five swords darted through the fog, and every point came back reddened. + +Then they broke into a run, hoping thus to sweep the deck, but their +weakness had by this time become evident to the defenders, who in their +turn pressed forward, conquering by sheer weight of numbers. Each of +the adventurers sought shelter for his back, a mast or bulwark, and +each was driven to fight independently. Three men rushed upon Penfold +and pressed him sore. The Englishman cut at the head of the foremost, +but while his arm was uplifted the others took the advantage offered +and ran in under his guard. Penfold drew his dagger and beat at them +with his left hand. The second Dutchman scratched him deeply along the +side. The third caught and held his left wrist, and shortened his +rapier to run the Englishman through the heart. Penfold saw death +before him, but only called grimly, "Fair play, ye dogs, fair play!" + +The sword was dashed from his hand. He pressed back to avoid the +plunge of the shortened blade, but the Hollanders had him at their +mercy. Penfold prepared to make a last effort to break aside, when the +foe who threatened him started rigid with a gasp of pain, and the +leader of the adventurers saw the point of a sword dart fearfully from +the Dutchman's chest. Then the man fell forward spitted from behind, +and with him another of the soldiers, while the third of Penfold's +assailants splashed heavily into the St. Lawrence. + +The man who had saved the leader's life went on his way fighting with +magnificent confidence in the strength of his right arm, and beside him +went the boy, fighting with all his father's fervour, his brown face +pale with passion, his little brown hands already oozing blood, and his +short sword from hilt to point all bloody too. + +"Angels or devils," gasped Flower, who was bleeding heavily from a +wound in the thigh, "they fight upon our side." + +"At them again," cried Woodfield. "After the brave stranger." + +"He takes too much upon him. I am leader here," grumbled old Penfold +unthankfully. + +The valour of the stranger turned the scale. None of the Dutch could +stand before that terrible blade. They gave way, were hunted back to +the cabins, and there brought to bay. + +"Yield you, sirs!" called Penfold. + +Seeing that they had done sufficient for honour, the men yielded, gave +up their weapons, and sought permission to finish their dressing. +Before this request could be granted, a deep voice exclaimed: + +"You grow careless, my masters. Know you not that a bird cannot fly +unless she has wings to carry her?" + +It was the stranger who issued this caution as he pointed with his +sword over the stern. + +The ship had drifted some eighty yards from her moorings, her keel +grating more than once upon a drift of mud. She had remained close to +the bank, out of reach of the strong central current, and now lay +almost motionless, because she had reached the slack water where the +river commenced its eastward bend. Behind her lay the fortress, +already vested in the golden light of the morning. Between, where the +white mist was stealing upward, came sailing a great hulk, and above +the vapour could be seen the flag of France crushing its golden lilies +against the topmast. At intervals came the indistinct murmur of +voices, the flash of hurried sparks dropped upon touchwood, the rattle +of cannon balls, the ramming home of charges down slim-waisted guns. + +"Fool that I am!" exclaimed Penfold. "Fool and forgetful! Up the +rigging, my lads, and set the mainsail. What breeze there is blows +down the river. Drive me yonder fellows up, George Flower. Do you see +that they set all sails, and if they be not ready to obey hurry them +with the sword point." + +The sailors were driven into the rigging to plume their ship for the +benefit of a victorious enemy. The canvas flapped out, the ship veered +towards midstream, and, instantly responding to wind and current, +floated to the left of the island, with the Frenchman scarce a hundred +yards from her stern. + +A voice came rolling out of the mist, the voice of D'Archand. "Are you +attacked by Indians?" he shouted. The master had undoubtedly made out +the Indian canoe floated beside the steps. + +"Let any man answer at his peril," said Penfold, glaring round upon the +unarmed Dutch. + +"Do we fear the French?" demanded Viner hotly. "Here are five--nay, +seven--good Englishmen, for surely our stout allies here have fought as +only English can----" + +"There are a hundred men upon yonder ship," interrupted the leader, +"men equipped with the newest weapons of Europe. It were madness to +divulge our names and nation. Sir," he went on, turning to the +stranger, "we are much indebted to you. Sir, you have fought like a +brave man, and have helped us to overcome our enemies. What counsel do +you give?" + +"Answer Roussilac that Indians have come aboard, but that the crew are +capable of defending themselves, if you will," the stranger replied. +"So may you avoid his fire. Or with your pleasure I will undertake to +answer the master myself, even as an Englishman should always answer a +Frenchman." + +"And how is that?" demanded Penfold. + +The stranger indicated the brilliant flag, flapping in the sunshine +like a wounded bird trying to fly but falling back. "By defying him so +long as that emblem flies," he said. + +Between heavy lines of mist, waved like the bar nebuly upon the shield +of the woolcombers, the black stem and white deck of the enemy had +become partly visible. Heads of watchers were peering over her side, +their bodies hidden, their faces barely above the fog line. Before the +cabins in front of the poop a canopy fluttered; under it a table, and +upon the table six great golden poppies lifted their heads, their +ragged petals flickering under the breeze. The Englishmen saw the bare +head and richly caparisoned shoulders of a tall priest, who swayed +monotonously from side to side, and muttered Latin in a deep voice. +The table was an altar, the poppies were candles, and the priest was La +Salle reciting the inevitable morning Mass. + +The better-built Dutch vessel, being easily capable of sailing a knot +and a half to the Frenchman's one, drew away, her main and fore sheets +swelling till they were round as the belly of some comfortable merchant +of Eastcheap who had profited by a successful venture upon the Spanish +Main. Very soon the voice of the militant priest became like the +murmur of an overhead insect. + +"Now by my soul!" cried Hough, with a quivering of his slit nostrils. +"It were an everlasting disgrace to Christian men to stand thus idle +and watch a priest of Baal offering sacrifice. Bid us run out the +guns, captain, and drop a good Protestant cannon ball amid yonder +catholic juggling. We have fought for our country this day. Let us +now commit ourselves to the Lord's work, and snuff out yonder stinking +candles, and end these popish blasphemies." + +Penfold made no sign of hearing this appeal. He said merely, "They +cram on yet more sail. But they shall not come up to us unless we are +brought upon a bar, and even so they cannot pass us, because the water +becomes narrow beyond. Where is friend Woodfield?" + +"Guarding the prisoners at the door of the cabin and keeping an eye +that they do not arm themselves." + +"Listen to the men below," said Flower. "Our caged birds become weary +of confinement, and beat their wings to escape." + +Hough and the lord of the isles held their eyes upon the Frenchman, who +was now one hundred and fifty yards away, and almost clear of vapour. +When they could see that the guns had been unshipped and were pointing +over the bows, neither man was able altogether to suppress his feelings. + +"The curse of God shall surely fall upon us," cried the Puritan +furiously. "When summoned to work in His vineyard we turn a deaf ear +to the call. Did evil come to me when I dragged with mine own hands +from the reformed communion table of our parish church at Dorchester a +Jesuit in disguise, and flung the dog into our little river Thame there +to repent him of his former and latter sins?" + +"Peace, friend," said old Penfold. "Here is not England, nor stand we +on English territory. Let yonder papists worship their saints and +idols to their own decay. We are but few in number, though valiant in +spirit, and with every man a wound to show. Remember also that this +ship is not yet our prize." + +"Croaker," muttered Hough disdainfully. + +"Say rather a man to whom age has brought sound judgment," returned +Penfold, unmoved. + +"It is my turn," said the deep voice of the unknown. "Sir Captain, I +have a favour to beg. There is a gun yonder on which I have set my +eye, a brass gun of some twenty pounds weight, loaded with ball. If it +displease you not, I will discharge that gun from the aftmost deck in +such a manner that it shall harm no man. Sir Captain, I have some +small experience in aiming the gun." + +Penfold set his rugged face towards his questioner. + +"Good sir," he said, "you are English among Englishmen. We are plain +countrymen of the royal county of Berks, village yeomen of small +degree, who have beaten our plowshares into swords; but you, I may +believe, judging from your speech, are somewhat higher. Tell us, if +you will, your name." + +"My name is my own, my sword the king's, my life belongs to my +country," said the stranger. "Enough to know that I am a man of Kent. +If now I have answered you, sir, I beg of you to answer me." + +"We should but reveal ourselves." + +"Every minute widens yon strip of water between ourselves and the +pursuer. She is sailing her fastest, and each minute sends us more of +the wind which she has been taking from us. This breeze may endure for +another hour, by which time we shall have reached the chasm which is +called Tadousac. Sixteen years have I dwelt upon this river, good +master, both in winter and summer, and no servant of King Louis, nor +Indian of the forest, knows its waters better than I." + +Penfold turned to the two associates supporting him. "What answer +shall I give?" he asked. + +"Consent," said fanatic and youth together; and Penfold gave consent +against his better judgment. + +Unaided, the stranger carried the short gun up the steps, rested it in +position upon its crutch on the sloping deck, and arranged the priming, +while the stern boy at his bidding produced knife and flint. The men +below awaited results with a certain curiosity, looking for little more +than an explosion of powder, and the hurling of a defiant missile +harmlessly into space. + +It might have been the excellence of the aim, it might have been the +working of Providence, more probably it was sheer commonplace English +luck; but, when the quaint little weapon had howled, kicked viciously, +and rolled over, there came the dull crash of lead with wood, a shower +of tough splinters, and--most glorious sight for the adventurers' +eyes--the top of the French mainmast, carrying the great white and gold +flag, which had been blessed by a bishop upon the high altar of Notre +Dame in Paris, sprang into the air like a pennoned lance, described a +half circle, and plunged to deck, piercing the canopy as though it had +been paper, missing the ministrant by inches only, scattering the +candlesticks and breaking the candles before the eyes of the +scandalised soldiers, who were concluding their devotions to the "_Ite +missa est_" of the priest. + +A great cheer ascended from the Dutch ship, making the cold, pine-clad +hills echo and ring. Hough forgot his sternness, and laughed aloud as +he clasped the gunner's hand. Old Penfold smiled grimly, with more +inward jubilation than he cared to show. + +"Now plume her, lads, and let us fly," he shouted. "Steer her around +yonder bend in safety, and we may laugh at her cannon." + +"The prisoners, captain! We cannot both fight the ship and hold guard +over them." + +"To the river with them," said Hough. "Let them swim ashore." + +"There may be some who cannot swim." + +"What better chance shall they have of learning? My father cast me +into the Thames when I was but a whipster, and said, 'Sink or swim, my +lad.' And I thought it well to swim." + +Protesting, struggling, swearing in an unknown tongue, the prisoners +were brought forth from the cabins and hurried over the side, the +laggards helped by a cuff or kick at starting. The turgid river +splashed with Dutchmen, like a school of porpoises, making with what +speed they could--for the water was exceedingly cold--towards the +rock-bound shore. + +Great was the confusion upon the Frenchman when she became so notably +disgraced, but presently D'Archand restored a semblance of order, and +the men trailed off to their duties, probably not a little afraid at +discovering that the ever-dreaded English, whose appearance north of +far-distant Plymouth had become a familiar nightmare, were aboard their +supposed Dutch ally. La Salle, who had immediately rushed into his +cabin and there divested himself of his ecclesiastical finery, speedily +reappeared in secular costume with his redoubtable sword naked in his +hand. The abbe could swear as heartily as any soldier when put to it, +which fact he proved beyond lawyers' arguments then and there. + +"Body of St. Denis!" he cried. "See to your priming, knaves. Ah, +hurry, young imp of the pit," kicking a scrambling powder-boy as he +shouted. "By St. Louis, our Lady, and the Cardinal! This is a Dutch +word, a Dutch troth, a Dutch alliance. We shall harry the traitors who +have leagued themselves with our enemies, unless their master, Satan, +lends them wings to carry them to the uttermost parts of the earth. We +shall hang them speedily to the rigging, if the saints be favourable. +Fire, rogues! See you not that she is slipping away from us? Ah, for +a sand bank, or sunken rock, to catch her as she runs! Mark you now, +when I throw a curse over them, how they shall be brought down in their +pride." + +Despite the malediction of Holy Church, the trim Dutchman swept on +nearly a quarter of a mile ahead. Sailors manned the rigging, and +crammed on as much additional sail as the masts would bear; the +dishonoured flag was replaced; Roussilac paced the main deck, pale with +rage, his fingers clasping and unclasping his sword-hilt. D'Archand +hurried to and fro, issuing orders with typical French rapidity. + +A jet of smoke broke over her bows, and a ball threw up a spout of +water in the wake of the fleeing vessel. + +"A most courteous and inoffensive messenger," quoth Flower, bowing to +the enemy. "Captain, shall we not make a suitable reply?" + +"I fear me powder and ball are out of reach," said the captain. "The +noisy hornets below guard the magazine. Would that we had a flag to +hoist over us, though it were nothing more comprehensible to our foes +than the five heads of county Berks." + +Another gun exploded, and after it another, and so they continued +ringing their wild music, the balls falling astern for the most part, +though more than one whizzed through the rigging, yet without doing +more damage than cutting a rope. + +"Take her wide round yonder point, master helmsman," cried the +stranger. "There lies a mud-bank stretching under the water well-nigh +to mid-stream. Mark you the place where it ceases by the ripple across +the river? Steer your passage to the left of that ripple, and all +shall go well." + +"Methinks the wind blows more keenly," said Woodfield. + +"There is coming upon us that wind which the Indians call the life of +the day, a breath of storm from the west which endures but a few +moments, blowing away the vapours of early morn and the last clouds of +night," said the man of Kent. "We may be sure of that wind at this +season of the year. After it follows calm, and the sun grows hot. +Haul down the lower main-sail, Sir Leader. The heavy mist upon yonder +hills tells us that the wind shall blow full strength this morning." + +Even as he spoke a ball from the enemy's bows roared overhead, and +snatched away a portion of the sail he indicated. The loose canvas +began already to flap and the flying ropes to whistle in the wind. + +"Let it remain so," said the Kentishman. "We have no need to take in +our sail since they have saved us the work. Didst see how she +staggered then? She shall never carry all that weight of canvas +through the life of the day, and the wind bears more heavily on her +than upon us. Ah, she gains!" + +It was as he had said. The unwieldy vessel fell into the breath of the +wind, and, righting herself after a sudden lurch, settled down into the +water, ploughing a deep white furrow, every mast bending and every rope +straining, every inch of canvas bellying mightily. + +The Dutchman came out to avoid the mud flat. She began to make the +bend, and her helmsman already saw the wide reach of river beyond, when +a terrible shout ascended from the men who were caged between decks. +At the same moment a pungent odour tainted the free air, and a thin +blue vapour began to leak from the cracks and joinings of the planks. + +The Dutchman was burning internally. Soon her deck smoked like a dusty +road under wind, and the shouts of the prisoners became terrible to +endure. The adventurers smelt the choking fumes, saw the curling +vapours, and their faces grew pale with the knowledge that they had to +face a more dangerous foe than the French, knowing well that any moment +a spark or a flame might touch the magazine. + +"Unfortunates!" groaned Penfold. "I had hoped to win this ship, and +with her sail to Virginia, there to gather a crew of mine own people, +and return hither to harry the French." + +"To the boats," cried Flower. "Better be sunk by a cannon ball than +perish like rats in a corn-stack." + +The wind rushed down from the westward rocks with a shout. It smote +the waters of the St. Lawrence, beating them into waves. It penetrated +the womb of the Dutch vessel, and fanned the smouldering fire into +life. It plucked at the cordage, fought with the sails, and bent the +masts until they cracked again. It came in a haze through which the +sun glowed faintly, and behind over the unseen heights the sky cleared +and burst into blue patches, because the passing of the life of the day +was as sudden as its birth. + +Down went the mizzenmast of the Frenchman with its crowning weight of +canvas, carrying away the spanker, the shrouds, davits, and quarter +boat; and her sky-sails, which a moment before had raked the breeze so +proudly, spread disabled in the river. She dragged on with her +wreckage, while men with axes swarmed into the poop to cut away the +dead weight of wood and saturated canvas. The mainmast curved like a +bow from the main shrouds to the truck, but remained fast until the +haze broke, and the sky became a field azure, from which the sun shone +out in his might. + +Flames were now pouring from the doomed ship, and the poop was a mass +of fire. The Englishmen ran for the boats, into which they flung every +article upon which they could lay their hands: swords and guns, axes, +clothing, provisions, bedding, and even spare sails and ropes. +Everything would serve some useful purpose in their life upon the +shore. The lord of the isles alone took nothing. He entered his canoe +with the boy, and before the adventurers quitted the doomed ship they +had reached the shore and entered the cover of the trees, the man +carrying the light canoe beneath his arm. + +"Release the prisoners," cried Flower, as he cast his last burden into +the boat. + +"Not so," replied the vindictive Hough. "Let them perish like the men +of Amalek before Israel." + +"Nay, we are no cold-blooded murderers," protested Woodfield. +"Unfasten the hatches, and let them save themselves." + +"Have they not been delivered into our hands that we may destroy them?" +said Hough. + +"Now you would undo the good work, and raise up again a host to be our +destruction in the time to come." + +"Let us not argue, lest we be destroyed," said young Viner. "What says +our captain?" + +But old Penfold was lying back in the boat, fainting with exhaustion +and loss of blood, and when Woodfield appealed to him he only murmured +the death sentence of the Dutchmen, "Let Jeremiah Hough command." + +"Cast off," said the Puritan. "Let the enemies of our country perish. +The Lord do so to me and more also if I spare any of the accursed race +who have sworn to sweep England from the seas." + +So the boat pushed off, and came after hard rowing to the shore, beside +the mouth of the little river which enters the main stream midway +between Cap Tourmente and the cleft of the Saguenay. Up this river the +men pulled to find a place for encampment, until the sweet-smelling +pine forest closed behind and hid them from their enemies, whose flag +they had flouted and beaten that day. While they worked their way +inland a mighty explosion shook the atmosphere, the cones rained from +the overhanging trees, the rock land thrilled, the face of the water +shivered, and the birds flew away with screams. + +"I fear me," said Hough, as he ceased his nasal droning of a psalm, "I +fear me that the popish dogs have been given time to rescue the +Hollanders." + +True it was that the French had been allowed both time and opportunity +for setting at liberty the wretches in the burning ship, but neither +Roussilac nor any of his captains dared to lead the venture, knowing +that any moment might witness the destruction of the ship. The master +took in his sails, cast anchor, and waited for the end. + +Thus the undertaking of Holland failed, as her treachery deserved. It +was her one attempt at wresting the fortress from the Cardinal's grip. +And from that day to this no man-of-war from the Netherlands has ever +sailed up the gulf of the St. Lawrence. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +COUCHICING. + +A month went after the failure of the Dutch venture, and the sachems of +the Iroquois still awaited the signal of the raft of fire. Van Vuren +had entered the fortress that morning which witnessed the loss of his +ship, and there remained at the mercy of the French, spending his days +in making friendly overtures to the commandant, avoiding La Salle--who +still refused to believe that it was not Van Vuren who had been his +cowardly attacker that distant night at the street corner in +Avignon--and anxiously inquiring for news concerning the expedition +which he had sent out to the west. The Dutchman was being punished for +his treachery by the knowledge that a sword was suspended by an +exceedingly frail thread above his head, for he strongly suspected that +the dwarf Gaudriole was cognisant of his visits to the council fire. +He was therefore afraid to approach the Indians again; but his mind was +yet occupied with its former plot of seizing the fortress with their +aid. + +During that month Roussilac had not been idle. With half his men he +had harried the country to east and west, that he might find and hang +the Englishmen who had dared to occupy his territory and disgrace his +flag. He did not venture into the forests of the north, because the +Iroquois were masters there. Once the adventurers came very near to +being taken, but bravery and English luck opened a way for their +escape. They were, however, compelled to abandon their cave among the +cliffs, and flee for refuge into the district inhabited by the friendly +Cayugas; and there, a few paces from the brink of Couchicing, the Lake +of Many Winds, they built them a hiding-place surrounded by a palisade, +which they ambitiously named New Windsor. To the north they were +protected by the face of the water, to the south by the primaeval +forest; on the west the Cayugas held the land, on the east the Oneidas, +both tribes well disposed towards the English and bitterly hostile to +the French. + +Finding himself again defeated, Roussilac cast about in his mind for a +sounder policy, and finally resolved to adopt Samuel de Champlain's +cunning and stir up the Algonquins anew to attack their hereditary +foes. Accordingly he despatched Gaudriole with a couple of soldiers to +the north, with a present of guns and ammunition and a message to the +chief Oskelano, praying him to descend straightway to the river, and +view for himself the majesty and power of the representatives of the +King of France. Oskelano, a treacherous and heartless rogue, snatched +at the gifts, asked greedily for more, and consented to return with the +dwarf to the fortress. + +This move on the part of the commandant escaped the knowledge of the +men who were busy in their way spinning the web of England's empire, +fighting for their own existence and for supremacy at one and the same +time. At their councils figured the lord of the isles--whose +well-hidden shelter in the heart of the region of the lost waters had +never been suspected by the searching party--and his stern young son. +Since that unlooked-for meeting on the deck of the Dutch vessel the +Kentishman had come into frequent contact with the men of Berks, and +their common nationality, cause, and necessities had quickly forged a +stubborn tie between them. But the geniality of the yeomen never +succeeded in breaking down the reserve of their mysterious colleague. +When asked to recount some portion of his past history he would but +answer brusquely, and when they demanded to know his name he merely +returned his former answer, "I am a man of Kent." + +During that month another provision ship, the _St. Wenceslas_ of +Marseilles, had sailed up the St. Lawrence, and so soon as she had made +fast and told the news of the world D'Archand lifted anchor and headed +for home, carrying Roussilac's despatches, and those soldiers and +settlers who, by reason of wounds or sickness, had become unfitted to +fulfil their military obligations. The French Government had taken +advantage of the dissensions which were rending England apart to send +by the _St. Wenceslas_ more emigrants into the new world--all picked +men, destined by the Government to be established, willing or +unwilling, regardless of soil or natural advantages, upon such +districts as might be considered to need strengthening, there to +survive or to become extinct. It would be their duty to form, not a +settlement capable of extension, but a military post; and they would be +sustained by supplies brought over from France by warships. It was a +weak policy, bound by the test of time to fail. The English motto was +settlement and a friendly attitude towards the natives; that of her +great colonial rival, aggrandisement and the destruction of the +aborigines. + +These facts were remembered by the venturers, when they beheld the +coming of the one ship and the departure of the other, and, egotists +though they were, the truth that they could not possibly form a +settlement unaided became at last too obvious to be ignored. After +repeated deliberations they decided upon a course which was indeed the +only one open to them. The advice, that one of the party should +attempt to reach the king's loyal town of Boston by overland journey +and there beg for help, proceeded in the first instance from the man of +Kent. He explained that the province of Massachusetts was well +occupied by Englishmen of every grade--soldiers of fortune as well as +artisans, farmers, and titled scions of great houses; and, he added, +there were ships of war in Boston and Plymouth harbours. This advice +found favour in the eyes of the others, and they proceeded to draw lots +to decide which one should make the hazard. The lot fell upon Geoffrey +Viner, the youngest of the party. His seniors at once held forth +objections, grounded upon his youth and inexperience; but the boy as +stoutly held out for his privilege, until the dissentients gave way. + +At noon upon the day which had been selected for the young man's +departure, the lord of the isles appeared at New Windsor to bid the +messenger farewell. Geoffrey went out with him, and they stood alone +in the shade of a hemlock, facing the lake and a white cascade which +streamed like a bridal veil over the face of the rocks. After the +Kentishman had imparted what little knowledge he had of the country to +the south, he went on to fix deeply into the mind of his listener the +importance of seeing Lord Baltimore, the Governor of New England, +personally, and of impressing the papist peer strongly with the vital +necessity of sending immediate succour to the north. + +"And what if my Lord Baltimore will not hear me, or hearing will not +believe?" asked Geoffrey anxiously. + +"Give to him this ring," replied the other, drawing reluctantly from +his left hand a gold circlet set with a stone bearing a coat-of-arms. +"Bid him remember the promise made to this ring's owner one summer +night in a Kentish orchard. Bid him also recall the words of King +Henry the Sixth upon Southwark Bridge, hard by Saint Mary Overies, to +his ancestor the keeper of the privy seal, and to mine the sheriff of +Kent." + +"Think you that our plans shall prosper?" the young man asked. + +"Have no doubt. Believe that already we have succeeded. Persuade +yourself that the French are driven out of their fastnesses, and the +land from Acadia to Hochelaga gives allegiance to King Charles. As a +man wills so shall it be. And yet be cautious." + +"Should I not bid them attack Acadia first? It is but a small colony, +and open to the water they say." + +"Nay," said the other. "Let us fight with our faces to the sea. How +shall it profit us to drive our enemy inland and disperse them as a +swarm of flies which rises and settles in another spot? We must drive +them eastward to the sea, where they shall either conquer or die. I +pray you guard that ring." + +As they moved away from the hemlock's shade a canoe swept over the lake +and touched the sand, and two stern-faced Cayugas lifted their paddles, +shaking the water from the blades. These brought a brace of +land-locked salmon to the beach. A young woman followed, and after her +an old man, his thick hair adorned with a bunch of feathers. These +were Shuswap and Onawa, his youngest daughter. + +The lord of the isles went forward, and met his native relatives upon +the beach. + +"Gitsa," cried the old man. "We greet you, Gitsa." + +"Is it well, Shuswap?" + +"It is the time of the wind of life, the good time," the old man +answered. "The waters are free, and the animals breed in the forest. +Where are the white men of the smooth tongue, Gitsa? Where are the men +who came to us at the council fire and said to us, 'Your enemy is our +enemy. Aid us now when we rise up against them'? Shall they return +with the wind of life?" + +"The north wind came upon them and swept them away," his son-in-law +replied, employing the sachem's figurative speech. "You have something +to tell me, Shuswap?" + +"There is a strange ship come to the high cliffs, a great ship from the +land of the accursed people," said the old man. "What is this that you +have told us, Gitsa? Said you not that the King of England shall send +many ships and men when the ice has gone, to drive out the men of +France and restore their own to the tribes of the Iroquois? What is +this that we see? The priest of France sends more ships, and more men +who shall kill the beasts of the forest and the fish of the waters, and +drive us back with their fire-tubes into the forests of the north where +the enemies of our race, the Algonquins, lie ever in wait. Is there a +king in England, Gitsa? Has he ships to send out? Has he men to put +into them? Have you lied to the sachems of the Iroquois?" + +"Be not afraid, Shuswap," said the white man. "You shall learn whether +there be a king of England or no. But he has many enemies in the +far-away world, and these he must conquer first. Even now we are +sending a messenger to the king's country, and he shall return with +ships and men, and the French shall flee before them." + +The man of Kent spoke with a heavy heart. He dared not confess what he +believed to be the truth--namely, that England was already embroiled in +civil war. + +"A tribe divided against itself shall be annihilated," said the sachem +sharply, with the clairvoyant power of the primitive man. "The +remaining tribes stand by until it is exhausted, and then fall upon +that tribe, and it is known no more. Is it so with the English, Gitsa?" + +"It is not so," replied the Englishman, a flush upon his tanned +features. "England stands above other nations of the world, even as +the sun is greater than all lights. She shines over the earth in her +strength. Were there no England the world would fall into decay, the +creatures who supply us with meat and fur would die, the fish would +fail in the waters, the forests would wither, there would be no rain +and no light by night or by day. The sun would turn black, the moon +would fall into the sea, the very gods would die if England were no +more. She shall take possession of this land in her own time, and +Frenchmen shall have no place in it except as subjects of our king." + +The old sachem lifted his cunning eyes and said: "It is well, Gitsa. +But if it be so, why does not your king lift his hand and drive away +his enemies, or blow with his breath and destroy their ships? Surely +that would be a small thing to a king who governs the world." + +"It would be a small thing in truth," replied the Englishman, smiling +in spite of his sorrow. "But the ways of the king are not our ways. +He allows his enemies to go upon their course, until a day comes when +he shall say, 'You have gone too far.' It is thus that he shows his +power." + +"It is so," said the sachem gravely. "We cannot read the mind of him +who rules. One year there are many animals in the forest, and we live +in plenty. The next we starve. A small tribe overthrows a great one. +A great tribe becomes too prosperous and is plagued with pestilence. +The young men are smitten. The old live on. The wind destroys the +forest, the river breaks its own banks. The lightning strikes down the +totem-pole which we have raised for his pleasure. It is so. There is +a mystery in life. The gods destroy their own handiwork. They remove +the strong, and let the weak survive." + +He passed on, an erect figure, in spite of his age, and treading firmly. + +Onawa, a silent listener to their talk, stepped out. She was good to +look upon, with her wealth of black hair, her large eyes, her rounded +face, the cheeks and lips lightly touched with paint, her slim muscular +figure. She could run against any man, and aim an arrow with the +sureness of any forester of Nottingham. But she was headstrong, as +changeable as water, and the Englishman did not trust her. + +"Where have you been, Onawa?" he said. + +"I have come from the camp with my father," she replied. "Where have +you left your son? They say, among the tribes, that he grows into a +great warrior. They say also that he carries wood and draws water and +cuts up the deer which he has killed. Our young men despise a woman's +work." + +"I have taught him the duty of helping his mother," came the reply. +"In my country a man lives for his mother or his wife, and her good +favour is his glory." + +The girl hesitated, a frown crossing her forehead. "Why are the French +so beautiful, so bold-looking?" she asked suddenly. + +"That they may captivate the minds and eyes of women who are weak." + +"They are better to look at than Englishmen. They do not wear old +garments marked with dirt. They do not let the hair upon their faces +grow down their bodies. They do not talk deep in their throats. They +are not serious. I love to hear them talk, to see them move. They +walk like men who own the world." + +"I have warned you against them," he said earnestly. "They are the +natural enemies of your people. Consider! What Frenchman has ever +married into your tribe and settled down among you?" + +The girl laughed scornfully, and turned to go, grasping her long hair +in her hand. + +"You hide from them because you know that they are better men than +you," she taunted. "It was a Frenchman who first came Jo our country +from the other world. Perhaps there was no England in those days. The +sun loves to shine upon Frenchmen. The English live in the mists. You +have taken my sister for wife, but I--I, Onawa, daughter of Shuswap, +would marry a Frenchman." + +"Never shall I wish you a harder fate," retorted the calm man; and +having thus spoken he turned aside towards the tiny English settlement +to greet his friends and join again his son. + +It was the first hour of night when Viner started upon his great +journey. The forest was white with a moon, and sparks of phosphorus +darted across the falls. When the wooden bars were drawn out of their +sockets and the five men emerged from the palisade, the monotonous +chirping of frogs ceased abruptly, and a great calm ensued. + +In single file they passed along the dark trail, the wet bush sweeping +their legs, the branches locked overhead. They rounded the red fires +which marked the camping-ground of the Oneidas; they smelt the acrid +smoke, and dimly sighted many a brown lean-to; the dogs jumped out +barking. They passed, the lights disappeared, the silence closed down. +Presently the trail divided; the branch to the left leading to the +river, that to the right bearing inland to the lakes, rivers, and +hunting-grounds known only to the Indians. + +"Get you back now," said Viner, halting at the parting of the ways. +"We are already in the country of the enemy. Bid me here God-speed." + +There they clasped hands, and in the act of farewell Flower slipped +into Viner's hand a little black stone marked with a vein of chalk. +"Keep it, lad," he muttered. "One spring when I was near drowning in +the Thames by being held in the weeds I caught this stone from the +river-bed. Methinks it has protected me from ill. May that same +fortune be on you, and more added to it, in the work which lies before +you." + +A ray of moonlight fell through an opening in the trees, and whitened +the five keen faces. + +"Superstition made never a soldier of any man," muttered the stern +voice of the Puritan. "Fling that idolatry to the bush, Geoffrey, and +go your way, trusting rather in the Lord with a psalm upon your lips." + +"It is but a reminder of home for the lad," protested Flower gently. +"We have each other. But in the solitudes what shall he have?" + +"'Tis but a stone from our river, friend Hough," said Geoffrey timidly. +"I thank you, neighbour," he added. + +"Fare you well," said old Penfold sadly. "We shall lack you sore." + +They turned away, and instantly became lost from the man who was going +south, because the trail bent sharply. The little band of adventurers, +now reduced to four, walked slowly and sorrowfully towards New Windsor, +until they came out upon the lake, and heard the beavers gnawing the +rushes, and the wind splashing the fresh water up the beach. + +"What has come to our nightingales?" said Penfold suddenly. "I like +not this silence." + +The frogs about the palisade were songless, and the sign was ominous. +At their leader's hasty remark the others came to a stand, and scanned +the prospect keenly, until silently and abruptly the ghost-like shape +of a woman rose between them and the moon. + +"'Tis but the girl Onawa, daughter of Shuswap," muttered Woodfield +reassuringly; but there was a suspicion in his mind which prompted him +to add, "What does she here?" + +Even while he put the question Hough cried out, and pointed with a wild +gesture, feeling that same moment for his sword. Gazing in the +direction which he indicated with a quivering hand, his brethren saw +before them the palisade, but not as they had left it. The wooden bars +had been set back into their sockets, as though to forebode the +occupation of their enclosure by an enemy. + +"Stay!" called Onawa haughtily, when the men approached her at a run. +"Your tepee has passed from you into the power of the king." + +"There is only one king," cried old Penfold. Then he shouted at her, +for all the land to hear, "What king?" + +"King Louis," said the girl defiantly. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +THE GAUNTLET DOWN. + +Oskelano, chief of the Algonquins, that unstable race, false alike to +friend and foe, and doomed to be the first of the savage tribes to be +extinguished, reached the fortress about noon on the day which had been +fixed for Geoffrey's departure to the unknown lands. Roussilac +personally met the treacherous old man upon the heights, and dazzled +his savage eyes with the splendour of a blue surcoat, upon which +gleamed the fleur-de-lys worked in gold. He proceeded to point out the +soldiers in their brave array, the strong huts of wood or stone dotted +about the cliff, the _St. Wenceslas_ riding upon the river, the +glistening guns, and the flashing steel. Finally he bade the old +savage note the impregnable nature of the French position. + +"Behold the citadel which my master has ordered me to build for your +protection," the commandant continued, pouring his figments through the +leering mouth of the dwarf Gaudriole. "We have not destroyed your +forests, nor robbed you of your shelters. You may enter our forts in +safety, and obtain whatsoever you desire in exchange for skins and +feathers. We do not mass together in one place. We distribute our +strength. Our forts are dotted along the coast. The tribes of +Maryland and of Massachusetts have shown you how the English congregate +upon the Potomac River. When you go to them for supplies of food, or +demanding recompense for that which they have taken from you, they +threaten you with death. Is it not so?" + +"Um," replied the Algonquin, not a muscle of his face stirring. + +"The English have their eye upon this north of the continent," went on +the governor. "In the south they rule, but only by permission of our +king. Have you obtained any benefits from them? Have they not rather +hunted you like wild beasts when you have resisted them? Remember how +Samuel de Champlain armed you so that you might fight against the +tribes of the Iroquois. He did not fear the Iroquois, but he saw you +in danger, and reached out his hand to save you." + +"Um, um," exclaimed Oskelano, with some symptom of feeling. + +"And now the King of France bids you choose between him and Charles of +England. If you accept my master's friendship he shall protect you +from your enemies. But if you refuse him he shall leave you to the +mercy of the Iroquois and the English, who shall rob and kill you until +there is not one Algonquin left." + +"The chief desires to know," said the interpreter, "why it is that the +English in the south have brought their wives and families, and why the +French come alone." + +"The English desire to take the country that they may make it their +home and abide here for ever," answered Roussilac. "The French are +here to protect the Algonquins, and when danger is over they shall +return to their wives and families in the homeland." + +"The chief also desires to know what is the cause of the king's +friendliness to a people whom he has never seen," continued the +interpreter. + +"King Louis has forbidden the English to enter this country, and when +they disobey he sends ships and men against them. It is his will that +the Algonquins shall possess this land in peace." + +"Um," said Oskelano profoundly, when these fictions had been expounded. + +"What says the wooden-faced fool?" asked Roussilac. + +"The doctors of his tribe tell him that all white men are liars," +replied the dwarf. "But the English are greater liars than the French." + +"Would that I might collect all the savages in this country upon yonder +island in mid-stream, and there exterminate them root and branch," the +governor muttered. + +"Import a shipload of bad brandy, commandant," suggested the +interpreter, with an evil grin. "That would spread a disease which +might carry them off in a few generations." + +"What say you?" exclaimed Roussilac. "Away, hunchbacked devil!" + +But when Oskelano had gone to the quarters which had been prepared for +him, and Gaudriole had followed with a grating laugh, Roussilac +remained to pace the cliff and consider the evil thought. "'Tis a vile +plan," he muttered. "Yet beasts are poisoned when they overrun the +land. By St. Louis, it is a plan which might work." + +That poor twisted freak of nature, Gaudriole, had lived formerly in the +gutters of Paris by his wits and the predatory powers of his fingers, +begging by day, stealing by night. Favoured by fortune beyond his +deserts, he had continued to escape the great stone gallows which had +been erected for the dismissal of vagabonds of his kind, and had +finally escaped to the New World, there to fall speedily into the hands +of the Indians. Having saved his life by the performance of some +sleight-of-hand tricks, he robbed the tribe which had taken him captive +and escaped that same night. For years he had lived among the natives, +learning their language, adopting their manner of living, until he had +made himself as much at home in the dense forests as in the slums of +his native city. Indian braves and French soldiers alike stood in awe +of him on account of his impish form and devilish ways. The governors +of the forts found him useful because he brought them information. The +free life suited the unprincipled dwarf, who was little better than an +animal invested with a trick of reasoning; and he knew that, like an +animal, he was liable to be hanged and his body thrown to the crows any +day of his sinful life. + +The cabaret in the Rue des Pecheurs was noisy that evening because the +ship which had lately arrived from Marseilles had replenished Michel's +casks. Soldiers were gaming behind the red curtain which half-blinded +the single window, and fierce songs sounded under the cliff as +Gaudriole shuffled down the pathway. The dwarf had not listened to the +welcome noise of the tavern for many a month, and his crooked heart +heated at the sound. + +"Saints of God!" the high voice of La Salle sounded. "If it be true, +as they say, that the devil lends favour to gamblers, then are you +lost, brother, body and soul. Michel, an you sing that lewd song +again---- A plague strike you drunkards! Have the streets of +Marseilles no new song?" + +"There is nothing new, my father," bawled a hoarse voice. "His sacred +Eminence holds all France as a man might contain in his hand an egg. +Only strong men, good fighters, be they priests or laymen, find favour +in the Cardinal's eyes, and 'tis said, though with what truth I know +not, that he sways his Holiness as the wind may play with a cornstalk. +Not a brick has been added to Marseilles this year past. The very +mass-bread is mouldy, and the women are hags----" + +"Peace, brute!" La Salle shouted. "Laroche, smite me yon babbler +across his mouth." + +Standing in the doorway, Gaudriole saw the fat priest heave, and aim a +terrific blow at a half-drunken soldier whose head lolled against the +wall. The dwarf shuffled forward with his malevolent laugh as the +soldier lurched aside with an oath. + +"The English are upon you, Messires!" he shouted with all his strength. + +Instantly there arose indescribable confusion. Trestles and stools +were flung aside, wine from overthrown goblets soaked black patterns +into the earthen floor, as every soldier made for the outside, grasping +his sword, or swearing because he could not find it. Out of the noise +grated the laugh of the dwarf, who slunk against the log wall, rubbing +his hairy hands. + +"A jest! A jest!" screamed Ferraud of shrill voice, his waxen face +regaining colour as he wagged his hand at the dwarf. "Masters, behold +Gaudriole! Liar, hunchback, bastard! Were you used as you deserve you +would hang from the roof-tree. Masters, come back. There are no +English within a thousand miles." + +"What found ye outside, my soldiers?" chuckled Gaudriole, as the men of +Mars tumbled disorderedly into the cabaret. "There is the wind. The +west wind, which the Indians say brings all that a man may wish for. +Comrades, did ye find the wind?" + +His hideous figure doubled, and his laughter grated again. + +"Buffoon of the pit!" cried Laroche, striding up and shaking the dwarf +until his head rolled. "Would make a laughing-stock of his Majesty's +brave men, deformed imp of darkness? Come forth now and sing to us. +Sing to us, I say, lest I beat your crooked shape into a lath." + +Because Gaudriole was aware of his value he dared to play such pranks. +He was indeed a capably grotesque comedian, and formerly had garnered +many a capful of sous at the corners of Paris by his antics, songs, and +contortions. His pathetic shape had saved him from the punishment +which often attended the tricks of less daring jesters; and it may be +surmised that his malignant face and cross-seeing eyes not unfrequently +repelled the would-be striker. Men were superstitious in the days when +the world was large. + +"Some wine first," the hunchback panted, for the priest's arm was +rough. "The ship moves not till she has wind in her sails. I have +been a drinker of water these months, and my dreams have been red of +wine. Ah, friend! may your beard grow golden, and curl even as your +mistress would have it." + +This to a singularly ugly soldier, with a flat, scarred face and +stubbly black beard, who handed him a potful of wine. + +"My beard becomes me well enough," the man growled, when a laugh went +against him. + +"Well, in faith. It grows out of your skin like bristles from a +chimney-brush." + +"Cease your gibes, hunchback, and to your capers. We grow thin for +want of laughter in this accursed country," cried Laroche. + +"What shall it be, Messires, a dance, a clever contortion, or a song--a +song of fair ladies, such as one may see upon the streets of Paris, +saving the presence of these most holy and renowned priests?" jeered +Gaudriole, with his intolerable laugh. + +"All. Give us all, buffoon, and invent somewhat for the occasion," the +master of ceremonies ordered. + +Not loth to practise his talents, Gaudriole took the centre of the +floor. Voice, in a musical sense, he had none. The noise he made was +little better than the screech of wind roaring through the hollow +mouthpiece of some gargoyle of the roof-gutter. Every fresh contortion +of his face was more hideous than the last, as he danced, shouted, and +twisted bonelessly over the wine splashes on the ground, until he +appeared to the spectators as some frightful creature of nightmare, +presenting the evil scenes and actions of their past lives before their +wide-opened eyes. + +He concluded his vaudeville amid shouts of applause, in which La Salle +alone took no part. The priest was disgusted at this exhibition of so +much that was brutal, and he was disgusted with himself for remaining a +listener and a watcher. He was, for those days, well-educated, and the +spectacle of the little monster writhing and yelling before him +repelled. It was Paris in truth that Gaudriole recalled; but not, for +him, the Paris of the corners and byways, not the Paris of vagabonds +and free-livers, but the city of the most brilliant court upon earth, +the city of intrigue where Cardinal Richelieu spun his red web to +entangle the feet of kings. The cabaret was but an interlude, a by-way +of the path to power; but the priest realised, as he sat among the +fools, that he had trodden the by-ways frequently and too well. + +He left the tavern with its fumes of smoke and wine, and escaped into +the cool, moist wind under the cliff, but a pair of cross-seeing eyes +followed his departure, and Gaudriole wormed his way through a +labyrinth of arms that would have detained him for more folly, and +hopped loosely up the ascent of the crooked path. + +"What would you, creature of sin?" demanded La Salle, when he perceived +who it was that followed him. + +"A word with you, holiness," panted the dwarf. "The woman Onawa sends +you greeting and prays that you will meet her at the beginning of the +forest where formerly she saw you by chance. She engages to show you +where your enemy may be found. She waits for you now, most renowned." + +"Dog!" exclaimed La Salle. "What have I to do with this woman? What +enemy is it of whom she speaks? I have no enemy save Van Vuren, who +lives now under the protection of the governor, and slinks at his heels +like a frightened hound." + +Gaudriole could never suppress the malignant grin which escaped from +the ends of his slit mouth whenever he spoke. + +"I but repeat the message as it was spoken. Think you that I dare +betray a Frenchman, and that a most holy priest? An I wished to do so, +the game would not be worth the candle. Gaudriole loves life as yonder +crows love carrion." + +"See you tell no man of this," the priest muttered, as he moved towards +the cliff. + +The way was rough, the breeze cold, as La Salle crossed the heights, +turning once to see the flag beating over the fort and men creeping +like midges about their tasks. He descended, and the swaying wall of +forest broke the wind. The pale purple crocus pushed its furry hood +from the short grass, the songless robins hopped before him, the smell +of fresh water was in the air. The fighting priest felt strong as he +breathed the wind. + +Onawa flashed out of the brush and waved her bow to him. + +"She has painted her face and looks forth ready for battle," said the +priest. "A comely maid, by St. Louis. What a figure is there, and +what freedom! She has a trick of moving her head which would make a +fashion at court." + +"Come!" Onawa called. "Hasten!" + +She spoke in English, and hope revived in the heart of the priest. + +"English. I show you," she cried. "I have waited a long time. It is +growing late," she went on in her own tongue, hoping vainly that he +might understand. + +"I commit my body to this adventure," said La Salle. "If these be the +English who captured the Dutch vessel and mocked us, the reward of +discovery shall be mine. A ship sails for home next week. Tidings +from the New World carry apace throughout Europe. The first step. Ha, +it is the first step that gives confidence. The rest is easy." + +He followed Onawa along a trail which bewildered with innumerable +twistings, and after an hour's sharp walking they reached an untrodden +bed of sage brush glistening upon the flats. Onawa picked up a faint +thread, which was invisible to La Salle's eyes, and led him on through +bush where the spikes of dead pines snagged his feet. Then came a cold +ravine down the sides of which quaking asps drooped and moss spread +thickly. More forest, growing every pace denser, until the girl +stopped and motioned her companion to enter what appeared to be a hole +made in the centre of a thicket. She held back the rough bushes to +allow him to pass ahead. For a moment La Salle hesitated. He was +human enough to know that his manliness had made an impression upon +Onawa, but at the same time he feared treachery. The Iroquois were +sworn foes of the French, and here was a daughter of the chief of the +Cayugas abetting a Frenchman. He looked at the girl. She smiled +brilliantly and made an impatient movement, and he advanced boldly into +the cold thicket. + +The ground shelved, and under the arched branches a spring freshet, +scarcely seven feet in width, ran hurriedly into the unseen. A canoe +rocked upon the water, held to the crooked root of a pine by a knotted +willow. Onawa motioned him into this canoe, and when he had taken his +place after sundry lurchings and difficulties, the girl stepped in, +unfastened the twig, and struck her paddle into the water. The canoe +swept away under the low branches. + +"I would I had Laroche with me," said La Salle, watching the cold trees +and the pale rocks approaching and receding. + +"English," said Onawa softly from time to time. "I show you." + +The trees went back and the rocks heightened. La Salle heard water +rolling up a beach and the sweep of wind across an open surface. The +freshet widened and grew more shallow; the keel of the canoe scraped +across a ridge of silt. With a deft turn of her paddle Onawa shot the +prow upon a sand bank, and signed to him to land. + +She led him along a cliff path, across a flat, again into sage brush, +and finally into more forest. They moved stealthily under cover, until +the trees thinned, and willow scrub sprang thickly out of a grey soil. +At a certain spot the girl halted and motioned her companion to look +forth. + +La Salle saw the little settlement of New Windsor nestling in its +enclosure, and needed no longer the information, "English," which the +girl offered with a smile. + +They lay in wait while the night grew upon them. La Salle watched when +the bars of the palisade were removed and five men came forth, and +marvelled to learn the weakness of the enemy. A bold scheme instantly +suggested itself. He would engage the enemy single-handed upon their +return, and wear them down one by one. + +Here Onawa became an obstacle, because he could not explain to her his +intentions. He did his best by signs and broken English, but the girl +misunderstood him. She believed that he was telling her that he had +taken the settlement, and she was expected to instruct the Englishmen +that their property had passed away from them. + +The white moon ascended the sky. The wooden bars sprawled where the +Englishmen had left them. La Salle felt confident that he would be +able to strike down the owners of the place as they passed singly into +the fort. + +Suddenly a great hound came out of the forest, sniffed his way to the +palisade, and stopped before the entry, growling and lashing his tail. +Onawa recognised the hound, and called to him. He heard her voice and +turned his leonine head to snarl fiercely. Then he headed for the +forest, giving tongue as he ran. Onawa sprang to the palisade, and +struggled to replace the bars. For a moment she pulled her blanket +over her face, leaving none of it visible except the eyes and forehead, +and the priest shivered. He remembered the mysterious swordsman who +had wounded him upon the Rue des Pecheurs. He assisted Onawa to put up +the bars. + +They heard voices in the forest. La Salle knew that he would require +his full skill in sword-play to save himself that night. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + +PILLARS OF THE HOUSE. + +The moonlight fell softly upon a clearing where a small fire +smouldered, where the lord of the isles and his son sat in silence, and +between them the great hound full-stretched in sleep. They were +resting before returning home to their island among the lost waters. +Only the cracking of the fiery wood, the overhead boughs chafing +fitfully, and the snapping of twigs too brittle to survive disturbed +the silence of the night. + +The little group made a stern picture in the light of the moon. The +hound bitten and blemished by many a conquering fight; the lean man +scarred by sword wounds; the boy scarce out of childhood, hungry to +learn--even the boy wore his scars. He was developing in a hard +school. He could not know that the work which his father pointed out +would receive, if accomplished, neither thanks nor reward. The +pioneers of empire might be compared with the insects of the coral +reef, insignificant atoms who have planted a foundation for the sea to +build upon. + +"Father," said the boy at length, "shall we not be returning to our +home?" + +There was another interval before the stern man looked up. + +"Methinks when you spoke that word I saw another home," he said, +raising a hand to his eyes as though he would dispel the vision. "I +saw methinks a grey house, its chimneys wreathed with ivy. Lawns +spread far, divided by paths, bound with close-cropped hedges of yew +and lined with flowers, where peacocks lift their feathers to the sun. +Down a green slope to the little river I see orchards of cherry, snowy +with blossom. A road ends at a church where I may read your name and +mine upon many a stone slab. There lies your grandfather, there my +mother. It is peaceful in that garden of Kent, our home at the other +side of the world." + +Young Richard leaned forward over his knees. His father was speaking +in parables. He had seen only the primaeval forest, the river torrents, +the lakes with their land-locked fish, the icefields. He had supposed +the world to be made of such. He had heard the clash of swords, the +shouts of war. He had supposed it was so the world over. A place of +peace had never entered into the scheme of his boyish calculation. + +"It is a dream of which you speak, father?" + +"Ay, my lad, for me a dream. You perchance shall see England with your +own eyes, for when I am gone you shall be the head of a family which +has for its motto, 'Let traitors beware.' Son, have you never wished +to learn your name?" + +"My name is Sir Richard," answered the proud boy. + +"I, your father, was called once Sir Thomas Iden. Formerly we were a +famous family, but now we wane, wielding an influence only over the +Kentish village which has been ours for centuries. Two hundred years +past the then head of our family, holding the office of sheriff of his +county at the time, slew a traitor named John Cade, who had openly +rebelled against the crown, and for this King Henry the Sixth conferred +upon him the honour of knighthood, presenting him also with a +coat-of-arms. In return for other services his Majesty bestowed upon +our house an unique privilege: right was granted to the head of the +family in each generation to confer knighthood upon his eldest son, if +that son should be deserving of the distinction. My father knighted +me, when I returned from an exploit against the Irish; and I handed the +honour on to you, when I found in you the hereditary longing for the +sword." + +The boy looked steadily across the fire, with wonder in his eyes. +"This then is not our home," he said, weighing his words with strange +gravity. "Should we not be in England, fighting for the king?" + +"God knows he needs the pillars of our house to help support his +throne," said Sir Thomas. "But no man can serve in two countries. I +have made myself a colonist, have married a daughter of the land, here +I can serve England if not my king, and here shall I die like a man of +Kent, with my face to the foe. I was the first Englishman to make a +home upon this bitter land. I resolved to build about me a colony, to +do for the north what John Winthrop and the papist Lord Baltimore are +doing in the south. I have appealed. I have sent for help. But +England will not hear." + +He paced through the wet grass, his hands clenched behind. + +"Is the cry of the colonies nothing to them? A handful of good men may +only sell their lives dearly in the trust that their example may fire +better men to deeds of conquest. Here we shall die in exile, and be +sent to haunt the great oblivion of these forests. Two such +ships-of-war as sailed from Devon in the golden days of Elizabeth, two +such ships as the merchant traders of Cheapside could send us without +loss, with another Hawkins to command, manned by our brave sailors of +the east country, would sweep the French out of their forts and clear +the land of them for ever. The Dutch hold the seas. France extends +her arms. England is again divided, the bloody rivalry between the +houses of York and Lancaster having taught her no wisdom. The +Parliament is against the king, and the country must bleed for it. We +are abandoned." + +The boy knew nothing of the politics of Europe, neither could he enter +into his father's dream of empire. He hated the French merely because +they were enemies, and because they had betrayed the Iroquois. To go +out and fight against them was more exciting, because more dangerous, +than to engage with the beasts of the forest; but the struggle between +the Powers of Europe for the ownership of North America had injected no +venom into his soul. + +"Shall I not live here always?" he asked. "Am I not to choose a maid +from the Cayugas, and settle upon the isles beside you, my father?" + +"Talk not of the future, son. Life is to-day, not hereafter. That +lies in the hand of God to give or to withhold. You shall return when +I am gone--return, did I say? You shall go to England with letters to +a notary in Maidstone, and he shall see that you come into your own. +You are dark of face, but English in heart, my Richard." + +The boy lifted his head with a sudden sharp movement. "Perchance that +day shall never come." + +The hound also lifted his head, and as his eyes sought the haunt of +shadows his jaw dropped in a wild howl. + +"Spirits sweep across my burying-place," whispered the youth. + +The hound lowered his head and howled again. + +"Frenchmen," muttered the boy. + +The brute slouched a few feet, broke into a trot, and disappeared. + +"He goes in the direction of New Windsor," said the knight. "Hast +heard any sound in the forest?" + +"There is no stir," replied the boy, holding his well-trained ear to +the ground. "The smoke from our fire carries. Let us go aside into +the shadow of the bush and watch." + +They retreated, flashing glances to right and left. The snap of a +twig, the very crushing of pine needles, sufficed to disturb that calm. +There was no premonitory shiver of the moon-rays, no suggestion of any +human presence upon the chilled air. Their feet sank audibly into the +white moss. Their breath made the semblance of a whisper between +father and son, the lion ready, the cub longing. The rim of the deep +shadow ran behind as they turned to face the clearing they had +abandoned. + +"The wind blows from New Windsor," said the knight. "The wind off +Couchicing." + +"If Blood takes hold of a man he shall die," went on the boy. "He will +hold at the back of the neck, and there hang until his fangs meet. Ha! +Didst hear that?" + +A branch had broken with a dry report. The trees moaned, and a few +distended cones struck the ground like spent bullets. + +"The breeze freshens. Methinks I hear the waves breaking upon the +beach." + +A raven passed before the moon, knelling violently. + +"He smells carrion," whispered the boy. "Already he smells blood upon +my sword." + +"Peace, boy," said his father; adding, compassionately, "He is but a +child." + +"Nay, father," said Richard, his blood rising. "I am no child. See +the mark of my wounds! Remember that glorious day when we captured the +Dutch privateer. I have prayed for such another day. Did I there +acquit myself as a child? Or did you call, 'Richard, come back! You +are too bold.' Hast forgotten, Sir Thomas?" + +His father passed the sword into his left hand, and threw his right arm +about his son's shoulder, drawing him upon his own thin body, and +kissed his cheek. Silence came between them. It was the first time +that the man had kissed the boy, and both for a moment were ashamed; +then young Richard's heart swelled with the pride of having won his +father's love. + +As they stood they moved, and their swords clashed. They remembered +their other bond of relationship, the brotherhood of the sword, and +each drew back. + +The raven had gone, but his note came upon the wind. + +The boy stood leaning forward, his ears drinking in the shuddering +noises of the bush, his face sharp with cold. The smoke stood upright +in the clearing like a swathed mummy. Now and again a spark drifted, +or a flurry of white wood-ash circled. There was yet no voice from the +lungs of the forest. + +"Blood smelt no animal," said the resolute Richard. "He does but +tongue softly when he follows a bear. That howl he gives when he runs +on the track of a man." + +"A wanderer lost in the forest. A spy from the fortress. One of +Roussilac's creatures," his father muttered. + +"They would take possession of the forest," the boy said passionately. +"Along the river I have come upon trees marked by the robbers +with--what is the name of that sign which they bear upon their flag?" + +"The fleur-de-lys. They brand the pines with that mark to signify that +the trees have been chosen for ship-masts and are the property of +France. Our hut upon the island is faced with logs which bear their +brand." + +"The Cayugas fell such trees and burn them, or cut them in half as they +lie. The Iroquois are yet masters, despite the decrees of King Louis. +How cold is this wind! Let me but warm my hands in the embers of our +fire." + +The boy crossed into the moonlight, and knelt within the smoke, rubbing +the palms of his hands upon the warm ground. His father stood in the +shadow, and watched every moving line of his son's body, muttering as +he listened to the outside: + +"At his age I was learning how to figure and spell in Tonbridge school. +Quarterstaff and tennis were my sports, with mumming and chess at home. +His sport is to hunt the wild beast, to track the deer, to lie in wait +for men. The sword is his pastime. His pleasure the dream. God +pardon me for bringing him into the world." + +The breeze bore along in a gust, bringing the muffled bayings of a +hound. + +"He calls me!" exclaimed the boy. "That is Blood's war-cry. Come!" he +shouted. + +"Patience, boy. Let the dog guide us. By advancing recklessly we may +fall into a trap." + +Each throb of the night brought the wild sounds nearer. Blood was in +full cry, the foam blowing from his jaws, the hackles stiff upon his +back. He was coming down the wind full-stretched. The bush gave, the +dew scattered from the high grass in frosty showers as he leapt the +moss-beds, his foot-tracks far apart. But no sound followed, except +the play of the branches and the murmur of the rising lake. + +"Remember how I brought him from the encampment as a puppy," said +Richard appealingly, "how I have trained him from the time that his +eyes opened. Whatever he discovers is mine. Say now that I may go +with him. He and I can cover the ground together. You shall follow in +your own time." + +"Perchance they shall be too many for you," said the father. + +"Nay, we shall advance with care, and hide if there be danger. The +whole army of France could not follow me in this forest." + +"There comes no noise of fighting." + +"It is but a spy who has discovered New Windsor. He must not carry +that secret back to the fortress." + +The hound broke forth, clouding the cold air with his breath, his eyes +like lamps. He leapt at his master, and snatched his sleeve with a +frothing muzzle, pulling him away. + +"Say now that I may go," the boy cried. "The enemy may already have +taken fear, and be retreating as fast as his cowardly feet may carry +him." + +The long awaited shout drifted down the wind, and the pale moon +shivered when she heard. + +"Go!" granted the stern man. + +"St. George!" yelled the maddened child, clutching at the hound's thick +collar of fur. The cry had no meaning. It was but a shout of war, a +valve to his passion. "On, Blood! St. George!" + +At full cry they were gone from the moonlight into gloom. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + +THE SWORD IMBRUED + +While the pendulum of a clock might have swayed thrice, the four +venturers stood facing Onawa as though her words had turned them into +stone. Then Hough, forgetting all save rage and lust for vengeance, +broke forward to reach the traitress. Instantly she ran for the bush, +and the voice of Penfold called his follower back. + +"Lift not your hand against a woman," he cried. "To the forest, my +lads." + +"To the forest an you will," Hough shouted. "I at least shall advance +to smite this woman's partner in sin, be he Frenchman or devil." + +"Be it so, neighbour," his captain answered. "Together let us stand, +or together fall. Advance, then, and take the place by storm." + +As they rushed out, La Salle braced himself to face the odds. He made +a few passes to free his arm, and trod the beaten ground to make sure +that it would not yield. Then, loosening the top bar, he flung it +forth as the spidery form of Hough descended, and it struck before the +Puritan's feet and stopped him dead. The same moment La Salle sprang +upon the lowest bar, but the support weighed down beneath its burden, +and his blade merely stabbed the air. + +"A priest, neighbours," Hough shouted. "Now to avenge our martyrs +burnt at Smithfield by Bloody Mary and the Pope." + +Onawa, standing forgotten at the edge of the bush, cast around her a +searching glance. The encampment of her tribe was far distant. The +hound had gone out howling. Danger from that quarter was yet to come. +She stood in shadow, the moonlight whitening the sand in front and +darkening the shapes which hurried to regain their own. No eyes were +upon her. She raised her left hand to her right shoulder and with the +same ominous motion dropped upon one knee, falling unconsciously into +the pose of a goddess of the chase. + +The attackers hesitated, knowing the reputation of the man with whom +they had to deal. To attempt to scale the palisade at that point meant +certain loss, and they were not strong enough to take the risk. Hunted +and hunters glared at each other over the pine bars. "Get you round, +Jesse," whispered Penfold. "The dog is bold because he knows his back +is safe." + +Woodfield ran beneath the palisading to a place known to him, where he +might scale the fence and so take the priest from behind. + +La Salle detected the ruse and taunted his baiters in native French, +while his keen eyes sought an opportunity to strike. He bent +cautiously and gathered a handful of sand. Hough sprang upon the bars, +and for the first time swords were clashed; for the first time also the +Puritan realised the power of the priest's wrist. The point escaped +his forearm by a mere margin, and La Salle laughed contemptuously. + +"Brave Lutherans!" he cried. "Four soldiers against a priest. +Advance, soldiers. The point a trifle higher. The elbow close to the +side. Now you stand too near together." + +"Wait until friend Woodfield comes up," muttered Flower. "Then he +shall laugh his last." + +As he spoke there came a sound through the moonbeams, as it were the +vibrating of the wings of a humming-bird, and to the music of this +disturbance Flower flung up his arms with a choking cough and closed +his sentence with a gasp of pain. His sword darted to the ground. He +swayed to and fro, his eyes wild, his mouth open in a useless endeavour +to appeal to his comrades, and then plunged down, like a man diving +into the water to swim, and sprawled at their feet, with a rough shaft +topped by a crow's feather springing from his back. + +A cloud of sand stung the faces of the survivors, and before they could +recover their eyesight, or awaken to the knowledge of Woodfield's +approaching shout, La Salle was across the bars and bearing down upon +them, his cold face branded with its mocking smile. He dashed their +opposition aside, and turned, flushed with success, to renew the +struggle, the taunts still ringing from his tongue. + +But help was near at hand. Before the maddened and half stupefied +Englishmen were able to move the night again resounded. Blood had +scented the foe and could no longer be restrained. The priest wheeled +round when he heard those howls, and escaped into the shadows with +Penfold and Woodfield at his heels. + +There was indeed one man, and he the most vengeful of his enemies, who +might have outstripped the priest, but it so happened that the +long-striding Puritan had lost his reason. Obeying the first impulse, +he pursued the traitress, mad to avenge the good yeoman who was +stretched to his long sleep at the entrance to New Windsor. Nor did he +realise his mistake until the shadow, after mocking him for a long +mile, flitted into the unknown depths of the bush, and so disappeared. + +"Fear not, masters," called young Richard, as boy and dog passed, +running as freshly as at the start. "Do but show my father which way I +have gone. Blood shall hunt the Frenchman down, and I shall slay him. +I shall slay him, friends." + +They swept on, flinging the dew across the bars of moonshine. That +triumphant voice came back to the two men as they slackened speed for +lack of breath: "I shall slay the Frenchman. I shall slay him, +friends." + +Penfold sank upon a bed of moss and panted into his hands. Woodfield +stood near, his breath coming in white steam, his breast rising and +falling. + +"It is God's way, neighbour," he said gently. + +The old leader's voice came in a sobbing whisper: + +"Through the device of the devil, smitten down foully.... A man of few +words, a good soul, with a smile for all. I knew him as a boy at home, +a gentle boy, who would never join in stoning birds in the hedgerow or +in killing butterflies, because, quoth he, God made them to give us +song and happiness. And yet none quicker than he at ball or quintain, +none braver at quarterstaff. Twice won he the silver arrow in Holborn +Fields, and at home would lead his mother to church a' Sundays, and a' +week-day drive the horses out to field. A sober lad as ever sang with +the lark beside our Thames.... An arrow in the back, an arrow shot by +an Indian witch. It passes all. Call you that God's way? God wills a +man to die in fair fight, with his death in front. And this! Oh, +George! To fall like a beast hunted for the pot." + +"Yet 'twas a soldier's end." + +"Tell them not at home," cried Penfold. "Let them not know, if ever we +see Thames-side again, how George Flower fell. Ay, like a flower he +came up, and as a grass has he been mown down. Many are the wiles of +Satan. The arrow that flieth by night, the coward arrow of treachery. +'Tis a foul wind that blows out a good man's life. He was a good man. +His old mother, if yet she live, may look upon his past and smile. +Such as George has made our England live. The strong oaks of the land. +From treachery and sudden death, good Lord deliver us!" + +"Amen, captain!" + +"Where is friend Hough?" asked the old man sharply, rising and groping +like one awakened from sleep. + +"I saw him rushing into the forest as a man possessed." + +"His zeal consumes him. I fear me while the madness last he will +thrust his sword through that witch and so bring us to trouble with the +Indians." + +"She will escape from him in the forest." + +"Bear with me," said Penfold brokenly. "To-night I am old. My leg +pains me so that I may hardly rest upon it. What is here? See! Whom +have we yonder?" + +The man of Kent came striding through, with the hot question: "Hast +seen my son?" + +As shortly Woodfield answered, and the knight hurried on without a word +along the dim trail where the pursued and the pursuers had passed. + +"I am but a useless hulk this night," groaned Penfold. "Do you follow +and bring me word, while I stay to keep company with our George." + +So Woodfield went. It was but a parting for the hour. He withdrew +himself from his tough old captain and fellow villager, without a grasp +of the hand, with no word of farewell, nor even a kindly look at the +rugged features that he loved, never dreaming that he and Simon Penfold +would speak again no more. + +The knight, more skilled in woodcraft, proceeded faster than the +yeoman. The clash of steel reached his ears against the wind, the wild +bayings of a dog, and deep French accents mingled with shrill +counter-blasts in an English tongue. The shuddering forest became +hideous, and the moonbeams came to his eyes red between the branches. + +Man La Salle feared not at all, but the fangs and glowing eyes of the +hound appalled. Any moment the brute might spring upon his back. He +could not hope to escape from hunters who covered the ground with the +speed of deer and might not be thrown off the scent. He stopped, +breathing furiously, and set his back against a smooth trunk; but when +his foes swept up, and he beheld the size and innocence of the +sword-bearer, he laughed, even as Goliath laughed when young David came +out against him armed with a sling and a few smooth pebbles from the +brook. + +"By the five wounds of God, 'tis but a child!" he muttered, as his +breath returned. "May it never be said that La Salle ran in fear from +a baby and a dog." + +He smiled with compassion for the white face which became visible when +a bar of light crossed it. "I will deal lightly with the child," he +said, "but the dog must die, or he shall hunt me through the night." + +"Down, Blood!" called the young voice; and the brute crouched like a +tiger, sweeping the grass madly with his tail. + +"He bears himself like a veteran," muttered La Salle, with a brave +man's admiration for courage. "The pity that he is so young!" + +"On guard, sir!" shouted Richard, stepping up with the challenge which +his father had taught him. + +"Back, little one," said the priest in his own tongue. "Put up your +sword until you become a man, and return to your fishing-lines, and be +young while you may." + +The boy could not understand one word of the hated language. Saving +his breath, he replied by springing forward, to cross swords with his +renowned antagonist as confidently as on the former memorable night he +had faced his father. A few passes, a turn or so, a quick lunge over +the guard, a rapid bout of skirmishing high upon the breast, and the +astonished Frenchman became assured that his youthful opponent was a +swordsman almost worthy of his steel. + +"By St. Denis!" he muttered, playing his sword from side to side with +his inimitable sureness. "What wonder is this! Are these Englishmen +soldiers from their cradle? A doughty stripling! He fences like a +maitre d'armes." + +But time was passing, others were upon his track, and, though La Salle +was willing to spare, he knew that he was compelled to strike. + +He stepped forward, closed with his antagonist, and by a deft turn of +his iron wrist caught the boy's sword at the hilt and wrested it from +his hand. Then he raised his point and lightly pricked the near +shoulder. + +"Go in peace, my son," he said in English. + +That contemptuous manner, naturally assumed before inferior and +superior alike, stung young Richard to the soul. He ran for his sword, +while Blood sprang up with a deep challenge, and plunged after La +Salle, who again had taken to flight. Richard followed at full speed, +his blood boiling to avenge the insult to his knighthood. + +"They come," said La Salle resignedly. "He must have the coup de +grace. Now God have mercy upon his infant soul." + +He came in his flight to a natural opening, one half in deep shadow, +the other lit by the sparkling moon and carpeted by short grass. +Columnar trees stood at regular intervals around this garden in the +forest. A few night lilies opened their sulphur cups. The place might +have been a dancing-ring for elves, and the priest crossed himself when +he stopped, looked round, and swiftly wiped his sword. + +"The turf like a rich cloth," he murmured. "The trees falling back, +the moon soft yet sufficient. An ideal spot for sword-play. But +methinks somewhat weird." + +The peace of the glade was broken in a moment. Blood dashed out, his +fangs bared, and made two fierce bounds over the turf. La Salle fixed +his eye upon a white spot in the underpart of the flying body, and at +precisely the critical moment stepped aside, catching the hound upon +his point and running him through from the centre of the white patch to +the stiff hackles of his back. He turned sharply, lest his sword +should break, and the dying body passed swiftly from his blade and +crashed into the bush. + +"When killing is too easy it carries the mask of murder," the priest +muttered. + +He turned again, for Richard was upon him with a sob of rage, and +shouting: "Devil! You shall die for killing my dog, devil that you +are!" + +Aware that his time was short, La Salle parried the boy's wild lunges +and replied by his own calculated attack. In that supreme moment of +his life Richard fought, even as his father might have done, with +strength, accuracy, and cunning manoeuvre. The swords played together +for little longer than a minute, and then came the _passe en tierce_ +outside the guard, which put an end to the unequal fight and left a +body bleeding upon the grass. + +A cry came from the forest, a near reassuring cry: + +"Hold him out, Richard. On the defensive. Do not attack. Remember +the pass I taught you." + +The priest's eyes dimmed. Hastily he arranged the warm body, closed +the eyes, straightened the legs and folded the stubborn arms, muttering +a prayer the while. + +"Heretic though you are, our Lady of Mercy may yet plead for you," he +said; but his words were inaudible to his own ears, because of the +shout which rang behind his shoulders: + +"Hold him off, Richard. I am with you. Keep your eyes upon his point. +I am here." + +As the bush gave before the avenger of blood, La Salle ran swiftly from +that spot. And all the forest seemed to be moaning for the child thus +cut down before he was grown, and the winds off Couchicing sobbed above +the hemlocks, and the moon sank down as cold as snow, drawing the +purple shadow closer to that white face and the straight, stiff limbs. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + +SPLENDOUR. + +In one short day the hand of fate had divided the little band of +venturers, destroying the physical life of Flower, leading Woodfield +into the trackless forest and losing him there, and driving Viner into +the unknown country of the south. Viner's course, during its early +stages, may first be followed, beside the lakes and across the thickly +wooded plains of the land which was later to be known as the northern +part of the State of Maine. + +No event marked his journey during the first day. On the second he saw +in the distance a party of Dutchmen, who also sighted him and gave +chase; but the swift young athlete shook off these slow men with ease. +Later he perceived the smoke of an Indian encampment, and bent off his +course, fearing lest the tribe might be hostile to all of his +complexion. By doing so he lost his bearings, and while attempting to +regain them wandered at evening into a glorious valley, bright with +flowers, and green with high grass undulating gently in soundless +waves. Perceiving a line of trees beyond, Geoffrey determined to gain +their shelter, and wait for the stars to guide him back to his +southerly route. + +He came to a shallow stream, a mere brook winding through the valley +amid red willow and wild rice and fragrant beds of brown-topped reeds. +A flight of swans passed overhead, their necks outstretched, their +bodies casting gaunt shadows across the grass. On the near side +patches of bush variegated the plain; beyond, the descending sun cast a +dazzling haze. The wind was murmuring in the reeds, and the whistlings +of aquatic fowl made a plaintive music. The lonely boy relieved his +solitude as he walked, by reciting to the tune of the breeze one of the +poetic fables he had learnt at school: + +"And when he was unable to restrain his secret, he crept among the +reeds, and murmured, 'King Midas has the ears of an ass.' But the +reeds betrayed him. When the wind passed they bent together and +whispered, 'Midas has the ears of an ass--the ears of an ass.'" + +Stepping among the sedges, where single stalks shuddered in the cold +water, Geoffrey looked for the ripple which would indicate a place of +crossing. The reeds inclined their feathery heads towards him, and the +malicious whisper seemed to follow, "Geoffrey has the ears of an +ass--the ears of an ass." Laughing at the idle fancy, he ran on at the +sight of a line of foam some little way down the stream. Drawing off +his shoes, he passed across the yellow gravel, the keen water nipping +his ankles, the reeds brushing his head. Old Thames had often been as +cold, when as a schoolboy he had waded through its weeds hunting the +dive-dapper's nest. + +Viner hesitated where the Indian trail split. That to the left ran +into the sun. He could scarcely see it, so dazzling was the glory. +That to the right was bare and cold, but leading, had he known it, +direct to the south. At the foot of a long bank the brook poured away +its water, and above in the fruit-bushes the wild canaries sang away +the hours. The youth took the bow from his shoulder, held it on end, +and let it fall. The bow pointed as he wished, as perhaps his fingers +had guided it at the moment of release. It fell into the sun. + +A breath of fire was in the splendour ahead, an acrid smoke crept down, +he heard the crackling of twigs. It seemed to the traveller that the +sun was consuming the grove before him. A voice began to sing. +Geoffrey tried to persuade himself that some little yellow bird was +sitting in the sun-grove warbling its soul out to him. Then an envious +night cloud swooped upon the lord of day and rolled him up in its dewy +blanket, and immediately a palisade, a grass roof, and a thicket +started out like black upon white. But the song went on. + +A log-cabin stood right in the centre of the setting sun, a snaky +palisade winding around, enclosing also a garden planted with corn and +potatoes, where already blade and crinkled leaf pushed from the dark +alluvial soil. Trees surrounded the house. + +Amid the smoke the side of an iron pot showed at intervals. The singer +held her head back, the slightest frown creasing her forehead. She was +waiting for the fire to burn clearly, and to encourage it she sang. + +Her hair, which hung all about her body, was golden-brown, no one tress +the same shade as another, the whole a bewildering mantle of beauty. +Its wealth became reckless when one crafty ray of sunlight eluded the +cloud and shot across her head. + +"Oh, oh!" she sighed, breaking off her bird-like song. "The sun will +not let my fire burn, and--this wicked wind!" + +The breeze, delighting to flirt with so glorious a creature, veered +slyly, and fanned the bitter smoke around her. She danced away +coughing, her cheeks scarlet, her red mouth gasping for pure air, her +tresses gleaming in their mesh of sunlight. Her movements were as +supple as the swaying dance of the pine-branch over her. She tried to +laugh while she caught at her breath, and, failing, fell back panting, +showing her tiny teeth. + +Then the violet eyes moved along the path, and all the pretty laughter +went out. A white hand drifted like falling snow, stole a tress of +hair, and shining pearls began cruelly to bite the silk. + +No maid could have desired a fairer vision. + +Geoffrey, tall, slender, and flushed, stood between the trees, his bow +in his hands, his Saxon blue eyes meeting the violet glances of +timidity with free admiration. The maid of the fire-side beheld his +clear complexion, his fair hair tied loosely at the nape of his neck, +his strong figure; and as she watched for a few moments, which were not +measured by time, her bosom began to rise and fall. Had she not prayed +for such a vision? She had surely wasted her sweetness long enough +upon the unsatisfying things of her daily life in that lone, hard land. +There was that in her young blood which rebelled against her +convent-like environment, where she had indeed her freedom, but where +the tree of knowledge had not been trained to grow. + +Viner stepped out and doffed his feathered cap. + +"Fair mistress," he said, bending before this beauty of the grove, +"give me your pardon for coming on you so suddenly. I am a traveller +on my way to the south." + +Madeleine Labroquerie answered him only with her eyes. + +"Can you tell me how many English miles I am from Plymouth?" + +He looked up, and learnt that the sun had not yet left the grove. He +saw the cloud of hair waving iridescent. His gaze wandered over the +beautiful head, until two eyes like purple iris flowers met his. + +"But I am not English." + +"Yet you speak in English," he protested. + +"Why, yes. In England I was brought up. I love England; but I am +French, and a Protestant." + +Geoffrey looked into the grove as he spoke on softly, mindful of his +duty: + +"Tell me, lady, how many days must I travel before I come to the +province of Massachusetts?" + +Madeleine Labroquerie had not a word to say. This handsome stranger +had hardly arrived, and already he suggested departure. + +"I must not delay," he faltered. + +"My fire!" cried Madeleine, stretching out her hands. "It will not +burn. Stranger"--she turned to him with a winsome glance--"will you +_make_ my fire burn?" + +She hurried to the smoking pile. He was beside her instantly. + +"You shall not soil those hands." + +"They are already smoked and soiled. And see--a burn!" + +Because Geoffrey dared not look Madeleine pouted at his back. Then she +kicked the smouldering wood, and exclaimed spitefully, "There!" + +"Your fire is too closely packed." + +"It is not," she snapped, daring him with her eyes. + +"You say it is not," he agreed; but loosening the heap. + +"I fear that it was," she sighed. "And the wood is damp." + +Geoffrey rebuilt the fire, placing the hot embers to face the wind, and +fanned the sticks until they burst into flame. + +The daylight went out like a failing lamp, and a red glow flung about +them as the fire increased. + +"I know that you are weary, sir," said the girl winningly. "Let me +lead you into the house and present you to my mother." + +Seeing wonder upon the young man's face, she pointed her shapely hand +through the smoke. + +"Down there my father lies," she explained in a hushed voice. "Deep in +the hollow where the beavers bite the bark at night. There the Indians +made his grave. French though we are, the Iroquois have been friendly, +because my father, who was a skilled physician, used them well. Here +my father hid from the world. He found a rest here, and yonder he +rests still hidden. I am with my mother and one native servant, who +loves us because my father saved his life. And I--I have never known a +friend." + +"Lady," said Geoffrey suddenly, "I would serve you if I might." + +"Rest you here a few days," she said quickly, "and tell my mother what +is doing in the world." + +"I must down to the coast." + +"Did you say Plymouth just now? Learn how ignorant I am. I did not +know there was a town of that name in all the New World. I have been +to the English Plymouth. There I saw the brave ships in her harbour, +and the red and white flags, and the sailors looking over the sea for +what might come sailing by, watching thus and hoping all the day. That +was a happy time." + +"There are yet as good men in Plymouth as ever sailed westward from the +Hoe," said the boy with eager pride. + +While he spoke the expression on Madeleine's face altered. She drew +away, murmuring as she moved, "Here is Madame, my mother." She added +hurriedly, and as he thought with fear, "I pray you be gracious to her." + +Viner turned, and there in the fire glow walked a little old woman in +black, a white cap holding her thin grey hair, her face pale, her eyes +sunken, and her colourless lips a tight line. She smiled coldly, and +showed no amazement when her daughter presented the traveller. + +"You are welcome, sir," she said in English. "We are poor and lonely +folk left to perish in the wilderness. My husband was an atheist, a +philosopher, and every man's hand was against him. He brought his wife +and family to the New World that he might study in peace and learn +somewhat of Nature's secrets. Last summer he was taken, babbling of +the work of his misspent life, careless of our farewells, heedless of +the state in which he left us. Philosophy is of a truth the devil's +work, inasmuch as it hardens the heart of man, loses him his God, and +wraps its slave in selfishness." + +The old woman signed herself slowly; then suddenly pushed beside the +traveller and snatched at her daughter's arm. + +"Cross yourself, girl! Infidel, cross yourself!" she cried. + +"Mother!" Madeleine shrank back, appealing with her lovely eyes. + +"Lutheran!" screamed the little woman. "Make the holy sign, and so +strive to save your wicked soul from the pit of destruction wherein +your father lies." + +"My faith is fixed," murmured the girl. "Ah, ah!" she panted. + +Madame Labroquerie struck the girl thrice upon her fair cheek, staining +the white skin red as a roseleaf. + +"Madame, forbear!" Viner stood between them, his blood hot with shame. +"This is no sight for a stranger and a man to witness." + +The little woman smiled at him and abandoned her daughter, who bent +over the fire to hide her crimson face. + +"You are English, sir. Your brave countrymen yield to none in their +respect for a woman, when she be young and fair to see. Let her be +old, they shall call her witch and fling her in the nearest pond. +There be young witches, good sir, better able to seduce the soul of man +than the old, though they keep neither cat nor toad, nor ride at night +across the face of the moon." + +Madame Labroquerie made him a low courtesy, and walked noiselessly to +the gate of the palisade. + +"That so lovely a daughter should be cursed with such a mother!" +muttered the youth as he watched her go. + +He came to the side of Madeleine, and found her crying. + +"My mother has a strange temper. She has suffered much," the girl +sighed. + +There was a pause, one of those rare intervals when ears are opened to +the music of the spheres, and souls may meet. + +"You are not happy here," he said. + +Her glorious eyes were two blossoms heavy with dew. + +"Friend!" She put out one hand, groping for something to hold. "I am +miserable." + +They stood together, hand in hand. + +"She struck you." + +There was no answer. Divine pity dropped upon his heart, sweet and +dangerous pity out of heaven. + +"Stay a little," she whispered. "For the sake of your religion, stay. +If for a day only, stay. Stay, for a woman's sake." + +It was dark in the grove outside the circle of the fire. He drew at +her fingers. He bent his head suddenly and breathed upon them. She +placed her other hand--a cold little hand--upon his. + +Then the evening breeze flung itself sportingly into the trees, and all +the branches sprang before it, and the foliage danced and shouted in a +laugh, singing noisily the old secret of the river reeds, singing, +"Midas is a king of gold--a king of gold." + +So the fire died down into an angry red, and all the birds of the grove +were songless. Madame walked alone from the rude house, her small face +white against dark clouds, and passed into the clearing. The Indian +who worked for the widow and daughter approached with a burden of wood. + +"Wind is coming," he said in his own tongue. + +"May it blow away heresy and all heretics," muttered the little woman. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +ENCHANTMENT. + +Within the grass-roofed cabin another fire glowed, and beside it +Madeleine entertained the guest, her white hands clasped upon her knee, +her eyes lustrous as she listened to the tale of adventure which her +young companion had to tell. + +"And now you would reach the south and bring your countrymen hither," +she said with the sweet practicability of her sex, after hearing his +story of ventures both by land and sea. "You would win territory, +perhaps fame. Then what would you do?" + +"Then? Why, I would return home," answered Geoffrey. + +"And then?" the girl pursued, the colour rising in her cheeks. + +"Then I would fight for the king." + +Madeleine sank back. + +"Would your fighting-days never be done?" she sighed reproachfully. +"Friend, the world gives better things than the sword. Think you," she +went on hurriedly, "we are put upon this world to hate one another and +be always at strife? Ah no. We are here to live! The soldier's day +must pass, his arm grow stiff, and 'tis then he sighs for life--the +sword gives only death. How wretched is that soldier's lonely end! It +is love in life that ennobles the body, and 'tis death in love that +clothes the soul in its flight to God." + +Her eyes had been fixed upon him. She cast them down suddenly and sat +trembling. + +"My father taught me the use of the sword, and explained to me the +action of the gun," Geoffrey faltered. "He taught me nothing else." + +"Your mother?" Madeleine whispered. + +"She died when I was a child." + +"She would have taught you. She would have told you to take the best," +murmured the girl. + +He could see only a rich coil of hair glowing in the firelight. + +"But I am untaught," she went on. "My father was ever a stranger, my +mother has never been a friend. I grew up with Jean-Marie, my brother, +who was a follower of your creed. He too believed that life has +nothing better than the sword, so went away to fight, and I have had no +word of him again. Alone I have taught myself to live, to see that +life is glorious, to find joy in drawing each healthy breath. I have +studied the birds and animals, and spoken to them, until they have +answered me so that I could understand. It is so magnificent, this +life!" + +A chill crept into the cabin and with it Madame Labroquerie, who peered +at the comely couple, and said in her grating voice: "You are weary, +sir. Daughter, show our guest where he is to rest." + +With another courtesy to the Englishman the bitter little woman passed +into her own room, and almost immediately the muttering of prayers and +clicking of beads disturbed the silence which her entry had created. + +"Rest you here," Madeleine whispered, pointing to a palliasse partly +covered by a bear-skin. "You shall sleep soundly I promise, for I have +filled that palliasse with the sweet-scented grass which grows in +yonder valley. May you rest there like Endymion, and may his dreams be +yours." + +"His dreams were of love--if the old tale be true," said Geoffrey, +flushing at his boldness. + +"Soft," she prayed, but she too had flushed. "My mother's ears are +keen. God be with you, my friend." + +"And with you also," he murmured, and raising her fair white hand he +pressed it reverently to his lips. + +No hostile sound disturbed the silence of the grove throughout that +night, and Geoffrey made no stir upon his scented bed, until the sun +streaming into the cabin and the noisy turk, turk, turk of the wild +bush-fowl rendered further sleep impossible. Having performed the +hasty toilet of that age, when by day and night a man had to be +prepared to fight for his life, he went outside, and was straightway +made welcome to the grove by a brilliant and versatile bluejay, which +obtruded itself upon the stranger and with cheerful chattering +friendliness volunteered to be his guide in return for a little +flattering attention. But when Madeleine came out into the sun, the +fickle bird deserted the man and paid court to the maid. + +It had been Geoffrey's honest determination to proceed that morning +upon his journey, but noon, and then evening, came and found him again +a tenant of the grove. All day he and Madeleine wandered in the green +valley, like children of innocence in a garden, the girl pointing out +her favourite haunts, the flowery ridges where she would while away +hours in day-dreams, and guiding him along faint paths which her small +feet, and hers only, had trodden into being; and as they so walked +Geoffrey forgot for the time his mission, and became blind to the path +of duty, because the spell of enchantment was over him, and all the +world went far away while Madeleine was laughing at his side, and her +sweet voice was in his ears, and her fragrant presence stirred before +his eyes. No day had ever been so short, no sun more bright, no +self-surrender ever more complete. + +Again the grove was in splendour at the close of the day, and again +Madame Labroquerie met her guest with a grating word of greeting and +her bitter smile; and again the laggard slept upon the scented couch +and had his dreams; and his dreams that night were not of power, nor of +duty, nor of his harassed friends beside Couchicing; but of shaded +bowers, and green valleys, and love in life, and Madeleine. And once +the girl cried out in her sleep, but neither her mother nor her lover +overheard her unconscious utterance, "I cannot let you go." + +But during the day which followed Geoffrey's conscience awoke and +reproached him for this love-in-idleness, and as the evening of that +day drew near his higher self conquered. Lying at Madeleine's feet, he +told her with averted face that on the morrow he must depart; and she +merely sighed very softly and made no answer, but longed in her heart +that the morrow might never come. + +Once again they returned to the grove, where Madame curtsied as before, +and muttered to her guest: "You are welcome, sir. For the third time I +bid you welcome to my poor home." + +Her meaning was unmistakable, and the young man flushed hotly as he +bowed in reply and thanked her for her words. More he would have said, +but Madeleine touched him lightly and motioned him to keep silent. He +turned and followed her to the hut, and they partook of food, and +afterwards sat together and talked on, and yearned for one another; and +in the meantime darkness fell, and the fire outside, which was +maintained at night to keep wild beasts at bay, surrounded the cabin +with a roseate glow. + + +Alone through that twilight Madame walked, muttering as was her wont, +and started in superstitious terror when she saw a tall figure standing +erect, spectral, beside the leaping fire. A few more steps and the +Frenchwoman recognised a priest. She hurried forward, and a minute +later genuflected to kiss the cloak of that man of blood, the Abbe La +Salle. + +In wonder the priest gave her the blessing which she sought and went on +to question her. Eagerly Madame responded, telling him her name and +circumstance, explaining her position, and mentioning her longing to +escape from that lonely spot. Her desires were, like herself, made up +of selfishness. She did not question the priest concerning the son who +had been driven out by her bitter tongue to join the commandant's +little force; nor did she mention Roussilac's name, because--so +entirely isolated was that shelter in the grove--she was not even aware +that the man who ruled the land was indeed her nephew. But La Salle +waived her petulant inquiries aside, and asked whether any Englishman +had lately been known to pass that way. Then Madame shortly acquainted +him with the coming of Viner. + + +"Bring me here something to eat," said the priest wearily, when he had +obtained the information which he sought. "Afterwards I will rest me +by this fire." + +"Now the saints forbid," cried Madame. "Shall an infidel lie in my +house, while a holy Churchman sleeps outside? Out the Lutheran shall +go, and you, my father, must honour my poor home this night." + +"'Tis not for me to provoke a quarrel," La Salle replied. "I may but +fight in self-defence. Let me have food and a palliasse here." + +Madame bent her grey head, and went to do his bidding. + +The cabin was in gloom when Madame entered and passed through silently +to procure food for the priest. Madeleine rose, seeking to be of +service, but the grating voice sent her back to the fireside. Viner +had also arisen, dimly suspicious. The girl's head reached his +shoulder, and to put away the thought, which recurred more strongly +when he noted her helplessness, he resorted to selfishness. + +"Am I safe?" he asked. + +Madeleine gave him a reproachful glance. + +"My mother hates all Protestants. The heathen Indians are merely +animals in her sight; but such as you and I are children of the devil." + +"The fire beyond the palisade is burning more strongly," he said. + +The door was open, and the glow entered the cabin like moonlight. + +"It is to keep away the wolves. You do not suspect--me?" + +"No, no," he said, in a manner that brought a smile to her mouth. "For +myself I care nothing, but I may not forget my comrades. I must be +upon my guard for their sake." + +The dame reappeared, a mantle over her shoulders and her hands. She +smiled grimly, and gently addressed her guest: + +"I have my birds to feed. They are the sole companions of my +loneliness, and each night finds them awaiting me beyond the palisade. +They are brighter birds than those of my country, but sadder because +songless. The saints protect you, sir, in your sleep to-night." + +"Shall I come with you, mother?" said Madeleine. + +"Why upon this night more than others?" answered Madame bitterly. +"Your way is never mine. When you shall learn to pray with me then you +may walk with me." + +She left the cabin, drawing the door close. + +"Stay you here," whispered Madeleine, detaining Viner with a gentle +hand. "There was that in my mother's manner which makes me fear. I +will follow her and bring you word." + +"I would not have you put yourself to danger." + +"For me there is no danger." + +"I go with you," he said. + +"No!" cried Madeleine, stamping her foot. "You shall not." + +He gave way and let her have her will. + +When Madeleine returned with the tidings that a tall French priest was +without, the young man's first impulse suggested that he should rush +out and attempt to silence the spy, but prudence and a girl's hand +detained him. For the first time Geoffrey shuddered at the thought of +danger. With those two beautiful eyes watching him tenderly he felt +that it was good indeed to live. + +"I shall watch over you," said Madeleine's fearless young voice. "See, +I will move your palliasse. Now this thin wall of wattles shall alone +divide us. We shall be so near that I can listen to your breathing, +and shall hear your faintest whisper. I pray you trust in me." + +"In the morning I shall see you," he urged. "I shall not depart +without thanking you?" + +"Oh, talk not of the morning," she cried. + +He seized her fingers, and when he kissed the hand it fluttered like a +bird. + +"I shall have my dreams," cried Madeleine, her face uplifted, and her +eyes moistened. "And they may be so happy that I shall not wake. See! +Yonder is my resting-place. The wattle-wall shall separate us. There +my head will lie. Give me your sword." + +She grasped the hilt, and thrust the blade through the trifling wall. +Then she spoke with averted face: "When you are lying down to rest I +shall tell you why I have done this." + +They separated after a few tender words of commendation. The fire +burnt down, and the north wind played roughly among the trees until the +cabin hummed like a cave. Madame entered, as noiseless as a cat, and +passed into her room. The rattling of her beads sounded at intervals, +before sleep deadened the enmity of her mind. + +"My hair is long," whispered Madeleine's sweet voice. "I am passing a +coil through the hole in the wattles. Hold it, and if you hear +disquieting sounds do not speak, but pull." + +"I have it," he whispered, seizing the warm silk enviously. + +"The holy angels watch over you," she murmured. + +"And you. As for me, I am already protected by an angel." + +"Angel?" she wondered. + +"Sainte Madeleine is her name." + +"Ah!" she said. + +The sound of uneasy breathing arose between the groans of the wind. +After a long pause Geoffrey spoke: + +"In sleep I may lose what I am holding." + +"Twist it about your fingers," said a whisper. + +"Still, I may lose it. You will draw it away from me when you turn." + +"Lie upon it." + +"My hair is also long. I am tying yours to mine." + +"I had thought of that," she murmured. + +Another period of silence. Then, in turning, Geoffrey's lips pressed +upon the rich coil, and left it with a kiss. There came a little +movement and an almost soundless whisper: + +"Did you call?" + +"You are not yet asleep," he reproved. + +"I am watching and listening." + +"I would rather you slept while I watched." + +"Then I should be the guardian no longer." + +"But always the angel." + +The glow from without was still over the cabin where Madeleine lay +wide-eyed. A spider let itself suddenly from the roof, and swung +spinning in wild glee at the end of a silver streak. + +"Friend," Madeleine murmured. + +"I am listening," he said. + +"There is a spider spinning from the cross-beam." + +"Would you have me destroy it?" + +"No. Oh, no! It is so happy in its life. I do not remember why I +called you. I had something more to say." + +"I shall not sleep until you think of it." + +"Shall you go away in the morning?" she whispered suddenly. + +There was no reply. + +"And leave me?" + +"The present is life," he reminded her. + +"The thought of the future may destroy the happiness of the present." + +"What would you have me do--obey my conscience or my heart?" + +"Both," she sighed. + +"Let us talk of it in the morning." + +"Now. Oh, the spider is spinning faster--faster." + +"The morning," he repeated. + +"Now," she breathed. "But soft! Set your lips to this hole, and you +shall find my ear." + +A sound of restless movement came from Madame's room, and a grating +voice: "From witchcraft, enchantment, and heresy our Lady and the holy +saints protect us." + +It was her lips that Madeleine placed to the hole in the wattle wall. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + +FIRESIDE AND GROVE. + +Ambition and not chance had brought La Salle thus far from the beaten +track. He had made it his policy to pursue the Englishmen in that land +until he should have brought about their extermination, knowing well +that any success in that direction would be rewarded by the richest +gift which his master Richelieu had to bestow. From Onawa he learnt of +Viner's departure for the south on the day following that venture +against New Windsor. The girl had discovered the young man's track and +gladly accompanied the priest, pointing out the trail, which was +imperceptible to his untrained eyes, and so bringing him to the grove +where Geoffrey tarried in the enchanted sleep. + +After Madame Labroquerie had gone to find him food, La Salle +reconsidered his plans by the light of her information. It was no way +of his to hide his light beneath a bushel, and the slaying of Viner in +that lonely country would, he reasoned, bring him little fame. If, +however, he should return to lodge the information with Roussilac, all +men would know of his agency. Therefore, when Madame returned, he +impressed upon her the necessity of detaining Viner for at least three +days within the grove. + +"'Tis easy," the little woman muttered. "I shall be courteous to the +young man, and praise his face and flatter his pride. Madeleine, my +daughter, shall do the rest. I warrant you he shall not stir from here +till the soldiers arrive; and then, I trust, a stake shall be prepared +and a goodly pile of faggots for the proper despatch of his heretic +soul." + +"I shall see that execution be done upon him," La Salle replied grimly. +"Now get you gone, for I would be alone." + +"Your holiness will remain until the morning," Madame prayed. "I would +then make my confession, and receive the peace of absolution." + +"Find me here at the dawn," La Salle answered. Then, uplifting his +blood-stained hand, he bestowed upon her his benediction and sent her +away. + +Not fifty yards distant Onawa stood as a guardian over the man she +loved, staring into the night, heeding every sound in the valley, +dreading the approach of some emissary from her tribe. The maid had +become an outlaw. Through her treachery the boy Richard, her own flesh +and blood, had come to his death. With her own hand she had slain a +man friendly to all her race. In the forest beyond the river a cruel +death by torture awaited her; her own father would be the first to +condemn her to the fire. She was thus compelled to stand or fall +beside the priest whom she had aided with that disregard for self which +has ever dominated a woman's actions. + +As she stood watching the firelight and the grove, dim ghosts arose and +began her punishment. She seemed to hear a sound of scuffling, and to +see young Richard and his great hound, Blood, wrestling together, as +they had been wont to do among the pine barrens, to the roar of the +wind and the lost waters. Again she heard the boyish voice, gasping +and triumphant, "I have beaten him again. I am stronger than he." And +as she shivered, there came an echo of her own former words from the +line of tossing trees, "He is brave and strong. He shall make a man +before he has grown." + +Beside the fire La Salle slept, lulled by the wind. He knew Onawa was +acting as a guard over him, else he had never dared to close his eyes. +Yet his rest became presently broken into by spiritual beings hovering +around in the grove, anxious to point out his future. The chafing of +boughs, the beating of leaves, the gnawing of the beavers around the +philosopher's grave, with more distant sounds from the country beyond, +were the media these beings employed. The disturbances passed into his +ear, which pressed upon the palliasse, and entered the torpid brain to +make a dream. + +Through the unlighted streets of a city a way was revealed before the +sleeper by means of lightning flashes. No fellow-creatures were in +sight, and yet the tongues of a multitude shouted as he ran, bells +clashed above, and trumpets blared below. Before him a vast square +opened, empty and wind-swept, and here the shoutings of the unseen mob +became terrific, here also a mountainous building rose into the clouds, +and midway upon a flight of marble steps sat an old man in white, +crowned with the tiara, extending a red hat towards the yelling +solitude. The dreamer rushed out to seize the prize; but between the +principality and power, as represented by the scarlet blot rising in +the gale, the silent lightning cut, and between this fire and Urbano +the Eighth a figure descended, and the lightning was a sword, which his +untiring arms flashed between the aspirant and his soul's desires. +"Cardinal-Archbishop!" cried the white figure. "Bought by blood!" +outcried the man in black, and his sword turned all ways in a flame of +fire. + +La Salle awoke with a shudder. That figure seemed to be upon him, +bending, holding him down with the hands of Briareus. Casting off the +terrible sleep, he started upright. A face was indeed over him, and +arms were dragging at his shoulders. The wind-tossed grove cleared, +with its fire glowing, and sparks flickering like a thousand eyes, and +the sleeper awakened recognised Onawa, who was summoning him to action +in her unknown tongue. + +"Perdition!" he muttered. "The witch haunts me like an old sin." + +Onawa went on pleading, pointing wildly at intervals down the wind. + +"You shall lead me into no more death-traps!" the priest cried. + +The frightened girl brought a knife from her side, and made as though +she would stab him. Then she pointed again, and, falling to her knees, +indicated her own tracks. + +La Salle peered along the glow of the fire and beyond where the sparks +were beaten back, then rose and approached the palisading, Onawa +clinging to him like a shadow. There was no danger there. He advanced +to the wattled door, prepared to receive an attack. When there came no +response to his unspoken challenge he turned back, and Onawa again +pointed along the way she had come. + +"Would to God I had spared that child! His face is there!" the priest +shivered. + +"Tuschota!" cried the girl. She touched the ground, reading him with +her eyes. + +A smothered cry broke from the lips of the priest. Onawa followed his +gaze, which went, not along the trail, nor into the fire-lit grove, but +above where the eastern sky had almost cleared of drift. + +"A portent!" moaned the priest. "'Tis the end of the world, and I am +found with the sword drawn in my hand." + +There was war in heaven. Across the plane of eastern sky hung a wild +picture of forest and rockland where pigmy men rushed together without +shock, where spectral weapons fell silently, and shadowy smoke burst +and rose. Tiny figures climbed a cliff, and similar grotesques fought +on high and pressed them back. The combatants appeared ant-like and +ridiculous objects as they swayed reflected upon the floor of heaven. + +Onawa watched the spectacle unmoved. She had witnessed the mirage +before, and by this present vision merely understood that an attack +upon the citadel was even then in progress. As the weird picture broke +up and scud came flying across a faint grey sky, she prayed in her +treacherous heart that the French might win. + +La Salle rose with some shame when he perceived that the sky had +resumed its normal aspect, and light at length dawned upon him as he +sighted a shadowy being stealing within the radius of the fire. + +"Tuschota!" warned the voice at his side. + +The priest knew then that Onawa had saved him from the knife which +would have avenged the half-breed boy, who had flung himself with such +desperate courage upon death. Casting away the arms which encompassed +him, he passed swiftly into the shadow of the grove, while Onawa +advanced boldly and met the woman she had wronged so grievously, and +dared to face her without shame. For a space they stood, gazing at one +another by the firelight, until the younger cast down her eyes and +began to shiver with the coldness of fear. + +"Approach me, sister," said the stern woman. "There is a question I +would have you answer. Refuse you dare not, for we are flesh and +blood; we are daughters of Shuswap the truthful, and the same mother +gave us birth. I seek not to know what brings you here this night, but +tell me now have you seen that proud priest who has slain my son?" + +"I have not seen him," cried Onawa fiercely; but she was cold to the +heart beneath the gaze of those colder eyes. + +"'Tis well. A daughter of the Cayugas lies not, save to an enemy. But +why do you slink thus away? You do not fear me, sister?" + +Onawa stared aside speechless. + +"After I became wife to the great white man you came often to our home +among the lost waters," Mary Iden went on. "My Richard loved you. +Remember, sister, how often you played with the child, how many times +you carried him in your arms, and told him the old stories of our race. +Hast forgotten how he would laugh at your coming, how he would run down +to meet you with a gift, and draw up your canoe and bring you to our +shelter by the hand? Remember when he had committed a fault how you +pleaded for him, calling him _Dear child_ and _Sunlight of the camp_. +Sister, I know that you grieve for the boy." + +Chilled at her words Onawa passed to the fire, turning from those +pursuing eyes. + +"I shall not forget how Richard loved you. When you need me, sister, +come, and I will give you your former place beside the fire. So shall +you rest and forget the strangers in this land. By the love that you +bore for my boy, sister, I will not forget you." + +Onawa looked up and saw only the figure of La Salle emerging from the +grove. Her sister had drawn back into the night. + +The gale circled the embers in whitening eddies. Onawa wildly snatched +a stick and raked the glowing fragments into a pyramid, upon which she +flung some roots of willow. A yellow fog ascended, torn hither and +thither by the spirits of the wind. + +She crept to La Salle's feet and fawned upon them. He spurned her and +still she struggled to approach, to cling as the weed upon a rock. She +had made the sacrifice of her life that she might serve him. She had +discharged the arrow to slay the Englishman solely that she might win +his love. She had relied upon her fierce beauty, her youth, and her +strength to conquer the handsome Frenchman. She had staked her all +upon her heart's desires. + +And now he flung her from him, and strode away from the fireside and +the grove. + +She followed, crying along the wind. He motioned her back and even +threatened with his sword, but she pursued, setting her feet in the +marks which his had made. When he halted for weariness she stood near +to guard him from her sister. When the grey day came she still +followed him, across open country, and so northward into the hills, and +towards the river, where the wind contained a breath of smouldering +bush. + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + +GLORIOUS LIFE. + +When Madame found La Salle gone and the fire black in the early +morning, she frowned until her eyes became hidden and went back to the +palisade, passing her old servant, who was shredding ears of wild rice. +She entered the windy house calling. Soon she came out, shaking a +willow stick in her angry hand, and stopped opposite the old man, who +continued his work, grumbling softly to himself, "Ah, Father Creator! +Father Creator! Why do you send this north wind in summer time? The +day is dark and cold. Send us the west wind, Father Creator." + +"Have you heard noises in the night?" Madame's voice grated. + +"I slept with the wind in my ears," answered the native. + +"Have you seen my daughter, or the young Englishman?" + +"I have seen the light struggling to break, and the grey heaven +rushing, and the thick wind beating. I saw a red fox run and a +blue-bird chattering across the wind," said the old man. + +"Have you not seen the priest?" urged Madame. + +"I was up at the dawn," replied the stolid worker. "The fire was dead +and the sleeping-place white with rain. A bear was seeking warmth upon +the embers." + +"I have been blind and deaf," cried Madame in a rage. + +At the first glance of light the cabin was as noisy as an ocean cave. +Madeleine's brain became too active for sleep when she knew that the +day was at hand. She rose softly, glowing with her new-found +happiness, and as she stirred she murmured the intensely human line of +that unhappy boy Kit Marlowe, who had perished in a tavern brawl a few +years before her birth, "Whoever loved that loved not at first sight?" +She darted up with that thought, but a coil of her long hair tightened, +and there came a startled movement from beyond the wall. + +"Hush!" she whispered, lifting a pink finger, forgetful that he could +not see. + +"Is it the day?" said Geoffrey. + +"Yes, yes. Release me. Let me fly. Do you not hear the wind?" + +"I am listening to you," he answered. + +"Forget me. Listen! That was like thunder. Are you listening?" + +"I am coming out with you," he said. + +Reaching the open, Geoffrey discovered Madeleine, her arms +outstretched, her hair rising in ripples above her head as she bathed +in the wind, battling and panting, her lovely face all heather-pink. + +"I can smell the pines," she gasped, "and the salt sea, and the +mountains. I can hear the roaring of water and see the soaring of +eagles. Oh, oh!" she panted. "It is glorious to live!" + +She cried as she drew him away impetuously: + +"The black priest has gone. Let us hope that he has been blown away +into a swamp, where the fairies shall bewitch him into a frog to croak +at the world for ever. Come now away. Tell me whether you had dreams +in the night. But stay!" + +She drew away from him suddenly. + +"Madeleine!" he exclaimed, wondering at her changed face. + +"I must remove this mask," she cried in a stately fashion, frowning and +placing her hands upon her sides. "Sir, who are you that you should +strive to win the heart of Madeleine Labroquerie? Why, I have sworn to +wed a knight, a man of title and estate, and you, a smooth-faced boy, +with long hair and cheeks as pink as mine, you come and speak to me of +love. Sir, how dare you thus to use an innocent maid?" + +She passed on ahead of her astonished lover and the trees of the grove +closed round them. + +"Madeleine----" he began, protesting. + +"Madeleine," she imitated. "Here is free-speech indeed. Now, sir, +stand and let me show you what you are. You are an Englishman, an +adventurer, one of a small band who think themselves strong enough to +attack the power of France in this new land, and you, the enemy of my +people, come to me with a tale of love, believing me to be a maid of +the wilds to be won and cast aside at will. Speak not to me. I will +not hear you. I am no simple provincial maid that I should fall in +love with a soldier's handsome face. Last night, yes, last night, +after an acquaintance of but three days, you dared to own your love, +and to humour you--in truth I was afraid--I confessed that I also loved +you. I, a French girl, such a traitress as to love an enemy of my +people! I was but fooling you. How I laughed to myself at deceiving +you so readily." + +She laughed disdainfully and curled her lovely lip. + +"I fear I have already tarried here too long," was all that Geoffrey +could say. + +"Stay one moment," cried the haughty beauty. "I should be base did I +not warn you. Soldiers are waiting for you upon every side. East, +west, north, and south they lie in wait for you." + +"There are no soldiers nearer than the fortress," said Geoffrey wildly. + +"You may believe so," replied the traitress. "But you have learnt +little of this country if you do not know that military posts are set +about from place to place. One such post is near at hand, and thither +I sent our servant after your coming. Can you not perceive that I have +betrayed you?" + +Had Geoffrey looked he might have seen her shiver as she spoke. + +"I thank you for your warning, but I may stay no longer," the young man +said, and he stepped away with his head down. + +"Which way do you take?" she demanded. + +"I am southward bound." + +"You are--brave, friend." + +"Friend!" he exclaimed, with a sobbing note of indignation. "Would you +have me trust in you again?" + +"I had forgot," she admitted. "Are you going now?" + +He moved on through the grove; but he had not made a dozen steps before +she called to him. + +"Have you, then, no word of farewell?" + +He turned, but did not look at her as he said: "May you live to fortune +and a happy future." + +"You said you loved me," said Madeleine, her figure drooping. "Why did +you deceive me?" + +"I loved you," he said hotly, moving back a step. "And I love you +still. When I first saw you standing by the fire with the sun falling +on your head I loved you. When I have left you I shall see, not the +girl who desired to betray me, but her who gave me this to hold for my +protection while I slept." + +He drew forth a long coil of golden-brown hair and held it in the wind. + +"You cut it off," she faltered. Then her manner changed again. "Throw +it down. Stamp upon it. Tread it into the ground." + +"I use it," he said, "as I longed to use you." And he put the lock +back into his bosom. + +At that she ran forward with the cry: "You love me. Take me there, +Geoffrey. That is my place. I will not be held out. Geoffrey, I love +you. Oh, blind, blind! I love you with all my heart and soul." + +She tried to force herself into his arms, warm, loving, and +irresistible. + +"I am the wickedest of liars," she breathed, twisting her fingers +within his. "I would not have gone so far, but I thought that you +knew. I thought that you feigned to hate me in return for my cruelty. +Ah, Geoffrey, I loved you when first our eyes met. I did so desire +your love, but, sweetheart--foolish, credulous--I--I feared you might +think I was won too easily. Will you value your prize the more, when I +tell you that my treachery, the story of the soldiers, the +settlement?--Oh, oh!" + +He guessed what she would have said, and so had seized her. + +"Betray you, blind love!" she whispered. "Dear foolish sweetheart, I +would open my veins and give my blood for you. How I tortured you! +Knowing what a cruel nature your love possesses, knowing it, can you +still love her?" + +"Madeleine----" + +"Stop," she entreated, lifting her violet eyes. "Repeat that name a +hundred times, and find for it a new attribute of love each time. But +let the first be false and the second fair." + +"Sweet Madeleine!" + +"Call me so, Geoffrey," she murmured. "And I shall not wish to change." + +There was a hill beyond, its sides covered with bleached grass, and +above a few gaunt pines beating their ragged heads together and +stabbing one upon the other with jagged arms where limbs had been +amputated by previous storms. To this place Madeleine led her lover. + +It was a strange day. Though long past sunrise there was barely light. +The clouds swept low, grey or indigo masses rushing south with the +speed of rapids. The dark, solid wind of the lowlands came in a +furious succession of great waves. The lovers might have been upon an +island with the ocean roaring round in storm. Out of the gloom the wet +rocks glimmered and the trunks of long-fallen trees described weird +shapes upon the plain. + +"This is life!" cried Madeleine. "Glorious life!" + +Geoffrey held her closely, looking down upon her wet and radiant face. + +"We can fight together, you and I," she went on. "No wind shall +conquer while we hold together. It may roar at us, but we are young +and strong, and the wind is old and worn. Think you that you can bear +with me always? I promise you I will never use deceit again. We shall +be together when the winds have all passed under heaven, and the trees +are gone, and the seas have dried. Our souls will live in the same +life and the same love. Together while the old world crumbles, and the +sun becomes cold, and the moon fades. There is no death. We shall +close our eyes one day and change our home. Life will run on for us, +the same magnificent life of love." + +"There is no death," he repeated, as though the idea had not occurred +to him before. + +"How many thousand years has this wind rushed upon this hill? How many +thousand shall it beat after we have changed our home? We are made to +live, Geoffrey. It is not we who are sick, not we who are oppressed. +We are made of stuff that does not perish, not flesh and blood which +wither, but breath and love. Kiss me, Geoffrey, kiss me with your +soul." + +"Sweet, you have more knowledge than I," cried Geoffrey as he kissed +her eyes. + +"See that huge cloud! How the monster wishes to smother us! There it +rushes, flinging its rain to spite us." + +"I shall see this wild spot for ever," he murmured. + +"In years to come," said Madeleine, "a city perchance may grow in this +solitude, and where we now sit a palace or a cathedral may be built, a +king may command, a pastor teach his people, bells may ring for +Christmas, and heralds sound their trumpets. But we shall not see that +city, my Geoffrey. We shall look below the brick and the stir of +people, and we shall see a hill of white grass with old pines atop, and +below streaming rocks and decaying trunks, with beyond a grove all +covered in damp gloom and lashed by wind." + +"I can see the faces of my friends," he muttered. + +The girl turned upon his shoulder and drew his face lower with her cold +hand, lifting her own until their eyes met. + +"Look there," she entreated. "Tell me what you see." + +"Heaven opening." He paused. "I see also my duty to my neighbour." + +Madeleine's head drooped. Presently a small voice whispered out of the +wind, "I would have you obey that message, lest by offending God we +wreck our happiness." + +"I live upon your will." + +"You must leave me. You shall not see me shed a tear. But I must have +you for this day, and afterwards"--she caught her breath. "Had ever a +young soldier so brave a love?" + +He kissed her hands, and her cold face, and her hair, which dripped +like seaweed. + +"No ifs," she implored, when her ears caught his broken words. "The +doubter fails. Look upon the deed as done, and God shall pardon the +presumption, because He was once a young man upon earth, and He knows +the longing of a brave heart. Already I think of you, not as going +forth to duty, but as returning to claim me for your bride." + +"I shall succeed," he cried, in a voice which defied the winds. +"Madeleine, you have made me strong. Listen, sweet. I have a home in +Virginia, most fair, they say, of England's colonies, and I come to +take you there. I have a house in a garden where the sun never sets, +and where a river runs gently to the sea between banks of flowers. +There is no hard winter or rough wind there, neither enemy nor noise of +battle to terrify your dear heart. There the potato grows, and the +white tobacco blooms scent the night, and there the voice of Nature +sings of peace. Will come with me, sweet?" + +"You have learnt your lesson," she sighed, content. + +Misty rain smote them, but they strained at each other and laughed at +it. The cold numbed their feet, but their hearts were so warm that +they did not heed it. Nature thundered at them, but the roar of menace +became a triumphal march, and the shriek of the fiends a benediction. + +"This one day you shall spare to me," said Madeleine. "Let us spend it +as a day to be remembered. I have a cave down yonder, around which I +have trailed the bushes and taught ivy to grow. There we will build a +fire and I will be your housewife. Come! let us run along the wind." + +He bent to assist her, and she feigned to be stiff with cold, the +lovely traitor, so that she might feel his arms about her. Hand in +hand they ran, the rain and wind driven upon their backs, the angry sky +lowering upon the two who thus dared to endure the perils of life so +happily. But the lovers knew that behind the damp gloom and the storm +smiled the kindly sun; and they knew that he would conquer in good time. + +So that happy day drew to its end in mist and rain, and the wind died +down, and the storm clouds went out of the sky one by one. The moon +broke wanly into light and a pale star of hope gazed serenely down. +Nature wearied of her tumult, and old AEolus drove the turbulent north +wind back into its cave and set his seal upon the mouth. + +Geoffrey and Madeleine stood struggling to part. There was no tear in +the violet eyes of brave beauty as she looked up smiling, dwelling +always upon the future to sweeten the bitterness of the present. "Love +must be tested," she murmured with her radiant philosophy. "Hearts +must be tried. Geoffrey, I love you." + +"Madeleine, I love you." + +She stood alone, swaying weakly, her face as pale as the moon. Then +she laughed to drown the beating of her heart, threw out her hands, and +ran breathlessly up the hill where the ragged pines merely nodded, and +down into the plain towards the grove, crying to the solitude: + +"Life is glorious--glorious!" + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + +CLAIRVOYANCE. + +While Geoffrey Viner was winning the love of Madeleine Labroquerie, and +escaping the snare which La Salle had contrived for his capture, +history was being made around the river and the heights. The priest's +daring venture into the forbidden country acted upon the tribes of the +Iroquois confederacy as a spark upon gunpowder; and when it became +known from one camp-fire to another that George Flower, and Richard, +son of Gitsa, had fallen upon Cayuga territory by the hand of a +Frenchman, the native stoicism was changed into madness and the signal +for a general uprising went throughout the land. It was the eve of +that great assault upon the French position which lives in oral +tradition among those degraded descendants of a once great people who +occupy the maritime provinces of to-day. + +Previous to that struggle, one phase of which was shown through the +portent of the mirage to La Salle while he stood in the haunted grove, +many deeds occurred which the chronicler cannot afford to pass over. +The narrative must therefore be resumed upon the second morning +following the dispersion of the venturers, that morning which saw Mary +Iden set forth on her mission of vengeance, and Oskelano returning to +his fastness in the north to prepare his men for battle. + +The sun had fought down the mists, and black craft of the fishermen +were already leaping along the river, when Van Vuren abandoned the +fortress and climbed the cliff, hoping, as every day he hoped, to find +some trace of his missing men. The night had been cold with north +wind, and the rock country, was still haunted with wet and flickering +shadows. One shadow, so dark and angular as to attract the Dutchman's +eyes, lurked under a crag, as a patch of sheltered ice might linger in +the midst of a land steaming with sunshine; but when Van Vuren +approached, this shadow moved and took upon itself a semblance of +humanity, and with the dispelling of the illusion the Dutchman beheld +the evil face of Gaudriole. + +"Adversity finds hard resting-places, my captain," said the dwarf, as +he crawled forth. "Your rock makes a bed rougher than a paving-stone, +but methinks a safer. Here a rogue may snore in his sleep without +bringing the king's men upon him. I have a message for you, my +captain." + +"Hast any tidings of my men?" asked the Dutchman eagerly. + +The head of the dwarf was on a level with his elbow; his matted hair +was wet with mist. His habiliments, partly native, partly civilised, +surrounded his crooked body in a ragged suit of motley; and a long +knife was driven into his belt. + +"He who answers must be paid," answered the hunchback, grinning. + +"Perchance you have already been paid," said Van Vuren suspiciously. + +"The honourable captain possesses the gift of Divination," sneered +Gaudriole. "See you how low yonder warship sits in the water?" he went +on, pointing down at the _St. Wenceslas_, which had lately arrived at +that coast. "Is it true, as I have heard the settlers say, that she is +loaded with gold from the shore of Labrador? 'Tis said that a man may +there see the precious metal shining at his feet, and has but to bend +to gather sufficient for a knight's ransom." + +"I pray you give me the message, good dwarf," said Van Vuren +flatteringly. + +"The cloak upon my captain's shoulders is of a truth a thing to be +desired," Gaudriole went on, fingering the rich stuff with his grimy +fingers. "Were it upon my back, 'twould handsomely conceal some very +clumsy work of nature. 'Tis the cloth that makes the courtier." He +burst into a raucous laugh, as he danced the cold out of his limbs. + +"His Excellency the commandant shall loosen that insolent tongue," +cried Van Vuren hotly. + +Gaudriole snapped his fingers in the Dutchman's face as he retorted: +"This is not the old world, my brave captain, and there is no restraint +upon lying here. Gaudriole is now a citizen of the New World. The +Cardinal himself is but a shadow here. Even a mountebank of the gutter +may turn traitor in the wilderness. Gaudriole is a man this side o' +the sea. Were we in Paris I might bow to kiss your garments, and call +you Holiness an you desired it. Here the jester is as good as the +general. Hunt me into yonder forest at your sword-end, bold captain, +and bid me play the will o' the wisp. I should but disappear into a +thicket ahead, rise up at your back, and this knife and a moss-swamp +would settle all your business. Doff your hat to a fool, captain, and +give him pipe and tobacco." + +Van Vuren clenched his teeth. He would then have given even his cloak +to effectually silence that biting tongue. But he was a stranger upon +French territory, and he knew that the slender tie of alliance would +not stand a strain. He prudently choked down his anger, and satisfied +the dwarf's more reasonable demand. + +"Never was a better gift sent to man than this same tobacco," said +Gaudriole. "See you, captain, how excellent are its qualities. It +shall manage the warrior beyond the arts of woman. No man shall use +the good smoke in anger, because at the first taste peace settles upon +his body and his soul desires to be alone. But 'tis a dangerous drug +upon an empty stomach." + +"The message," said Van Vuren impatiently. + +"Yonder comes in a good burden of fish," resumed Gaudriole, gazing down +indifferently to indicate a boat grating across the shingle. "I know +the oaf, one Nichet, who at home had not the wit to make a living. +Here he becomes a man with a name. This land is Paradise for those not +wanted across sea. Nichet shall presently leave his boat, to find +himself a stone to anchor her, and then I shall pass that way and take +of his best fish for my breakfast. The knave profits by the fool's +work. Fare you well, brave captain." + +"The message, villain," broke in Van Vuren. + +"Ah! I grow forgetful. 'Tis said that the Abbe La Salle is to go from +here to the land which the Scotch discovered and the valiant French +took from them, to that country upon the gulf which we call Acadie. A +happy quittance, say I. The abbe is too perilously apt with his long +sword. Let them send the fat pig Laroche after him, and this fortress +shall grow more peaceful than the streets of Versailles. Let there be +trouble, you shall always find a fat priest at the root of it." + +"Let La Salle descend into the bottomless pit," cried the Dutchman +violently. "And Heaven be praised if he drags you down with him. +Deliver me the message, hunchback." + +"Now Nichet moves away to search for a fitting stone," went on +Gaudriole. "Had I a message for you, captain? Let me consider. My +memory is weak of a morning." He struck out his long arm suddenly. +"Dost see that man signalling from yonder shore?" + +Van Vuren turned quickly. "Where?" he exclaimed. + +"This is the message," shouted Gaudriole, and as he spoke he rushed +under the Dutchman's arm, and shambled swiftly down the road. "To the +man who has to live upon his wits the Dutchman is a gift from Heaven +itself. Remember, my captain! The tobacco leaf is a brave cure for +ill humour." + +Van Vuren hurled a curse after him, and turned to ascend. From the +summit of the heights he scanned the prospect, and quickly learnt what +Gaudriole might have told him had he exercised greater forbearance. +The expedition had at last returned. Almost as soon as Van Vuren +looked out he heard a welcome cry, and presently perceived a figure, +clad in the distinctive dress of Holland, crossing the valley at a +rapid walk. With an exclamation of relief the captain hastened down, +and met Dutoit, his lieutenant and the leader of the exploration party, +upon the plain. + +Hurriedly the survivors collated their gloomy experiences. + +"Twenty-eight left of our seventy-five," muttered Van Vuren, when he +had heard Dutoit's report of two men lost and one dead of fever, "our +supplies and ammunition gone, our ship destroyed. We have nothing now +to hope for, except a safe passage home. Hast seen any Englishmen?" + +"Yesterday we sighted a spy making south, and him we pursued until he +escaped us in the bush," answered Dutoit. + +"These men never recognise defeat," went on Van Vuren. "They shall +spread upward from the south, flow into this land, and push the French +back from fort to fort. They have a wondrous knack of gratifying the +savages. Know you if any new expedition has come over?" + +"We came upon a man mortally sick, who babbled as he died about a ship +supplied by the wool-staplers, which started from Bristol some nine +months ago and was lost upon the reefs. This fellow had his face set +due north, and believed that he was travelling towards Boston----" + +"Who comes here?" cried Van Vuren, breaking in upon the other's story +with a note of fear. + +They saw the tall, stern figure of Mary Iden descending towards them, +armed as for the chase. She crossed the ridge and halted when she +sighted the men. Her face was ghastly, and her eyes roved wildly over +the prospect. Presently she put out her hand, and the Dutchmen waited +when they saw her sign. + +"Soldiers," cried a wild English voice, "have you seen the French +priest known as La Salle pass into the fortress?" + +Van Vuren, who had touched at most of the New World colonies in his +time, knew the Anglo-Saxon well enough to answer; but he started, and +said bitterly to his subordinate: + +"The very savages speak English. Where is the Indian who has a +knowledge of French in all this country, which the French rule? Did +not I say to you that it is as impossible to keep the men of King +Charles out of this land as it is to dam the ocean behind a bank of +sand?" + +He turned to the Englishman's wife, and demanded further knowledge. + +The woman struggled to return the answer which policy advised, but +passion overmastered her. Her eyes flashed wildly as she answered: + +"Your race has ever been friendly with mine. 'Tis true you are foes of +the English, but all nations hate England, even as the birds of the +forest hate the eagle because of the strength of his flight. Soldiers, +show me where I may find this priest. I have walked through the night +seeking him. But a few hours ago I was a mother. To-day my son gives +no answer to my voice. He was a great hunter was my son, though but a +boy, and he feared no man. This day we bury him where the waters +shout. He was good to look upon, he was strong like the young bear. +He had brave eyes. Soldiers, it is the priest who has slain my son." + +The anguished woman had spoken thus aloud as she walked through the +cathedral-like aisles of the forest, addressing the columnar pines, the +fretted arch of foliage, the dim bush shrines; so she had called as her +heart bled to the climbing tits, the ghostly moths, and the long grey +wolf as he slunk away. + +"Who is the father of your son?" pressed the Dutchman. + +Awaking to the consciousness that the question was not wholly dictated +by sympathy, Mary Iden drew herself erect, and, pointing over the heads +of the men, indicated the impregnable heights whereon waved the flag +azure a fleur-de-lys or, that emblem which dominated the land from the +islands in the gulf to the country where the foot of white men had +never trod. + +"I have learnt the story of the wanderings of the children of England," +she said in a strained prophetic voice. "Of the journey of the man +Cabot, who passed into the places of wind, into the great sea of ice, +and reached the land where the Indians dare not walk. Of the seaman +Frobisher, who touched the iron coast and lived. These men passed out +like spirits into the unknown, and came back with their great story as +men restored from the dead. As the crow follows the eagle, to take of +that which the strong bird leaves, so Frenchmen followed the great +adventurers of England. And now I see the French driven from their +fortress, from Tadousac and St. Croix. Those who dwell in Acadie shall +be driven out, and go as exiles into a strange country. I see soldiers +sweeping the great cliffs, freeing the valleys and plains. I see the +French settled upon their farms, and their flag no longer shines in the +sun, and the people bend themselves to the rule of an English Queen, +whose name is Victory and whose reign is peace. Many moons shall come +and go, many suns shall heat the Father of Waters before these things +shall be, and I shall not live to see that day." She pressed her hands +to her aching eyes, and shivered as she swayed, and once more cried: +"Soldiers, have you seen the priest who has slain my son?" + +"A witch!" exclaimed Van Vuren hoarsely. "Let us escape before she +overlooks us." + +The superstitious Dutchmen hurried out to rejoin their men, who were +camping in the forest; while Mary Iden made her way across the plain, +and so into the great red eye of the sun. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII. + +STAMEN. + +That knowledge of forest-craft, which enables the traveller to guide +his feet unerringly through pathless bush, was only in rare instances +acquired by the New World venturers, and then only after years of hard +experience. When Woodfield abandoned his captain to follow the career +of Hough he struck indeed in the right direction, but the native trails +were numerous, and along one of these the yeoman went astray. By +seeking to set himself right he became hopelessly lost in the labyrinth +of the forest; and at last succumbed to weariness and stretched himself +to sleep upon a bed of moss, until a ray of sunlight stabbed through +the dense roof of foliage and smote him across the eyes. + +Woodfield arose and looked around in sore perplexity, knowing not which +way to turn. The globes of dew gleamed in opal tints upon the grass, +the big robins passed wreathed in filmy gossamers, the earth smoked +with mist and thrilled with the voice of the glad west wind. But all +the beauty and peace of nature combined made no satisfying meal for an +empty body. Trusting to Providence, Woodfield started out afresh, and +walked strongly for many hours, but always making direct north and away +from the camping-ground of the Iroquois, away from Couchicing and the +little settlement upon its shore. + +The yeoman tramped on, until exhaustion came upon him. All around the +great white pines lifted two hundred feet in height, interspersed with +dazzling spruce and gleaming poplars. He smoked to still the pain of +hunger, but the strong tobacco made him dazed. He staggered on, and +presently heard the voices of approaching men. The trail bent sharply. +He passed on, with half-opened eyes and wildly throbbing brain, went +round the bend, and started suddenly as from an evil dream. Half-naked +bodies and painted faces closed round him in a clamorous ring; and +Woodfield awoke fully to the knowledge that he had fallen into the +hands of the Algonquins. + +With an effort he drew himself upright, and gazed bravely at an old +warrior with flowing hair, who nodded and smiled at him in a not +unfriendly fashion. + +"J'ai faim," the adventurer muttered, trusting that one at least of the +braves might understand the French language. + +It was the wily old fox Oskelano who confronted the Englishman. He +stretched out his hand--the etiquette of handshaking he had acquired +from his visit to the fortress--and articulated with difficulty: + +"You ... French?" + +Woodfield grasped the brown hand and nodded violently. + +"Necessity makes hypocrites of us all," he muttered for the +satisfaction of his stubborn English conscience. + +Oskelano grinned amicably and gave an order to his men; and straightway +the warriors closed round and escorted Woodfield to their camp, every +step widening the distance between him and his companions. They gave +him food and drink; they provided him with a shelter; they built a +smoky fire before him to keep away the flies. Finally Oskelano himself +came, accompanied by his brother, and the two squatted gravely at the +entrance to the bower and scrutinised their captive with pride and +interest. + +"Um," grunted Oskelano, after a long period of silence. + +"Ho," muttered the weary Englishman with equal gravity. + +The French vocabulary of the Algonquin chief did not extend beyond the +single word _diable_, a word which he uttered constantly in his +subsequent efforts to converse with his guest, without any +understanding of its meaning, but believing, since he had heard it +issue with frequency from the lips of the soldiers in the fortress, +that it was an expression of possibilities. He endeavoured to convey +by means of gestures that it had come to his knowledge that the +Iroquois were about to attack the fortress at the instigation of the +English. His spies had seen a messenger bearing the symbol of the +headless bird. They had also observed the general movement eastward of +the tribes. The gods had provided him with a rare opportunity for +attacking his enemy. He was the friend of the great French people--he +slapped his insidious old heart with his treacherous hand--he was eager +to fight for his allies, and in return he doubted not that the chief +far over seas, King Louis to wit, would graciously send to his good +Algonquin friends many of the magic fire-tubes, with an abundant supply +of that unholy admixture of saltpetre, sulphur, and charcoal which +possessed such a wondrous property of exploding to the physical +detriment of a foe. + +"Diable?" he grunted, staring eagerly at Woodfield. + +"Oui," answered the harassed Englishman, though in truth he had +understood nothing. + +"Um," grunted Oskelano; and there the interview ended, with nothing +gained on either side. + +But as the chief returned to his skin-hut, his brother, a sachem wiser +than he, made the disquieting assertion: "The white stranger is not of +the French tribe." + +"How know you so?" cried the perturbed chief. + +"He does not lift his hands, nor does he shake his shoulders when he +speaks. He sits without motion. He does not laugh. He is one of the +race they call English." + +Woodfield ate the strong bear-meat brought to his shelter by a silent +giant, and turned to compose himself for sleep; but the giant touched +his shoulder and made a gesture which there was no mistaking. The +Englishman rose, and immediately two other figures glided out of the +forest and cut off his retreat. + +They led him along a trail where the fireflies were beginning to light +their lamps, between the big trees, and out into short bush and +sage-brush where the cranes swept overhead, crying mournfully. +Rockland appeared presently, streaked granite overrun with poison-ivy. +The captive noticed that the rock was fretted with caves. + +Into one of these he was ushered by the custodians, who then gravely +divested him of his weapons. A fire was lighted near the mouth of the +cave, and there the bronze guardians squatted, maintaining an +intolerable silence throughout the night. + +A change of sentries took place at daybreak; another at mid-day; a +third the following nightfall. Food and drink were handed in to the +prisoner; but the guards spoke never a word and made him no sign. + +Another day went by, but as the time of evening drew near there came +the sound of camp-breaking down the wind. A host of armed men tramped +beside the cave. A group of doctors, attired in the fantastic mummery +of their craft, followed; and last of all came Oskelano and his brother +side by side. + +Around a solitary poplar men were at work, chopping down the brush with +their tomahawks. The guard stepped up upon either side of Woodfield, +who watched these preparations with a prisoner's suspicions, and led +him out to the cleared space. + +"Um," grunted Oskelano, and shook hands amiably with his victim. + +Then the men put aside their tomahawks and bound him to the poplar with +ropes of vegetable fibre. They piled the moss around him and flung the +sagebrush atop. Others brought up pine branches and piled them waist +high. Oskelano watched, his crafty face wrinkled with smiles. + +At last the Englishman understood that he was about to be made a +sacrifice to the fierce Algonquin gods. He uttered no useless prayer +and made no cry. "They have spared me the torture," he muttered +bravely. "Let me now show them how to die." As the silent and supple +natives worked around him, he recalled the tales that old men at home +had told him, of the Protestants who had died for their faith, laughing +at the flames and bathing their hands in them. The last scene in the +life of the old vicar of Hadleigh had often as a boy moved him to +tears. He remembered how that the old man had lighted from his horse +to dance on his way to the stake, and he recalled his noble words of +explanation: "Now I know, Master Sheriff, I am almost at home." The +passing into death through fire was merely a sting sudden and sharp. + +Water was dashed over the fuel until the pile gleamed frostily in the +fading rays. A fiery death for his captive was no part of Oskelano's +plan. He had discovered that suffocation was more effective and less +rapid than the flames. + +Tree and victim became soon hidden in a dense column of cloud, the +doctors resumed their march, the guard followed, the two sachems +brought up the rear, discussing their proposed attack as indifferently +as though that mighty pillar of smoke pouring upward in the still +evening air out of the plain of sage-brush had no existence in fact. + +Well-laid as was the cruel Algonquin's plan, he had not the wisdom to +guard against that element of the improbable which rarely fails to +enter into, and mar the working of, the best-contrived plot. + +A maid had concealed herself in the bush until the camp became clear. +Then she came forth and ran like the wind, but stopped upon the plain +with a cry of terror when she beheld an old man, who hobbled painfully +through the brush. The ancient turned, suspicious of every sound, but +when he saw the girl his dry face broke into a weird smile. + +"Hasten, child," he quavered, leaning heavily upon his staff. "The +Mother of God forgets not the good done by man or maid." + +He dropped a knife at her feet. The girl caught it up and sped onward +like a deer. + +The old man was a Christian. The maid was heathen. Old mind and young +working independently, the former actuated by the religion of altruism, +the latter wrought upon by nature, had entertained in secret the +self-same plan of rescuing the young Englishman from his terrible +plight. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + +COMMITTAL. + +While Woodfield was a prisoner in the camp of the Algonquins, his +comrades, who had searched for him in vain, made their sad parting from +George Flower upon the Windy Arm where the waters mourn for ever. + +This promontory had been so named by the Indians because it thrust +itself far out, like an arm, into Lake Couchicing, meeting the full +force of every wind. It made a suitable spot, thought the survivors, +for an Englishman's grave, being rough and rugged and strong to behold, +like the man whom they had known and loved and lost. + +When Hough had done droning his prayers, they heaped the soil into the +form of a mound, which they covered with warm peat. While thus +employed they beheld Shuswap passing down to the beach, where a dozen +long canoes lay ready for a start. One, which was covered with green +branches, had already been launched, and was rocking gently upon the +shallows. The Englishmen hastened to complete their work, when they +discovered that the sachem was awaiting them with impatience. + +Then a mournful procession crossed glass-like Couchicing, headed by the +sad canoe where boy and hound slept together as they had been wont to +do at home. It reached the fringed shore opposite, amid the sorrowful +cries of the paddlers. The canoes were carried across the strip of +land and down again to the water where the country was in splendour. +Here Nature struck no mourning note. Only a few stripped trees leaning +out, held from falling by tougher comrades which supported them on +either side, spoke mutely of the presence of death after life; and even +so showed strong green saplings from some living nerve of the +half-decayed roots to proclaim the final triumph of life over death. + +So they continued, until wild islets stood out, their banks humped with +beaver mounds, and the lost waters began to shout with the mourners, +and the swelling north wind shook the shore. The paddlers wrenched the +canoes round, chanting as they worked, and the whitecap waves slapped +the frail birch-bark sides. + +No man stood beside young Richard's grave. A flock of noisy birds +pecked amid the fresh-turned soil and flung themselves away before the +carriers. Sir Thomas took no part in these last rites. From that +pierced body of his son the jewel of great price had been snatched, and +the setting he left for others to handle. + +The mother stood beside old Shuswap, her bosom heaving vengefully as +the warriors consigned her son to the ground. After the heathen rites +had been performed, Hough's stern voice repeated the prayers which he +had but recently offered over his brother of the sword, and when he had +done green branches were flung into the grave, then a weight of stones, +and finally the rich, red clay stopped the mouth of earth which had +opened to devour her own. The Indians swept away, shouting a song of +war. The waters raced on; and wind and rapids met below with the noise +of thunder. + +Penfold walked among the trees; and there, scarce a stone's cast from +the sounding water, he came upon the knight, huddled upon the stem of a +fallen pine, his hands spread out across his knees, his head down, and +on the ground between his feet the two parts of a broken sword. + +The old yeoman came near and wrecked the silence by a gruff word of +sympathy; but Sir Thomas did not look at him. Presently he made a +blind movement and extended one lean arm towards the ground. + +"If you would serve me, friend," he said in a hollow voice, "cast these +fragments into yonder water. My son, whom I should have trained as a +man of peace, took that sword from my hand. My Richard's blood lies +heavy on me now." + +"Not so," said Penfold strongly. "The boy was his father's son. Would +you have seen him grow a weakling? Sons bred beside an enemy's camp +must fight or be found unworthy of their name." + +"The sword has fallen," said the knight. "Last night I had a dream." +A shiver coursed through him. "Take up the sword with which I killed +my son and bury it in the water. I have sworn to lay hand on it no +more." + +"I have lost a friend," muttered the yeoman. "One known to me by +hearth and in field, at work and pleasure. I have buried him this day +in a strange land. I grow old, and my friends drop from me as acorns +shed from the oak, but while my eye is steady and my arm strong I shall +fight for England's empire over sea. Old age, when dotage grows, is +time sufficient to mourn for friends. While strength remains a man +must work. Country, then friends, myself the last. 'Tis the motto of +the Penfolds of County Berks." + +"You have no flesh and blood to mourn." + +"What is relationship if it be not friendship? Know you not that two +brothers may fall in hatred from one another, and yet either have a +friend dear to his heart as his own soul? Our troubles we carry to our +pastor. Our highest love to the woman who stays for us on our way +through life. Such friendship binds more firmly than any tie of blood." + +"Speak not to me," cried the bitter man. "My ambition has fallen to +the ground." + +"Stand by yonder mound," cried Penfold. "The boy shall speak." + +"Vengeance shall not bring him back." + +"Had you fallen he would have gone upon his way stronger than before." + +"He was young and I grow old." + +"Yet I am older far." And the yeoman shook himself like an old lion. +"There is work for me." + +The knight lifted his head, and spoke more bitterly: + +"Poison stirs in our English blood, driving us from home, leading us +across seas to fight unthanked for our country's cause. What gadfly of +madness stings us on thus to build the foundations of Empire? What +honour shall be rendered to pioneers? Who shall seek our graves and +pause to say, 'Here lies one who fought to plant the red-cross flag in +the face of its enemies'? Fools, fools, fools! We forsake home and +kindred in pursuit of a dream, rise up for our unrewarded effort, and +fail. So we are gone and our deeds lie buried in our graves." + +"One leaf makes not a summer," replied Penfold. "The one cannot be +discerned by the eye, and yet that one does its share in making the +tree perfect. We also have our part to play. Our lives are obscure. +Our deeds shall live, if not our names. Let others reap the harvest." + +The knight rose, frowning at the sun-lit scene. + +"There is a cave a league away," he said. "There sorrow and myself +shall dwell. Seek not to find me." + +He placed a hand upon his breast. + +"Something has broken there," he said; and then went with drooping +head, striking the trees in the blindness of his flight. + +Hough stood low upon the shore between the islets. He heard the +footsteps of his captain, and spoke: + +"See where our friend's wife goes. Closing her ears to my good +counsel, she went into the hut, and returned with bow and arrows and a +knife. These she placed in her canoe, and yonder she goes to find the +track of that papist priest who has brought sorrow to us all." + +"Said she as much?" + +"Ay. 'Onawa, your sister, has brought this trouble upon you and us,' +said I, as she pushed away. 'She it was who smote down George Flower +by treachery, and she it was who brought the Frenchman to our +hiding-place.'" + +"Said she anything?" + +"Never a word. But her eyes strained upon the knife." + +Then the two lonely men returned to New Windsor, the slow day passed, +and night enwrapped in cloud fell upon the land. The fires of the +allied tribes spotted the forest with scarlet, and between the black +trees the upright figures of warriors, fully painted and feathered, +crossed as they threaded the mazes of the dance. Five thousand +fighters were there gathered, the best and bravest of the Oneidas, +Senacas, and Onandagas, mad to avenge their wrongs. Spies were posted +at every point; a hundred watched the fortress, passing the word from +man to man. In a chain they stretched from the height above the river +to the council fire, where the nine sachems sat muttering in whispers +and drawing omens from the flight of the smoke and the burning of the +logs. + +"Shuswap, great chief of the Cayugas, the woman your daughter would +speak to you," a voice sounded. + +"Let her come near," answered the old man. + +His keen eyes distended. He had looked, prepared to behold his younger +daughter, but instead his eyes fell upon Tuschota, her sister. The +father noted her warlike bearing, the bow slung upon her shoulders, the +arrows and knife thrust through her girdle. He saw also the sternness +of her countenance. + +"What would you, daughter?" + +"Where is Onawa, my sister?" + +"I know not," said the sachem. + +"Find her and bring her forth. She led hither the Frenchman who has +slain my son." + +The sachems turned and their black eyes glittered upon her. + +"It is false," cried Shuswap. + +"She desires to win the French doctor for husband. She brought him +therefore to the lake that he might lie in wait to kill the Englishmen. +One man Onawa killed with her own hand. My son is your son. Your +daughter, my sister, must die." + +She spoke, and passed away into the glow of the forest. + +Shuswap dashed his grey head to the ground. + +"She must die," muttered the counsellors. + +The news travelled like an evil wind from fire to fire. All the tribes +swore by their gods that the woman who had sought to betray them must +die. Not till then might Shuswap lift up his head among them. They +danced more cruelly, maddened by disgrace. + +A runner came from the depths of the forest, spots of blood thrown from +his flying heels. Three hours had he run at that speed. He passed the +warriors and their fires and reached the council. All the sachems sat +erect, save only old Shuswap, who lay forward, his head upon the dust. + +"Oskelano comes upon us at the head of the tribes of the Algonquins," +spoke the messenger. "They carry the fire-tubes given them by the +French." + +The sachems sat like figures of stone. + +"Which way do they come?" demanded Piscotasin, surnamed Son of the +Weasel, the learned chief of the Oneidas. + +"From the north." + +"They shall find us ready." + +The messenger passed back. Straightway the forest shivered with a wild +cry for battle until the leaves were shed like rain. + +There came another runner. + +"A fire-float passes down the Father of Waters." + +"It is well," said the Son of the Weasel. "It is the signal of the +friendly Dutch." + +Thereupon commenced that great advance of the confederate tribes which +descendants speak of to this day. The flower and strength of the +Iroquois, that great people which from time immemorial had ruled the +north-eastern land from the coast to the chain of inland seas, went out +to avenge their wrongs. The women rushed to find shelter from their +hereditary enemies the pitiless Algonquins. The army poured away in a +roaring torrent, draining the forest, leaving the fires licking the +sharp breeze with forked tongues, leaving only one man behind: + +Old Shuswap, doubled in the dust. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + +ENKINDLED. + +The raft of fire, which had been reported to the sachems as visible +upon the river, had indeed been ignited and started upon its course by +the hands of the Dutch, but without any idea of signalling to their +allies. The man who was chiefly instrumental in giving the signal, +which Van Vuren had arranged for in the time of his power, had never +heard of that secret conspiracy which the action of the English +venturers had brought to nought. + +Because the captain shrank from introducing his party into a camp +friendly only in name, where friction between his men and those of +Roussilac might have occurred, the Dutchmen bivouacked upon the +outskirts of the forest, and while darkness surrounded them sat smoking +solemnly and chatting, altogether ignorant of the contemplated native +rising. These men were of all ages and drawn from almost every station +in life. The most prominent character was one Pieter von Donck, an +elderly sailor of immense bulk, attired in the shapeless sack-coat, +white tucker, and immense knee-breeches of the period. This man, so +report went, had touched at every known harbour in the world, had +explored many an unknown tract of country, and was as well acquainted +with the streets of New Amsterdam, its double-roofed church, its +battery upon the hill, its toylike windmills, and its gallows beside +the wharf, as with the old-world town of Holland on the arm of the +Zuyder Zee. He had been sent out with Dutoit to act as guide for the +expedition, and it was well for the lieutenant that old Pieter had been +with him, otherwise the entire party must have been lost. Von Donck +was very nearly as skilful as an Indian in picking up a trail, and to +his more unenlightened comrades his knowledge of locality savoured of +witchcraft. Van Vuren and his lieutenant were conversing at a little +distance from the big circle, the former frequently consulting a scrap +of vellum covered with names and lines, the first map of the great +eastern coast which had ever been designed. + +"Yonder is a mighty precipice," observed presently one of the youngest +of the soldiers, nodding his head gravely in the direction of the +heights. "How the folk at home would marvel, could they but see what +we look upon daily in this land." + +"What say you, boy? What say you?" cried Von Donck, aroused from his +musings by this criticism. "What! call you yonder hill a precipice? +How would you name the cliffs of Jersey, had you seen them as I, Pieter +von Donck, saw them from the ship _Goede Vrouw_? Should you but cross +the expanse of Tapaan Bay, as I have done, should you enter the defiles +of the Highlands and see the wigwams of the Iroquois perched among the +cliffs like nests of eagles, should you see the black thunder-clouds +chasing the hobgoblins among the Kaatskills, as I, Pieter von Donck, +have seen them, then methinks, boy, you might sit among old travellers +and talk to them the night." + +The old sailor's voice was thick, and he snorted like an ox between his +words. + +"'Tis given to few to venture as you have done," spoke a conciliatory +voice from the circle. "Tell us now somewhat of your journey up +Hudson's River, good Piet." + +"A weird river, they tell me," said another voice. + +"True! true!" snorted the voyageur. "A river of ghosts and devils. A +river which changes the flow of its tide 'gainst all nature. A river +which shoals or deepens in an hour, to hold the explorer back, or to +lure him into the heart of a storm. 'Tis a river which few dare to +tempt. But I, Pieter von Donck, went up it under a master who, despite +his English blood, was the bravest man upon this earth. Ay, but I saw +even his cheek whiten, when we reached the whirlpools at the end of the +known world, and yet saw no sea ahead." + +"Who was that master?" asked the young man who had opened the +conversation. + +A derisive laugh sounded, followed by Von Donck's booming reproach: + +"Young man, have you no pride in the doings of the great? Hast never +heard the name of Hendrick Hudson?" + +"I knew not that you had been with him," muttered the youth. + +"Before Marie von Toit, your mother, was weaned I crossed the seas," +snorted the old man, smiling into the fire. "What Dutchman has not +heard of the ship which brought me over, the _Goede Vrouw_, which lies +as I speak a-rotting within the wooden harbour of New Amsterdam? San +Nicolas was her figure-head, the good saint who guided us through all +perils, and to whom upon landing we erected a chapel within sight of +the sea. He is the patron of our first settlement in this new world, +and shall remain so for ever. Now they call him Santa Claus, and the +children of New Amsterdam hang up each one a stocking in the +chimney-side on San Nicolas' Eve, for the good saint is a lover of +children, and rides that night over the houses, his wide breeches +filled with gifts, which he lets fall down the chimneys and so into the +stockings hung to receive them. All the city is a-laughing with +children on the morn of San Nicholas' Day." + +"Gives he then nothing to the elder folk?" asked one. + +"'Twas once his custom to do so, when he could find an industrious body +who spoke no evil of his neighbour," said Von Donck. "But he has much +ado to find such now." + +"Didst ever see the storm ship upon Hudson's River?" a listener +demanded. + +The old sailor pulled himself round to face the speaker. + +"What story is this?" he muttered. + +"There is a ship which haunts that river and comes a-sailing by night +or day, running 'gainst both wind and tide, her deck crowded with +Dutchmen who neither move nor speak. She comes before a storm, and +goes while men gaze, like a flash of light." + +Pieter von Donck grinned. + +"Will call me a phantom, brave boys? Here you shall find enough sound +flesh to make two men as good as any," he said, slapping his mighty +thighs. "That ship is surely none other than the _Half Moon_ herself. +Know you not that Hudson and his crew haunt the Kaatskills? O' nights +the good ship, which lies sunken at the end of the world, rises, and +the ghosts of my master and my mates pass from the phantom deck to +their revels within the mountains, and back ere morning to their +graves. Peace be to them, brave fellows all! + +"Twenty-nine years past," Von Donck went on, in his strident voice, +which brought Van Vuren near to listen, "we cast away from our new city +on the island, and sailed westward to discover the overland passage to +China. In a day we had left the land of the Manhattoes far astern, and +with a favouring breeze had run under the palisadoes, a wall of rock, +young friend, which makes yonder height seem to my eye no greater than +an ant-mound. The solitude unmanned all, save Hudson, who walked the +deck, swearing that he would reach the sea if he had to explore till +Judgment Day. Awful was that silence when our ship entered the shadow +of the Highlands, where the falling of a rope upon deck broke into +echoes among the hills, and over the river came a noise as of demons +laughing. The terror of the New World was upon us, and when we sang +our chanties, heaving the lead or drawing in sail, we would fain have +stopped our ears, so terrible were the voices which answered us from +the shore." + +"Was there no talk of turning back?" + +"There was no turning back with Hendrick Hudson. He strode the deck +day and night, and at his every order the black rocks pealed and the +precipices shrieked, though the weather would be calm and the wind not +more than a whisper. We held on our course until a storm seized and +flung us upon the shore; and there we made landing, in a place where +snakes darted their heads at us, and having built us a fire under the +basswoods, cooked food and dried our clothes. + +"'This mountain country is the place for me,' cried Hudson. 'Here +might we spend a free life, my sailors, hunting by day, and at sport by +night. Bring out our pipes and liquor from the ship, and in this +hollow let us rest until the storm clouds pass.' + +"So we remained there three days, chasing bears by light, spending the +dark hours around the fire, smoking our long pipes, and playing at +bowls, the favourite game of our master; and the mountains thundered, +and the goblin voices shrieked with every gust of wind. A fearsome +place, that dripping rock-forest at the end of the world. Upon the +third night came Indians to our camp, two sachems old and cunning, who +demanded by what right we had brought ourselves into their land. I can +see the face of Hudson now, with its straight black beard and hard +black eyes, and the angry twitch of his mouth, a trick of his when +crossed, as he answered them. 'We are Dutch,' quoth he. 'And if there +be any new passage across this world Dutchmen shall find it.' Then the +sachems came down from the rocks, and cursed him and his crew, swearing +to call up spirits of river and wind which should fight against our +ship. Hudson threatened them with the sword--there was methinks too +much hot English blood in our captain--and the next day we remanned the +_Half Moon_, and sailed away against the stream. + +"A wind struck us, and the horse-shoe which had been nailed to the mast +before starting dropped with a fearful clanging upon deck. We sang the +hymn to San Nicolas, and fastened the horse-shoe anew, but again it +fell. The Indian spirits were making mischief in the wind. The day +became dark; the sun went out; but Hudson bade us cram on sail, because +every hour he looked to hear the roar of the sea. 'And then for China, +my men,' cried he. + +"We ran into whirlpools and cross currents, and the _Half Moon_ struck +full upon a rock in the middle of the stream. The water roared around, +and I swam for my life through darkness, seeing no man, dreading every +instant lest a hand should seize my heel and drag me down. I reached +the shore, and there found a companion, who had saved himself as I had +done. Of our ship and mates we could find no trace, therefore we set +out together, and made a great journey overland, until by the grace of +God we saw the tower of the church of San Nicolas lit by the morning +sun, and the good folk of New Amsterdam coming out to greet us as men +brought back from the dead." + +Von Donck drew a flaming stick from the fire and relighted his rolled +tobacco leaf. A circle of solemn faces was set towards him. + +"The _Half Moon_ yet sails upon Hudson's River," remarked the sailor +who had questioned the voyageur concerning the storm ship. "She rides +out of a thunder-cloud, her sails flying against the wind, the men +staring over her side. One Sunday in the morn, when the folk were at +church and the dominie was preaching--such is the tale I have +heard--there sounded a mighty wind, and the building grew creeping +dark. Upon that a man ran in, crying, 'A ship! A Dutch ship sailing +by!' The dominie and all ran into the gloom of mid-day and saw a +vessel riding against the tide, full of men in wide breeches and +sugar-loaf hats, with faces as white as wool. Some of the bolder +youths manned a boat, and rowed out signalling, but the stranger gave +them no heed. Sometimes she would appear so nigh to them that they +could mark the flakes rotting from her beams and the weeds trailing +round her bows, and the same minute she would appear as though half a +mile away. And while they still rowed after her, they heard a noise as +of iron ringing upon her deck and straightway she rode into a cloud and +vanished. And afterwards came a great storm which wrecked close upon a +score of houses." + +"The old ship," muttered Von Donck, his eyes astray, his cheeks less +ruddy than their wont. "'Twas the sound of the horse-shoe falling to +deck which the rowers heard. Hudson swore in the face of Heaven that +he would make that passage. Mayhap he still strives, the storm holding +him back from the unknown north-west for ever." + +As the old sailor ceased to speak Van Vuren advanced, the strip of +vellum between his fingers, and stood a sharp figure in the firelight. +The men ceased their mutterings and leaned forward to hear what their +leader had to say. + +"Our expedition upon this land has failed, my men," he cried. "Our +ship lies burnt, our comrades are lost, we are not strong enough to +withstand the French. Shall we now make a journey through the unknown +land, and so down to our own free colony, through which pours Hudson's +river, of which I have heard you speak? Let us strive together to gain +the island of the Manhattoes, where our city of New Amsterdam smiles +upon the sea." + +The Dutchmen did not break into a shout as Englishmen might have done, +nor did they raise a noisy chatter after the manner of the French. +They looked on one another with grave faces, and each man puffed his +smoke more heavily. Finally old Pieter von Donck snorted and spoke: + +"I have played the pioneer before to-day, captain. 'Twould gladden my +eyes to see again the tower of San Nicolas by the sea." + +"Then let us away before morning," said Van Vuren. + +Boats of the fishermen were drawn along the white road of shore, and +these the Dutchmen requisitioned for crossing. They worked warily, +fearful of seeing the flash of torches along the path beneath the +cliff. The river brimmed and the stream flung down with a ceaseless +undertone. + +"What have we here?" snorted Von Donck, while he groped under the +gloomy wall. + +A number of dry logs, crossed and pinned together by wooden wedges, lay +upon the gravel spit, piled with dry grass and resinous boughs +interlaced. Beside were lengths of pine to act as rollers for +launching. The mass of inflammable material rose high. Torches were +pressed between two stones beside the logs. + +"'Tis but the raft made to give signal to the Iroquois tribes," +explained the lieutenant. + +"To the water with it," cried a voice. + +"Peace, fool. The French have sentries posted." + +"Fire it," snorted Von Donck. "Let not so much good work be spent in +vain. Will float it upon the French man-o'-war for a parting message." + +Eager hands set in place the rollers, and soon the unwieldy mass +grumbled riverwards. It nosed into the water and settled with a +splash, riding deep because the logs had weight. Flint and steel +struck, a shower of sparks rained upon the catch-fire, the torches were +ignited. At a word the grass flared, and the raft, released, struck +upon a rock, turned slowly, and raced down stream, a red and yellow +sheet of fire under a whirling canopy of smoke, straight for the +lantern which marked the presence of the man-of-war. + +"To the boats!" whispered Van Vuren. + +A cry was raised above, and soon the answering voices resembled a +chorus of daws frightened round a dark steeple by the shadow of a bird +of prey. While the Dutch were floundering in mid-stream a brass gun +thundered. The column of fire swept on, illuminating the seamed wall, +and throwing into black contrast the trees on the opposite shore. + +As the laughing Dutchmen reached land a terrific din from the hemlock +forest shocked the night, and this wild revelry became each moment more +terrible, until the wind seemed to cease to breathe. + +The raft was opposite the landing-stage, burning rapidly down to the +water, casting out flakes of fire and wisps of blazing grass. Lights +flashed confusedly upon the heights, and the tramp of armed men carried +solemnly across the river. + +"The Iroquois are coming out!" cried Van Vuren. + +"Let us wait like vultures for the pickings," muttered the lieutenant +at his side. + +"Vultures!" shrieked a malignant voice. "A good word, traitors." + +The men swung round and stared into the gloom. Upon a point of rock +they saw Gaudriole, squatting like a toad, his features half lit by the +glow of his pipe. + +"The plain of Tophet lies ahead," he snarled at them. "Others may play +at fire as well as ye." + +He sprang up and danced furiously upon the rock. + +"Slay me that hunchback," shouted Van Vuren in a rage. + +His men ran at the rock. Gaudriole spat at them like a cat and +vanished among the scrub. + +A wave of smoke fanned over the ridge. A deep glow, waving up and down +like a red rag, grew along the southern sky, advancing storm-like, +deepening in colour. + +The bush had been fired. + + + + +CHAPTER XX. + +SACRAMENTAL. + +The military routine of the fortress continued that day as usual, and +the approach of night brought no suspicion of the forthcoming assault. +The absence of La Salle was alone commented upon, yet without +apprehension, for the priest was notoriously lax in the performance of +his ecclesiastical duties, and only Laroche was seriously troubled in +mind for his brother priest. Roussilac indeed breathed more freely +when La Salle was not present in the fortress. At eventide two little +bells rang out, that to the east of the citadel being the bell of the +chapel of Ste. Anne, presided over by the junior priest, St Agapit, +that to the west the bell of Ste. Mary Bonsecours upon the hill. Here +Laroche, in the absence of La Salle, officiated to recite vespers and +hear confessions. + +Laroche, though a fighting bully lacking in every priestly quality, +was, among the soldiers at least, more popular than St Agapit. The +latter was a scholar, a man too learned, and somewhat too honest, for +his age, an ascetic, and a priest in every sense. It was well known +that he looked with a stern eye upon drunken brawls or vengeful +threats, whereas Laroche, himself a brawler when in his cups, judged +such offences leniently. St Agapit had no ambition, apart from the +faithful performance of his duty, the carrying out of which rarely +brought him into even remote contact with either of his colleagues. + +It was good to feel the cool breath of the evening after the heat and +burden of the afternoon. The little stone church of Ste. Mary upon the +brow of the hill darkened, and an aged crone passed into the sanctuary +to light the strong-smelling lamps. Laroche entered to recite vespers, +and rolled away to divest his great body of cope and alb; but as he +appeared again within the church his eyes fell upon some half-dozen +men, who waited to obtain an easier conscience by confession of their +sins. + +"A plague on ye," the priest grumbled as he stumbled into his box. +"Why are ye all such miserable sinners? Ha! is it you that I see, +Michel Ferraud? What sin now, you rogue?" + +The keeper of the cabaret in the Rue des Pecheurs fell straightway upon +his knees, and began to whimper: + +"The former wickedness. I am driven to the act, my father. Wine is +scarce, as your holiness knows, and great is the demand therefor. I +must eke out the supply against the coming of each ship, and it has +ever been but a little aqua puralis added to each keg; but to-day, +father, the devil jogged my elbow, and that which is blended cannot be +separated. The wine remains a rich colour, holy father, as you shall +see, and none shall know----" + +"Vile and shameless sinner that you are," the priest interrupted. "To +dilute a wine which is already too thin to gladden the heart of man and +make him a cheerful countenance--to do so, I say, is to commit a most +deadly sin." + +"Exact not so heavy a fine as at last confession, good father. Would +not have me close my tavern? The wine is a good wine," Michel added +professionally, "and the little water added is methinks an aid to +virtue." + +"Art so fond of water?" replied the confessor grimly. "Water you shall +have. Go down now to the river, swim across, and return in like +manner, and afterwards come to me again. Go now! I have lesser +sinners to absolve." + +"The river will be villainous cold, my father. And I cannot swim." + +"Learn," said the inexorable priest. "Come not to me again till you +have crossed the river as I have said. May you take into your evil +stomach an abundance of cold water while learning." + +The taverner retired dissatisfied, and when outside the church rubbed +his head and ruminated. "The confession was ill-timed," he muttered. +"His reverence is in an evil humour. The devil shall seize me body and +soul before I set one foot into that accursed river. But there is +Father St Agapit. I will go forthwith and confess to him." + +The taverner's propitious star was in the ascendant. When he reached +the chapel of Ste. Anne vespers had not concluded, for the office was +there recited with greater reverence and detail than in the church of +Ste. Mary Bonsecours. Michel pushed himself into a front place and +hastened to make himself conspicuous by various fussy acts of outward +devotion. The office over, he lingered until St Agapit came to him, +and the taverner then repeated the confession which he had already +made, with such disastrous consequences, to Laroche. + +"Since the evil nature of man drives him to drink much wine, let him +partake of it as weak as may be, for his soul's health," said the +sincere priest. "But, my son, it behoves you to make known to your +patrons the truth." + +"I dare not," said Michel, rejoicing at heart because he saw a prospect +of cheating the devil. + +"Then are you guilty of deceit," said the priest. "Mix water with your +wine no more, and for your deceit you shall say the litany of St. +Anthony of Padua six times before the altar of Ste. Anne. But see that +you wash before approaching the holy shrine, because I perceive upon +you the odour of wine-casks." + +Having brought his duty to an end, St Agapit drew his cloak round him +and went out. While studying that day the work of a German philosopher +he had been confronted by the startling theory that the brain and +stomach of the human system were possibly connected by means of nerves. +He desired to procure from one of the settler-soldiers a dead rabbit +which he might dissect for his own enlightenment. + +As he went a woman met him. + +"Father," she cried, "a soldier lies at my house at the point of death, +praying for a priest to confess him." + +"Follow me to the church," said St Agapit. + +He passed back into the little log-building, took the reserved Host and +the sacred oils from an inlaid case, and wrapping these consolations of +the Church in his cloak accompanied the woman. + +Upon a palliasse in one of the cabins on the eastern slope a young man +lay dying of pneumonia, that fell disease which the medical science of +the day could only fight by sage shakings of the head and a judicious +use of the cupping-glass. The commandant's own doctor stood there, a +man with some knowledge of medicinal plants and skilled by long +experience in the treatment of sword-cuts, helplessly watching the +exodus of his patient. + +"I resign him to your charge, good father," he said, bending his back +to the priest. "He has passed beyond the help of science. Had I been +summoned earlier"--he shrugged his shoulders--"a discreet use of the +lance might well have relieved the fatal rush of blood to the brain and +saved a life for the king." + +"Perchance an incision in the stomach to release the foul vapours----" +began St Agapit. + +"Useless, my father. The disease, I do assure you, is in the blood." + +The abbe knelt and administered the last sacraments of his Church. The +young soldier remained entirely conscious and his confession came in a +steady whisper. + +"Father," he concluded, "I would speak with the commandant." + +St Agapit looked at the physician by the flickering light of a pine +torch. The latter shook his head. + +"'Tis impossible. Roussilac is at supper. But I may leave a message +as I pass." + +"Say that Jean-Marie Labroquerie calls on him with his dying breath," +whispered the soldier. + +The physician left; the woman who owned the cabin moved silently in +preparation for the carrying out of the body, because people were +practical in the days when death by violence occurred almost hourly. +St Agapit lowered his thin face to catch the message of the passing man. + +"Hidden in the straw you shall find a roll of parchment. I pray you +take it and use it as you will. It is the work of my father, a learned +man. We quarrelled. I stole his work and left my home. I repented +and would have taken it back. It was of no service to me. I cannot +read. If it be of value, let my old father gain the profit." + +"Does he live within the New World?" + +"Two days' journey beyond the river. In a log cabin surrounded by a +palisade which these hands erected. My father healed some Indians who +were sick, and thus obtained their friendship. There was I brought up +with my sister, my fair sister. Oh, my father, I would see again my +sister. I would feel the touch of her hand, and see her bright hair +that flamed in the sun. I would give these my last moments for the +sight of her eyes, and the sound of her voice, saying as she was wont, +'Jean-Marie, my brother! Life is a glorious gift.' Ah, my father!" + +"Peace, son. Set your mind upon this suffering." + +The abbe held a crucifix into the glow of the torch. + +"Jesus is not so jealous, father, that He forbids us to love our own. +I was going back when I could obtain my conge, like the prodigal, to +seek my father's forgiveness. My mother was to blame for our +unhappiness. Solitude and disappointment had embittered her life. She +had a cruel tongue and her hand was rough. I was a coward. I fled. +My sister's eyes have pursued me. I made myself a profligate, to +forget. But memory is a knife in an open wound." + +The minutes passed punctuated by the gasps of the sufferer. The torch +burnt down to its knot, and another was kindled by the pale woman. The +sound without was the wash of the tide. + +"He comes not," moaned the soldier. "Bear me a message, father." + +The dry rattling of beads broke the silence. + +"Speak, my son." + +The soldier uttered a piteous cry: "Madeleine! Madeleine!" + +"Oh, son! Call rather on the name of Mary." + +A gust of dark air swept into the cabin, the torch flame waved like a +flag, and a man stood behind muffled to the eyes, breathing as though +he had come with speed. He threw aside his martial cloak, and +straightway stood revealed. + +"Jean-Marie," he muttered. + +"Arnaud. Stand aside, my father. Let me meet my cousin face to face." + +The priest moved back, and the two soldiers, the officer and the +fighting-man, stared into each other's eyes. + +"Had I known this, Jean-Marie----" began the commandant; but the figure +upon the palliasse, straining from death as a dog from the leash, broke +in upon him. + +"Cousin, you knew. When I have passed have you not averted your eyes, +ashamed of the man who has had neither the wit nor the opportunity to +rise? You have made yourself great, and I--but this is no time for +calling up the past. I am spent. Come to me, cousin--nearer. Why, +commandant, art afraid of a dying man?" + +"Is he dying?" + +"He is in God's hands," the priest answered; and the woman grumbled: +"Yes, yes, and a long time lying there, keeping me from my bed." + +"Out!" said Roussilac, turning upon her. "Out, and repeat not what you +may have heard." + +The woman slunk away frightened. + +"Ah, cousin, that old manner," smiled Jean-Marie. "So spoke you as a +boy. They said you would find greatness. My father would say, 'He is +a Brutus. Would condemn his own son.' I know not who Brutus was, but +my father was a learned man." + +He coughed terribly and lay back gasping. + +"Say what lies upon your mind and have done," reproved St Agapit. "I +would have you die with better thoughts." + +"Cousin," panted Jean-Marie, "I forgive you as I hope for mercy. Place +now your hand on mine." + +Roussilac did so, shrinking at the freezing contact. + +"Your aunt and uncle and Madeleine your cousin dwell in this land, two +days' journey beyond the river. My father was hunted for his life. +They called him a wizard. You know? Yes, once at home you might have +shielded him, but there was your advancement to be thought on. Swear +to me to find them. Tell Madeleine how I died. Be good to her. Ah, +cousin, be a brother to Madeleine. You shall find her the fairest +sister in all this world. Swear to bring them from their solitude, to +protect my father. Swear before this holy priest to feed and clothe +them if they be in want, to care for them, and be to them a brother and +a son." + +Roussilac, who had softened for the moment, grew again stern. His +position was not so sure that it could withstand the attacks of tongues +that might whisper at home that the young governor of the new colony +sheltered a heretic uncle. Jean-Marie was quick to note the change. +He knew the hardness of his cousin's heart. + +"Swear to me, or have my shadow cursing you through life." + +The priest put out his arm with a word of adjuration. + +"The crucifix," the commandant muttered. + +St Agapit held it over the dying man. + +"Touch not the sacred symbol without a prayer, my son. Beware God's +wrath!" + +With one hand grasping the cold fingers, the other pressed fearfully +upon the metal figure thrilling in the priest's grasp, Roussilac took +the oath that was required of him. + +"And that I will keep it, I call God, our Lady, and the blessed saints +to witness!" he concluded in a hushed voice. + +Hardly had he spoken, and while he still watched his cousin lying white +with the light fading from his eyes, the fortress from end to end +became tumultuous. A gun roared, a din of shouting, the thud of flying +feet, the shriek of women, the cry of his soldiery swept up the slope +in wave upon wave of uproar. + +"An attack!" he cried. "And I am from my post!" + +"Peace!" said St Agapit, with a frown. "The God of battles is not +here." + +"Arnaud," came the hollow whisper out of the tumult, "I have more to +say. My voice goes. I pray you bend your head." + +"I came secretly," said Roussilac wildly. "I cannot stay. Father, +duty is calling me. My reputation, my position----" + +"Your family," said the priest, pointing sternly. + +The night air became a storm with the shout: "The Iroquois! The +Iroquois are upon us!" + +"Cousin!" whispered the dying man. + +"My position!" cried the commandant; and turning with the confession he +caught up his cloak, saying: "I will return. I will come back to you, +Jean-Marie. My country calls me." + +"His ambition!" murmured the lean priest, as the door swung back, and +the tumult rolled in like a raging sea flung upon a cave. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI. + +IRON AND STEEL. + +The fortress was invested upon three sides: up the precipitous westward +slope swarmed the Senacas and Cayugas; the fan-shaped body of the +Onondagas advanced from the east, where the ground was broken; eastward +and westerly on the valley side, where the attackers hoped to strike +the victorious blow, the confederate bands of the Mohawks and Oneidas +lay hidden, awaiting the signal which had been agreed upon. The river +occupied the line to the south, and between its banks and the enemy +ambushed in the valley an outlet was left in order that the French +might be given the opportunity of vacating their position. Once in +open country, they might be broken up into bands and hunted down. + +The attack from west and north had been arranged to draw the French +from the one point where the fortress was vulnerable. It appeared as +though the besieged were tumbling blindfold into the trap, which a +general of experience would have at once suspected. Every fighting-man +in the fortress assembled to hold the almost impregnable heights. In +the absence of the leader this mistake was pardonable. There the noise +of battle was terrific. The wild light of the bush fire beyond the +river flung its shadows over the grass hill and cast into detail +figures and flashing tomahawks. A storm of hissing arrows swept over +the rocks. The bronze-skinned warriors rushed up and climbed the +heights. The bravest of the Senacas, that hardy fighting race of the +highlands, were already within the fortress, tomahawking the gunners +with hideous yells. + +The man-of-war was useless. Boats were let down, and the sailors flung +ropes round the ends of the logs which supported the fire-raft, and +towed the flaming peril away. Then the clumsy ship blundered up +stream, only to find herself helplessly cut off from the enemy by the +sheer wall of rock. She drifted back, and the master gave the order +for the guns to be beached and dragged up the slope to strengthen the +resources of the besieged. + +"'Fore Heaven!" cried Van Vuren. "The natives win!" + +The Dutchmen had perforce returned to watch the progress of the +assault. They saw the Cayugas dealing blows against the summit, +repulsed, but never actually losing ground. Each assault found the +height invested more strongly by the overwhelming host. Similar +success attended the ascent of the Onondagas. The rival factions +swayed upon the distant summit, lit by the fire of the cannon. + +The Dutchmen hovered in uncertainty, until the opposition yielded and +the Indians began to burn the huts which looked down upon the river. +At this signal a shout went up from the valley, and the Mohawks and +Oneidas rushed out to complete the work. At the same time Van Vuren +gave the word, and the big men re-crossed the river, gained the level, +and joined the sachems and doctors who were dancing and screaming at +the foot of the hill. + +Abruptly a line of soldiers formed upon the crest to the roaring of +cannon, and these trained fighters bore down through the smoke, +sweeping away the opposition as wind carries the snow. Immediately +yells of dismay sounded above, where the Indians who had been trapped +were being put to the sword. The blind repulse had at length given way +to method. + +A report had passed about the fortress that Roussilac had been +assassinated, and the body deprived of its brains became thereupon +powerless to act. But Gaudriole came hopping from gun to gun, crying: +"Courage, my comrades! I have seen the commandant. He did but go down +to the chapel of Ste. Anne to confess his sins. See where he comes! +Long live our governor!" + +The soldiers caught up his cry and fought with new energy when they +beheld Roussilac's slight figure wrapped in a long cloak. He passed +deliberately from east to north, issuing his orders and rapidly +altering the entire nature of the fight. The besieged became the +attackers; the hunters became the hunted. Roussilac's pale face +restored confidence. His contemptuous coolness brought victory within +sight. Before setting the trap for the Cayugas and Senacas his martial +eye had lingered upon the silent valley. There he concentrated his +best fighters, and despatched an order to the ship, directing the +master to bring up the naval guns. The sailors were soon at their +work, dragging the light guns into position and training the muzzles +upon the suspected valley, while powder-monkeys ran up with charge and +ball, and the gunners arranged their port-fire. + +With the attack of the previously ambushed Mohawks, the battle for +possession may be said to have commenced. Skill, holding a position +which subsequent history proved to be practically impregnable, became +opposed by numbers blindly indifferent to death. + +The Dutchmen fled at that repulse when the natives about them had been +flung back almost to the forest. They halted upon the beach and +deliberated on the practicability of flight through the smoking country +which hemmed the opposite shore. It was then that Dutoit made the +discovery that two of his men were missing. + +"We cannot regain the bodies," said Van Vuren, when the announcement +was made. "The French mayhap have already discovered them, and thus +know that we have taken arms against them. Flight is now forced upon +us." + +Dawn was near when Hough reached the scene of action. The din of +battle had carried over the land, driving the birds and beasts +northward in fear, and he and his stout comrade had started out at +once. Scarce a mile had been traversed when Penfold's leg gave way; he +sent his companion on, and hobbled slowly along his track, hoping to be +in before the end. + +At a glance the Puritan perceived the flaw in the attack. + +"Why do ye waste your men against that wall?" he shouted at the chiefs. +"Bring every man round to the east. Follow me, warriors. Follow, we +shall conquer yet." + +He might as profitably have addressed the stones. He ran in among the +fighters, dealing blows with the flat of his sword, and pointing +through the shadows to the fierce conflict upon the edge of the valley. + +"There!" he shouted, trying to recall some scattered words of the +language. "There, where the sun rises!" + +At length he made himself clear, and a section of the fighters, more +cool-headed than the remainder, professed themselves willing to follow, +and some of the hot-headed chiefs, perceiving method in the +Englishman's madness, turned also calling back their men. + +Twice had the Mohawks broken through the front line and been repulsed +before reaching the cannon, which spouted its hail down the valley. A +barrier of French dead piled the space beside the artillery. Roussilac +strode to and fro, withdrawing men from points where they could ill be +spared that he might throw them upon the side where the lines wavered. +Here the flower of the fighting-men struggled. Laroche fought here +like the brave man he undoubtedly was, swearing fearfully, but never +ceasing from the skilful sword-play which freed many a brown warrior +from the burden of the fight. A charm seemed to protect his great +body, the arrows leaving him unscathed, the blows of the tomahawks +seeming to deflect as they descended, until the soldiers fought for the +pride of place at the side of the priest, whom they believed to be +under the special protection of the saints. + +"Infidels, unbelieving and unbaptised! Down, down!" shouted Laroche, +blinking the sweat from his eyes. + +Repeatedly the Iroquois turned the line at the weak spot which Nature +had overlooked in her plan of fortification, but Roussilac was prepared +always with a band waiting to stem the rush. This could not last. His +soldiers were thinning, and there seemed to be no limit to the numbers +of the Indians. They pressed up in horde upon horde, their shouts +cleaving the moist wind, their arrows inexhaustible, their courage +undiminished. Then the word came that the Cayugas and Senacas were +giving way upon the west with the manifest intention of strengthening +their allies. + +"Let them come," cried Roussilac loudly, for his men's benefit. "Only +send me as many soldiers as can be spared from that position." But to +himself he muttered: "The game is up," and he wrung his brain for a +_ruse de guerre_. + +"Send me a dozen men with a cannon yonder to work round and attack +these savages in the rear," he said to one of his captains, who had +been put out of the fight by a wound in the arm. "If they can but +raise sufficient noise they may appear as a relieving force. It +disheartens even a brute to fight between two foes." + +"We cannot spare the men, Excellency." + +"They must be spared," replied Roussilac. + +A messenger rushed up, breathless and triumphant. + +"Excellency, the Algonquins are coming to our aid in force," he panted. + +For the first time in many hours the commandant smiled. + +"You spoke truly," he said to the captain. "We cannot spare those men." + +He turned and recoiled with a shiver. St Agapit, a long, black figure, +stood beside him in the wet wreaths of the dawn. + +"Your cousin is dead," said the priest. "He died but half an hour ago, +with a curse upon his tongue. You have lost me that man's soul." + +He half lifted his hand and moved away, seeing nothing of the great +struggle, heeding the clamour not at all, because the sun was about to +rise and he had his Mass to say. + +While light was breaking over the cliffs in the east, where the +fishermen of Tadousac hid themselves throughout that night, Oskelano +brought his men clear of the forest and disposed them upon the plain. +The old man was no mean general. He sent out his spies, and when the +men returned with the information that the French were being crushed by +superior numbers he divided his force into three bands. The first he +sent like a wedge between the Onondagas and the force advancing from +the west under Hough's leadership; the second he flung to the north of +the Mohawks and Oneidas; and, having thus completely separated the +allied forces, he threw his third band upon the rear of the men who +were slowly carrying the position from the valley. + +The Cayugas and Senacas were beaten back to the river. The Onondagas, +attacked on two sides and at first mistaking foe for friend, were +shattered at a first charge and fled for the forest. The fighters in +the valley alone held their ground, until the light became strong; and +then Roussilac drew up his entire force and directed in person a charge +which hurled the stubborn Mohawks back upon the axes of the Algonquins +awaiting them upon the lower ground. The survivors fled and were +pursued by the northern tribe. The French flung themselves down +exhausted, while Laroche wiped his sword and streaming face, and panted +a benediction upon dead and wounded and living alike. + +Thus the Iroquois Confederacy received a shattering blow from which it +never recovered; and the land was made secure to France for a long two +hundred years. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII. + +OB AND AZURE. + +After that complete repulse of the Iroquois tribes the French found +themselves so weak as to be practically at the mercy of a foe. Another +resolute attack must have driven them from their position. But the +Iroquois bands were completely disorganised; the few English scattered +about the maritime provinces, including that remnant of Scots in the +east, who had settled Newfoundland and Nova Scotia only to see their +territories wrested from them, were entirely inadequate even in +combination to menace the supremacy of the House of Bourbon; and it may +be questioned whether, at that time, any Scotsman would have stood to +fight side by side with the English. Soon another ship would arrive +from Marseilles, bringing, not only provisions and ammunition, but a +reinforcement of men, prepared to till the ground as settlers should, +but far more ready to continue the French error of attempting to +colonise with the sword. On the heels of the discovery of two Dutch +bodies among the Indian slain, La Salle returned, and conveyed to +Roussilac the information that an English spy was escaping south. +Gaudriole also announced that Van Vuren and his company were bearing in +that same direction. Roussilac's hand was forced. If these men +escaped him the fortress might be called upon to resist, not only an +English, but possibly a Dutch invasion also. He sent out twenty men +immediately to cut off the Hollanders, leaving the garrison depleted to +no more than fifty men available for defence; and the commandant made +haste to reward Oskelano for his services as suitably as his resources +would permit, and sent him home, fearful lest the treacherous Algonquin +might discover, and take advantage of, his weakness. + +When La Salle stood before him, and announced that the English spy was +the guest of one Madame Labroquerie, a widow living with her daughter +in the country to the south, the commandant refused to betray himself, +but replied that he would accompany the priest and be a witness to the +hanging of the Englishman. At the same time, he considered, he might +keep the oath which he had sworn to his dead cousin. Having given the +order for a troop of men to attend upon his person, he abandoned the +subject which awoke in him unpleasant memories, and bowing haughtily to +La Salle--for he and the priest were in a manner rivals--congratulated +him upon his appointment to the governorship of Acadie, the +confirmation of which, signed by the Cardinal himself, had lately been +delivered by the hand of the master of the _St. Wenceslas_. + +"This fortress will be the weaker for your loss, Sir Priest," he said, +feigning a sorrow which he could not feel. "May I seek to know when +you propose to set forth to the undertaking of your new +responsibilities?" + +"If my work here be finished what time the _St. Wenceslas_ sails +homeward I shall depart with her," La Salle replied, flashing a +disdainful glance upon Roussilac. "But I have yet to rid this land of +its English vermin." + +With that implied scorn of the governor, and suggestion of his own +superiority, La Salle departed to make his preparations; and an hour +later a troop of horsemen rode forth, Roussilac at the head, and beside +him Gaudriole jesting for his chief's amusement; on the other side the +two priests--for Laroche accompanied his senior--and behind six +soldiers, riding two abreast on bright bay ponies, their weapons +flashing in the sunlight. + +There had been war in the grove. An angry scene passed between mother +and daughter when Madeleine returned after seeing her lover upon his +way. For the first time in her life the girl lost her sweet patience, +and returned word for word so hotly that Madame at length became +afraid, and backed away, yet muttering: + +"Men shall stay your pride, girl, if a weak woman may not." + +"They also shall find that a resolute mind is not quickly broken," +Madeleine returned. + +"The law against heresy is still in being," Madame threatened, made +still more bitter by the knowledge that her daughter and Geoffrey had +together outwitted her. "I have borne with you, because you are my +child. Our Lady punishes me for my lack of devotion. I had speech but +recently with a holy priest. We shall see, when that priest returns. +We shall see!" + +"Drive me from you with that bitter tongue, as you drove out +Jean-Marie," cried Madeleine, her fair throat swelling like a bird in +song. "So shall you die without son or daughter at your side, and none +but an Indian shall see you to your grave." + +At that Madame put up her hand with a superstitious gesture, and limped +away, her yellow face wrinkled with rage; nor did she speak again to +her daughter until the Indian servant entered the cabin to announce the +coming of a warlike band. Then she croaked at Madeleine: "'Tis the +holy priest. Know you not, girl, how those are punished who conspire +to aid an enemy of their country?" Then she hasted away to don the cap +and gown which she had kept against the coming of a change of fortune. + +There came a sound of voices, the troop rode into the grove, and +Madeleine, as she stood trembling at the door, was greeted by +Gaudriole, who bowed and grinned as he announced his Excellency the +Commandant to visit the Madame Labroquerie and the fair lady her +daughter. + +"I am Madeleine Labroquerie," stammered the girl, frightened for a +moment by the brave show of mounted men. + +"Cousin," cried a half-familiar voice, "hast put a friend and relative +out of memory?" + +Dazzled by the sunlight after the gloom of the cabin, Madeleine shaded +her eyes. She saw before her a tall man, sallow and dark, his hair +falling in snaky lines to his shoulders, the golden fleur-de-lys worked +upon his blue surcoat making his face the more sickly by comparison. +Before she could return his salutation he had dropped to his knee and +kissed her hand. + +"Years have passed since we parted, cousin," he said. "The present +finds me with position, and you with beauty. I knew not that you were +here until your brother told me." + +"Arnaud!" she exclaimed, giddy with amazement at finding the boy who +had been the autocrat of childhood's games grown into a man of power. +Then, because her heart was so tender to all that breathed, she forgot +the character of the man who was looking down upon her with increasing +wonder to find how the plain child with the tangle of flaming hair had +blossomed into this lovely creature, and asked quickly: +"Jean-Marie--what of him?" + +Roussilac was not a man to tell ill-news gently. Wasting neither words +nor sentiment, he replied: "Your brother died but recently of fever, +calling upon your name with his last breath." + +His final words were intended to show her that he had been by the sick +man's side until the end. + +Madeleine turned white and tottered. Then, as her strong heart +recovered, she said: + +"Let me call my mother. My father has long been dead. We have +remained poor, Arnaud," she added defiantly. "But if you have +ascended, we have at least not descended." + +"To what higher pinnacle can a woman wish to attain than that of +perfect beauty?" he replied gallantly; but he noticed that she left him +with a frown. + +"Had I but known that she had grown so fair!" he muttered. + +Gaudriole was grinning at his side. The dwarf put up his red hand and +showed his chief a dead butterfly, its bright plumage well-nigh worn +away, its wings crushed and wet. + +"Short-lived beauty, Excellency," he leered, with the jester's +privilege. "Yesterday shining in the sun. To-day!" He laughed +hoarsely and dropped the ruined insect. "'Tis a world of change and +contrast," he chuckled. "Mark this philosophy, my captain. When old +age sends me white hairs and a reverend aspect you shall perchance call +me beautiful, if you look not too closely at my hump; but when the +bloom of yonder beauteous lady turns to seed----" + +"Off, Bossu!" cried Roussilac angrily. "Learn to turn your jesting +with a better judgment, or your tongue shall be slit and your back +whipped." + +"My faith!" the dwarf chuckled. "I have no back. I am like the frog, +but shoulders and legs." + +Madame herself appeared in a fresh white cap and an antique gown. It +was not her way to be gracious, nor were her recollections of her +nephew's fidelity of the happiest; so she did but greet him coldly, +asking why he had now come since he had tarried so long. + +"Good aunt," came the reply, "I would have sought you earlier, had I +known you were in this land. I have not long held command, and my +hands have been filled in crushing the strength of the Iroquois. I +entreat you both to return with me now and take up your abode at the +fortress, not indeed as my guests, but as an honoured mother and +sister." + +"Pretty talk," sniffed Madame. "I said in the old days you would make +a courtier. So you, the governor of the land, knew nothing of this +home of your poor relations a paltry two days' journey beyond the +river. There is no man so blind as he who makes a living by that +infirmity. This girl tells me that my son is dead. Died he in the +faith of the Church?" + +"Surely," said Roussilac. "But tell me I pray, good aunt, is it true, +as this Indian says, that the English spy has already escaped?" + +"Yes, he has gone," cried Madeleine, flushing warmly. "He has gone, +Arnaud, to--to the west." + +Her deceit was so transparent that even Roussilac could not restrain a +smile. + +"And why, fair cousin," he asked, addressing her with marked deference, +"why should this Englishman seek the unknown west, where it is believed +none dwell save Indians? Would he not rather turn towards the south, +and seek New England and his own people?" + +"Indeed I know not why he should seek the west," Madeleine replied, +between tears and laughter. "But I do assure you he has gone in that +direction----" + +"Peace, girl," her mother cried. "The fool lies to you, Arnaud. She +is a heretic, shame though it be, and her master is the father of lies. +'Tis true the English spy escaped in the early morning, but he knows +not the land, and may yet be secured. I am surrounded all my life long +by wickedness," the bitter woman continued. "My husband was perverted +by the sin of science. Jean-Marie was but a knave. He left me here. +Madeleine is a heretic, and she has threatened to leave me also. Well, +I will come with you, Arnaud, but see that you give me a scented pillow +for my head and a cup of warm wine at evening. Stand not there, +nephew, like a wooden stock, but command one of yonder evil-faced +rogues to bring up a horse fitted for the age and dignity of the first +lady in this thrice-accursed land." + +An evil smile curved the thin line of Roussilac's mouth. His aunt had +indeed not changed; but she had yet to learn that he had advanced. He +turned to where the priests were talking loudly in the shade of the +grove, noting La Salle's anger at the failure of his mission, and a few +paces beyond his troopers jesting in the sun. Then he looked upon the +fair face of Madeleine and smiled again. + +"Tamalan," he called, dividing his attention between the soldier he was +addressing and his aunt, "prepare your pony for the use of the first +lady in this great colony of France--the lady Madeleine Labroquerie." + +He bowed slightly towards the silent girl. + +For one instant Madame appeared to stifle. Then she drew back her lips +and snarled at her nephew, yet without uttering a word. + +"This is not Normandy, Madame," said Roussilac calmly. "And you have +not here the boy whose cheeks you would smite when the angry fit was on +you. This is the New World, and I am the Representative of his most +sacred Majesty, King Louis the Thirteenth." + +Madame started forward, two passionate red spots upon her cheeks, her +bony hand uplifted; but Roussilac indicated the golden fleur-de-lys +upon his breast and said, in the quiet consciousness of power: +"Remember!" + +The little woman stood for a moment motionless, grinding her teeth, her +black eyes starting from a ghastly countenance, then flung herself back +into the cabin, tearing at her hair and cap in the madness of her +anger. Roussilac watched with the same quiet smile, and when she had +gone turned to Madeleine and said: + +"My aunt forgets that time may work a change." + +"Pardon her," murmured the girl. "This solitude has touched her brain." + +Then La Salle strode up with angry questionings: "Shall we tarry here +all the day, Sir Commandant, while the heretic escapes? Know you not +that New England swarms with Puritans, who, if they but hear of our +weakness, shall fill this land and compel us forth by their numbers?" + +"You speak truly, Sir Priest," Roussilac answered. "We do but waste +our time." + +Crossing to the men, he selected the five strongest ponies and the five +most trustworthy soldiers, and charged the latter to ride out, secure +the Englishman, and hang him out of hand. These men set forth +immediately, while Roussilac turned himself to the task of soothing La +Salle, and to the pleasure of flattering the fair lady his cousin. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII. + +THE EVERLASTING HILLS. + +After their escape from the dangerous region of the fortress on that +night of battle, Van Vuren and his band made towards the far-distant +country watered by the Hudson, travelling under the guidance of Pieter +von Donck across the unfrequented territory, over balsamic hills of +spruce, through swamps and thickets, and across a desert of dusty +stone, until they reached a range of green mountains which made an +immense backbone along the land. Here they halted, and the note of +argument was raised. Van Vuren had developed a sullen mood, induced by +jealousy of Von Donck, who had taken the office of leader upon himself, +and at this point he turned upon the sailor and a heated battle of +words ensued. The captain indicated the flat district spreading +westward, and confidently declared that the route lay there. His men +obediently turned to follow, with the exception of Von Donck, who, when +his argument failed, separated himself forthwith from the company. + +"Take then your inland path," he shouted at them angrily. "You shall +in due time come among the savage Adirondacks, where the Mohawks dwell +unconquered, and where all manner of wild beasts fill the fastnesses. +No white man has preceded you there. This way I smell the sea. Keep +your course, captain, if you will not be ruled by me. I am for New +Amsterdam and the hostel beside San Nicolas." + +"Pieter knows the land," urged Dutoit. + +"Go then with the stubborn fool," replied Van Vuren hotly. "Follow me, +my men. This way for the sea!" + +The rest of the company succumbed to discipline and followed their +leader, though with manifest unwillingness; while Von Donck gave them +over to their fate and travelled alone into the green hills. + +What befell Van Vuren and his company history relateth not. It is +certain that they were never taken by the French, because the party +which Roussilac had sent out returned in due course to the fortress, +and reported that they had failed to discover any trace of the +traitors. But at a later date there went a story about Hudson's river, +concerning a party of Dutchmen said to be haunting the spurs of the +Adirondacks, weather-beaten men, wrinkled and long-bearded, their feet +covered with scraps of hide, their clothes eked out by furs, +continually setting out upon a journey, but always returning to their +starting-point. Still later, after New Amsterdam had been conquered by +the English and had received the name of New York, mothers would often +frighten their errant children with the tale of the lost Dutchmen who +wandered about the north, their beards dragging on the stones and +tangling among the bush, watching the sun by day and the stars by +night, and sometimes separating as though in anger, but only to combine +again and renew the hopeless search. Probably Van Vuren and his men +were destroyed by the fierce Mohawks; possibly they fell a prey to the +animals which roamed in their thousands among the Adirondacks, or +perished of want after their ammunition became exhausted; the one fact +is certain that not one of them ever reached the sea-blown country of +the Manhattoes. + +While this fatal dissension took place Geoffrey was crossing the plains +upon the further side of the green mountains, only a short distance +ahead. He had made excellent progress, concealing himself cleverly +from bands of marauding Indians, guiding his feet by the constellations +at night, and searching by day for the tree-moss which delicately +furred the north side only of the hemlock boles; but there still +remained over two hundred miles of wild country between him and the +town of Boston. He tramped on, unheeding sore feet, feeling the spirit +of brave Madeleine at his side, averting the perils of night, guiding +his feet accurately southward. As time went on, and he reflected how +great was the distance he had already traversed, the joy of life became +so strong that he could have flung away his sword and dared the world +with bare hands. + +Two weeks had passed since that parting from his comrades; and on the +evening of the fourteenth day he broke from the bush and for some +moments stood bewildered at the scene before him, blinking his eyes, +and longing to step back into the greenwood shade. + +White masses of mountain glowed ahead, peaks and crags all glittering +in the sun like a huge cascade streaming down from the clouds; ranges +of pure crystal, polished like glass, and edged with rose-pink by the +colours of the western sky; snow-white gorges of milky quartz, and +silver cataracts flung in foam from the whiteness above to the green +below. + +"These," he said softly, with a thrill of old-world superstition, +"these must surely be the great crystal mountains where the Iroquois +believe that the gods dwell." + +He hurried on, his eyes watering because of the dazzling light +reflected from those crystal walls; and as he went he turned to lover's +thoughts, and determined that, after all, the sun glow upon the white +peaks was not one-half so lovely as the flush upon Madeleine's soft +cheek. Here before him was Nature's finest insentient handiwork. It +was glowing and full of music, but its loveliness lacked life, and its +warmth was borrowed from the sun. It was only beautiful as a part of +the environment of the life of the soul. How he longed for Madeleine +to stand at his side and behold those everlasting hills in splendour +and the sun swimming in red! And with that longing he half +unconsciously breathed the healthful text to which she had attuned her +happy soul, "It is life--glorious, everlasting life!" + +Vitality rose to its full height within Geoffrey's body; and when he +felt no more the weight of his heavy kit, he ran over the broken ground +and up the narrow gorge, until two white walls closed him gently into +the panting bosom of the crystal hills. + +"Here is the home of fairies," he exclaimed, when he stopped at a great +height, and looked upon three tiny lakes which made a trinity of +motionless mirrors decked by feathers of cloud, the water like white +wine brimming in great bowls of granite. + +Immediately a gentle voice was wafted through the air, "Here is the +home of fairies," and after a pause the information was repeated like +the warble of a weary bird, the last notes dying inaudible around the +cliffs. + +Geoffrey dared not speak again. The genius of the place was over him, +waiting to give a signal to the expectant choir. Footfalls preceded +the traveller, the echo of his own. The many-mouthed King of the +Mountains pattered before him, breathing the stranger a gentle welcome +to the district which he ruled. Geoffrey crept on tiptoe to the edge +of the nearest pool, until he could see the weedless rock-bottom and +the land-locked salmon lying near the surface, gently fanning their red +fins, and watching him with wondering eyes. Seating himself, the +traveller bathed his weary feet and watched the water swallows, darting +and splashing, snatching the fat flies which spotted the surface like +drops of rain, sucking them in and pushing out their little black noses +for more. + +The sun went down and a chill crept into the wind. Geoffrey left the +enchanted spot, and the salmon shooting like silver arrows through the +darkening pool, and, again ascending, entered a richly-wooded glen +through which a cascade ran in a white thread; and here, close to a +winding path beaten out by the feet of mountain sheep, he pitched his +camp and ate his frugal meal of dried meat, which he eked out by a few +early berries and some sweet roots of the wood althaea. + +The light went out from the long day as he sank into dreams of +Madeleine. He pictured her swaying among the scented grasses of the +lowlands, or breathing a prayer for his welfare while she awaited the +evening star in the faint blue of the sky. He saw her leaning from the +hill-top watching the southern line, and bounding joyously away when +she found the sky all clear. He imagined her lying asleep with her +mind awake for him; and he believed that in his sleep her sweet dreams +would cause his lips to open and his tongue to call her name. + +A rustling in the near bush recalled him to the present. He thought +the sound was occasioned by some restless bird, but when the +disturbance became more decided, he rose, alert, and, putting out a +hand for his bow, shrank back into a place of shelter. Hardly had he +done so when a thicket of willow shivered and parted. + +The watcher saw two savage eyes aglow like lamps, and as he sank to the +ground and remained motionless as a figure of stone, a great panther +slouched into the open, with its nose upon the ground. + +The creature passed, blowing up the dust as though following a fresh +scent. Geoffrey noticed with a thrill of relief that the ground it was +intent upon was not that which he had traversed. When the huge cat had +crawled into the bush, he drew out one of his few remaining arrows and +cautiously followed; but not more than twenty paces had he advanced +into the clinging bush when there came to him for the first time during +his wanderings the exclamation of a human voice. + +Geoffrey plunged forward recklessly until he saw a circular opening +such as Nature delights to make in her laying out of the densest +forest. The cataract formed the left; a bank of trees rose to the +right; opposite him a big man sat in the half light, holding a +smouldering pipe, his eyes fixed in terror upon the panther, which lay +upon its belly half a dozen yards away, growling and lashing its tail +in its savage cat's joy. The man was unarmed. He had left his pack +and weapons under a shelf of white rock which gleamed behind. + +Viner edged nearer, but as he stirred a twig snapped and the panther +looked round, its eyes full of fire and blood. At the same moment the +stout man discovered his rescuer and a flush of colour returned to his +bloodless cheeks. Keeping his eyes upon the enemy, he began to crawl +towards the rock, shouting as he went: "Drive at him, boy. Send a +shaft through his neck, and Pieter von Donck shall stand your friend +for life." + +The bolt, well-aimed by the boy's cool hands, sprang that instant into +the beast's shoulder. As it felt the sting of the barb, the panther +roared and leapt mightily into the bush, landing upon the exact spot +which Geoffrey had cleverly vacated in time to save his life. Again +Von Donck bellowed like a bull: + +"Let him have one such another, comrade. Then into the bush and dodge +him. I have powder here and ball." + +Geoffrey hurriedly slipped another arrow along the groove of his +cross-bow and secured the string. Quick as he was, the great cat was +quicker. It hurled itself upon the tree behind which its enemy had +taken shelter, and its iron claws wrenched off great flakes of bark. +Again Geoffrey saved himself by leaping back, but the panther was up at +the rebound and on him. For the third time Geoffrey dodged, and in +doing so released the string, and the bolt, by happy chance, pierced +the demon in the chest as it descended. The next instant Geoffrey was +felled to the moss. But this effort was the panther's last. An +explosion shook the bush, there came a villainous smell of saltpetre, a +whirl of smoke, and the mountain cat fell upon its side, quivered, and +lay dead. + +"A brave invention this powder," snorted Von Donck triumphantly out of +the smoke. "But methinks too costly save for an emergency." He broke +off and muttered into his beard: "A thousand devils! The boy is +English." + +"A strange meeting, friend," said Geoffrey, as he rose somewhat blindly +to his feet. + +"Adventure makes many an alliance," quoth the Dutchman. "Were you +black, or brown, or yellow man, I would take your hand and swear to +stand your friend. You have saved my life, boy. Nay, deny it not, and +at the further risk of your own. By my soul, the brute has clawed your +shoulder. This must be seen to. Come, lie you here, while I bring +water and wash the wound and bind it up as best I can. A pestilence +destroy these same unholy animals. They strike a man like lightning." + +"If I have saved your life, you have done as much for me," said +Geoffrey. "Let us divide the honours." + +"A hand-shake upon that," cried the hearty Dutchman. "We are enemies +by blood, boy. You have fought against my people before this night, +and are like, I doubt not, to do so again. The Puritans of +Massachusetts have their eyes upon our New Netherlands. You and I may +yet meet upon opposite sides in the battle; but may God forge a +thunderbolt for my destruction if I do not seek to preserve the life of +one who has shed his blood for me. I suspect, boy, you are no true +Englishman. I dare swear your father or mother came of a good Dutch +stock." + +"I am English born and bred," said Geoffrey. "I could wish you were +the same," he boldly added. + +"Out, jester!" said the big man as he went down to the cataract. "It +is your envy speaking. Black never made itself whiter by longing." + +The Dutchman returned with his hat half filled with water and attended +to the injuries of his new friend, with podgy hands which were but a +little less rough than the nature of the man who owned them. Every +protestation on the part of his patient he silenced by a growl. When +the slight flesh-wound had been bandaged, he replenished the fire to +keep other mountain cats at bay, and they sat together under the white +wall, Von Donck occupied in skinning the defunct panther, chatting +noisily the while. + +"Do you wonder that I speak your language when I have been brought up +to a better?" he observed as the soft night grew upon them. "A soldier +of fortune must needs pick up all he can, grains and chaff alike. Many +years past, before that yellow hair of yours had grown to trouble a +maiden's heart--Ah, that blush was good. Shall repeat the phrase. +Before that yellow hair had grown to win a Dutchman's heart--see how I +spare your blushes to hurt your pride--I served under Hendrick Hudson, +who called himself English, though plague me if I could ever tell what +was English in him save his oaths. I promise you he could ring an +English oath to drown the best of yours. To-morrow will tell you how I +sailed with him up the Mohican river which now bears his name. 'Tis a +happy day for you, young comrade. Your future wife and children shall +bless this day--when you and old Pieter met. Plague the lad! His face +is like a poppy in a corn-field. Shall stand together, young +yellow-head, till the end of this journey. I do not seek to learn your +business, but you shall know mine. I am going home, boy, back to San +Nicolas by the sea, and there shall grow a yet rounder belly, and tell +travellers' tales, and toss my neighbours' children upon my knee. We +shall part in New England, enemies if you will, but until we reach the +fields of the Puritans we stand together, and the Indians that burn you +shall burn me also." + +"How come you to be travelling alone?" asked Geoffrey. + +"When you reach my age, young whipster, you shall learn that questions +are like thistle-seed, tossed here and there, serving no better purpose +than the sowing of a fresh weed-crop. I ask no question, but I know +that you carry a despatch to your Puritans in the south. See how +shrewdly I have hit it. Until two days back I travelled with my +company, but when they chose the way which leads to destruction I left +them. They have gone to the devil, and I am for the sea. At this +present time I am for sleep. When the moon touches yonder ridge, wake +me and I will take my watch. This panther's family may be on the +prowl." + +"'Tis a fine skin," said Geoffrey, indicating the striped coat which +Von Donck was stretching along the rock. + +"Will look well upon my shoulders," said Pieter complacently. "'Tis +mine by hunter's right. Shall swagger about New Amsterdam in it and +shame the burgomaster. At nights will sit in the hostel and say how I +killed him with mine own hand. The folk shall not believe, but I shall +have the hunter's satisfaction of making a brave show. By San Nicolas, +the brute shall not die so easily when I come to tell the story." + +The garrulous old sailor made a bed of grass and moss, and prepared to +sleep. Suddenly he broke into a deep laugh, and lifted his hand to +indicate a crystal ridge towards which the moon was drawing. "See you +how yonder granite is shaped into a man's face?" he said. "And, as I +live to sin, a likeness of mine own. See there my crooked nose and +flabby forehead and my hanging lips? Behold my beauty, boy, and bear +in mind that Pieter von Donck and yourself are the first travellers in +these crystal mountains. Ah, Pieter von Donck! Pieter von Donck!" he +continued in a shout, lifting himself upon his elbow, and shaking his +fist at the massive face of granite. "You sleep well yonder, Piet von +Donck. May you sleep as soundly for ten thousand years. Now, boy, +remember me in your prayers, but see that you put me not before your +sweet maid. God forbid that you should put an ancient rogue before +her. Forget not to shake me by the shoulder when the moon snuffs the +nose of yonder old man of the mountains." + +He fell back and soon began to snore, while Geoffrey watched the stern +stone profile and the moon rolling serenely over the crystal heights; +and as he watched he drifted away into dreams. + +These aerial castles toppled and fell when there came to his ears from +the adjoining valley a disturbance, which might have been occasioned by +mountain gnomes beating the rock with hammers of iron. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV. + +ART-MAGIC. + +Throwing off his sleep with a deep breath so soon as Geoffrey touched +his shoulder, Von Donck stared up at the moon, and then upon the +equally pale face of the watchman, who knelt over him and exclaimed: +"Hear the sounds along yonder valley?" + +In a moment the Dutchman was on his feet, alert and listening. + +"So," he snorted, when the steady tap-tap of the fairy hammers reached +his ears. "We are first here by only a little. How is that shoulder, +young fighter? Too stiff to draw a bow, or cross a sword?" + +"What mean you?" asked Geoffrey. + +"Frenchmen are upon us. The knaves to ride o' night when honest folk +sleep! They have forgot that the blessed echo carries far beyond them. +Now 'tis for me to contrive some snare for your executioners." + +Geoffrey quaked at the ugly emphasis which the big man gave to his +words. A new feeling of security had come to him with the sealing of +his partnership with the stout Hollander; and it appeared as though his +dream of safety was to be dissipated before it had taken a concrete +form. + +"What else think you?" went on Pieter, with his snorting laugh. "Shall +Roussilac allow a spy to reach New England, there to make known his +weakness, without striking a blow for his capture? See you that +straight limb on yonder pine? I tell you that slim body of yours would +have swung there ere sunrise, had you not by good luck fallen in with +Pieter von Donck." + +"They shall never hang me," said Geoffrey defiantly. + +"Spoken like a Dutchman," said the sailor. "But now to work. I have +as little mind as you to die out of season, for my shrift shall be as +short as yours if yonder little men pull me down. Scatter the fire, +and remove all traces of our camping-place, while I pull at my pipe and +think. The soldiers have a hard climb before them yet." + +Von Donck screwed the pieces of his wooden pipe together, filled the +bowl, and taking a brand from the fire, removed to the edge of the +cataract. There he sat, puffing great clouds, his eyes settled upon +the ravine, his face stony in thought, while Geoffrey swept the fire +into the cataract and obliterated all traces of the recent struggle +with the wild cat. + +"Bring me my panther hide," called Von Donck, rising with leisurely +movements. "We shall win a bloodless victory, and enjoy a laugh to +boot. Yonder lies the man to fight for us." + +He pointed with the stem of his pipe into the middle of the moon. + +Refusing to divulge more of his plan, Von Donck threw the pelt across +his shoulder and strode into the bush. Geoffrey followed, and the two +men struggled on for upwards of a mile, until the ground went away +sharply and the cataract thundered far below through a neck of rock +scarcely more than four feet in width. Here Von Donck halted and +steadied his body upon the brink. + +"If I fail to make this jump, reclaim my body from yonder depths, and +say that I fell like a soldier," he jested. + +Crossing the chasm, they descended, letting themselves from rock to +rock, and running whenever a sheep walk became visible. As they +entered the ravine the noise over the hills became more definite. + +"How is it they have tracked me?" asked Geoffrey as they ran. + +"I have no breath for idle talk," gasped his comrade. "They bring with +them an Indian, one of the cursed Algonquins, who shall tell when even +a bird has hopped across a stone." + +The climb began, up the face of the hills to the region of the moon. +The crystal wall was nowhere precipitous. When the summit had been +attained, Von Donck flung himself between the mighty lips of the +granite face and gasped heavily. Some minutes elapsed before speech +returned to him. + +"I would as soon carry a man upon my back as this weight of flesh," he +growled. "By San Nicolas, I did never so sweat in my life." + +"This is open rock, without tree or shelter," said Geoffrey +wonderingly. "We could have made a better stand in the bush." + +"Hasten yonder," ordered Von Donck. "Bring me as much dry wood as you +can bear, and ask no question, or I shall heave you down the face of +this cliff, which it has well-nigh killed me to climb." + +When Geoffrey returned with a few dry pine sticks, Von Donck was +collecting some moist moss from the underpart of the rocks. The moon +stood above the granite nose of the colossal face, and by her light the +Dutchman drew an imaginary line from the twin projections, which became +invested by distance with an exact similitude of the human mouth, to a +hole in the rock some twelve yards away. Here he built a fire, placing +above the grass and dry sticks a pile of white moss. Then he sat down +and well-nigh choked with laughter. + +"Prepare to strike a spark," he whispered. "But let no smoke arise if +you would escape hanging. The troop shall carry away with them a tale +to make these crystal mountains feared for ever." + +"What plan is this?" said Geoffrey irritably. "We stand upon the most +exposed spot of these mountains, and do you propose to light a fire so +that all who are concerned may know where we may be found?" + +"Control that voice and temper," whispered Von Donck. "Every sound +carries over yon ravine. Come, sit near me, and watch as pretty a +piece of art-magic as brain of man ever devised. Show not yourself +above the great face, or we are undone, and drop no spark into that +fire if you love your life." + +Geoffrey crawled along the side of the face and lay flat beside the +Dutchman's knee. The latter proceeded: + +"The Indians have great fear of these mountains. I promise you yonder +Frenchmen are driving their guide at the point of the sword, and +feeling none too secure themselves at entering the devil's country. A +man who fights a good sword shall sweat when a bird screams o' night. +So soon as they show themselves the old man of the mountains shall lift +up his voice, and you shall find, boy, that his tongue is mightier than +our swords." + +When Von Donck had spoken a breath of wind swept the exposed ridge. As +it passed a faint groan arose from the rock, and passed, leaving them +staring at each other fearfully. + +"It was but the wind," Geoffrey muttered. + +"San Nicolas!" stammered the Dutchman. "This comes of playing with the +powers of darkness. 'Twas the groan of a lost spirit." + +"Stay!" whispered Geoffrey. "I thought that the sound proceeded from +yonder stone." + +His comrade regarded the round mass which had been indicated with +starting eyes, but when he saw nothing supernatural, crawled near and +examined it nervously, asking: + +"Think you some spirit is imprisoned within?" + +"See this hole?" exclaimed Geoffrey, pointing to a small aperture +visible at the base. "'Tis what they call a blow-stone, if I mistake +not. Here the wind enters and so makes the noise that we heard." + +"Soft," said Von Donck, vastly relieved. "Soft, or you spoil my plan." + +Setting his lips to the hole, Geoffrey sent his breath into the womb of +the rock. A subdued murmur beat upon the air and settled the matter +beyond dispute. Von Donck rocked himself to and fro, chafing his legs +with his podgy hands, scarlet with excitement. + +"A hundred thousand devils, but they shall run," he chuckled. "I had +purposed to use my own voice, but this is better far." + +The sound of other voices came in a murmur across the ravine. + +"To the fire," whispered the Dutchman. "Nurse the flame, and let it +not burst forth until I give the word." + +He scrambled up the side of the rock and looked over the giant's nose. +The opposite cliffs were bathed in moonlight, and the watcher saw two +men standing above the cataract. + +"Now, boy," he muttered deeply. "Let the fire burn, and when the +flames dart up choke them with the moss." + +Geoffrey complied with the mysterious command; but as he pressed the +moss down and a cloud of smoke ascended, a mighty bellowing shook the +air, and he started round to behold Von Donck lying flat along the +rock, his grotesque face and bulging cheeks pressed against the +blow-stone, his body heaving like a gigantic bellows as he pumped his +breath into the hole. + +"More fire," came a choking whisper. "A strong flame, then smoke as +before." + +The flames darted up and whipped the moonbeams, the smoke followed, and +again the bellowing shocked the night. Then Von Donck scrambled up, +and his triumphant voice came down: + +"They run! They run!" + +The trackers were fleeing wildly from the crystal hills. Had they not +seen fire and smoke belched up from the mouth of that terrible face of +granite, and heard the giant's awful roars of anger? Headlong they +went, mad with terror, leaving their ponies in the bush. + +"Here is a brave victory," snorted Von Donck; and he gave vent to his +delight by turning a caracole upon the forehead of the giant. + +"Now for New Netherlands and Hudson's River!" he chanted, drawing at an +imaginary cable as he danced along the great stone face. "'Tis scarce +a hundred miles down to the sea. We have but to keep clear of Indians, +and all shall be well. Yonder are ponies for us to ride, and, I doubt +not, bags of provisions hanging to the saddles. We may laugh at +pursuit, boy. The French shall not dare to return. Take now my hands +and let me see you make a holiday caper. Higher! San Nicolas, the boy +shall make a dancing-master. Ha, Pieter von Donck! Pieter von Donck! +'Tis as cunning an old rogue as ever wore shoe-leather!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXV. + +NOVA ANGLIA. + +Good fortune and fair weather smiled upon the two travellers during the +remainder of their journey, and not another notable adventure befell +them before they rode from the forest during the fall of day, and saw +the fenced fields of the Lincolnshire farmers stretching before them +down the Atlantic slope. Melancholy stumps of trees dotted the +prospect as far as the eye could travel; beyond, the thatched or wooden +roofs of small houses glowed in the strong light; and from the far +distance came the inspiring wash of the sea. + +Von Donck reined in his pony and fell from the saddle. "Dost now feel +at home?" he cried. + +Somewhat sadly Geoffrey shook his head. He was indeed grievously +disappointed to find New England so different from the old. He had +hoped to see neat hedgerows, compact farms, and sloping meadows, such +as he might have looked on in his native county of Berks. He had hoped +to see a wain creaking over the fields, to hear the crack of a whip and +the carter's cheery song. He saw nothing but poverty, small +beginnings, and the signs of a hard struggle for existence. Some men +were working in the distance. He could see the quick flash of their +axes and hear the solemn blows as steel bit the wood. Between dreary +lines of fencing, jagged stubs, patches of corn, showing yellow here +and there, springing from every cultivated foot of ground; beyond, some +acres of burnt ground, and those cold wooden houses with their enormous +chimneys, so altogether unlike the warm brickwork of Old England homes. + +"This is not Virginia?" he asked. + +"Virginia lies five hundred miles to the south, very far beyond +Hudson's River," replied Von Donck. "'Tis a fairer province than this, +and better settled, because older. Be not downcast, boy. Here thought +is free, and here a man may reap the full reward of his labours. You +shall find no tax, nor persecution, nor kingly oppression in this land. +Here the people rule for the people; and here you may worship God after +your own inclining, and dwell in peace all the days of your life." + +"It is a barren land," protested Viner. + +"What would you look for in the new world? That island of yours was +once a land of forest and swamp. The first man was put into the garden +to till it. Labour shall conquer here as elsewhere. Mark you the +richness of the soil and the purity of the air. Here you shall fear no +pestilence, and if your hands be not afraid to work you shall raise two +crops of corn in one season. Gold and silver there are none; but he +who owns an ox and has no corn may exchange with him who has corn but +wants for meat. In our settlement we use strings of wampum for +currency. A shell from the beach becomes gold when it shall buy a man +that which he lacks." + +The comrades drew back into the forest and waited for evening, because +Geoffrey would not advance alone, and Von Donck dared not risk his life +among the Puritans, who were at war with the people of New Netherlands. +They partook of their last meal together, and when the shadow of night +grew heavy upon the fields, Pieter rose and shook himself. + +"We have now come to the parting of our ways," he muttered. "You are +among your people. We will together cross yonder fields, and then you +shall wish me God-speed. The town of Boston lies upon your right hand. +I shall beat inland at the base of Connecticut, until I reach the bank +of Hudson's River, and there I am upon my own territory where no man +shall lead me. I shall ride beside the river until I come to the +little city of the Manhattoes, where William Kieft rules. San Nicolas! +How old Will the Testy shall stare and blow at his pipe when he sees +Pieter von Donck on the steps of his bowerie!" + +They set out upon the last stage along a trail between the whispering +corn. Von Donck had grown suddenly silent. He plucked at the panther +skin, snorting occasionally, and casting side glances at his companion, +who rode close to his side, intent upon the prospect of low houses and +broken bush. When Geoffrey at length leaned over with a warning to +point out the figure of a man, who was proceeding down a side path with +a dog at his heels, the old Dutchman replied by touching the shoulder +nearest him and saying: + +"Dost feel the smart of that wound yet?" + +"It is nothing," Geoffrey answered. "See you not that man advancing?" + +"The marks shall remain," went on Pieter solemnly. "The scar will be +there to remind you of a good friend in New Amsterdam. My lad, I shall +seek to hear of you. Each time I look on this skin I shall breathe a +wish for the happiness of the boy who saved my life in the crystal +hills. When you come to make your home in Virginia, send to Pieter von +Donck at the hostel by San Nicolas, and if he be alive, and not grown +too fat to walk, he will come out to meet you. Will not forget the old +rogue who tricked the French?" + +Geoffrey put out his hand and grasped the podgy fingers. "May I meet a +traitor's end if I forget my friend," he answered. "Had it not been +for you my dry body would now be swinging in the wind of the mountains. +I wish you well, Pieter; I shall ever wish you well. Now ride! You +would not have me fight for you against my own people." + +"There is no English blood in him," snorted Von Donck. "A Dutchman, I +say, a Dutchman to the ends of his hair." + +The dog was bounding towards the travellers, and the farmer put up his +hand and hailed them. + +"We are Englishmen," Geoffrey called back. + +"Now, by the sack of San Nicolas, out upon you," shouted Von Donck. "I +am no Englishman. I am a Hollander, fellow, Hollander from head to +heel." + +"Ride!" exclaimed Geoffrey, smiting his comrade's mount. "God be with +you, Pieter." + +"And you, boy." + +Von Donck lashed his pony and the nimble animal bounded off to the +west, while Geoffrey dismounted, and, holding the savage dog at bay +with his sword, advanced to meet the owner of the land. + +"Do not fear, friend," he said, as they drew together. "I am no spy, +but an Englishman from the north. He who rides yonder is a friendly +Dutchman who has accompanied me upon the way. I pray you tell me is my +Lord Baltimore within the town?" + +The settler, a tall man in a quaker hat and black cloak, which fell +from his neck almost to the ground, regarded the speaker with cold, +unfavouring eyes. + +"You know little of this country, young sir, if you believe that Lord +Baltimore governs here," he replied at length. "You stand within the +province of Massachusetts beside the town of Boston, and the lord you +seek rules over the province of Maryland and that country to the west +of the bay of Chesapeake." + +Geoffrey's heart sank at this chill reception, and he lowered his eyes +despondently before the stern gaze of the Puritan as he answered: + +"I come to pray for a ship and men to be sent against the French, who +hold the north. He who sent me, charging me to deliver this ring in +his name to Lord Baltimore, believes that his countrymen and mine will +not fail to help us in the time of need." + +"Put not your trust in Massachusetts," said the listener dourly. "We +have much ado to defend ourselves against the Mohicans and the pinch of +famine. We know not ourselves where to turn for aid, and your cry is +ours also. You have reached the valley of dry bones, young stranger." + +"The dry bones stood up in an exceeding great army," returned Geoffrey +boldly. + +"Even so. If it be God's will, we also shall stand up. What is the +name of him who sent you?" + +"Sir Thomas Iden." + +"Of county Kent?" + +"The same." + +"I have heard of that family as most loyal to the Crown. Arms, a +chevron between three close helmets, if my memory mistake not. I also +am from the south, driven out, like many a better man, by the hand of +persecution. Come now! I will lead you to the house of John Winthrop, +our governor." + +The town of Boston was then a mere village of distressful huts crowded +within a great palisade; the single street, which led to a quay of +closely-packed logs covered by stones with earth atop, was rough ground +over which the tyreless wheels of primitive carts jolted woefully. The +candle-light from a few windows shed a dreary gleam across the way, +where men closely muffled drifted along with a stern "Good-e'en." +There was neither laughter nor tavern-singing nor play-acting in that +cheerless town, no throwing of dice nor rattle of cups. The Puritan +mind was dominant; and the only sound of music that disturbed the +unhappy silence was the lugubrious droning of a psalm or sad-toned hymn. + +A lamp flickered near the entry, and beside the watchman, who kept the +light burning at the gate, stretched a board; and upon the board +appeared in short black letters the notice:-- + +"No person within this province, professing to believe in Jesus Christ, +shall be in any ways troubled, molested, or discountenanced for his or +her religion, or in the free exercise thereof." + +"See!" said the guide, without a smile. "Here we have liberty!" + +At the entrance to a low house near the end of the street they stopped, +and the guide knocked. After a long interval a shutter was pushed back +and a voice demanded to know who it was that knocked. + +"A stranger from the north to see the governor," said the guide. + +The voice grumbled and lessened gradually, still grumbling, until it +sounded more loudly and the door opened. An old man stood on the +threshold, a lighted candle in his hand, the thick grease running upon +his fingers. He looked from one to the other, and cried in a shrill +voice: "The governor is with his reverence. The stranger must wait." + +"I am content to wait," said Geoffrey. + +Hearing a sound, he looked back, and saw the man who had brought him so +far already receding in the gloom of the street. The porter bade him +enter, and when he had done so provided him with a seat, and there left +him for a good hour, at the end of which time he reappeared in darkness +and said shortly: "Come!" + +The room into which Geoffrey was ushered contained all the marks of +extreme poverty. The light came from one great log glowing in the big +fireplace, for the night was chill with the breath of the sea and a +sharp north wind. Two figures occupied this comfortless room, one on +either side of the fire, the older man attired in the simple gown and +bands of a minister of religion; the other, dark, with luminous eyes +and white forehead, leaned forward, the long fingers of his right hand +trifling with his wig. Both were well-known in their generation. The +layman was John Winthrop; the minister Roger Williams. + +"You are welcome to Boston, sir," said Winthrop, without rising, but +merely lifting his head in the firelight to scan the face of the +visitor. "Come you to our town by chance?" + +"I come from the far north to seek aid," said Geoffrey, with a boyish +pride which caused Williams to frown. + +"_Terra incognita_ indeed," he murmured. "A cold land where Popery is +rampant. How great is the distance, and how came you thence?" + +Geoffrey told his story and delivered his message. The two men watched +him intently, Winthrop always playing with his wig, Williams leaning +out with hands clasped over a massive Bible held upon his knee. When +Geoffrey had finished his tale, there was a moment of silence, broken +only by the spitting of the fire. Then the Puritans looked across the +hearth and smiled. + +"The poor man is the helper of the poor," murmured Williams. + +John Winthrop laughed bitterly. + +"When a poor man begs of me he has my all, and that I give to our poor +brethren in the north. They have my prayers. Young man," he went on, +rising and confronting the messenger, "you have nobly performed a noble +duty; but in coming to us you confront poverty indeed. Here night and +day we struggle for existence. I myself have gone to rest, knowing not +how to face the morrow. We have our wives and little ones to feed and +protect, and these are our first charge. Daily the cry goes out to us: +'We want.' Nightly we dread to hear the shout of 'Mohican invasion.' +We fight, not for fame nor for honour among nations, but for a foothold +upon this continent, where we are striving to plant a home for the +free, to the glory of God, and the shame of England who has cast us +out. Young man, you have done your duty." + +"And your help shall come from Heaven," murmured the divine deeply. + +"I shall proceed to Lord Baltimore. To him I was sent," said Geoffrey. + +"Go to him if you will, but the answer you shall there receive will be +that you have heard already," said Winthrop. "Virginia is in sore +straits, being unable to convey her tobacco crop to the Old World, +since there are no English ships to cross the seas." + +"Nevertheless I shall go," said Geoffrey. + +John Winthrop bowed his head. "You shall sleep under my roof this +night and accept what poor hospitality I have to offer. My friend and +servant shall minister to your needs." + +He made a slight movement of his hand to signify that the interview was +ended, and the messenger retired, sorely depressed at the manner of his +reception. The old man who had opened the door gave him food and +drink, asking no question and imparting no information; but continually +droning through his nose a hymn, or muttering in gloomy tones some sad +portion of the Scriptures. He was one of the most zealous of +Winthrop's company, all of whom were Nonconformists, but not +separatists. Indeed, they esteemed it an honour to call themselves +members of the English Church, and openly admitted that they had +emigrated in order that they might be divided from her corruptions, but +not from herself. For all his devotion, the old servant was not a +cheerful companion for a man who was already cast down in mind, and +Geoffrey was glad to be rid of him and alone in a cold, bare room, +which was as sad in all its details as the men who occupied the town. + +It was long before sleep came to the traveller. He had become so +accustomed to the open air that the atmosphere of his room stifled him. +When at last he succeeded in finding unconsciousness the boom of the +sea shook the house and occupied his brain. + +Morning came, and with it a heavy tramp of feet. A rough hand struck +the door, and the sleeper awakened with a start, to behold at his side +three men, cloaked and stern, the foremost holding a scrap of paper, to +which was affixed a red official seal. + +"Sir stranger, surrender yourself," he said. + +"What means this?" exclaimed Geoffrey. "I am an Englishman in a colony +of the English." + +"The charge against you is that of treason," replied the stern Puritan. + +"Treason!" repeated the young man; and rose dumbfounded. + +"It is suspected that you are a spy, in the employ of our enemies the +Dutch." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI. + +STIGMA. + +Thus Geoffrey became a prisoner among his own people, owing to the +friendliness of Von Donck, the honest Dutchman having failed to reckon +with the intense suspicion of the Puritan mind. When the manner of his +guest's arrival had been explained to John Winthrop, that pious +governor raised his eyebrows in astonishment, and did not hesitate to +give instructions for the new-comer to be held in close confinement, +pending an inquiry into the movements of the Dutch. While this +investigation was being pursued, justly and in good order as the +governor directed, or, in other words, with extreme slowness, many +notable events occurred in the disordered country of the north. + +The _St. Wenceslas_ had slipped from her moorings and drifted down the +St. Lawrence, bearing La Salle towards Acadie, and certain despatches +which were destined for the chief minister of France. Unwillingly +Roussilac had been compelled to record the services rendered to Church +and State by the proud departing priest. + +"You have well served yourself, Sir Commandant," La Salle had said, +after insisting upon his right to peruse the detailed history of the +Iroquois defeat, which contained no word of reference to the assistance +rendered by the Algonquins. "And now, by Heaven, you shall serve me." +And Roussilac, for all his ill will, was not strong enough to dare +resist the priest. + +There yet remained in that district the Kentish knight, old Penfold, +and the Puritan; and when the man of Kent came to learn of La Salle's +departure, he left his solitary cave, and buckled on his sword, and +returned to action, though the dream of his life had vanished. His +younger brother, the fool of the family, who from boyhood had spent his +days in idleness, trolling for pike or chasing with his dogs, would +continue to occupy the old mansion which the elder had abandoned, and +leave it, as he had been empowered to do failing news from the New +World, to his son, when the days of fishing and the chase should be +accomplished. + +The knight came to his home beside the lost waters, and his wife, who +had visited him each day with food in the lonely cave, received him +with her proud silence and stood to hear his will. She it was who had +told him of the sailing of the ship and the going of La Salle. + +"Let us also travel to this land of Acadie," the knight said. "My +Richard haunts me with reproaches. I go to make ready our canoe for +the long journey. My mind shall find no rest till I have avenged our +son." + +He went out and built a fire upon the beach, and while the lumps of +pitch, prepared from native bitumen mixed with pine resin, were +melting, he peeled soft sheets of bark from the snowy birch trees and +patched the canoe, caulking every seam with pitch. About the time of +the evening shadow his work was done; but as he was returning to his +home a voice called, and the Puritan hastened to his side. + +"Welcome, friend," said the knight. "How fares it with you and your +brave comrade?" + +"We suffer who sojourn in Mesech," said Hough. "Old Penfold lies +grievously sick of a fever." + +"Dwell you far away?" the knight asked. + +"Nigh upon two miles by land and water. We have returned to the cave +which we occupied before our taking of the Dutch ship." + +"My wife shall prepare a medicine. She is well skilled in the arts of +healing," said the other. "You shall bring us to your cave with all +speed." + +"The disease has already taken hold upon his mind," said Hough. "One +time he is holding his mother's gown, old man though he be, and +wandering in water-meadows to pluck long purples and clovers, muttering +as he picks at his blanket. 'Here is trefoil, good for cattle, but +noisome to witches.' Another time he reaches for his sword, and +swears--the Lord forgive him--at the weakness which holds him down. +'The French are upon us, comrades,' he calls. 'Let me not lie like an +old dame with swollen legs.' Then he falls a-crying, and shouts, +'England! England!' Methinks if his mind were healed he would stand +up again." + +Mary Iden being summoned, and having made her preparations, the three +set forth and came to the cave, which the adventurers had hoped to +exchange for the Dutch vessel, then lying fathoms deep beneath the +cliffs of Tadousac. There they found Penfold stretched along a heap of +grass, babbling incessantly at the cold walls and the shadows. When +the figures darkened the entrance, he screamed at them and sprang up, +only to fall back upon the rude bed, a fever-held body agitated by +stertorous breath. + +"Build me here two fires," said the quiet woman, as she passed to the +sick man's side. + +"Witch!" shrieked Penfold. "Flower! Woodfield! Comrades, where are +ye? Save me now from sorcery. Hough! Go bring the villagers, and bid +them fling this hag into the Thames and pelt her with stones when she +rises. To me, comrades! Leave not your old captain to perish by +witchcraft." + +"Canst heal him from this madness?" muttered Hough. "Myself I dared +not let his blood, fearing lest I might do that which should hasten his +end." + +"Our people let no blood," came the answer. "We bring great heat into +the body, so that the evil spirit shall come forth to seek water. Then +we strengthen the body, so that it may be able to resist his return." + +Already Penfold ceased to struggle beneath her soothing hands. The +fires blazed fiercely, the smoke and hot vapours being drawn upwards +into the natural chimneys. Obeying instructions, the men placed their +sick comrade between these fires and covered him closely, while the +skilful healer moistened his brow and lips with water in which she had +steeped the young pink bark of the bitter willow, thus wringing the +fever out of his body like water from a sponge. + +"I am saving the old man," she whispered in a confident voice. + +At the end of another hour the limp rag of humanity was steeped in +sleep. By then the night was strong and the stars little orbs in +splendour among the clouds. The breathing which the men heard when +Mary Iden rose from her knees might have been that of a little child. + +"The evil spirit has been driven forth to find water. Lift the man +quickly; for the foul creature travels faster than the moonlight." + +Obedient to superior knowledge, the men reconveyed the sleeper to the +grass bed, and there the healer roused him to administer a decoction of +bruised herbs: serrated calamintha, the perfoliate eupator, later more +popularly known as the fever-wort of North America, and the white-rayed +pyrethrum, which lifted its bitter bloom upon the heights. The sick +man gasped as he swallowed the powerful tonic, and sank back into +untroubled rest. + +Presently the knight and his wife departed, and Hough accompanied them +upon the first stage of their return journey; and when they reached the +lake-side, where the canoe sprawled along the shingle, the knight +acquainted his fellow-countryman with his plan of departure. Hough +listened, gazing dimly over the scintillating surface, where a silver +ribbon of moonlight led away to the Isle of Dreams. + +"Where lies that land whither you go?" he asked at length. + +"In the far east where Sebastian Cabot first touched," the Kentishman +replied. "There I may sight the great ocean, which we islanders love, +and scent the good brine and watch for an English sail." + +"Here there is nothing we may do," said Hough, removing his eyes from +the dreamy lake. "There surely we may look for the ship which Lord +Baltimore shall send when Viner comes down to Virginia. I too would be +near the sea and smell liberty." + +With that they parted, and Hough returned to his hole among the rocks +with visions of the sea. Within that cave, where Penfold slept during +his guardian's absence, the fires darted, tincturing with red the +silver of the moonbeams against the sable wall of cliff. Between the +granite and the forest of pines a stream of moonlight spread like a +glacier. A figure stole from the black belt, stepped cautiously into +the white road, and waded, as it were, through the rippling beams. It +was Onawa, who had watched the two men and her sister making west; she +knew that one of the men would return after a little interval; and she +understood that the work which she had undertaken must be done quickly. + +No croaking bird aroused Penfold from his sleep to warn him of the +she-wolf. It was one of those ironies which run through life that one +sister should have cast the sick man into healthy slumber in order that +the other might stab him as he lay. + +A cloud of blood-sucking insects trumpeted around Onawa. Their thin +noise seemed to her a tumult, and she stopped and looked back along the +cold white stream. A lean wolf was slinking in her direction, his +muzzle snuffling the dust. She shivered when she remembered that the +murderess was doomed to become a werewolf after death to prowl about +the scene of her former sin. The creature howled. The pale girl +started and ran into the cave. + +Her belief remained constant that she might still win the love of La +Salle by destroying his enemies. She knew that he had gained renown by +her betrayal to him of the English settlement. Now he had gone in the +great ship to Acadie. She was about to follow, having neither home nor +people, being indeed hunted for her life; but first she might destroy +another of his enemies. Then she could learn to say: "I have killed +the old Englishman who stirred up my people to attack yours." And she +thought that he might welcome her at last for the sake of her good +deeds. + +A frightened howl broke upon the night. The wolf, disturbed by some +enemy of its species, was hurrying for cover. The crisp snapping of +twigs, succeeded by a rattling of small stones, were caused, not by the +pads of the black loup-garou, but by a body weightier and less +cowardly. These sounds were deadened by the walls of rock, and Onawa +did not hear them. Swiftly she drew away the coverings from the +white-faced sleeper, and old Penfold smiled innocently at her in his +drugged sleep. Onawa drew in her breath, unsheathed her knife, and +felt its point; then leaned back, measuring the distance by the faint +glow, and her arm went up to strike. That next moment she screamed +with terror, turned, struck wildly at the air, and was carried back to +the granite floor with Hough's iron fingers driven round her throat. + +Step by step the grim Puritan dragged the girl back to the mouth of the +cave, and there pinned her to the rock with one arm, while reaching +with the other to the corner, where he had piled a rope taken from the +deck of the privateer. He bound her hand and foot; and thus helpless +she stared up, and read her death upon his face. + +For over an hour Hough paced the floor of the cave, listening to his +captain's gentle breathing, and recalling the violent death of +Athaliah, slain by order of Jehoiada, and the fate of Jezebel, cast +from an upper window at the command of Jehu; for such a man as the +Puritan regulated all the actions of his life by the light revealed to +him from the Bible. There was, he reasoned, the highest authority to +justify the act which he contemplated; only the manhood in him recoiled +from the slaying of a woman. At length his mind became fixed. He bent +and drew together the scarlet embers of the fire. + +Onawa made no sign of terror, and no appeal for mercy; but her eyes +followed every movement of her stern captor, as she sought to learn her +sentence without betraying her fear. + +"The witch is fair," the Puritan muttered, standing over and regarding +her fawn-coloured skin, her even features, and large dark eyes. "A +woman takes pride in her beauty. May the Lord punish me if I act now +unjustly and for vengeance alone." + +He pushed a stick into the fire and watched it grow red, then turned +sharply upon his victim. The girl's eyes flashed defiance when they +met his. + +"Behold!" he exclaimed, drawing a thin hand across his terrible face, +upon which the Court of Star Chamber had written its unjust judgment. +The girl saw the slit nostrils, the cropped ears, the branded cheeks, +and the scarred forehead. Her tongue became loosened at that sight, +and she prayed for instant death, because she knew it was vain to plead +for mercy. + +Outside the cave the long black wolf, which if native testimony were +accepted, contained the soul of some sorcerer, or of some vile man who +had slain his friend, crept back to search for scraps of food. As a +cloud drifted over the moon the brute dropped a bone which it had +snatched, and scurried away like a human thief into the shadows, +terrified by a wild scream from within the granite cave. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + +REVELATION. + +Had Madame Labroquerie continued firm in her resolve never to approach +the fortress while her nephew ruled, all might have been well; but +unfortunately for her daughter, and, as it was to prove, for herself, +the bitter little woman permitted her longing to enter again into the +affairs of the world to prevail over her hatred for the commandant, and +so suffered herself to be brought to the citadel, railing savagely +throughout the journey. Before a week had passed she revealed herself +fully as an unnatural mother and an implacable foe. Yet, to do justice +to even a worker of evil, it must be admitted that Madeleine, with all +her sweetness, was a sore trial to a fanatical Catholic and bigoted +patriot, for she refused to be ashamed of her heresy, and was never +weary of singing the praise of her English lover. + +Left to themselves, neither Laroche, now the head of the Church in that +district, nor Roussilac would have taken action against the lovely +sinner; but Madame, in one of her fits of ungovernable anger, publicly +preferred two charges against her daughter, accusing her of heresy and +treason, and calling upon the Church to punish her for the one offence +and the State to exact a penalty for the other. + +These were grave indictments, but both priest and layman closed their +ears, the former not wishing to be troubled by unpleasant duties, the +latter hanging back, not on account of the tie of relationship, but +because of Madeleine's beauty. But when Madame, in another fit of +fury, openly denounced the commandant before D'Archand, who for the +second time had arrived at that coast, as a Lutheran at heart, and a +protector of the enemies of the Church, he was driven to act for the +sake of his ambition. So Madeleine was arrested and confined in a +small stone hut high upon the cliff, and before her door a sentry paced +both by day and night, while Laroche, with many deep grumblings, was +compelled to undertake the uncongenial task of saving the fair girl's +soul. + +To the credit of the priest, be it said that he was charitable. He +believed Madeleine had been perverted from the right way by some spell +of witchcraft, and this belief was strengthened by the fact that, when +he adjured the girl by the tears of the Saviour to weep, she merely +laughed at him. It was notorious that a guilty witch was unable to +shed tears. Accordingly Laroche attended himself to the obvious duty +of exorcising the evil spirit which had taken up its abode in her; but, +in spite of all his efforts, the girl remained as wickedly obstinate as +before. + +"The Church acts towards her children with wondrous love, and because +of that love may chasten," the abbe preached. "'Tis the duty of the +faithful within the fold to bring in the wandering sheep, either by +suasion or by force. Being bewitched, my daughter, you stand in great +peril, and we, by the powers entrusted unto us, may remove that danger, +when reasoning fails, by bodily torment. Be converted, and your soul +shall live. Remain in your unbelief, and punishment shall follow, +because a living heretic is a danger to the world and a dishonour to +the holy saints." + +Even such sound doctrine as this failed to move the heart of Madeleine, +and each day Laroche grumbled louder at his failure, and Roussilac +shrank yet more from bringing his cousin to trial, and Madame became +more stinging in speech and more furious in her awful passions, because +of the suffering of her mind during lucid moments, when she could see +herself in sunny Normandy once more young and sane. Her hatred for +Roussilac increased, until she would spit and snarl at him when he +passed, and scream: "Infidel! This shall be known in France. Power +shall fall from you, and the people shall curse your name." And when +the men who had been sent after Geoffrey returned afoot with their tale +of failure, Madame Labroquerie made it known from the ship to the +citadel that it was the commandant who had secured the spy's safety for +the love of his heretic cousin. + +Coward as he was in many ways, Roussilac at length saw that he must act +or be dishonoured; he must either release Madeleine or bring her to +trial for treason. The former alternative was impossible, because the +girl was an ecclesiastical prisoner. The lightest sentence he could +pass for treason was banishment, and he could not endure the prospect +of losing Madeleine. Besides, when he had sentenced her, she still +remained to be judged by the clerical court. It needed a wiser brain +than Roussilac's to solve so tangled a problem. Nevertheless, he +resolved to attempt it. After some speech with Laroche, who was +heartily weary of the whole business, the commandant passed from the +church of Ste. Mary, after the hour of vespers, and ascended the +winding path which led towards the hut where the impenitent was +imprisoned. The sentry saluted as the governor approached, then +resumed his march along the brown scar which the constant tread had +made. + +"Withdraw yonder," Roussilac ordered. + +A happy voice broke out, as he put up his hand to the door: + +"There is the sun upon the side of the wall. So it is already evening. +Time flies as fast in prison as elsewhere. I pray you, sun, shine upon +Geoffrey rather than on me!" + +Cribbed and confined as the girl was, she steadily refused to be cast +down, because she was assured that life had far better things in store. +Her lover was pursued, but then she knew he would escape. Her body +might be held in prison, but her spirit was free, flying over forest +and hill, and singing like a lark against the clouds. + +Her note changed when Roussilac flung open the door and stood before +her in a flood of light. + +"Cousin," Madeleine said coldly. "You break upon me suddenly. I had +better company before you came. Why do you drive my friends away?" + +The commandant closed the door and stepped forward, his sallow face +working. + +"You are alone," he said. "None dare visit you without permission." + +"I am never alone," she declared. "My friends left me when you +entered; but they shall return when you depart." + +"Am not I a friend? Nay, more--I am a relation," began Roussilac; but +she checked him with the reproof: "I have no family now that Jean-Marie +is dead." + +"Your mother," he reminded her. + +"She has delivered me into the power of the Church." + +"Because it is best for you. I would care for your body, Madeleine, as +your mother cares for your soul. Cousin, think not unkindly of me. I +would release you; but what power have I to remove the judgment of the +Abbe Laroche? He has sentenced you to close confinement, until----" + +"My lover returns to release me," she finished, and backed from him +with a laugh. + +Roussilac clenched his fingers tightly, and jealousy venomed the words +which then left his lips: + +"Foolish girl, would you rouse all the evil in me? Bear with me, +cousin," he went on quickly. "It is not in me to endure patiently. +Since that day when I stood before you in the grove I have not known +the meaning of peace. My nights have been long, my days dark, my +position unprofitable----" + +Again she interrupted him, to simplify what she knew must follow: + +"Because you think that you love me." + +He stepped forward to seize her hands; but she drew back and steadied +herself against the wall. + +"I do love you, sweet cousin." + +"You do not love me. Need I give you the lie when your own tongue +gives it you? Is it love when the nights become long, and the day +dark, and position brings no pleasure? Arnaud, I love, and am held in +prison; but my nights are short, my days warm, and my position is a +happiness. Believe you that love, however unrequited, takes away from +life? I tell you it adds, it enriches, it beautifies. It is a crown +which makes a humble man a king, and the halo which makes the +singing-girl a saint. Love gives a man strength to use his power, to +defy superstition and false religion, to snap his fingers in the face +of a fat priest who believes that a strong will may be bent and broken +by holding the body in bondage. Had I my heart to offer I would scorn +your cowardly love." + +He had faced her while she spoke, but when she stopped he turned, and, +feeling the sting of her eyes, savagely pulled at the cloak which had +drifted from his shoulders. + +"My mother has sent you," said Madeleine. + +"She and I are bitter enemies," came the sullen answer. "I have but +borne with her for your sake. She seeks to stir up mischief all the +day long." He turned abruptly. "Have you no kind word for me, little +cousin?" + +He looked worn and old, and the girl pitied him; but she was too honest +to deceive by fair speech. + +"You brought me to this place against my will," she reminded him. "I +was happy in our cabin beyond the river. You have played into the +hands of my mother, who desires to see me punished because I have +abjured her faith. Would you have brought me here had you found the +plain country maid you had looked to see?" + +"I swore to your brother to protect you." + +"Do not recall that death scene, I pray you," she said firmly. "If the +spirit of Jean-Marie looks down upon us now, he finds you--protecting +me!" + +Roussilac winced as that shot struck him. "Blame me not," he said more +submissively. "Were you a civil prisoner only, I would open this door, +and you should go as free as air. My purpose in coming to you is to +urge you to free yourself." + +"Never at the price demanded. Arnaud, I put your courage to the test. +I trow that the man who loves a woman will for her sake perform what +she may demand, even though he lose position for it. Open the door, +and lead me to Father Laroche, and say to him: 'Father, I have taken it +upon myself to release your prisoner, since it shames me to see flesh +and blood of mine confined against her will in the fortress over which +I rule.' Do so, Arnaud, and I shall believe in you." + +"It is madness to ask it," said Roussilac loudly. + +"Let us have the truth. You dare not." + +"It is so," he confessed. "I dare not set myself against the Church, +which has the power to consign a man's soul to hell." + +Madeleine smiled contemptuously. + +"If you would search your heart and read truly what there you find, I +should hear a different answer. You do not fear Father Laroche. He +does not wish to hold me here. Rather would he cast me from his mind, +that he might have more time to spend at the tavern and his brawls. I +will tell you what you fear: your actions are watched, your words +criticised. If you let me free, it would be rumoured that you were +false to the faith. That rumour would be wafted across seas, and your +enemies at home would see to it that you were recalled and relegated to +the obscurity from which you have arisen. You would rather treat your +cousin as a courtesan than abate one fragment of the pitiful power +which shall some day fall from your body like a rag. Now, my +commandant, are you answered?" + +Roussilac said not a word when he saw the scorn in those violet eyes. +He merely put out his hand, and opened the door, muttering, as though +to himself: "That pride shall break when she knows." + +"Know?" cried Madeleine. "What should I know?" + +He looked at her savagely, feeling that it was in him to make her +suffer. + +"That your lover is hanged at my command." + +He closed the door quickly and fastened it, half hoping, half dreading, +to hear the scream of anguish which he believed must follow. But there +came to him as he waited a peal of joyous laughter, and the happy words: + +"Geoffrey, Geoffrey! would that you could hear that! Dead! Why, my +love, you are full of life. Were you to die, which God indeed forbids, +your dear spirit would fly at once to me. Dead! Have I not seen you +in my dreams? Do not I see you now walking within sight of the New +England fields? Oh, Geoffrey! Near--how near! Who is that great man +riding beside you, a panther skin across his shoulder? How noisily he +talks ... and now leans over, and pats you on the arm. Ah, gone--gone! +And he would have me think that you are hanged!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + +BODY AND MIND. + +Roussilac strode towards the river, and in that hour found it in his +heart to envy the meanest settler in the land. Like many a man who has +risen from the ranks, he found himself destitute of friends. He had +cut himself off from his own relations, lest they should hinder his +ascent, and none had come to take their place; the captains of noble +birth, his official equals, having refused to receive into friendship +the son of a Normandy farmer. The home government was but using what +military talents he possessed to their advantage; and when his services +had been rendered, he would be cast aside by the proud priest who ruled +the destinies of France, and another chosen in his stead. + +"Courage!" he muttered. "'Tis but imagination which makes a weakling +of me. I will to D'Archand, and inquire of him whether or no my name +be yet in favour. Then to stand up like a man, and sweep away my +enemies, let them be priests, relations, or demons." + +D'Archand was idling upon deck, but at a word from the commandant +entered his curtained cabin and produced a flask of Burgundy as an aid +to conversation. First Roussilac sought to hear more particularly the +news of the world, and induced the master to expatiate upon the +revolution of the Scottish Covenanters, the struggle of Charles for +money and ships, the resolute stand of John Pym for just law, the +prosperity of France under Richelieu, and the breaking of the short +treaty between that country and Holland. D'Archand warmed to his +discourse under the influence of the wine and a thrill of patriotism, +as he concluded: "I have but recently crossed the high seas without +sighting a hostile vessel. The Dutch privateers have gone home empty. +The English coffers are bare. France now holds the world. I drink to +the Cardinal and our King." + +Abstractedly Roussilac lifted his glass. When the master leaned over +and emptied the flask between them, the commandant observed, with an +assumption of indifference: "Didst hear any word of praise for my work +in this land?" + +"My stay was short," D'Archand answered. "I heard no talk of you, +commandant--at least, not upon the streets, and to be spoken of in the +street is the only fame, I take it. But there were rumours afloat +regarding the Abbe La Salle." + +"Perdition!" muttered Roussilac. "Shall these priests never confine +themselves to their own affairs?" + +"Your princes of the Church are statesmen now rather than priests," +said the master. "The Abbe La Salle comes of a renowned family. 'Twas +said that he is wasted in this colony. I also heard it said--accept +the rumour as you will--that his Holiness has set a cross against his +name." + +"What means that?" asked the commandant hastily. + +"Urbano the Eighth, who, I may tell you, has recently bestowed the +title of Eminence upon his Cardinals, having suitably enriched his +family and acquired the Duchy of Urbino, now seeks strong men, priests +who are fighters rather than scholars, to aid him in the execution of +his plans, and he who has the cross set against his name may be assured +of sudden promotion. A canon of Notre Dame, who is much in favour with +Cardinal Richelieu, informed me that La Salle may immediately be +recalled. His Holiness will raise a parish priest to the cardinalate, +through the grades of canon, dean, and bishop, in a month or less, +according to his necessity for that man's help." + +"The _St. Wenceslas_ now bears for home with my despatches," said +Roussilac moodily. "I have mentioned the abbe as instrumental in +holding heretics at bay." + +"His Holiness loves a fighter," muttered D'Archand significantly, as he +opened another flask of Burgundy. + +A light glimmered here and there when Roussilac made his way homeward, +and the murmur of the forest brushed his ears as he passed. The news +of another man's advancement hurt his selfish nature as though it were +a premonition of his own failure. He hesitated where the path split, +then hastened to his house, entered, and immediately found himself in +the presence of his aunt, who awaited his coming, knitting her fingers +in the lamplight. + +"So!" she snapped, her little face hard and wrinkled like a sour apple. +"We have now open treachery at headquarters. Treachery against Church +and State. You, the representative of the King, the upholder of the +faith! You shall be stripped of your power and be disgraced. And I +will walk a hundred miles barefoot, if there be need, to see sentence +executed upon you." + +Her attack was ill-timed. The commandant was then in no mood to bear +with a mutinous subject, though she had been his own mother. + +"Out of my sight," he said fiercely. "Out, I say. Madame, my +forbearance is at an end, and I will be obeyed. Would you have me +forget that you are a woman and a relative?" + +"Since you have forgot your duty to God and the King, forget that +also," screamed the little woman. "Seducer, what have you done with my +daughter? Where have you hidden her? Abductor! You shall learn what +it means to defy Holy Church. Tell me, where have you taken her?" + +Roussilac's anger cooled at that, and he lowered his voice as he +answered: "I left my cousin not three hours ago in the place where she +is confined as an impenitent by the judgment of the Abbe Laroche. +There you shall find her." + +"Arnaud," shrieked Madame, "deceive your men, cheat a priest, you may, +but you shall not so prevail upon me. I know your deeds and the +vileness of your heart. As a child you were ever false; as a man you +hated your own people, because you had risen and they remained obscure; +and now you stand before the mother of the girl whose heart you have +helped to harden, whom you have taken and hidden for your own purpose, +and ask her what she means when she demands to know the truth." + +"If you have information, I will in my official capacity hear it," +Roussilac answered. "But forget not that my nature can be fiercer than +yours, and do not tempt my power." + +"Your power!" sneered Madame. "It has already departed from you. I +thank you, Arnaud, for having disowned your honest family. How ill the +cloak of innocence lies upon your shoulders! Madeleine's cell stands +empty, as you know well. Beside the door the sentry lies stabbed +through the heart, murdered by your hand as surely as though you +yourself had driven home the dagger. I have but come from there, and +none know what has been done, save you the doer, and I the accuser." + +Roussilac caught up his cloak, and wrapped it about his shoulders. +"What took you to her prison?" he demanded, his own nature being no +less suspicious than hers. + +Madame laughed furiously. + +"You are a brave rogue, Arnaud. You plot, and murder, and seduce, and +smile through it all, and act the innocent like a mime. Know that +Father St Agapit came to me--a haughty priest, with no respect for +age--to recommend that Madeleine should be entrusted to his care, that +he might obtain her conversion by a new method. 'Let her not be +crossed,' quoth he. ''Tis human nature to offend more deeply in the +front of opposition. I would let her go free, and win her by gentle +persuasion to the fold.' What does a priest know of the pride of a +girl's heart? 'Is the branch broken by persuasion for the fire?' said +I. 'No, you shall take it in hand strongly and break it by force.' To +that the abbe said, 'You shall not compare the inanimate thing with the +living creature whom God has gifted with free-will. Go now to her and +be gentle. Try her with mother's milk rather than with the strong meat +of human nature. I have bidden the sentry admit you.' So I went to +win my erring child as the priest taught me, for I never yet have +disobeyed a Churchman, and what I found you know." + +"You are right, Madame, if what you say be true," said Roussilac +sternly. "There is treachery here." + +"Behold my hand! It points at the traitor," screamed the pale woman, +her fury surging back upon her. "You shall not escape with your +fellow-sinner. You shall not go from me until I hear from your own +lips where you have placed Madeleine, my child." + +"Woman, I know nothing," he snarled. "Is my position nothing to me +that I should play so loosely?" + +A cry of animal rage broke that instant from his throat. Madame had +dashed upon him, and, before he could beat her back, had clawed his +face like a maddened bird from cheek-bones to chin. + +At that terrible indignity the pusillanimous spirit of the commandant +was sobered into resolution. He hurled her back screaming, and put up +a hand to his burning face. The finger-tips came away reddened. + +He shivered from head to foot. Madame was raving. Roussilac steadied +himself, then walked from that place, a cold, sinister figure, the +howling of the mad woman pealing into his ears. + +Scarce a minute had elapsed before he returned, accompanied by two +soldiers; and again facing Madame Labroquerie, whose bloodless face was +distorted with the fury of her terrible nature, issued his orders in a +pitiless voice: + +"Secure that woman, and keep her in ward this night." He raised his +hand, and smiled vengefully at the marks on his fingers, as he drew off +his ring, which he extended to the man nearest him with the words: +"Take your authority. Spare not force, if force be wanted. Restore +this ring to me after sunrise, when you shall have hanged this woman +upon the eastern side of the fortress." + +Again Roussilac smiled, and, turning quickly, passed outside. One +terrible scream made him lift his hands to his ears, then he hurried up +the steep path, to see with his own eyes the cold body of the sentry, +and the empty cell, and to learn that Madame had not lied. + +For a few moments he stood, like a man in a trance, seeing indeed his +problem solved, but knowing that Madeleine was lost to him. He turned +to the dead body, and commanded it to speak; and when he understood +that the spirit had passed for ever from his discipline, he spurned the +cold matter with his foot, and in a fury cried: "I would give my +position and all I have to hear this dead man speak." + +"Listen, then," said a cold voice. "The dead are not silent." And +Roussilac cried out with superstitious fear, then started, when he +beheld a tall figure proceeding from the shadow of the doorway, and +recognised St Agapit, the priest. + +"Who has done this?" he demanded. "What lover of this girl has dared +to enter the fortress, to stab one of my guards, and carry her off +beneath my eye?" + +"I am no reader of riddles," said St Agapit. "I came here to reason +with the maid, because it seemed to me that her heart, young as it is +and tender, must surely respond to the message of love. Why she +refuses the only faith by which mortals may be saved passed my +understanding. But now I know that she has been driven into heresy by +the neglect of a father and the unnatural spirit of a mother, and +strengthened in her sin by the persecution of a cousin." + +"Father, I loved her." + +"Not so. You shall find at your heart passion, but not the warmth of +love. It is not the ice which produces the plant and the flower. It +is the warm rain and the sunshine. You offered her the storm, and +wondered because she desired the sun." + +"Where has she gone?" cried the blind man. + +"To freedom. My blessing follows her, unbeliever though she be." + +The ascetic moved forward, thin and stern, and made the sign of the +cross over the fallen sentry. + +"Bless me also," cried Roussilac, catching at his skirt. "Father, I +have done much evil. Bless me before you go." + +"I may pity where I may not bless," said St Agapit, and passed with +that same dignified step which awed the Iroquois into silence when on a +distant day they led him out to die. His shadow flickered once upon +the slope, went out, and the governor was alone with the dead. + +The soldiers who had been left to execute their commander's unnatural +order glanced fearfully at one another, and he who held the ring +muttered a charm against the evil eye. That cry of impotent rage, +which had caused Roussilac to stop his ears, fell from the lips of +Madame Labroquerie so soon as her mind caught the meaning of her +sentence; and when the men at length advanced to take her, she writhed +and bit the air, and hurled after her nephew words of execration which +caused the soldiers to draw back and cross themselves in terror. All +the hate and madness of the unhappy woman's ruined mind poured forth in +one awful torrent, until she sank to the floor and settled there to +silence. + +Then the men took courage to seize her, believing that the blood which +they saw issuing from her mouth was produced by the wounds which her +own teeth had inflicted; but when the body fell limp in their arms they +realised that nature had intervened. + +One at the head, the other at the feet, they carried through the night +the silent shape of Madame Labroquerie, who was never to move, never to +rave, again. Yet so blindly obedient to their officer's word of +command were these men in the ranks, that they carried the body out and +executed sentence upon it an hour after sunrise in the valley of St. +Charles. + +At that same hour rumour went about the fortress--set in motion by a +sentry, who had seen the governor rushing down to the forest during the +night--to the effect that Roussilac was lying under a spell of +witchcraft. This rumour became an established fact when the Abbe +Laroche was seen proceeding from the church upon the hill with asperges +brush and a shell of holy water. + +"Such is the end of ambition," murmured St Agapit, when they had +brought him the evil tidings. "Can a clay body resist free spirits of +the dead?" + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + +WOMAN'S LOVE IS LIFE. + +Before we leave the fortress, to return thither no more, a glance must +be taken at Madeleine, evading the power of the Church and the secular +arm, escaping from the mother who had grown to hate her and the cousin +who had not courage to shield her. Her rescuer was not a man--if it be +true that man was made in the image of God--yet his actions upon that +night went far to prove that he owned a human heart. + +So soon as Roussilac had gone from his cousin's sight for ever, the +tramp of the sentry's feet began again beating out the seconds like a +clock. The girl was unable to see the soldier, but at regular +intervals his shadow blackened the cracks along the door, and sometimes +she heard him growl when a mosquito pricked his neck. Life became +strangely mechanical as she lay half-asleep, her eyes opening and +closing at intervals, her ears half unconsciously admitting the sounds +of the outer world, her body subdued for the time and yielding to +languor. But soon she stirred, hearing voices outside her cell. A +grating laugh hurt her nerves, and after it came the order of the +sentry calling on some unwelcome visitant to depart. Then the heavy +tramp sounded monotonously again. + +"Would rather be a toad gnawing the root of a tree, than a machine to +pace a dozen yards of grass," taunted an ugly voice. "Admit me into +the hut, Sir Sentry. Know you I have this day been ordained a priest +of Holy Church, and 'tis my duty to reason with the fair impenitent. +Shall defy me, rascal? I can mutter a spell that shall knock the sword +from your hand and shake your body with ague." + +"Begone!" muttered the soldier. "I talk with none while on my duty." + +Madeleine stirred uneasily. Something fell lightly against her arm, +and she looked up to the aperture which made a window. Nothing unusual +met her eyes; but when she moved again a soft odour brushed her face, +and her delighted hand caught up a bunch of wild bush roses. + +"I go." The fully aroused girl felt that the hideous voice was +intended for her ears. "There is no moon to-night, and after dark, +when none shall see, I will be here to ease your duty by a song of +roses and woman's love, brave comrade. Mayhap I shall then meet with a +less churlish welcome." + +"That may be," answered the soldier sullenly. "Another shall have +taken my place. Sing to him if you will." + +"Oh, the lovely flowers!" murmured Madeleine. The blooms had opened +since noon and their yellow hearts were wet, because the gatherer had +dipped each one into the river, before tying them together with a blade +of scented grass. + +She brushed these sweet companions against her cheek, wondering who +could have dared to show himself her friend. The time passed happily +while she waited in tingling expectancy for the coming of dark. + +First came Laroche, full of bluster and talk of the wickedness of +self-will, of the fate of the unbeliever in the next world, and the +punishment of the heretic in this. The abbe had employed the afternoon +in putting an edge to his sword with his own clerical hands, and his +mind was fully occupied with the fineness of the bright steel and the +excellence of the point while he talked. + +"We must save a soul from the everlasting burning," he said with +menace, as he made to depart. "When the body is put to pain the mind +is said to yield with wondrous readiness, and there is joy in Heaven +over the sinner that repenteth. Impenitence in one so young is surely +the work of the devil. The power of exorcism has been conferred upon +the priests of Holy Church. Pray to our Lady and the saints, daughter, +that they strengthen you for the ordeal." + +Laroche swaggered out conscious of having well performed an unpleasant +duty, and hurried down to the street of fishermen, to convince himself +that Michel had not again dared to adulterate his wine. + +After vespers came St Agapit. He had spent the day over his +manuscripts, endeavouring to unravel some of the perplexities of the +human mind. The ascetic was liberal beyond his time. He regarded +Madeleine as rather an object for pity than for punishment. Her brain +had been worked upon and her mind possessed by some spirit of darkness; +and it became his duty to deliver her from the benumbing influence and +to point out to her the way of life. + +But when he came to leave the stone hut, he was for the first moment in +his life a doubter. Madeleine had spoken with such happiness of the +joy of life; had held out to his colourless face her blushing rosebuds, +bidding him note that their smell was as fragrant to her the Protestant +as to him the Catholic; had dwelt upon her faith, which was pure and +perfect even though it excluded the aid of saints and the help of the +Mother of God. And thus had she answered his final argument: + +"In the free country birds would surround me, and each one had its own +way of showing me affection. One would peck at my gown, another caress +me with its wings, another, too shy to approach, would sit on a bough +and sing as best it could. But I loved them all, and the shyest the +best. Father, if the birds have each a different way of showing us +love, may not we, who are better than many sparrows, be allowed to +worship God after our own different promptings?" + +St Agapit blessed her less sternly than usual, and returned perplexed +to his studies, there to search for proof of what Madeleine had said, +praying like the holy man he was for light and understanding. +Reluctantly he was compelled to admit that it was an evil spirit which +had spoken to him out of the mouth of Madeleine. So he went into his +little chapel and prayed for her and for himself that the doubt of his +heart might be forgiven him. + +But in years to come, after those days when the Islanders had stirred +up the Iroquois to avenge their wrongs, a sachem of the Oneidas would +narrate the story of the death of the white doctor, dwelling upon those +last moments when the priest had turned to him to say: "Tell me, is it +true that you worship the sun?" + +"Surely," answered the sachem. "For the sun is our life." + +"In worshipping the sun," cried the exultant priest, "you have surely +worshipped the one God." + +And over the horde of bloodthirsty natives, who were preparing his +fiery torment, St Agapit made the sign of the cross. + +Evening came, soft and fragrant, with a rush of sweet wind when the +door opened to admit food and drink for the prisoner. Madeleine caught +a glimpse of the sentry who took up his post after the proclamation of +the evening gun; a thick-set man, swarthy and black-bearded, a Cyclops +in appearance, but a Cerberus for watchfulness, as the girl knew; for +once, when she had timidly tried the door, the brute had growled at her +like a dog. + +Darker grew the air. Madeleine stood against the wall, listening to +the rush of water far beneath, the drone of beetles, and the scarcely +audible murmur from the heart of the fortress. The last beam went out, +the tired day was asleep, and Cerberus tramped, growling out his +thoughts. + +It became so dark that the walls disappeared. Clouds hung low, dark as +the under-world; the stars were blotted out; not a gleam of phosphorus +nor a smoky ray shot upward from the north. The land whirled blackly +into space. + +Madeleine moved her forehead from the cold stone and sighed softly. +She crept to her bed and sat shivering gently, holding fast her +treasured blooms. The night damp had revived the flowers and drawn out +their odour, so that the girl pleased herself with the fancy that she +was sitting in a rose-bower. + +She heard the screech of an owl far away, the rattle and splash of +oars, the running out of a chain, the snap of a belated locust. She +heard the ticking of an insect in the walls; and she heard the growl of +Cerberus: + +"A plague upon that ghost-light!" + +She heard a sound which made her shiver, though it might have been +nothing more than a heavy foot struck sharply upon the turf; but hardly +had the thrill passed when a gasp and a great groan made the dark night +wild, and the hill-top and every stone in the building seemed to jar as +the ground was smitten. The silence that followed was unbroken by the +solemn tramp which had become a part of the girl's life. The human +clock was broken. + +Then a subdued voice began to sing, harsh and unmusical, straining to +be sympathetic, and its song was of peace and love in an old-world +garden. Harsher grew the voice, though the effort to be tender +underlay each note. + +"Friend," whispered Madeleine + +The song was stilled. + +"Oh, friend, open the door and let me feel the air." + +"Prepare your eyes for a hideous sight," muttered the voice, dull and +grating like a saw. + +"My deliverer cannot make me fear," she murmured. + +The iron bolt grated, the door opened, and Madeleine beheld in the +gloom the shapeless outline of the dwarf. + +"Thank the night, lady," he said. "It is kind because it hides one of +nature's failures. A spider, they say, once saved a Scotchman. A +hunchback may do as much for a queen." + +Madeleine stepped out to the balmy night. + +"What made you come to my aid?" she murmured. "It is death for you." + +"Lady," said Gaudriole, "I bow to the Church, because hypocrisy drives +many a sinner to play the saint. When the fat Laroche calls me to my +duty, I confess with my tongue in my cheek and burn a rushlight. That +is for policy. Before you I am a Protestant. By myself I am a +believer in living long and cheating the gallows. That again is +policy. I hate the Church and its priests, therefore I have released +you. Also, by some strange mischance, nature has placed a man's heart +within this contemptible body. But let us hasten." + +"The sentry!" exclaimed Madeleine. + +"Look not in that direction," said Gaudriole. "Lady, which way? I +will guide you to safety, stay by your side while I can serve you, and +when you say, 'Back, dog!' I disappear." + +"You have done murder," cried the girl. "Let me see. Stand aside. +Ah, poor wretch! He was but doing his duty, and his blood is on my +head." + +"The deed is mine, both in this world and the next," said Gaudriole. +"I had a grudge against the knave. He stunned me once with his fist +when I stumbled by mischance across his foot. Lady, you must come +quickly. I see lights moving yonder. There is no time to lose." + +"Geoffrey!" murmured Madeleine softly to her self. + +"For his sake," urged the dwarf. Then he paused and ground his teeth. + +"But you?" she exclaimed. + +"I!" Gaudriole uttered his malevolent chuckle. "To-morrow I shall be +hopping about the fortress, full of wild fancies which shall mightily +impress the superstitious. I shall say how, as I lay on the hillside, +I saw lightning strike the sentry dead, and how at the roll of thunder +the door of this hut burst open and you passed out in a flame of fire. +Laroche shall worship you as a saint to-morrow, if he worship aught but +his belly and his sword, and shall keep the day holy in honour of +Sainte Madeleine. Fear not for me. I have a clever tongue, lady, and +a brave imagination, and if I am pushed can devise twenty men to do +this deed. Come!" he whispered sharply. "The lights approach." + +Madeleine permitted herself to be hurried away, and the ill-matched +pair made no stop until the forest had closed behind. Not a sound came +from the heights; only the watch-fires flickered gently in the wind. + +"Which way?" cried Gaudriole. + +"The sea," said Madeleine. + +"There lies your path. 'Tis a mountainous country yonder. If you hide +to-night, I will after dark to-morrow bring down a boat, and in that +you may escape." + +"I know how to find food, and the Indians will not harm me," she +replied. "I have made myself friendly with them, and carry a marked +stone which one of their sachems gave me." + +"Say now the words, 'Back, dog!' and I leave you." + +Madeleine turned reluctantly to the dwarf. + +"Go, friend," she said, with her pitying smile Gaudriole went down on +his sharp knees, and his crooked shoulders heaved. + +"Lady, I am no man, but a beast who has done you what little service it +might. My life shall continue as nature has fitted me, but when I come +to die on the gallows, as such as I must end, I would have one blessed +memory to carry with me into hell. Suffer me to kiss your hand." + +Madeleine hesitated, her lips parting pitifully, her eyes wet as the +grass which brushed her skirt. Then, as the poor villain raised his +hideous face, she bent and swiftly kissed his grimy brow. Her glorious +hair for a moment streamed upon his elfin locks, then she was gone, +breathing a little faster, while Gaudriole lay humped upon the ground. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX. + +LAND-LOCKED. + +With the life of Master William Grignion, alderman, and subsequently +sheriff, of the City of London, these annals are not concerned. The +merchant's existence cannot, however, be altogether ignored, owing to a +certain venture on his part, which resulted in an English ship being +cast upon the shore of Acadie at the beginning of winter. Master +Grignion was an austere man, who, by dint of miserly practice and sharp +dealing, had amassed what in those days was a considerable fortune. +After marrying his only daughter to an impecunious peer, he occupied a +shameful old house upon Thames bank, the greater part of which was +stocked with bales of merchandise. From the single window of the +living-room, which was furnished below the degree of discomfort, the +old man could view the overtoppling houses upon London Bridge; and here +Master Grignion counted his gains each night, while his starved dog +slunk from corner to corner sniffing uselessly for a scrap of food. + +Owing to the scarcity of English ships, no valuable cargo of tobacco, +and none of the products of New World grist-mills or tanneries, had for +many months crossed the seas. For weeks the alderman had been +engrossed by an idea, which grew in strength upon him--namely, that if +he built for himself a ship and despatched her to Virginia, he might +very possibly add materially to the already considerable store of gold +pieces which were secreted about his house from cellar to attic. But +Master Grignion knew well that the seas were held by England's foes, +and the nightmare of failure held him back from his project month after +month. One evening, however, while he watched the muddy Thames after a +good day of business, the finger of inspiration touched him, and, +gazing up into the London sky, which was not murky in those days, he +remarked: "Hitherto ships have been constructed for strength. Dutch, +French, and Spanish vessels are alike slow and cumbersome. It has +occurred to no man to build a ship for speed." + +Having solved the problem, Master Grignion knew no rest until he had +found an enterprising shipbuilder, who was clever at his business and +at the same time weak in bargaining. Discovering in Devon the man he +required, the alderman divulged his plan; and from that day forward +until the _Dartmouth_ stood fully decked before Barnstaple the miser's +talk was of sailcloth and sailmaking, with masts, yards, gaffs, booms, +and bowsprits. The _Dartmouth_, when completed even to the +satisfaction of her avaricious owner, was undoubtedly ahead of the time. + +One Silas Upcliff, an old sea-dog with a face red and yellow like a +ripe apple, and a fringe of snow-white whisker below the chin, a native +of Plymouth, and a man well salted by experience, volunteered to raise +a crew and sail the _Dartmouth_ to the Potomac; and, after a vast deal +of haggling over the questions of provisioning and wages, his offer was +accepted. And one fine day the brigantine shook out her wealth of +canvas and skimmed away westward, over the track of such brave vessels +as the Pelican, the little _Discovery_, and the Puritan _Mayflower_. +Trembling with pride and excitement, and a certain amount of fear lest +at the last moment his ship might be seized for the service of the +king, Master Grignion stood by while the anchor was heaved, shouting +his final injunction: "Fight not with your guns, Master Skipper. +Should an enemy attack you, let out more sail and fly." Silas Upcliff +nodded in stolid English style, and, as he drew away, turned to his +mate and muttered: "From the French, the storm, but most of all from +misers, good Lord deliver us." + +From the French the _Dartmouth_ was indeed delivered, but not from the +storm. Hostile vessels were sighted, but the brigantine's speed +enabled her to show a particularly dainty stern to these privateers; +and all went well with her until the line of the American coast lifted +ominously distinct above the horizon before being blotted out by a mass +of fiery cloud. Then came the storm, which flung the little vessel far +from her course, carried her northwards, and finally cast her upon the +coast of Nova Scotia, after failing in its effort to wreck her on the +western spurs of Newfoundland. When the storm ceased, a freezing calm +set in, and for two days snow descended without intermission. Upcliff +gave the order to build a house out of pine logs, where he and his men +might take shelter while they repaired the ship; for the little +_Dartmouth_ had been terribly strained by the storm and pierced by the +sharp-toothed rocks. The skipper believed that he was near his +destined harbour, and was sorely puzzled by the snow and bitter cold; +but, when a sailor came hurriedly to report that he had seen the smoke +of a distant settlement and a tree stamped with the fleur-de-lys, the +captain began to greatly fear that the miserly alderman had lost his +venture, and he bade his men bring out their cutlasses and to see that +they were sharp. + +When the snow ceased and the atmosphere became clear, a tall figure +came down among the pines, and gave a hearty welcome to the skipper and +his men. The visitor was Sir Thomas Iden, and he came not alone to +greet the master of the _Dartmouth_, for none other than Madeleine was +at his side. + +The brave girl had travelled far that night of her release, and for two +days hurried eastward, keeping near the river, existing on butternuts +and the different kinds of berry which flourished in abundance at that +season of the year, until on the eve of the second day she saw the +smoke of a camp-fire rising from the beach. Descending, she revealed +herself boldly to the campers, who were none other than Sir Thomas and +his native wife; and when the former heard her story, and knew that she +was English at heart, if French in name, and further learnt that she +was the affianced of Geoffrey Viner, who had gone out to bring them +help, he bent with knightly grace and kissed her hand, and besought her +to accompany him to the land above the sea. Madeleine joyously +consented; and from that hour her troubles ceased. + +Afterwards Jeremiah Hough came to the land beside the gulf, and with +him Penfold, fully recovered from his fever; and these men also took +Madeleine to their hearts--though the stern Puritan refused to trust +her--when they heard how she had served their comrade. In the pathless +land above the sea, a little to the east of Acadie, they settled +themselves; the knight, his wife, and Madeleine in one log-cabin in a +hollow; Hough and Penfold in another, placed in the heart of a dense +pine-wood. No marauding band had been abroad to trouble the land. The +only danger which appeared to threaten the Englishmen, now that winter +had set in, was the possibility that some Indian spy might carry the +news of their hiding-place into the town; and this danger was a very +real one, for, though they did not know of it, Onawa had followed La +Salle to Acadie. + +It was Madeleine who sighted the _Dartmouth_ snowed up beside the +beach. She had gone out into the storm to run along the cliff and +fight against the mighty buffetings of the wind which had upset the +plans of Master Grignion. She sped back over the spruce-clad hills, +and coming first to the adventurers' hut stopped to tell them the +tidings. They ran forth, flushed with the hope that Geoffrey had +succeeded, and, standing upon a hill-top, argued concerning the +stranger's nationality, until they came regretfully to the decision +that she could not be from English shores. + +"I saw never a ship so light in build," said Penfold. "See you the +number of her masts? She is made to run and not to fight, whereas our +English ships are made to fight and never to run. She is, if I mistake +not, a Dutch vessel." + +"Peradventure the Lord shall deliver her also into our hands," quoth +Hough fervently. + +The captain shook his grizzled head, and answered sadly: "Recall not +that day of our triumph. Then were we five good men. Now George, our +brother, lies on the Windy Arm, and friend Woodfield is no more, and +young Geoffrey has gone out into a strange country. Only you and I +remain, and my arm now lacks its former strength." + +In the meantime Madeleine had run for her protector; and before the day +was done both Penfold and the Puritan knew of their error, and had +joined hands once again with men from their native land. + +When Silas Upcliff learnt that he stood upon the perilous Nova Scotian +coast, he felt more shame than fear--shame to hear that the land was +mastered by the French. Had not those bold sea-brothers of England the +Cabots discovered it over a century earlier, and had not James the +First conferred his crown patent of the whole of Canada upon Sir +William Alexander, his Scottish favourite? The honest skipper well +knew that the magnanimous Charles had confirmed the bestowal of that +prodigious gift, acting, it must be assumed, under surprising +ignorance, seeing that the land was no more his to give than were the +New Netherlands or Peru. And at that time, when Roussilac held the St. +Lawrence and La Salle the priest ruled Acadie, the Scottish peer, who +was nominal lord of all the land, was peacefully engaged in writing +mediocre poetry in his castle of Stirling! Between the ostensible and +actual ownership spread a vast gulf of difference, as the men upon that +shore were to learn to their cost. + +Silas Upcliff gave his compatriots a sailor's hearty handshake, and the +men who knew the land and its occupants rendered the new-comers what +assistance they might, while Hough lost no time in begging them to join +in an attack upon Acadie. To that Upcliff could only make the reply: +"My services are bought, my ship is armed for defence only, and my men +are sworn to run rather than to fight." + +Then Madeleine offered her services as housewife to the crew, and when +the men knew that she loved an English lad, that she was a Huguenot, +and had formerly trodden the streets and lanes of Somerset and Devon, +that she even knew the familiar names above merchants' doors in Bristol +and Plymouth, and could quote them with a pretty accent, they fell in +love with her forthwith, from Upcliff himself to the rogue of a boy +before the mast. From that time forth she ruled them with a velvet +discipline, joining the workers engaged in repairing the ship's +injuries, and helping them by her happiness and approval. + +"Hurry! hurry!" she would cry. "Ah, but you talk too much. She shall +float to-morrow. Then to break the ice and flee away!" + +"Art in such hurry to lose us, lass?" said Upcliff on the second day +after the snow. + +"But I shall not lose you," cried Madeleine. "I am going to sail away +with you. I shall bring good fortune and favouring winds; and if any +man be sick I will nurse him back to strength. None ever die whom I +watch over. The sick are ashamed even to think of death when they see +me so full of life. You will take me to my Geoffrey, in the land of +the free?" + +"Ay, and to England if you will," cried the hearty skipper, who had +already heard her story. "But, my lass, your Geoffrey may be on his +way back, and you may but get south to find him gone." + +"No," replied Madeleine, shaking her head decidedly. "He is not on his +way back. I think he is in trouble. I cannot understand, but I feel +that he is being punished for what he has not done, and I know that I +can help him. No one can help a man like the woman who loves him. +Geoffrey wants me, and I must go." + +"You shall go, girl," promised the sea-dog; and, turning half aside, +muttered: "If the boy have played her false, I shall have it in my mind +to run out a line from the cross-tree and see him hanged." + +"False!" cried Madeleine, with a scream of laughter. "Is the sun false +when the clouds will not let him shine? Why, I would slap your wicked +face, and cook you no supper to-night, if I believed that you spoke in +faith." + +She ran away, kicking up the dusty snow, and throwing back a laugh +which filled the winter air with the breath of spring. + +Each calm morning the boats of the deep-sea fishermen put out from +Acadie, and returned before evening with their frozen freight. The +Englishmen stifled their fires and stilled their voices when these +boats drew near. Their shelter was well hidden among the pines; the +snowed-up brigantine resembled nothing so much as a rock bearing a few +dead and stripped firs. Every night the sailors laughed at danger; but +each morning found them on the watch. + +A week passed without event, until the evening of the eighth day +arrived and found the sailors packed within their log-hut at the back +of the ice-bound bay awaiting the call to supper. The three +adventurers were also present as the skipper's guests. The cabin was +warm and well lighted, equipped by the men's handiness with nautical +furniture from their ship. From the region beyond a curtain, which +divided the interior, came the smell of cookery and the joyful roaring +of a fire. A feeling of security was upon the company, because +snow-clouds were rolling up outside and the gulf was filled with fog. +As night drew on these grey clouds appeared to melt into feathers +innumerable, and the pines became snow-steeples, and the rocks huge +beds of down. The brigantine was locked within a sheet of ice, and +that mysterious silence which had so terrified Cabot the pioneer held +all the land in thrall. But the Englishmen cared for none of these +things. They knew that the colony of Acadie was being buried in the +snow; the unknown coast had no terrors; nor did they fear the black +winter sea which southwards groaned and tossed. So they gave each +other good cheer, and listened to Upcliff, who beguiled them with +reminiscences of his seafaring life until his throat was dry. Then he +paused to refresh himself with a rolled tobacco-leaf, and his sailors +broke the silence which ensued by singing melodiously a soft musical +chanty, which recalled to the mind of each his free and happy life upon +the main and the rollicking days ashore. This song also stirred into +activity a memory which lay latent in the skipper's mind. + +"I saw the man who made that verse," he said, leaning over the circle, +and putting out his hand for silence. "Will tell you where I saw him. +'Twas on London street beside Globe Theatre, coming by Blackfriars, and +he stood with another honest gentleman watching us wild fellows roll +past. We were singing like boys on the road from school and making the +fat watchmen run. London town was a brave place for us young sailors +up from the West Country, and we were bent on having our pleasure, +though we had to pay for it before my Lord Mayor." + +"What was the name of master?" asked one of the men. + +"A comely gentleman," went on the captain, disregarding the questioner. +"Though methinks as pale as any wench who had lost her lover. Not a +wrinkle on the face of him, and the forehead of him wide and smooth, +ay, and as cold looking as any slab of stone from Portland cliff. But +the eyes of man! I caught the look of them, and they seemed to pass +through my brain learning in one glance more about me than ever I knew +myself. And the smile of man! Can see it now as he turned to his +fellow and said: 'The sailor is the man to drive our care away, good +Burbage.' And then he said softly those words you have now been +singing, 'One foot in sea and one on shore, To one thing constant +never.' A Christian gentleman, they told me. A great actor, and a +poet who made money, they told me. Should watch his 'Tempest' played. +Would make you feel on shipboard, and hold on to a pillar of the pit to +steady your feet withal." + +"He loved a mariner," said a voice. "The Englishman smells of salt +water, say they in France. 'Tis better, so honest Will did say, than +to smell of civet." + +"How goes the weather?" demanded the captain suddenly. + +"Snowing. Our little barque is but a drift." + +The sailor who had sought to learn the poet's name repeated his +question, and while the information was being driven into his obtuse +head by half a dozen of his mates in concert, the curtain dividing the +cabin became suddenly agitated, a white hand fluttered for an instant, +and a bright voice called: + +"Your food is ready, children." + +The sailors rose, laughing as heartily at the pleasantry as though they +had not heard it before, and obeyed the summons gladly. To every man +was set a great bowl of stew, and the fair cook, resting her hands upon +her sides, watched them as they set to work. + +"You are idle," she declared. "I have but little meat left, and you, +great children that you are, require so much feeding. In the morning I +shall turn you out to hunt. The snow shall have stopped by then, and +you may follow the deer by their fresh tracks." + +Madeleine nodded severely at the sailors as she thus made known to them +her mind. + +The crew were still over supper, and Silas was telling one of his sea +stories to ears which had already heard it a score of times, but +listened patiently because it was the master speaking, when a deep +sound broke among the hills and rolled onward through the snow, making +the rough coast throb. + +The skipper's mouth was open to laugh at his own excellent wit, but +that sound brought his lips together, as it caused all his listeners to +start for the door. The same cry was upon every tongue, as their hands +dragged away the sail which stretched across the entrance: + +"A gun!" + +They poured into the terrible whiteness, huddling as close as sheep. +Nothing was visible, except the steady masses shed from the clouds like +wool. Not a sound, nor any sign of life. They waited, straining their +eyes out to sea, but the gun did not roar again. + +"Cast your eyes over to the west," called a voice, and the master found +Sir Thomas at his side. + +A glow in that direction filled the sky, making the surroundings weird, +and from time to time a red tongue of fire leapt up. + +"'Tis a French ship bringing provisions," said the knight, pointing +into the unfathomable mass. "She has signalled, and yonder fire burns +to guide her in." + +"Wreck her!" cried a Cornishman. "Let us build another fire on the +cliff to the east. With fortune, she shall steer for our beacon +instead of theirs." + +"We should but make ourselves known," growled Upcliff. + +A terrified shout broke upon his speech, and one of the men jumped +against the huddled party, shrieking in fear. + +"What ails you, Jacob Sadgrove?" cried the skipper. + +"God save me! A foul spirit close at my side. She grinned out of the +snow and floated away, her feet never touching ground. A warning--a +death warning, and I a miserable sinner." + +The man grovelled upon his knees up to his waist in snow, flapping his +hands and groaning. + +"Speak up, man!" said Sir Thomas. "What is that you saw?" + +"He has seen a wyvern," spoke the master contemptuously. "Was always a +man to see more than other folk." + +"Stood at my side and grinned in a fearsome manner," whined the sailor. +"The nose of her was slit like man yonder, and the ears of her were +like a dog's, and she breathed fire out of her mouth." + +"Stay!" cried Hough, stepping out. "Say you that her face was marked +like mine?" + +"The same," panted the man. "But dead and cold, and her eyes like +fish----" + +The Puritan drowned his wailings by a bitter cry. + +"Forgive me, friends," he cried. "The Lord delivered me that woman to +slay, and I, weak vessel that I am, drew back, and now am punished, and +in my punishment you must share. We are discovered." + +"The name of that woman?" demanded Sir Thomas. + +"The sister of your wife." + +"I knew it," groaned the knight. "The agent of my son's death. Which +way went she?" he cried at the terrified sailor. + +"She flew there--there," stuttered the man. + +"Follow the tracks!" + +"Nay, there are none. The snow already covers them." + +"Her feet ne'er touched the snow," wailed the man. "Her feet were hot +from the everlasting fire." + +"Peace, fool," said Upcliff. He turned to Hough. "Are our lives in +danger?" + +"Never in greater. The woman is an Indian spy, who is now on her way +to the settlement, where rules a hot-headed priest who has sworn to +kill every Englishman in the land. They will be on us ere morning." + +"There is only one way," said the master. "We must break the ice, +release our barque, and put out. The sea is calm." + +"She will not float." + +"She shall float." + +Upcliff gave his orders coolly, and the sailors hastened to obey +through the muffling mists. The greater number attacked the ice with +axe and saw, while the minority dismantled the shelter and reconveyed +its contents to the ghostly ship. Every man worked his hardest, +longing for the sea. The blow of axes and the snarl of a long saw +sounded along the hidden coast. + +Madeleine came down, all white with snow like a bride, and cheered them +on, and presently brought each man a bowl of soup to renew his +strength. A narrow lane opened through the ice, an ink-black passage +in the colourless plain, but beyond stretched a long white field before +the jagged edge where the snow wave curled in a monstrous lip. + +The brigantine righted herself with a flutter and a plunge, casting the +snow from her yards, and the grinding of her keel made joyful music. +The toilers, sweating as though they had been reaping corn in summer, +laboured to open the path to the stagnant sea. + +"The rent in her hold is plugged by solid ice," called the skipper. +"She shall carry that cargo bravely through this calm." + +The big feathers of snow became spots of down, which lessened to the +degree of frost points before morning. The country began to unroll, +all padded with its monstrous coverlet; the trees masqueraded as +wool-stuffed Falstaffs; the cliffs seemed to have increased in the +night; the heavens were nearer the earth. The coast appalled in its +cold virginity. + +"One more hour, and then for the sea," sang Upcliff. "Is everything +aboard?" + +"All but the stove, captain. We wait for it to cool." + +"Bring it out into the snow." + +As Upcliff gave the order, a man crossed the brow of a western hill and +floundered knee-deep towards the bay. It was Hough, and he shouted as +he ran: + +"The French are coming out!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI. + +IN THE FALL OF THE SNOW. + +Because the Father of Waters was frozen over and its track buried in +snow, despatches from Quebec could only be conveyed by the hand of +overland couriers. Winter had set in early that year, and with more +than usual severity; and this was probably the reason why no messenger +had lately arrived from the heights to inform the governor of Acadie as +to what had taken place in and around the modest capital of New France. + +The priest was not concerned by this silence. He had indeed lost much +of his interest in the doings of the New World, since D'Archand had +informed him of his popularity at home. He felt that he had made his +advancement sure. During the weeks which followed autumn, when the +maples were resigning their gorgeous vestments of red and gold, he had +occupied himself in setting the affairs of his charge in order, looking +to shortly receive a command to proceed to Rome, there to receive the +reward of his stewardship. Onawa had passed out of his memory, and +with her the brave young boy whom he had smitten in the forest by +Couchicing. He sent no expedition out to search the land. He had done +sufficient for glory. He was not the man to waste his energies upon +works of supererogation. No slip could lose him that spiritual +principality towards which he had pressed by word and act since the day +of his ordination. As he strode through the snow the settlement seemed +to shrink from him, and the trees to bow, as though foreseeing the +power which was about to pass into his hands. + +La Salle reached his chapel, recited vespers in the arrogant voice +which made him feared, and returned to his quarters. A spirit of +restlessness was over him, and when he could resist no longer he rose, +and, taking his sword, lunged repeatedly at a knot in the wall, +striking it full until his body began to sweat. + +"No falling off," he muttered, as he examined the pricks in the wood. +"No sign of weakness yet." He lowered the sword, and mechanically +wiped the point in the tail of his skirt, then passed his firm hand +caressingly down the blade, murmuring, with a self-conscious smile: "I +have finished my fighting. Henceforth my wrist must stiffen and my arm +rust, while the power which has controlled the sword shall pass into +the use of tongue and pen." + +A knock fell upon the door, and in response to his reply a personal +attendant entered, and with a low reverence announced: + +"A messenger to speak with you, Excellency." + +At the governor's word a man was ushered in, clad in furs, his beard +heavy with icicles, a pair of long snow-shoes slung upon his back. He +made a profound genuflection and stood with bent head awaiting +permission to speak. + +"Come you from the upper fortress?" asked La Salle. + +"Yes, Excellency, with despatches for France and a letter for your +Holiness." + +La Salle put out his hand for the communication, broke the thread, +unfolded the sheet, and, holding it in the lamplight, bent over to read. + +"Ha!" he exclaimed, his eyes lifting. "Laroche. What means this +signature?" + +"The noble commandant Roussilac has been stricken with sickness," +hesitated the messenger. + +"What ails him?" asked the priest. + +The man faltered, but finally gained courage to reply: "It is said, +Excellency, that the noble commandant acts strangely, as a man +possessed by some unholy influence." + +La Salle brought the letter again to his eyes, and hurriedly scanned +the ill-written lines. + +"It is explained here," he said indifferently. "La tete lui a tourne. +Was never an able man," he muttered to himself. "Was ambitious, and +thought himself strong enough to stand alone. 'Tis but justice." He +looked across coldly, and sharply ordered the messenger to withdraw. + +The emissary retired, bowing as he backed out, while La Salle ran his +eyes over the remainder of the letter, muttering his comments aloud. + +"Gaudriole hanged for murdering a soldier. So, so! Was but a brute. +The little Frenchwoman dead of a fit, and her daughter escaped. A +weeding-out, in faith. The traitorous Dutch gone beyond capture. The +English spy also escaped. The men sent after him returned afoot, and +swore that they had been set upon by demons among a range of white +mountains. Would have hanged the fools. The Iroquois tribes gone into +winter hunting-grounds. The country altogether clear. The Algonquins +still friendly. This colony is now settled to France beyond question." + +La Salle dropped the letter, and fell into musings. Once he put his +hand to his brow, as though he could already feel a mitre pressing +there; he fingered his ring, and moved his foot, to frown when his eyes +sighted a rough boot instead of the scarlet shoe of his dreams. Then +he was awakened by a noisy rattling and a shock. + +The crucifix which had hung upon the log wall--more as a sign of +profession, as the gauntlet outside the glove-maker's shop, than as a +symbol he revered--lay broken upon the floor. + +The priest rose, muttering a frightened imprecation, and as he +nervously gathered up the shattered symbol his ears became opened to a +hurrying of feet over the fresh snow. All the soldiers and settlers +appeared to be rushing past afoot, shaking the ground and the walls of +his house. It was doubtless this disturbance which had detached the +crucifix from its nail. La Salle pulled a beaver cap over his forehead +and made for the outer door, and there encountered a messenger who came +to inform him that a ship's gun had been heard at sea. + +"Bid them fire the beacon," said La Salle. + +"It has been done, Excellency. There is not a breath over the water. +But the snow pours down." + +The priest's official bodyguard awaited him; and when he appeared every +man saluted and fell into place, and so accompanied him to the cliff, +where a huge fire was making the sky scarlet. This fire was a centre +towards which all the settlers were hastening like flies towards a +lantern. The coming of a ship from the Old World, with supplies, fresh +faces, and news of friends, was a red-letter day in the monotonous +calendar of their lives. The white figures hurried through the night +like an inferno of chattering ghosts. + +"She shall not be in till morning light," quoth a wiseacre. "There are +rocks, see you, in the gulf, and her master shall run no risk after +escaping the perils of the ocean." + +"Will wager to-day's haul of fish that she lies up here before three +hours are gone," cried another. + +"And I my fishing-net that we shall not see her before day," retorted +the confident first speaker. + +"That net is mine. Didst not hear the gun?" + +"Sounds carry far through the winter air." + +"The snow muffles. She is scarce a mile out." + +"Ah, that is indeed a fire! The light of it shall reach far out at +sea." + +The excitable folk laughed loudly whenever a fresh load of wood was +flung upon the flames, and carried away by their feelings danced an +ambulatory ballet in the red mist, a dance, like the Prosperity of the +Arms of France to be given before Richelieu a few months later, not +altogether without political significance. These settlers danced to +the tune of their song; and their songs were Success to the Ships of +France and Destruction to the English. While these revels lasted no +one observed a soldier hurrying up behind, with a woman at his side. +The woman was Onawa, breathing quickly as though she had been running +at the top of her speed. + +"Yonder stands his Holiness," said the man, stopping to point out La +Salle surrounded by his little band of attendants. + +Onawa abandoned her guide and rushed out, maddened and witless with her +foolish passion, until she reached the side of the man she loved and +was warmed by his dark eyes, which yet flashed angrily upon her, as he +turned to shake off the parasite, ejaculating: + +"Whom have we here?" + +"It is I," she cried wildly in French, having at length acquired some +little knowledge of that language. "Let me speak." More she would +have said, but her store of the language failed in the time of need. + +"Uncover her face," ordered La Salle. "Take her into the firelight +that we may see with whom we have to deal." + +"Let me speak to you here," prayed the girl, drawing back into the +snow-lit gloom; but she was seized and dragged upward close to the +dancing ring, and rough hands drew the covering from her face. + +"Tete de mort!" exclaimed La Salle, and started back when he recognised +the face that had once been handsome set towards him in the wild +firelight, fearfully branded, the nostrils slit, the ears cropped, a +letter seared upon each cheek. "Cover that horror, and drive her out +lest she bewitch us." + +"Hear me," the unhappy girl moaned, holding out her hands in an agony +of supplication. "Yonder your enemy cover the shore. Many men and a +ship held in the ice." She panted forth the syllables in the best +French she could muster, throwing out her hands along the eastern shore. + +La Salle's expression altered as he turned to his subordinates with the +old fighting passion in his eye and heart. + +"My men," he said, "this woman is but an Indian, but she is +trustworthy, I know. An English vessel has been cast ashore, and the +sailors seek to make shelter. What say you? Shall we warm our blood +and relieve this tedious time of waiting by venturing out to +exterminate the vermin?" + +"Should we not first send out a spy?" suggested an old officer. + +"It is well thought on. Choose you a man, and bid him take this woman +for a guide. Let him stab her if she prove false. Do you gather +together our fighters," went on the priest, turning to another, "and +bid them make ready to sally out immediately." + +"Shall you venture yourself, Excellency?" + +"Shall I not!" cried La Salle, his hot blood afire for one more fight +and one more triumph. "I fear we shall find but poor sport, but such +as it is I shall take my share. Break up yonder circle of madmen, and +order them to make ready. Hasten, so that we may have our hunt, and be +ready to receive the ship when she sails out of the fog." + +"I go not," cried Onawa, furiously resisting the soldiers who would +have forced her away. She broke from them, ran to La Salle, and fell +upon her knees, panting: "I go with you, that I may fight with you, and +die for you." + +"The woman has yet to learn a soldier's discipline," said La Salle +coldly. "Secure a rope round her, and if she prove obstinate let her +feel the end of it." + +Onawa flung herself forward to grasp his feet, but two soldiers stepped +out and dragged her away. + +"Now, my brave comrades! To arms!" shouted the fighting priest. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII. + +ARMS AND THE MAN. + +Silas Upcliff groaned bitterly when he heard the Puritan's shout. +Being a brave man, his spirit inclined towards lending aid to his +compatriots, but being honest also, his sense of duty impelled him to +observe the oath which he had made to his niggardly owner. While he +was thus halting between two opinions, the three venturers left him +upon the shore, the blood tingling in their veins at the prospect of a +glorious death. + +Penfold led the way and took command, carrying his burden of years as +lightly as any man upon that coast. Striking upward from the bay, +where the sailors were fighting the ice, he brought his companions to a +height of three hundred feet above the sea, where the cliffs were +divided by a narrow defile down which in summer coursed a stream. + +"I have kept this place in mind," said the old man, when they halted at +the extremity of the pass. "Here we shall make our stand." + +So contracted was the way that the snow, massed heavily upon the sides, +in places nearly touched. Some pines clung to the rock, hanging over +the defile, straining at their rope-like roots. At these the old +yeoman pointed with the order: + +"Fell me two trees so that they shall fall along the pass." + +The others scrambled up the cliff and cut at the snaky roots, while +Penfold occupied himself below in treading the snow into a firm bed. +Soon the tough pines began to crack and sway. First one crashed down, +then another, and after that Upcliff came running, short of breath, +into the defile, having at length made up his mind that Master Grignion +must lose his ship. + +"The enemy show black against the snow yonder, a hundred men if there +be one," he shouted. "Tell me now, how shall I dispose my men?" + +"Return to your ship, Master Skipper, and cut her free with what speed +you may," replied Penfold gruffly. "We stand here to hold back the +enemy so long as life remains." + +"Mayhap they shall not come this way?" suggested Upcliff. + +"If they do not, then are ye doubly safe. Before they can pass round +you shall be away, for I know of no easy path up yonder wall, and on +the south the sea guards us. See you not that they must here advance +singly, and that one good fighter may hold them all at bay?" + +"They have guns," said Upcliff, cocking his ear to listen to the axes +ringing keenly in the bay. + +"They shall not use them. The snow must drench their priming." + +The skipper made a step back, but halted again. + +"I cannot desert you, comrades," he said hoarsely. "My owner is also +an Englishman, an alderman of London town, and, close-minded though he +be, I wot he would lose his venture and his ship rather than see +England shamed. Bid me call my men to the far end of this pass, and +there let us stand together until the end." + +"See you not that this is our affair?" replied Penfold. "We are +fighting for our own hands, having blood of comrades to avenge. Go, +for you do but waste your time and ours." + +"Away," added Hough, pushing the skipper gently back. "The Lord being +on our side, how should we be afraid? They come about us like bees, +and are extinct even as the fire among the thorns, for in the name of +the Lord shall we destroy them. Go, good master, and while we smite +these worshippers of idols do you release your ship." + +Thus compelled to observe his oath, Upcliff gave way, though with great +unwillingness, and ran to the end of the pass, where his eyes were +gladdened by the sight of the _Dartmouth_ riding in the black channel, +dressed out in all her canvas. His sailor's heart warmed at the +spectacle, but sank again when he contemplated the wide white field +which still spread between the deep sea and his ship. He staggered +down, blowing like a whale, and snatching an axe from the tired hands +of one of his sailors wielded it furiously. + +The men in the pass twisted the pine-boughs and snagged the trunks to +form a rough chevaux-de-frise. Before an hour had passed they heard +footfalls crushing the snow, and then Penfold smiled and rose to his +feet. The old man had been resting beneath a tree. + +"Comrades," he said, "I lead by the privilege of age. Not more than +one can make a stand in this narrow pass. Do you ascend the cliff, one +on either side, and as the enemy attempt to climb the barrier cast snow +into their faces. The rest you shall leave to me." + +"Out on you, old Simon," said Hough strongly. "I am younger than you +by many years, and thus shall last the longer." + +"You may fill this place after me," said Penfold. "But while I live I +rule." + +Hough was not satisfied, and the argument was only brought to an end by +the sight of a cap lifting above the ridge. + +"To your places," whispered Penfold, stepping quickly to the barrier. + +The knight was already upon the cliff, sheltering his spare body behind +a pine. He awaited the one man who, he felt assured, would not lose +the opportunity of a fight, and he did not desire to risk his life +until he and that man could meet. + +"Captain!" called a French voice startlingly, "a barrier is thrown +across the way." + +"Over it," ordered the officer. + +The man jumped upon the fallen trunk and threw up his hands to grasp +the higher branches; but his fingers merely clutched the air, he gave a +groan, and fell back, pierced through the heart by Penfold's sword, +which had darted from the interlacing branches. A shout went up from +the pass, which was now a struggling mass of soldiers. + +"Information ever costs a man," said the officer coolly. "Storm the +barrier." + +Two soldiers rushed out and flung themselves upon the locked trees, +jostling each other in the constricted space. A lump of snow hit the +foremost between the eyes, he gasped, and would have turned, but a +sword-thrust sent him to his doom, and his comrade, blinded in the +self-same manner, shared his fate. + +"There are men in hiding yonder," rang a voice. "The villains shelter +behind the trees." + +"Find me a way round," roared an angry voice, and La Salle pushed along +the pass. "Are we to be held here by one man behind a fallen tree?" + +"There is no way up, Excellency," said an officer, gazing up the face +of the rock. "The heretics have well chosen their place." + +"Send men round," shouted the priest. + +A detachment was sent instantly to find a way over the cliff, while +woodmen with axes went out and laid furiously upon the pines. Penfold +disabled the first, but another advanced, and after him another, each +unwilling to obey, but unable to hang back. + +Three dead bodies were dragged out, and La Salle tried the expedient of +sending his men in rapid succession against the barrier. The wet snow +dashed upon their faces, one by one they dropped before that stinging +sword, man after man fell back, but another always stood ready to rush +into the gap, to make the attempt, and give way to someone more +confident than he. Penfold's dogged old tongue counted off the strokes +to the ringing of the ice-axes from the bay. The soldier-settlers came +faster, each man more fierce than the last, because their blood was +heated by the shame of this defeat. The old man's misty breath came +streaming between the branches where his untiring sword flickered in +and out. + +Two at a time came the Frenchmen, until at length, profiting by a +mis-stroke, a couple gained the summit of the barrier. The first to +jump down fell a prey to the stout yeoman, but the second reached the +ground unharmed. A shout of triumph went up, and the soldiers swarmed +the obstacle. + +"Excellency, the Indian woman has shown us a way over the cliff," +exclaimed a voice beside La Salle. "That way, says she, we shall +encounter no opposition." + +"I will myself make the trial," La Salle answered. "Do you in the +meantime win this pass." + +"She says also that we must hasten, because these men are holding the +pass while their comrades free the ship from the ice." + +Penfold fought on, grim to the end, but his sword had lost its +deadliness and his arm was growing numb. His comrades aided him as +best they could, but they too were acting upon the defensive, because +some of the more daring soldiers had scaled the slippery sides of the +pass in a futile endeavour to drag them down. The old man groaned and +tottered as the light failed gradually from his eyes. + +"Let it be said of me," he gasped, "that I gave them half an hour." + +Voices roared in his ears, like the waves of a stormy sea about to +close over his head. + +"Strike! He is spent. Strike him down." + +There followed an onward rush. Over the old man's failing body sped +the bitterness of death. + +He felt a sword in his side, another in his shoulder, and at the pain +he revived like an old lion, and roared and plunged forward, feeling +his way with his point, until he found his striker's heart, and then he +shouted with all the strength that was left: + +"Stand up in my stead, comrade! I have made a good fight, and +accounted for the best. They shall run before us yet. To me, comrade! +Ha! St. Edward and St. George!" + +With that last shout he fell, deep into the red snow, his old body +spouting blood, and so died like a valiant man of Berks, with his sword +fast held, and his grey head set towards the foe. + +Hough hurled back a soldier, who had clambered up the cliff to dislodge +him, and would have flung himself down to stop the way, when on a +sudden a tall figure slid down the side opposite him, and stood +immediately to defy the body of men sweeping through like an inundating +wave, wielding his sword with calm, nervous strength, his keen eyes +starting from a thin, brown face. + +Then Hough's courage gave way, and sinking to his knees, while the +enemy rushed through, he cried aloud. Death had no terror for him; but +the spectacle of that cold man, whom for an instant he had seen, +fighting in the raw light of the dawn, then thrown down and trodden +under foot, made him shiver to the heart. + +"The Lord encompasses us with the spirits of our friends," he cried, +knowing that it was Jesse Woodfield who already lay hacked and bruised +and buried in the snow of the defile. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII. + +THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED. + +The Acadians swept towards the bay, but their governor was not with +them. La Salle had gone alone over the cliffs, along the way which +Onawa had revealed, and he went not unseen. The Kentishman followed, +searching out each footprint in the snow. Once again the priest was +destined to take up the sword, before assuming the mantle of spiritual +power. As he passed among the pines the loneliness of the place began +to make him fear, and when he stopped with a curse, because he knew not +which way to turn, he seemed to behold the sword of his dream flashing +like lightning between the mitre and himself. And while halting he +heard perplexing shouts, lessening, receding, and growing faint, as his +men rushed down upon their foes. + +Hearing those shouts Upcliff looked up from the field of ice, and his +heart for an instant ceased when he saw that the enemy had gained the +pass. + +"Now, men of Somerset," he shouted, "let our bird fly right soon, or we +shall never sight England again." + +"We can do no more than our best, captain," growled the sailor Jacob +Sadgrove. "My arms are near dead with work." + +"Out!" cried Madeleine, sweeping forward. "Out, and make room for a +woman." + +She caught up the axe which the grumbler had dropped, and, lifting her +brave arms, attacked the barrier of ice with never a thought of fear, +until the sailor returned glumly to his work for shame. + +"Only a few more yards," the deceiving girl cried, throwing back her +flushed face. "Look not behind. To regard work closely is to fear it. +Attack boldly, and it is done. See how the ship struggles to be free! +Soon we shall fly through the open water, with the wind in our sails. +Then shall you rest, and it shall delight you to remember the work." + +So she called, laughing and singing at intervals, and running here and +there to encourage the toilers, a faithful angel of hope, while the +axes rang more strongly and the men cast side-glances towards the foe +and swore breathlessly at their impotence. + +"Get you aboard, lass," said Upcliff, loosening his cutlass. "Here is +work for men. My lads, we shall make a good fight for country and +faith, and die, if God will, like true men facing odds. Now we are +taken on both sides." + +He pointed to the north-west. Out of the gloom of dawn and the +fog-wreaths, which ever haunt the Nova Scotian banks, sailed a +full-rigged man-of-war beating against the breeze. It was the +provision ship making for the settlement now that the helmsman could +see to steer between the rocks. + +"Nothing but a miracle can serve," quoth the skipper. "And the age of +miracles is past." + +"Have but faith, and the miracle shall yet be wrought," cried +Madeleine, her magnificent confidence strong within her, even in that +hour when a less bold spirit would have seen the doors of a heretic's +prison reopening. "God shall yet make a way for us to escape. I know +we are not doomed. Help me, captain, and you sailors, with your faith. +We are never to be taken. We are to escape from our enemies, and God +shall give to us the victory." + +Upcliff smiled sadly as he gazed at the radiant face of the prophetess, +shaking his grizzled head as he muttered: + +"May the good Lord bless you, girl. You send us forth strong to fight." + +Then again he faced his men and formed them in line; and when they +stood ready to receive the enemy, every man his cutlass in hand, the +master cried out strongly: + +"Let no man surrender. For such the French have a gallows. Lads, we +shall, by God's grace, leave a deep mark on yonder little army before +the ship comes nigh. See you how slowly she labours down? She can +scarce make headway against the tide, and the breeze freshens every +minute. Now for a bold stand, a stern struggle, and may the Lord have +mercy on us all." + +Stout Somerset throats answered him with a cheer. They had exercised +their privilege of grumbling over the uncongenial work of cutting a way +for their ship through the ice-field while their compatriots fought +upon the cliffs; but not a man drew back from the prospect of that +hopeless battle. + +The Acadians struggled down the long hill, floundering in the soft +snow, and, halting upon the flat, drew up in the form of a crescent. +There were signs of unwillingness among the settlers, due in part to +the reputation gained in those days by Englishmen of never shrinking +from a struggle to the death. They were also perturbed by the absence +of La Salle, whom they had not seen since Woodfield had been +overwhelmed and left for dead in the defile. + +While the French thus hesitated, Upcliff and his impetuous men were for +advancing to the attack; but Madeleine came before them, and in a +strained voice, altogether unlike her usual tones, implored the skipper +not to move towards the shore. + +"Do not leave the ice," she cried. "I charge you go not beyond the +ice." + +"The maid has surely lost her wits," muttered Upcliff. + +"See the eyes of her!" whispered Jacob Sadgrove to his nearest +companion. "Have seen a horse look so, when he knows of somewhat +coming, and would speak of it if he might." + +A roar broke the morning fog. The ship had fired to encourage her +allies. The ball splashed into the black water far from the gallant +_Dartmouth_, which quivered and shook her sails in furious helplessness. + +"Swear to me that you will not leave the ice-field," cried Madeleine. + +"Ay, if you wish it," said Upcliff; adding bluntly: "May die as well +here as yonder. Stand together, lads. They come!" + +"Oh, why so long?" prayed Madeleine, bending upon the snow. "It is +time for the miracle. I know we are to be saved, but it is terrible to +wait. I know that not a hair upon the head of any of these men shall +be harmed; but they know it not, and they prepare for death because +they cannot see. Oh, God, send us now the miracle!" + +"Stand firm!" shouted Upcliff. "Let them make the charge, and we shall +smite them as they stumble in the snow." + +He spoke, and straightway a mighty report rang along the shore. The +ice on which the men planted their resolute feet quivered and heaved. +The attackers halted and drew back; the attacked stared at one another +in superstitious wonderment. No smoke drifted behind. The guns upon +the ship had not spoken. But the echoes of that dry, sharp sound still +crashed among the cliffs. + +Madeleine rose, and sent her rapturous voice singing into the ears of +all: "The miracle! The miracle!" + +Already a channel of black water frothed and bubbled between the +English sailors and the French settlers, a channel which widened each +moment, as the ice-floe which the change of temperature had parted so +suddenly from the shore drifted seawards, drawn out by the strong gulf +current, bearing the men snatched from death, the little ice-locked +ship, and the girl who had trusted so firmly and so well. + +They flocked round her, the rough sailors, crying like children, and +knelt to kiss her hands. + +"To work!" she cried, pointing to the silver strip which held the floe +united. + +But before the men could again use their axes the strain told. The ice +cracked again and the field was divided into two parts. There was a +momentary danger lest the brigantine should be crushed between the +floes, but this peril was averted by the regularity of the current. +The men swung themselves aboard, lifting Madeleine up the ladder of +ropes and so upon deck. The enemy already had become grotesque black +spots upon the shore. + +"Clear the decks for battle!" the captain thundered as the little ship +ran free of the ice. + +The Frenchman had altered her course, and was bearing down upon the +_Dartmouth_, roaring with all her guns. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV. + +THE THIRST. + +Onawa, daughter of Shuswap, vagrant and traitress, she who had brought +disaster upon her own people, continued to reap the reward of all her +constancy to the enemy of her race. Famished and parched, she sank +into a bed of snow, and rested her wildly throbbing head against a +frosted tree. She had not eaten for many hours, her shelter was more +than a league away, and her strength was gone. Her reward also was a +maddening thirst. + +After tracking down the Englishmen, watching them in the fall of the +snow, enduring every privation until she had learnt their strength, she +had gone at full speed to the settlement, madly hoping even then that +La Salle might look on her with favour, despite her branded cheeks and +mutilated face. His reward was to give her over to the soldiers, who +had mocked her because she was of the hated race, a savage in their +eyes, and had bound her with a rope and scourged her with the end of +it, and had even struck her with their fists when she halted from +exhaustion, and would have stabbed her to death had she refused to +obey. Thus she received her full reward. And now she could do no more. + +Neuralgic pains coursed through her head, until the weight of her hair +became a torment. Feverishly she sucked a handful of snow, but the +awful thirst remained unquenched. The sounds of the chase entered her +ears dimly from that half-lit region ahead, until drowsiness passed +into her body, and her head dropped, and her eyes closed, and the sleep +which moves imperceptibly into death came upon her. Her passionate +heart lowered its beat, her pulses throbbed more sluggishly, as she +drew close to the threshold which separates life and its object from +the world of dreams. Her body collapsed, her head slid down; the soft +snow sucked her in like quicksand. + +A figure passed among the slim terebinth columns. Though the sleeper +had brought down her father into dishonour, had betrayed her tribe, and +called the shadow of death across the home of her kindred, her sister +had not forgotten her. The figure approached, bent over the huddled +shape, and shook it roughly back to life. + +"Tuschota!" muttered the girl, as her eyes opened upon the immobile +brown face. + +"Rise," said the woman. "Lean on me, and I will take you to my hut." + +"Leave me here," moaned Onawa. "I would lie until the great sleep +comes." + +"I am your sister. I may not leave you thus to die. Yonder food +awaits you, and drink, and the warmth of burning logs." + +She assisted Onawa to rise. The girl staggered and clung with dead +hands. Together they passed down the slope, and so came to the cabin +cunningly hidden amid snowy bush. A fire burnt redly, and hard by +stood a stone vessel filled with rice-water. Towards this Onawa +reached her hands, with the cry: + +"I am tortured with thirst." + +Without a word her sister gave her drink, and watched her while she +gulped at the tepid liquor. Suddenly she put out her hand, and grasped +the vessel, saying: + +"See! I have meat ready for you." + +Onawa partook of the food like a famished beast, and as strength +returned the former love of life awoke, and she longed to go forth to +renew the hopeless quest; but she felt her sister's eyes reading her +thoughts, and presently she heard that sister's voice: + +"It is good to live, Onawa." + +She made no reply, but leaned forward, thrusting her hands against the +scarlet wood. + +"Even when son and husband are taken away, and the light fails, and all +the ground is dark, it is still good to live," went on the voice. "Why +the good God gives this love of life we may not know." + +"Give me more drink," the girl panted. + +"Our father shall soon pass into the spirit land," went on the stern +woman, unheeding her request. "He is old, but 'tis not age that saps +his strength. Honour has departed from him. He has lost the headship, +and another fills his office." + +Onawa stared sullenly into the leaping heart of the fire. + +"As this life continues we find trouble. You have lost beauty, and I a +son. We shall not regain that which we have lost. Sisters in blood we +are, and sisters in unhappiness also." + +"I have brought sorrow into your life," muttered Onawa, less in +penitence than defiance. + +"And shall do so again. This night you have brought the enemy of my +people out from Acadie. There was a time when you betrayed my son into +the hands of him who now spurns you from his side. That which is done +cannot be undone, and God shall punish." + +"Why, then, have you brought me here?" cried Onawa fiercely. "Why did +you not leave me to perish, that you might be rid of me for ever?" + +"Remember you not the words that I spoke to you in the grove? I bade +you have in mind that in the time when you should hunger and thirst you +might turn to me. I have not forgotten, though you turned against me +when your heart followed its own longing. + +"I grieved for your Richard." + +"So the hunter grieves when he by mischance has slain the bear cub +which has strayed. And so he avoids the mother if he loves his life." + +At that moment there rang in her steady voice a threat. Onawa looked +up and met a suffering brown face and large quiet eyes. There was no +menace there, nothing but longing for the dead and charity for the +living. + +She pressed a hand upon her burning throat. "Give me drink," she +gasped. + +Her sister poured some of the rice-water into a smaller vessel. This +she stirred gently with a stick, watching the ruined face of Onawa with +the same patient eyes. Outside the hut a flight of snow birds whirred +from side to side. + +"When you have drunk you shall go forth," said Mary Iden deliberately. +"You shall seek to aid my enemy when he strives to strike down my +husband." + +Onawa gave a cry. In wondering over her sister's forgiveness she had +forgotten La Salle. + +"They may already have met," she muttered. + +A stern smile crossed her sister's face. + +"Can you not hear?" she whispered. "Yet you say you love the white +priest. I have heard this long while the noise of sword striking +sword. I listen without fear, knowing that no man can conquer my +husband when no treachery hangs behind. Can you not hear the sounds of +the fight?" + +"My ears burn," cried Onawa. "I hear only the cold wind passing among +the pines." + +"They fight!" exclaimed her sister triumphantly. "My Richard shall +rest to-day." + +"The water," gasped Onawa for the third time. "My throat is on fire." + +"Drink and go forth." + +Grasping the vessel in both hands, Onawa drained it to the dregs. +Then, as her arms fell, and the taste in her mouth became exceeding +bitter, and a strange exaltation visited her brain, and her body began +to burn, and numbness came into her feet, she bent with one terrible +groan, to hide her fear and her shame, and--if it were possible--her +awful knowledge of the wolfsbane poisoning that draught, from the calm +black eyes which stared at her across the fire. + +"Aid whom you will," said the steady voice, which was scarce audible +above the furious beatings of the listener's heart. "The day breaks." + +A lifeless winter sun was struggling into the hut. + +The pride of her race remained with Onawa to the end. She would not +show fear, nor useless rage, in the presence of her sister. She would +not confess what she knew, nor acknowledge that she had met with the +punishment which she deserved and the laws of their race demanded. +Passing into a sad beam of light, she drew herself erect and panted: + +"I shall go forth." + +"Go, sister," said the poisoner. "I too go forth, but we shall not +walk together. For you the west and the forest, for me the south and +the sea." + +"I go among the pines." + +"Farewell, sister." + +"Farewell." + +Erect and proud, Onawa passed out with her awful sorrow, through the +opening morning, and so among the trees, still dignified and unbending +because she knew those calm black eyes followed all her movements. On +she went into the increasing gloom, until the snow carpet appeared to +grow hot, and opalescent colours fringed the trees, and sounds of +sleepy music hummed around her head. The red and green lights flashed +up and down; solitude closed behind her; the pine-barrens were on fire. +The world was gone. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXV. + +SWORDCRAFT. + +The path taken by La Salle ascended and brought him finally to the +crest of a hill. Here a wood of storm-beaten pines stood motionless in +the white calm of the long winter sleep. Between the dimly lighted +trees spread a narrow scar of black earth, which had been protected +from snow by the funereal boughs above. The spot was as silent and as +sad as a burying-place. It seemed to the priest that the balsamic +pines might have been planted to neutralise any noxious odours +emanating from the ground. He shivered at the thought, turned to +retrace his steps and find an outlet which might lead him to the shore; +but straightway a restraint fell upon his feet, and a thrill raced +through his body, when he perceived that the place whereon he walked +was haunted ground. + +Before him stood a figure, white-faced and worn, clad in ragged +garments, a man to all outward seeming no more sentient than the pines, +for he moved not at all, nor did he speak, nor make a sign. As though +rooted and frozen, he stood across the way, showing life and feeling +only in his eyes. + +"By all the saints!" the priest muttered. "'Tis but a half-starved +Englishman." + +Then he shouted his ready challenge to the silent man, who passed +immediately with swift movements to the strip of bare ground, and, +halting within touch of his enemy, addressed him sternly in the Gallic +tongue: + +"That you may learn, Sir Priest, with whom you have to deal, know that +before you stands Sir Thomas Iden, a squire of England and a knight of +Kent, a man moreover who has sworn to fight you fairly to the death. +Remember you that night on which you put to death a boy in the forest +beside Couchicing? That boy was my son, my only child. Sir Priest, +you and I have crossed swords before this day. I was then a better man +than now; but, with the help of my God and the spirit of my child, I +shall lay out your body in this lonely spot for the winds to howl upon, +and leave your eyes open for the crows to peck at. I pray you answer +only with your sword." + +Hot words came to La Salle's tongue, but he did not utter them. He +found himself daunted by the horror of the place and the unyielding +attitude of the knight. As he brought up his renowned right arm, it +shivered and the hand was cold. But so soon as their blades met, his +fighting spirit arose and conquered the superstitious fear, and a +fierce light shone again in his eyes, and the knowledge was borne back +upon him that he was in truth the finest swordsman in the New World, +and with that he shouted out, "Have at you, heretic dog!" and attacked +with all his might. + +Not a bird moved through the air, not an insect lived upon that hill +top, not an animal passed that way. The two men had the gloomy wood to +themselves. Not even a breath of wind passed to wave the pines, or +scatter into motion last autumn's rusted leaves, which spotted with red +the sable rent in the great white sheet which Nature had drawn across +the ground. The rhythm of the swords rang monotonously, as the two +weird figures drifted to and fro, from side to side of the dusky bluff, +struggling the one against the other, with life as the winner's prize. +Before the abbe spread his splendid career of power as a prince of the +Church. He had but to emerge triumphant from this last taking of the +sword to assume the dignity of his new office and realise the ambition +of his heart. While the avenger saw neither priest, nor governor, nor +fencer of renown, but merely a fellow-being who had extinguished the +light of his young son's life. + +So the momentous minutes passed. When the sound of quick and furious +breathing began to pulsate around the hill, Mary Iden ascended from the +hollow, after playing her part in the avenging of her son's death, and +watched with bosom heaving rapidly every movement of her husband, sure +in her faith that he was the strongest man alive. Yet she aided him +with her counsel; and when the passion of the fight had entered also +into her she cast contempt and hatred upon La Salle, and mocked his +skill, though he was on that day the finer swordsman of the pair. + +"Wait not, husband," she cried warningly. "He is more spent than you." + +Sir Thomas heard and rushed out. La Salle, standing sideways, parried +the thrust with a slight motion of his iron wrist, and, rounding, took +up the attack, which ended in a feint and a lunge over the heart. His +sword glanced under the knight's arm and the point struck a fir and was +almost held. + +"Perdition!" he muttered. "I must use greater caution." + +For a few seconds the blades were dazzling as they darted together with +the malignity and swiftness of serpents; then La Salle feigned to +stumble, lowering his point as though he had lost his grip, an old +trick he had often employed successfully, and as the knight leaped +forward to take his opening, the priest recovered and sent the blade +into his opponent's side. Life had never appeared to him so good as at +that moment, but before his laugh had died the Englishman leaned +forward, grasping the sword and holding it firmly in his side, lunged +out, and ran the priest through the chest, after La Salle had saved his +life by throwing up his arm and deflecting the point from his heart. + +They fell apart, gulping the keen air for a taste of new life. The +watcher advanced, her brown face ghastly, but her husband put out his +hand and motioned her back. + +"Away, Mary. There is life in me yet." + +Unwillingly she retired, and a flush of pride crossed her face when her +husband staggered across the snow, his eyes still clear and fierce. La +Salle, no whit less dauntless, came up also and stood swaying like one +of the trees behind. + +"You are brave, Englishman, and a worthy foe," he gasped. "We have +shed each other's blood. Let us now cry hold and part." + +"There can be no truce between you and me," came the deep reply. "This +fight is to the death." + +"Life has its pleasures," urged La Salle. + +"Of such you deprived my son." + +"Your blood be upon your own head!" + +Again their swords clashed. No signs of weakening yet upon either +drawn face. The balance swayed neither to the one side nor to the +other. + +Again the watcher started out, appealing to her husband. It would be +an easy matter to attack La Salle from the rear; to trip his foot with +a stick; to blind him by a handful of snow. But the knight would not +hear her; and even threatened when she made as though she would disobey. + +The priest listened for the tramp of feet and the call of voices. He +would then have called the meanest settler in Acadie his brother. +Shoutings came to him from the bay, the roar of the ship's gun, and the +splitting of the ice. He groaned and cursed the folly which had driven +him into this snare. + +Courage revived when he scored by a clever stroke; but again his +triumph was short-lived. The knight answered by driving his point hard +into the open side. Darkness dropped upon their eyes. They reeled +like drunken men, fighting the air, feeling for each other, falling +body to body, and pushing apart with a convulsive shudder. + +"Where are you?" gasped the abbe. + +"Here," moaned the Englishman, striking towards the voice. + +"It is enough," said La Salle, the voice gurgling in his throat. +"Flesh and blood can endure no more. Put up your sword." + +"Only in your heart." + +They held at each other with one hand while fighting with the other. A +wound on one side was answered by a wound on the other. It appeared as +though neither had another drop of blood to shed, not a muscle left +unspent, nor a breath to come. The chill of the winter was in the soul +of each, and it was also the chill of death. They crawled at each +other like torn beasts, upon hands and knees. + +"You are spent," pulsated La Salle. + +"My sword has gone through you twice." + +"Husband, bid me strike him," implored the watcher. "He is scarce able +to lift his arm." + +"Back, woman," panted the dying man. + +Once more they stood upon their feet, and again their points were +raised, but now against bodies which had lost all consciousness, save +the ruling passion of ambition in the one and vengeance in the other. + +"Down!" snarled the abbe, knowing not it was the last word which his +tongue should utter; and, closing with his enemy, threw his remaining +life into one lunge. + +The sword left his hand for ever. By a glimmer of light through the +red darkness he saw the body of the knight stretched black along that +ghastly carpet; he saw the woman running forth with a great cry to +raise it by the shoulders. Then night fell upon the victor as he +stumbled on among the trees, with a small sane voice of consciousness +singing in his departing soul: "You have fought your last fight. You +shall win the red hat yet." + +So he was found by his defeated soldiers, feeling his way from pine to +pine, leaving in his wake two dotted lines more ruby-red than the +cardinal's soutane. They bound up his wounds as best they could, and, +raising him upon their shoulders, bore the dead weight of unconscious +matter into Acadie. + +At noon the ship came to the landing-stage. During the excitement +which accompanied and followed her arrival even the governor became +forgotten. A cadaverous priest was the first to step ashore, casting +around him glances of intolerable pride. Others were quick to follow, +and soon it became noised abroad that Roussilac was to be recalled and +that Pope Urbano had need of La Salle the priest. Even such momentous +matters were put aside by the settlers in their anxiety to hear tidings +of home and friends. + +In the meantime the pale-faced priest had set forth for the governor's +abode, muttering imprecations upon the bitter country in which it had +become his evil lot to settle. + +"His Excellency?" he inquired shortly at the door; and the seneschal, +awed by his morose manner, merely made a reverence and pointed as he +said: "He lies within, Holiness." + +More he would have said, but the nuncio passed on quickly and entered +the room, holding forth a missive tied with scarlet thread, calling in +a jealous voice: + +"Your Excellency! A letter from Rome. A call for your return." + +La Salle was lying along the bed. The messenger came nearer. + +"Awake, your Excellency! His Holiness Pope Urbano sends to you----" + +There the strange priest stopped at beholding a broken crucifix beneath +the sleeper's right hand; and a sneering smile curved his lips, and he +shrugged his thin shoulders, as he callously observed: + +"Methinks his Holiness has sent in vain." + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI. + +SETTLEMENT. + +It has now been shown how the golden lilies prospered in the north, and +how the red lion, who should in time tear those gay lilies down, was +laughed at and despised. The paths of ambition, of treachery, of +vengeance, have brought direct to the same terminus, where that "fell +sergeant death" stood forth to cry "Halt" to soldier and to priest. +The name of La Salle has ever been held in honour, but chiefly to +memorise Robert the explorer, not the ambitious priest his uncle. The +name of Iden is still revered by Kentish folk; but that respect is won, +not by Sir Thomas, who--if the tradition in his family be true--married +an Indian wife and flung away his life to avenge his son, but to Sir +Alexander, who slew the rebel Cade in a Sussex orchard. The name of +Onawa is held in memory by none, though for many generations the wood +wherein she died of the poisoned draught administered by her sister was +shunned by the Iroquois, because there sounded amid the pines at night +the howling of a werewolf. + +The old chronicles mention two Englishmen who escaped from the French, +and Jesse Woodfield and Jeremiah Hough are the names recorded. When +the Acadians swept down the defile to secure Upcliff and his men, the +Puritan was ignored, and the yeoman, who had made so startling an +appearance, was left for dead. So soon as they had gone Hough made for +his companion, and discovered that he was indeed material and alive, +though sorely wounded. Presently Woodfield revived, and when he was +able to stand the Puritan led him away up the white hills to find a +place of shelter. The hut in the pine-wood being too far away, they +proceeded by slow stages towards the home of the knight, knowing +nothing of what had occurred, and scarce guessing it when they gained +the bush-filled hollow, which was stirred to its depths by the wailing +of a death-song. + +"A fitting welcome for broken-hearted men," said the Puritan. "By the +waters of Babylon we sat down and wept. The children of Edom have +smitten us full sore. Happy shall he be that rewardeth them as they +have served us. Take courage, old lad. We are even now at home." + +"Home without friends," broke from the pale lips of the man within his +arms. + +"Where the graves of comrades are, there is the brave man's home. In +England we are gone out of mind, and broken like a potter's vessel. +Here amid the snows old Simon and old George lie sleeping well." + +The song stopped when they entered the hut and stood between the living +and the dead. Immediately Woodfield sank down in unconsciousness, and +after one glance upon the sad scene and a few bitter words, Hough knelt +at his comrade's side and searched for his wounds. + +"Let a woman perform a woman's work," said the pale watcher, rising +from her husband's side. "For him"--she inclined her head to the +silent figure--"the light is gone. He sees no longer the sparkling +air. His eyes shall not burn again. The great God knows how well he +lived and how he died." + +Seeing the question on the Puritan's lips, she went on: + +"The hand that smote our son smote him. I saw the man go, and death +with him like a cloud above his head. Give me the water that stands +yonder that I may wash these wounds." + +"Who brought him hither?" the Puritan asked. + +"These arms carried him. While he lived he would have me bear no +burden. The wood for the fire he took from me, saying, 'This is no +woman's work. A woman shall smile for her husband, prepare him food, +and keep a home for his return.' These arms carried my son to his +grave. My husband was not there, or surely he would have said, 'This +is no work for you.' These arms carried my husband from the place +where he fell. His eyes looked up to mine, as though again he would +say, 'This is no work for you.' Once more they shall carry him. +Afterwards I will wait for the coming of the south wind, which carries +the souls of the dead." + +She applied her skill in healing to the restoration of the white man. +She cleansed his wounds and cooled his fever, leaving him at length +sleeping with a wan smile of triumph on his face. By then Hough also +was asleep, his face terrible in its mutilation and sternness. + +When he revived, Woodfield told his comrade how he had been captured by +the Algonquins and how they had sought to put him to death. + +"I awoke from unconsciousness," he said, "to find myself within a cave, +attended by the maid who had loosed my body from the tree. An old man +watched the entry and brought me food. These two had saved my life, +the maid because she loved my white skin, the man because he was +Christian and had lost a son who would have been of my age had he +lived. I remained in that cave many days, gaining vigour, and on a +certain evening, when left alone, ran out into the shadows and hid +myself in the forest, covering my tracks as best I could. + +"The maid pursued and besought me in her own manner to return. Many +times I escaped from her. Often she brought me food, or I must have +perished of hunger during my long wanderings through the forest. I +would hear her calling after me in the still night. I would from some +hill-top see her following my track, and when she found me she would +hold me by the feet and strive to move my heart. But resisting the +wiles of Satan, who would have me to forget my own country and my +father's house, I ran from her again." + +"We thought you dead these many months." + +"It was the will of God that I should seek for you in vain," went on +Woodfield. "Once I lay in a swamp to hide myself from a band of French +explorers. Once I was attacked by six men. One I killed, and the +remainder fled, frightened by lightning which struck down a tree +between us. Another time I concealed myself in a hemlock while the +soldiers made their camp beneath its branches. So I fought my way on +towards the east with an Englishman's longing for the sea, and when +winter drew on I made me a shelter in the pine woods on the westward +side of Acadie, and there mourned for you and for Simon Penfold as for +comrades who had fallen in the battle." + +"How came you so suddenly to our aid?" + +"In the darkness of the falling snow I ventured to approach the +settlement. Nay more, I entered at the open gate, careless of my life, +and followed the soldiers out, my heart rejoicing when I learnt from +their shouts that countrymen of mine were near at hand. I climbed +among the cliffs, and, looking down, beheld old Simon fighting in the +defile. I was descending to give him help when he fell." + +"The Lord gives and the Lord has taken away," said the Puritan solemnly. + +While the words were on his lips the wattle door was shaken and a soft +voice called. Another moment a white figure entered with a rush of +smoky air, and Madeleine stood before them, wrapped in a sail which she +had assumed to render her progress across the snow invisible. She +threw away the covering and laughed triumphantly. + +"Say not that the ship is taken?" cried Hough. Then he muttered: "A +man may tell nothing from the maid's manner. Sorrow or joy--'tis the +same to her. She laughs through it all." + +"The ship is safe," said Madeleine. "We were attacked by the +man-of-war, but when we drew clear of the ice we soon left her +lumbering astern, until she gave up the chase and sailed for shore. We +have not lost a man." + +"Then what do you here?" + +"Think you that Silas Upcliff would desert friends?" cried Madeleine +indignantly. "So soon as he knew himself to be safe, he changed his +course and beat up the coast eastward until darkness fell. Then he +dropped down, and now has sent a boat to bring you off. I have come +for you, and must take no refusal, else I am sure they shall hang me +upon my return. I would bear the message myself. The master at first +crossed me, but, being a wise man, he gave way to a woman's whim. +Come! The boat waits, and liberty lies beyond." + +She moved across the earth floor and grasped the Puritan's arm. + +"What maid is this?" asked Woodfield, as he gazed at the vision of +beauty; and when Hough had told him the good soldier's heart swelled, +and he raised his stiff body that he might take her hand, while she +smiled at him through a mist of pity. + +"I want you, wounded man," she said. "There are none sick aboard, and +I must have one to care for, or my hands will hang idle all the day. I +have thrown in my lot with your people, because mine own have driven me +forth. You shall call me sister if you will, and you shall be brother +to me, because he who is to be my husband is your true comrade, and +'tis friendship that makes brotherhood rather than blood. Rise, +brother, and lean on me." + +"Girl," said Hough, with his stern smile, "this spell you cast over us +is more potent than witchcraft." + +"We come," cried Woodfield, drawing himself upright. "Say, comrade, +let us flee to Virginia, and settle among our own, that we may hear the +blessed English tongue again." + +"We go," answered Hough gloomily. "Here is no English colony, but we +seek one in the south." + +"Go," said Mary Iden, now again Tuschota, daughter of Shuswap, to the +three. "Take what you desire for your journey, and go forth. Here are +furs, and here strong medicines. Take all. The great God guard you +upon the seas and upon the land whither you go to dwell." + +So the two Englishmen and the French girl went forth under the winter +sky, where a shy moon peeped through laced clouds like a fair maid +looking between the curtains of her bed. A dull glow of firelight +showed when they looked back into the hollow; and once, when they +paused for breath, their ears became filled with the wild sound of +singing for the dead. + +Morning dawned, and the brigantine was well away, running with a fresh +breeze from the colony of France, all hearts aboard as light as the +frosty waves which kissed her sides. Through fog and snow she went, +like a bird flying to the warmth. Little wonder that the men sang at +their tasks; that Upcliff repeated his old stories of the main with a +fresh delight, none grudging him a laugh; that Woodfield gathered +health at every hour; that Madeleine laughed from morn to night. They +were as children released from school, playing on the happy home-going. + +So the _Dartmouth_ drew down to Boston quay, after one delay on the +unfrequented shore to make repairs, the men clanking at the pumps to +keep the leaking barque above the line of danger. The citizens flocked +down to meet her, and Hough's approving gaze fell upon Puritan faces +among whom he could feel himself indeed at home. + +Winthrop himself was called to give the sailors welcome to New England. +He stepped aboard, and grasped the master's hand; but not a word could +he utter before Madeleine came between them, her beauty all in +splendour, her mouth quivering, as she cried: + +"Tell me, sir--tell me quickly, where is my Geoffrey?" + +She had forgotten that other men bearing her lover's name walked the +earth. Winthrop stared in some bewilderment, and the more stern of his +following frowned at so much glorious life and impetuous loveliness. +The majority repeated the name with ominous shakings of bearded chins. + +"'Tis our comrade, young Geoffrey Viner, of whom the maid speaks," said +Woodfield in explanation. + +"Yea," exclaimed Madeleine. "Let me off the ship." + +"Stay," said Winthrop. "The young man is here indeed." He turned to +Hough with the demand: "Is he beyond doubt a true Englishman?" + +"True!" exclaimed Madeleine, her violet eyes two angry flashes. "You +suspect him? Oh, you false man!" + +It was the first time that John Winthrop had been accused of falseness; +and the novelty of the accusation brought a smile to his face. + +"The boy is loyal to the faith, and as true an Englishman as yourself, +brother Winthrop," broke in the voice of Hough. + +"Let justice prevail where I rule," said the pious governor when he +heard this. "I thank God that you have come in time. It has been +proved to our satisfaction against this boy that he has conspired with +the Dutch for the capture of our town, and as I speak he lies under +sentence of death. Thus the wisest judges err, and the humble of us +ask Heaven to amend our faults." + +Madeleine had paled very slightly while Winthrop spoke. Then she drew +her small dignified self upright, and said very confidently: "I knew +that we should arrive in time." + +"Methinks we shall scarcely find any swifter messenger to bear the good +news to the young man----" commenced the quiet voice of Roger Williams, +who had joined his friend and governor upon the quay. + +The end of the pastor's sentence became drowned in a shout of hearty +laughter such as had never been heard before in Boston; for immediately +he began to speak Madeleine picked up her skirt, and was already +running like Atalanta, breathlessly demanding from those who stood by +whether her feet were carrying her in the right way. + +"Send a cheer after her, men of Somerset," shouted Silas Upcliff. +"For, by my soul, a braver lass ne'er loved an Englishman!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVII. + +THE PLOWSHARE. + +It was summer in the year 1647, and over all the colony of Virginia +there was peace. Fortunate were its settlers to be cut apart from +their brethren in the isle of strife, where the deceitful king was +imprisoned in his palace of Hampton Court, and the London citizens +filled their streets with cries of "Parliament" and "Privilege." New +England remained untouched by this wave of feeling, of which indeed it +knew nothing, and its people went on planting their crops and gathering +the increase, happy to be removed from the oppression of a king and the +persecution of the Church. + +Upon the south side of the Potomac, at no great distance from the sea, +stood a two-storey house overhung with wild vines, and approached by a +ladder-like flight of steps which rose between two borders of flowers. +Behind a plantation stretched in a straight mile, fringed on either +side by sweet-smelling bush, where purple butterflies played through +the long day and a silver stream laughed on its way to the sea. + +The Grove, as this homestead was named, had quickly identified itself +among the successful colonial ventures. The day of small things was +rapidly nearing its close. Not only were the joint owners of the +plantation able to supply the neighbouring village with wheatmeal and +cheeses, but their export business to the Old World was growing more +profitable each season. The Virginian exporters, Viner and Woodfield, +were well-known to import merchants of Bristol, and faded invoices of +that firm were to be seen in more than one dusty counting-house a +century later, when change and chance demanded a winding-up of the +business of certain old-time traders across the seas. + +This success was due not altogether to the energy of the partners who +gave their names to the undertaking. It was commonly reported that the +Lady of The Grove was in the main responsible for much of her husband's +prosperity. According to rumour, Mistress Woodfield was an excellent +housewife, clever at her needle, and with a better knowledge of simples +than any woman in the New World, if methinks somewhat over-inclined to +play the grand dame and careful against soiling her hands. With +Mistress Viner it was otherwise. She was never to be found taking her +ease in idleness, or retailing gossip concerning neighbours. Sloth, as +once she said when rebuking the governor--for she feared no man--is an +epidemic which claims more victims than the plague. Early in the +morning she walked her garden, inhaling the sweet air, noting what +progress had taken place during the night, ordering and arranging all +things; and should her husband long delay joining her, how +reproachfully she would call: "Geoffrey! Oh, slug! You are losing an +hour of life." At fall of evening she would walk in the plantation +beside her fair-haired lad, as she loved to call her lord and master, +planning fresh improvements, and never failing to note the beauty of +the life which slept around. Seldom did she speak of the past; never +did she trouble her mind concerning the future. All would be well she +knew. There could be no time so good as the present. "What do we want +with past or future?" she would exclaim, when she caught her Geoffrey +in retrospective or anticipatory mood. "Cold mirrors in which we see +our silent selves like blocks of wood or stone. It is this minute +which is our own glorious life." The cruellest, and falsest, thing +that any woman could say concerning Madeleine Viner was that the fair +mistress of The Grove had been seen wearing a sorrowful face. + +The simple inscription, "An American Woman," was carved by her own +desire over Mistress Viner's burying-place at the dawn of the +eighteenth century;' and at a later date an unauthorised and unknown +hand cut upon the shaft of the wooden column which stood upon her +resting-place, and was destroyed by fire before Canada was wrested from +the French, the not unsuitable motto, "Ride, si sapis." + +Over the fireplace of the principal room in The Grove a ring was set in +the hard oak woodwork. This ring contained a sigil engraved with the +arms of the Iden family, a chevron between three close helmets, and was +given a place of honour in the home because through its power Geoffrey +obtained a letter of recommendation and a subsequent patent of land +from that liberal-minded papist, Lord Baltimore, to whom the ring had +been delivered upon the safe arrival of the _Dartmouth_ in the Bay of +Chesapeake. + +"Better men never bled for England than the men of Kent," said the +peer, when he had listened to Geoffrey's story. "Braver men ne'er fled +from her shores to save their loyal lives. The owner of this ring was +once my honoured friend. His name has for long been most famous for +devotion to the crown." The lord sighed and sadly added: "This Charles +shall learn to rue the day when he first cast aside the help of his old +loyalist families, and by oppression and persecution most intolerable +drove them from their homes. But now, with God's help, we purpose to +build up upon this continent a new people, greater and more +clear-sighted than the old, and the motto of that people shall be, +'Liberty of thought and freedom in religion.' Tell me now, how shall I +serve you?" + +"I would settle, either in Maryland or in Virginia, and help to build +up that new American people of whom you speak," the young man answered. + +So Geoffrey Viner obtained favour in the eyes of Lord Baltimore by the +power of the ring; and when the patent for the land issued, he and +Woodfield forgot their former dreams of power, and, exchanging sword +for axe, felled the big trees and cleared away the bush, that they +might plough the virgin soil and plant their seed. As for stern Hough, +he remained in Boston, to fight Satan, since he might no longer fight +the French, and to preach the gloomy doctrine that he loved; and there +he lived to a great age, and there suddenly died one winter morning in +a bitterly cold church--for the religious feeling of the community +would allow no physical comfort to the worshipper--with a Bible between +his hands and a strained smile upon his face, as the preacher dilated +upon a psalm-singing Heaven reserved for the elect, and a burning fiery +furnace for all else. Hough had been a good man, according to the +light which he had received, and doubtless the psalm-singing Heaven was +his. + +It was evening. Geoffrey and Madeleine walked hand in hand through +their plantation, inhaling fragrance from the dewy blooms. Rain had +fallen during the afternoon, but when the sun broke out, to bid the +settlers good e'en, the country became a fairy-land. A sleepy bird +piped on a distant branch. A pale evening star rose in the east where +warm vapours were swimming in a silent sea. The peace was perfect in +that true Arcadia. Wars were yet to horrify the province, but the +shadow was not yet. For the present the sword was buried, and the +earth brought forth fruit plenteously. + +"If only I might have my wish!" exclaimed Madeleine, breaking a long +silence. + +Her husband looked at her, pressing her fingers within his, but +answered nothing. + +"I would have the whole world like this," she went on. "Geoffrey, we +would not, if we could, seek to conceive a world more beautiful than +ours. Yet how we spoil it by not knowing how to live! Were it my +world I would banish all hypocrisy, all disputings over religion, all +lust for power, and try to teach my people how to love--how to love, +and nothing else." + +"Making us perfect before our time," said Geoffrey, watching tenderly +the evening lights playing across her hair. + +"No, husband. We shall not attain perfection here. But it is from +this country that a light shall proceed to spread throughout the world. +Are we not already showing others how to live? What people before us +have ever dared to permit independence in thought and freedom in +religion? We have already stripped the Church of its mysteries. We +believe that a man may rise to God without a priest. We are going to +grow very great on this side of the seas, and fly very high, and our +motto shall always be Peace. Then we shall destroy all weapons of war, +and break up armies, and settle down in brotherly love, each man upon +his own plot of ground----" + +"Envying that of his neighbour," broke in her husband gently. + +"Ah, Geoffrey! Scoffer! But mayhap 'tis a foolish dream. Could we +but live in love, it might follow that the wolf would be ashamed to +hunt the lamb, and would feed upon grass, and thus it might happen that +our kine would lack. It is best as God ordains. The panther must +remain fierce, the bind-weed choke the flower, the rose grow its thorn, +and the berry retain its poison. But would you walk in my garden, +husband?" + +"And see the devil changed into a monk?" asked Geoffrey, with a smile. + +"There is no devil in my garden," cried Madeleine joyously. "The snake +has no bite, and the devil is dead of idleness. The angels show +themselves among my roses." + +"They are here," said Geoffrey simply. "Madeleine, sweet wife, before +we met I followed the promptings of the body; but through your eyes I +have seen the soul. It is not the soldier who wins life with his +sword. He does but strive in a vain shadow, until that happy day--ill +for him if it comes not--when there dawns upon his heart the light of +love, and his mind is inspired, and his ears hear the stirring of +wings, and his eyes are opened." + +"What does he see, husband?" she asked caressingly. + +"The sweet spirit of the woman who is sent to be his star." + +They returned to their home in the sunset, and Madeleine was singing +softly as she swung her husband's arm. The young matron ran forward, +to be entranced and transfigured by the last sunrays, and kissed her +fingers to the departing orb with a blithesome cry: + +"Wake us before the morning bell, bright sun, and come not in clouds as +you came to-day." + +Upon entering the flower garden a resonant voice, alternating with +tremendous bursts of glee, destroyed the stillness of the evening. +Husband and wife looked at each other in complete understanding, and +Madeleine held a finger to her lips, and motioned Geoffrey to advance +on tip-toe. They pressed through a bower of roses, beneath a tangle of +creepers, through tall rye-grass, and as they advanced the great voice +came more strongly to their ears. At length they stood unseen within +sight of their house front, and, drawing close together, laughed +restrainedly. + +Upon the topmost step, in a line with the entrance, sat a man of +immense bulk, holding a pretty fair-haired child upon his mighty knee; +and this child he was dancing up and down, shouting a quaint +accompaniment meantime. Around his head trailed the luxuriant vines, +covered with their fluffy white blooms, and the dainty humming-birds +went whirring by, chasing in sport the hivebound bees. + +Leaning back, and heaving his knee up and down, the big man continued +to serenely bellow his nursery refrain: + +"Ha! Pieter von Donck! Pieter von Donck! 'Tis as cunning an old +rogue as ever wore shoe-leather!" + +"Funny man! Do it again," chirruped Geoffrey Viner the younger. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVIII. + +VALEDICTORY. + +And now in the days when the world is small, and ships of iron rush to +and fro upon the seas, and the sword has become a burden, and the +mightier plowshare ripples the plain, gone are the golden lilies, gone +the power of the soutane rouge, gone the House of Bourbon; and two +small islands of the gulf, St. Pierre and Miquelon, bound by their +rocks and beaten by the waves, gather the harvest of the sea under the +lion's protection, and mourn in their loneliness over that proud +supremacy which has passed away for ever. + + + + + + PRINTED BY CASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED, + LA BELLE SAUVAGE, LONDON, E.C. + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Plowshare and the Sword, by +Ernest George Henham + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PLOWSHARE AND THE SWORD *** + +***** This file should be named 35141.txt or 35141.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/5/1/4/35141/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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