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+The Project Gutenberg Etext of Alice of Old Vincennes
+by Maurice Thompson
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+Title: Alice of Old Vincennes
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+Author: Maurice Thompson
+
+Release Date: May, 2003  [Etext #4097]
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+The Project Gutenberg Etext of Alice of Old Vincennes
+by Maurice Thompson
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+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+To M. PLACIDE VALCOUR
+M. D., Ph D., LL. D.
+
+MY DEAR DR. VALCOUR: You gave me the Inspiration which made this
+story haunt me until I wrote it. Gaspard Roussillon's letter, a
+mildewed relic of the year 1788, which you so kindly permitted me
+to copy, as far as it remained legible, was the point from which
+my imagination, accompanied by my curiosity, set out upon a long
+and delightful quest. You laughed at me when I became enthusiastic
+regarding the possible historical importance at that ancient find,
+alas! fragmentary epistle; but the old saying about the beatitude
+of him whose cachinations are latest comes handy to me just now,
+and I must remind you that "I told you so." True enough, it was
+history pure and simple that I had in mind while enjoying the
+large hospitality of your gulf-side home. Gaspard Roussillon's
+letter then appealed to my greed for materials which would help
+along the making of my little book "The Story of Louisiana."
+Later, however, as my frequent calls upon you for both documents
+and suggestions have informed you, I fell to strumming a different
+guitar. And now to you I dedicate this historical romance of old
+Vincennes, as a very appropriate, however slight, recognition of
+your scholarly attainments, your distinguished career in a noble
+profession, and your descent from one of the earliest French
+families (if not the very earliest) long resident at that strange
+little post on the Wabash, now one of the most beautiful cities
+between the greet river and the ocean.
+
+Following, with ever tantalized expectancy, the broken and breezy
+hints in the Roussillon letter, I pursued a will-o'-the-wisp,
+here, there, yonder, until by slowly arriving increments I
+gathered up a large amount of valuable facts, which when I came to
+compare them with the history of Clark's conquest of the Wabash
+Valley, fitted amazingly well into certain spaces heretofore left
+open in that important yet sadly imperfect record.
+
+You will find that I was not so wrong in suspecting that Emile
+Jazon, mentioned in the Roussillon letter, was a brother of Jean
+Jazon and a famous scout in the time of Boone and Clark. He was,
+therefore, a kinsman of yours on the maternal side, and I
+congratulate you. Another thing may please you, the success which
+attended my long and patient research with a view to clearing up
+the connection between Alice Roussillon's romantic life, as
+brokenly sketched in M. Roussillon's letter, and the capture of
+Vincennes by Colonel George Rogers Clark.
+
+Accept, then, this book, which to those who care only for history
+will seem but an idle romance, while to the lovers of romance it
+may look strangely like the mustiest history. In my mind, and in
+yours I hope, it will always be connected with a breezy summer-
+house on a headland of the Louisiana gulf coast, the rustling of
+palmetto leaves, the fine flash of roses, a tumult of mocking-bird
+voices, the soft lilt of Creole patois, and the endless dash and
+roar of a fragrant sea over which the gulls and pelicans never
+ceased their flight, and beside which you smoked while I dreamed.
+
+MAURICE THOMPSON.
+JULY, 1900.
+
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+    I. Under the Cherry Tree
+   II. A Letter from Afar
+  III. The Rape of the Demijohn
+   IV. The First Mayor of Vincennes
+    V. Father Gibault
+   VI. A Fencing Bout
+  VII. The Mayor's Party
+ VIII. The Dilemma of Captain Helm
+   IX. The Honors of War
+    X. M. Roussillon Entertains Colonel Hamilton
+   XI. A Sword and a Horse Pistol
+  XII. Manon Lescaut, and a Rapier-Thrust
+ XIII. A Meeting in the Wilderness
+  XIV. A Prisoner of Love
+   XV. Virtue in a Locket
+  XVI. Father Beret's Old Battle
+ XVII. A March through Cold Water
+XVIII. A Duel by Moonlight
+  XIX. The Attack
+   XX. Alice's Flag
+  XXI. Some Transactions in Scalps
+ XXII. Clark Advises Alice
+XXIII. And So It Ended
+
+
+
+
+
+Alice of Old Vincennes
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+UNDER THE CHERRY TREE
+
+
+Up to the days of Indiana's early statehood, probably as late as
+1825, there stood, in what is now the beautiful little city of
+Vincennes on the Wabash, the decaying remnant of an old and
+curiously gnarled cherry tree, known as the Roussillon tree, le
+cerisier de Monsieur Roussillon, as the French inhabitants called
+it, which as long as it lived bore fruit remarkable for richness
+of flavor and peculiar dark ruby depth of color. The exact spot
+where this noble old seedling from la belle France flourished,
+declined, and died cannot be certainly pointed out; for in the
+rapid and happy growth of Vincennes many land-marks once notable,
+among them le cerisier de Monsieur Roussillon, have been destroyed
+and the spots where they stood, once familiar to every eye in old
+Vincennes, are now lost in the pleasant confusion of the new town.
+
+The security of certain land titles may have largely depended upon
+the disappearance of old, fixed objects here and there. Early
+records were loosely kept, indeed, scarcely kept at all; many were
+destroyed by designing land speculators, while those most
+carefully preserved often failed to give even a shadowy trace of
+the actual boundaries of the estates held thereby; so that the
+position of a house or tree not infrequently settled an important
+question of property rights left open by a primitive deed. At all
+events the Roussillon cherry tree disappeared long ago, nobody
+living knows how, and with it also vanished, quite as
+mysteriously, all traces of the once important Roussillon estate.
+Not a record of the name even can be found, it is said, in church
+or county books.
+
+The old, twisted, gum-embossed cherry tree survived every other
+distinguishing feature of what was once the most picturesque and
+romantic place in Vincennes. Just north of it stood, in the early
+French days, a low, rambling cabin surrounded by rude verandas
+overgrown with grapevines. This was the Roussillon place, the most
+pretentious home in all the Wabash country. Its owner was Gaspard
+Roussillon, a successful trader with the Indians. He was rich, for
+the time and the place, influential to a degree, a man of some
+education, who had brought with him to the wilderness a bundle of
+books and a taste for reading.
+
+From faded letters and dimly remembered talk of those who once
+clung fondly to the legends and traditions of old Vincennes, it is
+drawn that the Roussillon cherry tree stood not very far away from
+the present site of the Catholic church, on a slight swell of
+ground overlooking a wide marshy flat and the silver current of
+the Wabash. If the tree grew there, then there too stood the
+Roussillon house with its cosy log rooms, its clay-daubed chimneys
+and its grapevine-mantled verandas, while some distance away and
+nearer the river the rude fort with its huddled officers' quarters
+seemed to fling out over the wild landscape, through its squinting
+and lopsided port-holes, a gaze of stubborn defiance.
+
+Not far off was the little log church, where one good Father
+Beret, or as named by the Indians, who all loved him, Father
+Blackrobe, performed the services of his sacred calling; and
+scattered all around were the cabins of traders, soldiers and
+woodsmen forming a queer little town, the like of which cannot now
+be seen anywhere on the earth.
+
+It is not known just when Vincennes was first founded; but most
+historians make the probable date very early in the eighteenth
+century, somewhere between 1710 and 1730. In 1810 the Roussillon
+cherry tree was thought by a distinguished botanical letter-
+writer to be at least fifty years old, which would make the date
+of its planting about 1760. Certainly as shown by the time-stained
+family records upon which this story of ours is based, it was a
+flourishing and wide-topped tree in early summer of 1778, its
+branches loaded to drooping with luscious fruit. So low did the
+dark red clusters hang at one point that a tall young girl
+standing on the ground easily reached the best ones and made her
+lips purple with their juice while she ate them.
+
+That was long ago, measured by what has come to pass on the gentle
+swell of rich country from which Vincennes overlooks the Wabash.
+The new town flourishes notably and its appearance marks the
+latest limit of progress. Electric cars in its streets, electric
+lights in its beautiful homes, the roar of railway trains coming
+and going in all directions, bicycles whirling hither and thither,
+the most fashionable styles of equipages, from brougham to pony-
+phaeton, make the days of flint-lock guns and buckskin trousers
+seem ages down the past; and yet we are looking back over but a
+little more than a hundred and twenty years to see Alice
+Roussillon standing under the cherry tree and holding high a
+tempting cluster of fruit, while a very short, hump-backed youth
+looks up with longing eyes and vainly reaches for it. The tableau
+is not merely rustic, it is primitive. "Jump!" the girl is saying
+in French, "jump, Jean; jump high!"
+
+Yes, that was very long ago, in the days when women lightly braved
+what the strongest men would shrink from now.
+
+Alice Roussillon was tall, lithe, strongly knit, with an almost
+perfect figure, judging by what the master sculptors carved for
+the form of Venus, and her face was comely and winning, if not
+absolutely beautiful; but the time and the place were vigorously
+indicated by her dress, which was of coarse stuff and simply
+designed. Plainly she was a child of the American wilderness, a
+daughter of old Vincennes on the Wabash in the time that tried
+men's souls.
+
+"Jump, Jean!" she cried, her face laughing with a show of cheek-
+dimples, an arching of finely sketched brows and the twinkling of
+large blue-gray eyes.
+
+"Jump high and get them!"
+
+While she waved her sun-browned hand holding the cherries aloft,
+the breeze blowing fresh from the southwest tossed her hair so
+that some loose strands shone like rimpled flames. The sturdy
+little hunchback did leap with surprising activity; but the
+treacherous brown hand went higher, so high that the combined
+altitude of his jump and the reach of his unnaturally long arms
+was overcome. Again and again he sprang vainly into the air
+comically, like a long-legged, squat-bodied frog.
+
+"And you brag of your agility and strength, Jean," she laughingly
+remarked; "but you can't take cherries when they are offered to
+you. What a clumsy bungler you are."
+
+"I can climb and get some," he said with a hideously happy grin,
+and immediately embraced the bole of the tree, up which he began
+scrambling almost as fast as a squirrel.
+
+When he had mounted high enough to be extending a hand for a hold
+on a crotch, Alice grasped his leg near the foot and pulled him
+down, despite his clinging and struggling, until his hands clawed
+in the soft earth at the tree's root, while she held his captive
+leg almost vertically erect.
+
+It was a show of great strength; but Alice looked quite
+unconscious of it, laughing merrily, the dimples deepening in her
+plump cheeks, her forearm, now bared to the elbow, gleaming white
+and shapely while its muscles rippled on account of the jerking
+and kicking of Jean.
+
+All the time she was holding the cherries high in her other hand,
+shaking them by the twig to which their slender stems attached
+them, and saying in a sweetly tantalizing tone:
+
+"What makes you climb downward after cherries. Jean? What a
+foolish fellow you are, indeed, trying to grabble cherries out of
+the ground, as you do potatoes! I'm sure I didn't suppose that you
+knew so little as that."
+
+Her French was colloquial, but quite good, showing here and there
+what we often notice in the speech of those who have been educated
+in isolated places far from that babel of polite energies which we
+call the world; something that may be described as a bookish cast
+appearing oddly in the midst of phrasing distinctly rustic and
+local,--a peculiarity not easy to transfer from one language to
+another.
+
+Jean the hunchback was a muscular little deformity and a wonder of
+good nature. His head looked unnaturally large, nestling
+grotesquely between the points of his lifted and distorted
+shoulders, like a shaggy black animal in the fork of a broken
+tree. He was bellicose in his amiable way and never knew just when
+to acknowledge defeat. How long he might have kept up the hopeless
+struggle with the girl's invincible grip would be hard to guess.
+His release was caused by the approach of a third person, who wore
+the robe of a Catholic priest and the countenance of a man who had
+lived and suffered a long time without much loss of physical
+strength and endurance.
+
+This was Pere Beret, grizzly, short, compact, his face deeply
+lined, his mouth decidedly aslant on account of some lost teeth,
+and his eyes set deep under gray, shaggy brows. Looking at him
+when his features were in repose a first impression might not have
+been favorable; but seeing him smile or hearing him speak changed
+everything. His voice was sweetness itself and his smile won you
+on the instant. Something like a pervading sorrow always seemed to
+be close behind his eyes and under his speech; yet he was a
+genial, sometimes almost jolly, man, very prone to join in the
+lighter amusements of his people.
+
+"Children, children, my children," he called out as he approached
+along a little pathway leading up from the direction of the
+church, "what are you doing now? Bah there, Alice, will you pull
+Jean's leg off?"
+
+At first they did not hear him, they were so nearly deafened by
+their own vocal discords.
+
+"Why are you standing on your head with your feet so high in air,
+Jean?" he added. "It's not a polite attitude in the presence of a
+young lady. Are you a pig, that you poke your nose in the dirt?"
+
+Alice now turned her bright head and gave Pere Beret a look of
+frank welcome, which at the same time shot a beam of willful self-
+assertion.
+
+"My daughter, are you trying to help Jean up the tree feet
+foremost?" the priest added, standing where he had halted just
+outside of the straggling yard fence.
+
+He had his hands on his hips and was quietly chuckling at the
+scene before him, as one who, although old, sympathized with the
+natural and harmless sportiveness of young people and would as
+lief as not join in a prank or two.
+
+"You see what I'm doing, Father Beret," said Alice, "I am
+preventing a great damage to you. You will maybe lose a good many
+cherry pies and dumplings if I let Jean go. He was climbing the
+tree to pilfer the fruit; so I pulled him down, you understand."
+
+"Ta, ta!" exclaimed the good man, shaking his gray head; "we must
+reason with the child. Let go his leg, daughter, I will vouch for
+him; eh, Jean?"
+
+Alice released the hunchback, then laughed gayly and tossed the
+cluster of cherries into his hand, whereupon he began munching
+them voraciously and talking at the same time.
+
+"I knew I could get them," he boasted; "and see, I have them now."
+He hopped around, looking like a species of ill-formed monkey.
+
+Pere Beret came and leaned on the low fence close to Alice. She
+was almost as tall as he.
+
+"The sun scorches to-day," he said, beginning to mop his furrowed
+face with a red-flowered cotton handkerchief; "and from the look
+of the sky yonder," pointing southward, "it is going to bring on a
+storm. How is Madame Roussillon to-day?"
+
+"She is complaining as she usually does when she feels extremely
+well," said Alice; "that's why I had to take her place at the oven
+and bake pies. I got hot and came out to catch a bit of this
+breeze. Oh, but you needn't smile and look greedy, Pere Beret, the
+pies are not for your teeth!"
+
+"My daughter, I am not a glutton, I hope; I had meat not two hours
+since--some broiled young squirrels with cress, sent me by Rene de
+Ronville. He never forgets his old father."
+
+"Oh, I never forget you either, mon pere; I thought of you to-day
+every time I spread a crust and filled it with cherries; and when
+I took out a pie all brown and hot, the red juice bubbling out of
+it so good smelling and tempting, do you know what I said to
+myself?"
+
+"How could I know, my child?"
+
+"Well, I thought this: 'Not a single bite of that pie does Father
+Beret get.'"
+
+"Why so, daughter?"
+
+"Because you said it was bad of me to read novels and told Mother
+Roussillon to hide them from me. I've had any amount of trouble
+about it."
+
+"Ta, ta! read the good books that I gave you. They will soon kill
+the taste for these silly romances."
+
+"I tried," said Alice; "I tried very hard, and it's no use; your
+books are dull and stupidly heavy. What do I care about something
+that a queer lot of saints did hundreds of years ago in times of
+plague and famine? Saints must have been poky people, and it is
+poky people who care to read about them, I think. I like reading
+about brave, heroic men and beautiful women, and war and love."
+
+Pere Beret looked away with a curious expression in his face, his
+eyes half closed.
+
+"And I'll tell you now, Father Beret," Alice went on after a
+pause, "no more claret and pies do you get until I can have my own
+sort of books back again to read as I please." She stamped her
+moccasin-shod foot with decided energy.
+
+The good priest broke into a hearty laugh, and taking off his cap
+of grass-straw mechanically scratched his bald head. He looked at
+the tall, strong girl before him for a moment or two, and it would
+have been hard for the best physiognomist to decide just how much
+of approval and how much of disapproval that look really
+signified.
+
+Although, as Father Beret had said, the sun's heat was violent,
+causing that gentle soul to pass his bundled handkerchief with a
+wiping circular motion over his bald and bedewed pate, the wind
+was momently freshening, while up from behind the trees on the
+horizon beyond the river, a cloud was rising blue-black, tumbled,
+and grim against the sky.
+
+"Well," said the priest, evidently trying hard to exchange his
+laugh for a look of regretful resignation, "you will have your own
+way, my child, and--"
+
+"Then you will have pies galore and no end of claret!" she
+interrupted, at the same time stepping to the withe-tied and peg-
+latched gate of the yard and opening it. "Come in, you dear, good
+Father, before the rain shall begin, and sit with me on the
+gallery" (the creole word for veranda) "till the storm is over."
+
+Father Beret seemed not loath to enter, albeit he offered a weak
+protest against delaying some task he had in hand. Alice reached
+forth and pulled him in, then reclosed the queer little gate and
+pegged it. She caressingly passed her arm through his and looked
+into his weather-stained old face with childlike affection.
+
+There was not a photographer's camera to be had in those days; but
+what if a tourist with one in hand could have been there to take a
+snapshot at the priest and the maiden as they walked arm in arm to
+that squat little veranda! The picture to-day would be worth its
+weight in a first-water diamond. It would include the cabin, the
+cherry-tree, a glimpse of the raw, wild background and a sharp
+portrait-group of Pere Beret, Alice, and Jean the hunchback. To
+compare it with a photograph of the same spot now would give a
+perfect impression of the historic atmosphere, color and
+conditions which cannot be set in words. But we must not belittle
+the power of verbal description. What if a thoroughly trained
+newspaper reporter had been given the freedom of old Vincennes on
+the Wabash during the first week of June, 1778, and we now had his
+printed story! What a supplement to the photographer's pictures!
+Well, we have neither photographs nor graphic report; yet there
+they are before us, the gowned and straw-capped priest, the fresh-
+faced, coarsely-clad and vigorous girl, the grotesque little
+hunchback, all just as real as life itself. Each of us can see
+them, even with closed eyes. Led by that wonderful guide,
+Imagination, we step back a century and more to look over a scene
+at once strangely attractive and unspeakably forlorn.
+
+What was it that drew people away from the old countries, from the
+cities, the villages and the vineyards of beautiful France, for
+example, to dwell in the wilderness, amid wild beasts and wilder
+savage Indians, with a rude cabin for a home and the exposures and
+hardships of pioneer life for their daily experience?
+
+Men like Gaspard Roussillon are of a distinct stamp. Take him as
+he was. Born in France, on the banks of the Rhone near Avignon, he
+came as a youth to Canada, whence he drifted on the tide of
+adventure this way and that, until at last he found himself, with
+a wife, at Post Vincennes, that lonely picket of religion and
+trade, which was to become the center of civilizing energy for the
+great Northwestern Territory. M. Roussillon had no children of his
+own; so his kind heart opened freely to two fatherless and
+motherless waifs. These were Alice, now called Alice Roussillon,
+and the hunchback, Jean. The former was twelve years old, when he
+adopted her, a child of Protestant parents, while Jean had been
+taken, when a mere babe, after his parents had been killed and
+scalped by Indians. Madame Roussillon, a professed invalid, whose
+appetite never failed and whose motherly kindness expressed itself
+most often through strains of monotonous falsetto scolding, was a
+woman of little education and no refinement; while her husband
+clung tenaciously to his love of books, especially to the romances
+most in vogue when he took leave of France.
+
+M. Roussillon had been, in a way, Alice's teacher, though not
+greatly inclined to abet Father Beret in his kindly efforts to
+make a Catholic of the girl, and most treacherously disposed
+toward the good priest in the matter of his well-meant attempts to
+prevent her from reading and re-reading the aforesaid romances.
+But for many weeks past Gaspard Roussillon had been absent from
+home, looking after his trading schemes with the Indians; and Pere
+Beret acting on the suggestion of the proverb about the absent cat
+and the playing mouse, had formed an alliance offensive and
+defensive with Madame Roussillon, in which it was strictly
+stipulated that all novels and romances were to be forcibly taken
+and securely hidden away from Mademoiselle Alice; which, to the
+best of Madame Roussillon's ability, had accordingly been done.
+
+Now, while the wind strengthened and the softly booming summer
+shower came on apace, the heavy cloud lifting as it advanced and
+showing under it the dark gray sheet of the rain, Pere Beret and
+Alice sat under the clapboard roof behind the vines of the veranda
+and discussed, what was generally uppermost in the priest's mind
+upon such occasions, the good of Alice's immortal soul,--a subject
+not absorbingly interesting to her at any time.
+
+It was a standing grief to the good old priest, this strange
+perversity of the girl in the matter of religious duty, as he saw
+it. True she had a faithful guardian in Gaspard Roussillon; but,
+much as he had done to aid the church's work in general, for he
+was always vigorous and liberal, he could not be looked upon as a
+very good Catholic; and of course his influence was not effective
+in the right direction. But then Pere Beret saw no reason why, in
+due time and with patient work, aided by Madame Roussillon and
+notwithstanding Gaspard's treachery, he might not safely lead
+Alice, whom he loved as a dear child, into the arms of the Holy
+Church, to serve which faithfully, at all hazards and in all
+places, was his highest aim.
+
+"Ah, my child," he was saying, "you are a sweet, good girl, after
+all, much better than you make yourself out to be. Your duty will
+control you; you do it nobly at last, my child."
+
+"True enough, Father Beret, true enough!" she responded, laughing,
+"your perception is most excellent, which I will prove to you
+immediately."
+
+She rose while speaking and went into the house.
+
+"I'll return in a minute or two," she called back from a region
+which Pere Beret well knew was that of the pantry; "don't get
+impatient and go away!"
+
+Pere Beret laughed softly at the preposterous suggestion that he
+would even dream of going out in the rain, which was now roaring
+heavily on the loose board roof, and miss a cut of cherry pie--a
+cherry pie of Alice's making! And the Roussillon claret, too, was
+always excellent. "Ah, child," he thought, "your old Father is not
+going away."
+
+ She presently returned, bearing on a wooden tray a ruby-stained
+pie and a short, stout bottle flanked by two glasses.
+
+"Of course I'm better than I sometimes appear to be," she said,
+almost humbly, but with mischief still in her voice and eyes, "and
+I shall get to be very good when I have grown old. The sweetness
+of my present nature is in this pie."
+
+She set the tray on a three-legged stool which she pushed close to
+him.
+
+"There now," she said, "let the rain come, you'll be happy, rain
+or shine, while the pie and wine last, I'll be bound."
+
+Pere Beret fell to eating right heartily, meantime handing Jean a
+liberal piece of the luscious pie.
+
+"It is good, my daughter, very good, indeed," the priest remarked
+with his mouth full. "Madame Roussillon has not neglected your
+culinary education." Alice filled a glass for him. It was Bordeaux
+and very fragrant. The bouquet reminded him of his sunny boyhood
+in France, of his journey up to Paris and of his careless, joy-
+brimmed youth in the gay city. How far away, how misty, yet how
+thrillingly sweet it all was! He sat with half closed eyes awhile,
+sipping and dreaming.
+
+The rain lasted nearly two hours; but the sun was out again when
+Pere Beret took leave of his young friend. They had been having
+another good-natured quarrel over the novels, and Madame
+Roussillon had come out on the veranda to join in.
+
+"I've hidden every book of them," said Madame, a stout and swarthy
+woman whose pearl-white teeth were her only mark of beauty. Her
+voice indicated great stubbornness.
+
+"Good, good, you have done your very duty, Madame," said Pere
+Beret, with immense approval in his charming voice.
+
+"But, Father, you said awhile ago that I should have my own way
+about this," Alice spoke up with spirit; "and on the strength of
+that remark of yours I gave you the pie and wine. You've eaten my
+pie and swigged the wine, and now--"
+
+Pere Beret put on his straw cap, adjusting it carefully over the
+shining dome out of which had come so many thoughts of wisdom,
+kindness and human sympathy. This done, he gently laid a hand on
+Alice's bright crown of hair and said:
+
+"Bless you, my child. I will pray to the Prince of Peace for you
+as long as I live, and I will never cease to beg the Holy Virgin
+to intercede for you and lead you to the Holy Church."
+
+He turned and went away; but when he was no farther than the gate,
+Alice called out:
+
+"O Father Beret, I forgot to show you something!"
+
+She ran forth to him and added in a low tone:
+
+"You know that Madame Roussillon has hidden all the novels from
+me."
+
+She was fumbling to get something out of the loose front of her
+dress.
+
+"Well, just take a glance at this, will you?" and she showed him a
+little leather bound volume, much cracked along the hinges of the
+back.
+
+It was Manon Lescaut, that dreadful romance by the famous Abbe
+Prevost.
+
+Pere Beret frowned and went his way shaking his head; but before
+he reached his little hut near the church he was laughing in spite
+of himself.
+
+"She's not so bad, not so bad," he thought aloud, "it's only her
+young, independent spirit taking the bit for a wild run. In her
+sweet soul she is as good as she is pure."
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+A LETTER FROM AFAR
+
+
+Although Father Beret was for many years a missionary on the
+Wabash, most of the time at Vincennes, the fact that no mention of
+him can be found in the records is not stranger than many other
+things connected with the old town's history. He was, like nearly
+all the men of his calling in that day, a self-effacing and modest
+hero, apparently quite unaware that he deserved attention. He and
+Father Gibault, whose name is so beautifully and nobly connected
+with the stirring achievements of Colonel George Rogers Clark,
+were close friends and often companions. Probably Father Gibault
+himself, whose fame will never fade, would have been to-day as
+obscure as Father Beret, but for the opportunity given him by
+Clark to fix his name in the list of heroic patriots who assisted
+in winning the great Northwest from the English.
+
+Vincennes, even in the earliest days of its history, somehow kept
+up communication and, considering the circumstances, close
+relations with New Orleans. It was much nearer Detroit; but the
+Louisiana colony stood next to France in the imagination and
+longing of priests, voyageurs, coureurs de bois and reckless
+adventurers who had Latin blood in their veins. Father Beret first
+came to Vincennes from New Orleans, the voyage up the Mississippi,
+Ohio, and Wabash, in a pirogue, lasting through a whole summer and
+far into the autumn. Since his arrival the post had experienced
+many vicissitudes, and at the time in which our story opens the
+British government claimed right of dominion over the great
+territory drained by the Wabash, and, indeed, over a large,
+indefinitely outlined part of the North American continent lying
+above Mexico; a claim just then being vigorously questioned,
+flintlock in hand, by the Anglo-American colonies.
+
+Of course the handful of French people at Vincennes, so far away
+from every center of information, and wholly occupied with their
+trading, trapping and missionary work, were late finding out that
+war existed between England and her colonies. Nor did it really
+matter much with them, one way or another. They felt secure in
+their lonely situation, and so went on selling their trinkets,
+weapons, domestic implements, blankets and intoxicating liquors to
+the Indians, whom they held bound to them with a power never
+possessed by any other white dwellers in the wilderness. Father
+Beret was probably subordinate to Father Gibault. At all events
+the latter appears to have had nominal charge of Vincennes, and it
+can scarcely be doubted that he left Father Beret on the Wabash,
+while he went to live and labor for a time at Kaskaskia beyond the
+plains of Illinois.
+
+It is a curious fact that religion and the power of rum and brandy
+worked together successfully for a long time in giving the French
+posts almost absolute influence over the wild and savage men by
+whom they were always surrounded. The good priests deprecated the
+traffic in liquors and tried hard to control it, but soldiers of
+fortune and reckless traders were in the majority, their interests
+taking precedence of all spiritual demands and carrying everything
+along. What could the brave missionaries do but make the very best
+of a perilous situation?
+
+In those days wine was drunk by almost everybody, its use at table
+and as an article of incidental refreshment and social pleasure
+being practically universal; wherefore the steps of reform in the
+matter of intemperance were but rudimentary and in all places
+beset by well-nigh insurmountable difficulties. In fact the
+exigencies of frontier life demanded, perhaps, the very stimulus
+which, when over indulged in, caused so much evil. Malaria loaded
+the air, and the most efficacious drugs now at command were then
+undiscovered or could not be had. Intoxicants were the only
+popular specific. Men drank to prevent contracting ague, drank
+again, between rigors, to cure it, and yet again to brace
+themselves during convalescence.
+
+But if the effect of rum as a beverage had strong allurement for
+the white man, it made an absolute slave of the Indian, who never
+hesitated for a moment to undertake any task, no matter how hard,
+bear any privation, even the most terrible, or brave any danger,
+although it might demand reckless desperation, if in in the end a
+well filled bottle or jug appeared as his reward.
+
+Of course the traders did not overlook such a source of power.
+Alcoholic liquor became their implement of almost magical work in
+controlling the lives, labors, and resources of the Indians. The
+priests with their captivating story of the Cross had a large
+influence in softening savage natures and averting many an awful
+danger; but when everything else failed, rum always came to the
+rescue of a threatened French post.
+
+We need not wonder, then, when we are told that Father Beret made
+no sign of distress or disapproval upon being informed of the
+arrival of a boat loaded with rum, brandy or gin. It was Rene de
+Ronville who brought the news, the same Rene already mentioned as
+having given the priest a plate of squirrels. He was sitting on
+the doorsill of Father Beret's hut, when the old man reached it
+after his visit at the Roussillon home, and held in his hand a
+letter which he appeared proud to deliver.
+
+"A batteau and seven men, with a cargo of liquor, came during the
+rain," he said, rising and taking off his curious cap, which, made
+of an animal's skin, had a tail jauntily dangling from its crown-
+tip; "and here is a letter for you, Father. The batteau is from
+New Orleans. Eight men started with it; but one went ashore to
+hunt and was killed by an Indian."
+
+Father Beret took the letter without apparent interest and said:
+
+"Thank you, my son, sit down again; the door-log is not wetter
+than the stools inside; I will sit by you."
+
+The wind had driven a flood of rain into the cabin through the
+open door, and water twinkled in puddles here and there on the
+floor's puncheons. They sat down side by side, Father Beret
+fingering the letter in an absent-minded way.
+
+"There'll be a jolly time of it to-night," Rene de Ronville
+remarked, "a roaring time."
+
+"Why do you say that, my son?" the priest demanded.
+
+"The wine and the liquor," was the reply; "much drinking will be
+done. The men have all been dry here for some time, you know, and
+are as thirsty as sand. They are making ready to enjoy themselves
+down at the river house."
+
+"Ah, the poor souls!" sighed Father Beret, speaking as one whose
+thoughts were wandering far away.
+
+"Why don't you read your letter, Father?" Rene added.
+
+The priest started, turned the soiled square of paper over in his
+hand, then thrust it inside his robe.
+
+"It can wait," he said. Then, changing his voice; "the squirrels
+you gave me were excellent, my son. It was good of you to think of
+me," he added, laying his hand on Rene's arm.
+
+"Oh, I'm glad if I have pleased you, Father Beret, for you are so
+kind to me always, and to everybody. When I killed the squirrels I
+said to myself: 'These are young, juicy and tender, Father Beret
+must have these,' so I brought them along."
+
+The young man rose to go; for he was somehow impressed that Father
+Beret must wish opportunity to read his letter, and would prefer
+to be left alone with it. But the priest pulled him down again.
+
+"Stay a while," he said, "I have not had a talk with you for some
+time."
+
+Rene looked a trifle uneasy.
+
+"You will not drink any to-night, my son," Father Beret added.
+"You must not; do you hear?"
+
+The young man's eyes and mouth at once began to have a sullen
+expression; evidently he was not pleased and felt rebellious; but
+it was hard for him to resist Father Beret, whom he loved, as did
+every soul in the post. The priest's voice was sweet and gentle,
+yet positive to a degree. Rene did not say a word.
+
+"Promise me that you will not taste liquor this night," Father
+Beret went on, grasping the young man's arm more firmly; "promise
+me, my son, promise me."
+
+Still Rene was silent. The men did not look at each other, but
+gazed away across the country beyond the Wabash to where a glory
+from the western sun flamed on the upper rim of a great cloud
+fragment creeping along the horizon. Warm as the day had been, a
+delicious coolness now began to temper the air; for the wind had
+shifted into the northwest. A meadowlark sang dreamingly in the
+wild grass of the low lands hard by, over which two or three
+prairie hawks hovered with wings that beat rapidly.
+
+"Eh bien, I must go," said Rene presently, getting to his feet
+nimbly and evading Father Beret's hand which would have held him.
+
+"Not to the river house, my son?" said the priest appealingly.
+
+"No, not there; I have another letter; one for M'sieu' Roussillon;
+it came by the boat too. I go to give it to Madame Roussillon."
+
+Rene de Ronville was a dark, weather-stained young fellow, neither
+tall nor short, wearing buckskin moccasins, trousers and tunic.
+His eyes were dark brown, keen, quick-moving, set well under heavy
+brows. A razor had probably never touched his face, and his thin,
+curly beard crinkled over his strongly turned cheeks and chin,
+while his moustaches sprang out quite fiercely above his full-
+lipped, almost sensual mouth. He looked wiry and active, a man not
+to be lightly reckoned with in a trial of bodily strength and will
+power.
+
+Father Beret's face and voice changed on the instant. He laughed
+dryly and said, with a sly gleam in his eyes:
+
+"You could spend the evening pleasantly with Madame Roussillon and
+Jean. Jean, you know, is a very amusing fellow."
+
+Rene brought forth the letter of which he had spoken and held it
+up before Father Beret's face.
+
+"Maybe you think I haven't any letter for M'sieu' Roussillon," he
+blurted; "and maybe you are quite certain that I am not going to
+the house to take the letter."
+
+"Monsieur Roussillon is absent, you know," Father Beret suggested.
+"But cherry pies are just as good while he's gone as when he's at
+home, and I happen to know that there are some particularly
+delicious ones in the pantry of Madame Roussillon. Mademoiselle
+Alice gave me a juicy sample; but then I dare say you do not care
+to have your pie served by her hand. It would interfere with your
+appetite; eh, my son?"
+
+Rene turned short about wagging his head and laughing, and so with
+his back to the priest he strode away along the wet path leading
+to the Roussillon place.
+
+Father Beret gazed after him, his face relaxing to a serious
+expression in which a trace of sadness and gloom spread like an
+elusive twilight. He took out his letter, but did not glance at
+it, simply holding it tightly gripped in his sinewy right hand.
+Then his old eyes stared vacantly, as eyes do when their sight is
+cast back many, many years into the past. The missive was from
+beyond the sea--he knew the handwriting--a waft of the flowers of
+Avignon seemed to rise out of it, as if by the pressure of his
+grasp.
+
+A stoop-shouldered, burly man went by, leading a pair of goats, a
+kid following. He was making haste excitedly, keeping the goats at
+a lively trot.
+
+"Bon jour, Pere Beret," he flung out breezily, and walked rapidly
+on.
+
+"Ah, ah; his mind is busy with the newly arrived cargo," thought
+the old priest, returning the salutation; "his throat aches for
+the liquor,--the poor man."
+
+Then he read again the letter's superscription and made a
+faltering move, as if to break the seal. His hands trembled
+violently, his face looked gray and drawn.
+
+"Come on, you brutes," cried the receding man, jerking the thongs
+of skin by which he led the goats.
+
+Father Beret rose and turned into his damp little hut, where the
+light was dim on the crucifix hanging opposite the door against
+the clay-daubed wall. It was a bare, unsightly, clammy room; a
+rude bed on one side, a shelf for table and two or three wooden
+stools constituting the furniture, while the uneven puncheons of
+the floor wabbled and clattered under the priest's feet.
+
+An unopened letter is always a mysterious thing. We who receive
+three or four mails every day, scan each little paper square with
+a speculative eye. Most of us know what sweet uncertainty hangs on
+the opening of envelopes whose contents may be almost anything
+except something important, and what a vague yet delicious thrill
+comes with the snip of the paper knife; but if we be in a foreign
+land and long years absent from home, then is a letter subtly
+powerful to move us, even more before it is opened than after it
+is read.
+
+It had been many years since a letter from home had come to Father
+Beret. The last, before the one now in his hand, had made him ill
+of nostalgia, fairly shaking his iron determination never to quit
+for a moment his life work as a missionary. Ever since that day he
+had found it harder to meet the many and stern demands of a most
+difficult and exacting duty. Now the mere touch of the paper in
+his hand gave him a sense of returning weakness, dissatisfaction,
+and longing. The home of his boyhood, the rushing of the Rhone, a
+seat in a shady nook of the garden, Madeline, his sister,
+prattling beside him, and his mother singing somewhere about the
+house--it all came back and went over him and through him, making
+his heart sink strangely, while another voice, the sweetest ever
+heard--but she was ineffable and her memory a forbidden fragrance.
+
+Father Beret tottered across the forlorn little room and knelt
+before the crucifix holding his clasped hands high, the letter
+pressed between than. His lips moved in prayer, but made no sound;
+his whole frame shook violently.
+
+It would be unpardonable desecration to enter the chamber of
+Father Beret's soul and look upon his sacred and secret trouble;
+nor must we even speculate as to its particulars. The good old man
+writhed and wrestled before the cross for a long time, until at
+last he seemed to receive the calmness and strength he prayed for
+so fervently; then he rose, tore the letter into pieces so small
+that not a word remained whole, and squeezed them so firmly
+together that they were compressed into a tiny, solid ball, which
+he let fall through a crack between the floor puncheons. After
+waiting twenty years for that letter, hungry as his heart was, he
+did not even open it when at last it arrived. He would never know
+what message it bore. The link between him and the old sweet days
+was broken forever. Now with God's help he could do his work to
+the end.
+
+He went and stood in his doorway, leaning against the side. Was it
+a mere coincidence that the meadowlark flew up just then from its
+grass-tuft, and came to the roof's comb overhead, where it lit
+with a light yet audible stroke of its feet and began fluting its
+tender, lonesome-sounding strain? If Father Beret heard it he gave
+no sign of recognition; very likely he was thinking about the
+cargo of liquor and how he could best counteract its baleful
+influence. He looked toward the "river house," as the inhabitants
+had named a large shanty, which stood on a bluff of the Wabash not
+far from where the road-bridge at present crosses, and saw men
+gathering there.
+
+Meantime Rene de Ronville had delivered Madame Roussillon's letter
+with due promptness. Of course such a service demanded pie and
+claret. What still better pleased him, Alice chose to be more
+amiable than was usually her custom when he called. They sat
+together in the main room of the house where M. Roussillon kept
+his books, his curiosities of Indian manufacture collected here
+and there, and his surplus firearms, swords, pistols, and knives,
+ranged not unpleasingly around the walls.
+
+Of course, along with the letter, Rene bore the news, so
+interesting to himself, of the boat's tempting cargo just
+discharged at the river house. Alice understood her friend's
+danger--felt it in the intense enthusiasm of his voice and manner.
+She had once seen the men carousing on a similar occasion when she
+was but a child, and the impression then made still remained in
+her memory. Instinctively she resolved to hold Rene by one means
+or another away from the river house if possible. So she managed
+to keep him occupied eating pie, sipping watered claret and
+chatting until night came on and Madame Roussillon brought in a
+lamp. Then he hurriedly snatched his cap from the floor beside him
+and got up to go.
+
+"Come and look at my handiwork," Alice quickly said; "my shelf of
+pies, I mean." She led him to the pantry, where a dozen or more of
+the cherry pates were ranged in order. "I made every one of them
+this morning and baked them; had them all out of the oven before
+the rain came up. Don't you think me a wonder of cleverness and
+industry? Father Beret was polite enough to flatter me; but you--
+you just eat what you want and say nothing! You are not polite,
+Monsieur Rene de Ronville."
+
+"I've been showing you what I thought of your goodies," said Rene;
+"eating's better than talking, you know; so I'll just take one
+more," and he helped himself. "Isn't that compliment enough?"
+
+"A few such would make me another hot day's work," she replied,
+laughing. "Pretty talk would be cheaper and more satisfactory in
+the long run. Even the flour in these pates I ground with my own
+hand in an Indian mortar. That was hard work too."
+
+By this time Rene had forgotten the river house and the liquor.
+With softening eyes he gazed at Alice's rounded cheeks and sheeny
+hair over which the light from the curious earthen lamp she bore
+in her hand flickered most effectively. He loved her madly; but
+his fear of her was more powerful than his love. She gave him no
+opportunity to speak what he felt, having ever ready a quick,
+bright change of mood and manner when she saw him plucking up
+courage to address her in a sentimental way. Their relations had
+long been somewhat familiar, which was but natural, considering
+their youth and the circumstances of their daily life; but Alice
+somehow had kept a certain distance open between them, so that
+very warm friendship could not suddenly resolve itself into a
+troublesome passion on Rene's part.
+
+We need not attempt to analyze a young girl's feeling and motives
+in such a case; what she does and what she thinks are mysteries
+even to her own understanding. The influence most potent in
+shaping the rudimentary character of Alice Tarleton (called
+Roussillon) had been only such as a lonely frontier post could
+generate. Her associations with men and women had, with few
+exceptions, been unprofitable in an educational way, while her
+reading in M. Roussillon's little library could not have given her
+any practical knowledge of manners and life.
+
+She was fond of Rene de Ronville, and it would have been quite in
+accordance with the law of ordinary human forces, indeed almost
+the inevitable thing, for her to love and marry him in the
+fullness of time; but her imagination was outgrowing her
+surroundings. Books had given her a world of romance wherein she
+moved at will, meeting a class of people far different from those
+who actually shared her experiences. Her day-dreams and her night-
+dreams partook much more of what she had read and imagined than of
+what she had seen and heard in the raw little world around her.
+
+Her affection for Rene was interfered with by her large admiration
+for the heroic, masterful and magnetic knights who charged through
+the romances of the Roussillon collection. For although Rene was
+unquestionably brave and more than passably handsome, he had no
+armor, no war-horse, no shining lance and embossed shield--the
+difference, indeed, was great.
+
+Those who love to contend against the fatal drift of our age
+toward over-education could find in Alice Tarleton, foster
+daughter of Gaspard Roussillon, a primitive example, an elementary
+case in point. What could her book education do but set up
+stumbling blocks in the path of happiness? She was learning to
+prefer the ideal to the real. Her soul was developing itself as
+best it could for the enjoyment of conditions and things
+absolutely foreign to the possibilities of her lot in life.
+
+Perhaps it was the light and heat of imagination, shining out
+through Alice's face, which gave her beauty such a fascinating
+power. Rene saw it and felt its electrical stroke send a sweet
+shiver through his heart, while he stood before her.
+
+"You are very beautiful to-night Alice," he presently said, with a
+suddenness which took even her alertness by surprise. A flush rose
+to his dark face and immediately gave way to a grayish pallor. His
+heart came near stopping on the instant, he was so shocked by his
+own daring; but he laid a hand on her hair, stroking it softly.
+
+Just a moment she was at a loss, looking a trifle embarrassed,
+then with a merry laugh she stepped aside and said:
+
+"That sounds better, Monsieur Rene de Ronville much better; you
+will be as polite as Father Beret after a little more training."
+
+She slipped past him while speaking and made her way back again to
+the main room, whence she called to him:
+
+"Come here, I've something to show you."
+
+He obeyed, a sheepish trace on his countenance betraying his self-
+consciousness.
+
+When he came near Alice she was taking from its buckhorn hook on
+the wall a rapier, one of a beautiful pair hanging side by side.
+
+"Papa Roussillon gave me these," she said with great animation.
+"He bought them of an Indian who had kept them a long time; where
+he came across them he would not tell; but look how beautiful! Did
+you ever see anything so fine?"
+
+Guard and hilt were of silver; the blade, although somewhat
+corroded, still showed the fine wavy lines of Damascus steel and
+traces of delicate engraving, while in the end of the hilt was set
+a large oval turquoise.
+
+"A very queer present to give a girl," said Rene; "what can you do
+with them?"
+
+A captivating flash of playfulness came into her face and she
+sprang backward, giving the sword a semicircular turn with her
+wrist. The blade sent forth a keen hiss as it cut the air close,
+very close to Rene's nose. He jerked his head and flung up his
+hand.
+
+She laughed merrily, standing beautifully poised before him, the
+rapier's point slightly elevated. Her short skirt left her feet
+and ankles free to show their graceful proportions and the perfect
+pose in which they held her supple body.
+
+"You see what I can do with the colechemarde, eh, Monsieur Rene de
+Ronville!" she exclaimed, giving him a smile which fairly blinded
+him. "Notice how very near to your neck I can thrust and yet not
+touch it. Now!"
+
+She darted the keen point under his chin and drew it away so
+quickly that the stroke was like a glint of sunlight.
+
+"What do you think of that as a nice and accurate piece of skill?"
+
+She again resumed her pose, the right foot advanced, the left arm
+well back, her lissome, finely developed body leaning slightly
+forward.
+
+Rene's hands were up before his face in a defensive position,
+palms outward.
+
+Just then a chorus of men's voices sounded in the distance. The
+river house was beginning its carousal with a song. Alice let fall
+her sword's point and listened.
+
+Rene looked about for his cap.
+
+"I must be going," he said.
+
+Another and louder swish of the rapier made him pirouette and
+dodge again with great energy.
+
+"Don't," he cried, "that's dangerous; you'll put out my eyes; I
+never saw such a girl!"
+
+She laughed at him and kept on whipping the air dangerously near
+his eyes, until she had driven him backward as far as he could
+squeeze himself into a comer of the room.
+
+Madame Roussillon came to the door from the kitchen and stood
+looking in and laughing, with her hands on her hips. By this time
+the rapier was making a criss-cross pattern of flashing lines
+close to the young man's head while Alice, in the enjoyment of her
+exercise, seemed to concentrate all the glowing rays of her beauty
+in her face, her eyes dancing merrily.
+
+"Quit, now, Alice," he begged, half in fun and half in abject
+fear; "please quit--I surrender!"
+
+She thrust to the wall on either side of him, then springing
+lightly backward a pace, stood at guard. Her thick yellow hair had
+fallen over her neck and shoulders in a loose wavy mass, out of
+which her face beamed with a bewitching effect upon her captive.
+
+Rene, glad enough to have a cessation of his peril, stood laughing
+dryly; but the singing down at the river house was swelling louder
+and he made another movement to go.
+
+"You surrendered, you remember," cried Alice, renewing the sword-
+play; "sit down on the chair there and make yourself comfortable.
+You are not going down yonder to-night; you are going to stay here
+and talk with me and Mother Roussillon; we are lonesome and you
+are good company."
+
+A shot rang out keen and clear; there was a sudden tumult that
+broke up the distant singing; and presently more firing at varying
+intervals cut the night air from the direction of the river.
+
+Jean, the hunchback, came in to say that there was a row of some
+sort; he had seen men running across the common as if in pursuit
+of a fugitive; but the moonlight was so dim that he could not be
+sure what it all meant.
+
+Rene picked up his cap and bolted out of the house.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE RAPE OF THE DEMIJOHN
+
+
+The row down at the river house was more noise than fight, so far
+as results seemed to indicate. It was all about a small dame
+jeanne of fine brandy, which an Indian by the name of Long-Hair
+had seized and run off with at the height of the carousal. He must
+have been soberer than his pursuers, or naturally fleeter; for not
+one of them could catch him, or even keep long in sight of him.
+Some pistols were emptied while the race was on, and two or three
+of the men swore roundly to having seen Long-Hair jump sidewise
+and stagger, as if one of the shots had taken effect. But,
+although the moon was shining, he someway disappeared, they could
+not understand just how, far down beside the river below the fort
+and the church.
+
+It was not a very uncommon thing for an Indian to steal what he
+wanted, and in most cases light punishment followed conviction;
+but it was felt to be a capital offense for an Indian or anybody
+else to rape a demijohn of fine brandy, especially one sent as a
+present, by a friend in New Orleans, to Lieutenant Governor
+Abbott, who had until recently been the commandant of the post.
+Every man at the river house recognized and resented the enormity
+of Long-Hair's crime and each was, for the moment, ready to be his
+judge and his executioner. He had broken at once every rule of
+frontier etiquette and every bond of sympathy. Nor was Long-Hair
+ignorant of the danger involved in his daring enterprise. He had
+beforehand carefully and stolidly weighed all the conditions, and
+true to his Indian nature, had concluded that a little wicker
+covered bottle of brandy was well worth the risk of his life. So
+he had put himself in condition for a great race by slipping out
+and getting rid of his weapons and all surplus weight of clothes.
+
+This incident brought the drinking bout at the river house to a
+sudden end; but nothing further came of it that night, and no
+record of it would be found in these pages, but for the fact that
+Long-Hair afterwards became an important character in the stirring
+historical drama which had old Vincennes for its center of energy.
+
+Rene de Ronville probably felt himself in bad luck when he arrived
+at the river house just too late to share in the liquor or to join
+in chasing the bold thief. He listened with interest, however, to
+the story of Long-Hair's capture of the commandant's demijohn and
+could not refrain from saying that if he had been present there
+would have been a quite different result.
+
+"I would have shot him before he got to that door," he said,
+drawing his heavy flint-lock pistol and going through the motions
+of one aiming quickly and firing. Indeed, so vigorously in earnest
+was he with the pantomime, that he actually did fire,
+unintentionally of course,--the ball burying itself in the door-
+jamb.
+
+He was laughed at by those present for being more excited than
+they who witnessed the whole thing. One of them, a leathery-faced
+and grizzled old sinner, leered at him contemptuously and said in
+queer French, with a curious accent caught from long use of
+backwoods English:
+
+"Listen how the boy brags! Ye might think, to hear Rene talk, that
+he actually amounted to a big pile."
+
+This personage was known to every soul in Vincennes as Oncle
+Jazon, and when Oncle Jazon spoke the whole town felt bound to
+listen.
+
+"An' how well he shoots, too," he added with an intolerable wink;
+"aimed at the door and hit the post. Certainly Long-Hair would
+have been in great danger! O yes, he'd 'ave killed Long-Hair at
+the first shot, wouldn't he though!"
+
+Oncle Jazon had the air of a large man, but the stature of a small
+one; in fact he was shriveled bodily to a degree which suggested
+comparison with a sun-dried wisp of hickory bark; and when he
+chuckled, as he was now doing, his mouth puckered itself until it
+looked like a scar on his face. From cap to moccasins he had every
+mark significant of a desperate character; and yet there was about
+him something that instantly commanded the confidence of rough
+men,--the look of self-sufficiency and superior capability always
+to be found in connection with immense will power. His sixty years
+of exposure, hardship, and danger seemed to have but toughened his
+physique and strengthened his vitality. Out of his small hazel
+eyes gleamed a light as keen as ice.
+
+"All right, Oncle Jazon," said Rene laughing and blowing the smoke
+out of his pistol; "'twas you all the same who let Long-Hair trot
+off with the Governor's brandy, not I. If you could have hit even
+a door-post it might have been better."
+
+Oncle Jazon took off his cap and looked down into it in a way he
+had when about to say something final.
+
+"Ventrebleu! I did not shoot at Long-Hair at all," he said,
+speaking slowly, "because the scoundrel was unarmed. He didn't
+have on even a knife, and he was havin' enough to do dodgin' the
+bullets that the rest of 'em were plumpin' at 'im without any
+compliments from me to bother 'im more."
+
+"Well," Rene replied, turning away with a laugh, "if I'd been
+scalped by the Indians, as you have, I don't think there would be
+any particular reason why I should wait for an Indian thief to go
+and arm himself before I accepted him as a target."
+
+Oncle Jazon lifted a hand involuntarily and rubbed his scalpless
+crown; then he chuckled with a grotesque grimace as if the
+recollection of having his head skinned were the funniest thing
+imaginable.
+
+"When you've killed as many of 'em as Oncle Jazon has," remarked a
+bystander to Rene, "you'll not be so hungry for blood, maybe."
+
+"Especially after ye've took fifty-nine scalps to pay for yer
+one," added Oncle Jazon, replacing his cap over the hairless area
+of his crown.
+
+The men who had been chasing Long-Hair, presently came straggling
+back with their stories--each had a distinct one--of how the
+fugitive escaped. They were wild looking fellows, most of them
+somewhat intoxicated, all profusely liberal with their stock of
+picturesque profanity. They represented the roughest element of
+the well-nigh lawless post.
+
+"I'm positive that he's wounded," said one. "Jacques and I shot at
+him together, so that our pistols sounded just as if only one had
+been fired--bang! that way--and he leaped sideways for all the
+world like a bird with a broken leg. I thought he'd fall; but ve!
+he ran faster'n ever, and all at once he was gone; just
+disappeared."
+
+"Well, to-morrow we'll get him," said another. "You and I and
+Jacques, we'll take up his trail, the thief, and follow him till
+we find him. He can't get off so easy."
+
+"I don't know so well about that," said another; "it's Long-Hair,
+you must remember, and Long-Hair is no common buck that just
+anybody can find asleep. You know what Long-Hair is. Nobody's ever
+got even with 'im yet. That's so, ain't it? Just ask Oncle Jazon,
+if you don't believe it!"
+
+The next morning Long-Hair was tracked to the edge. He had been
+wounded, but whether seriously or not could only be conjectured. A
+sprinkle of blood, here and there quite a dash of it, reddened the
+grass and clumps of weeds he had run through, and ended close to
+the water into which it looked as if he had plunged with a view to
+baffling pursuit. Indeed pursuit was baffled. No further trace
+could be found, by which to follow the cunning fugitive. Some of
+the men consoled themselves by saying, without believing, that
+Long-Hair was probably lying drowned at the bottom of the river.
+
+"Pas du tout," observed Oncle Jazon, his short pipe askew far over
+in the corner of his mouth, "not a bit of it is that Indian
+drowned. He's jes' as live as a fat cat this minute, and as drunk
+as the devil. He'll get some o' yer scalps yet after he's guzzled
+all that brandy and slep' a week."
+
+It finally transpired that Oncle Jazon was partly right and partly
+wrong. Long-Hair was alive, even as a fat cat, perhaps; but not
+drunk, for in trying to swim with the rotund little dame jeanne
+under his arm he lost hold of it and it went to the bottom of the
+Wabash, where it may be lying at this moment patiently waiting for
+some one to fish it out of its bed deep in the sand and mud, and
+break the ancient wax from its neck!
+
+Rene de Ronville, after the chase of Long-Hair had been given
+over, went to tell Father Beret what had happened, and finding the
+priest's hut empty turned into the path leading to the Roussillon
+place, which was at the head of a narrow street laid out in a
+direction at right angles to the river's course. He passed two or
+three diminutive cabins, all as much alike as bee-hives. Each had
+its squat veranda and thatched or clapboarded roof held in place
+by weight-poles ranged in roughly parallel rows, and each had the
+face of the wall under its veranda neatly daubed with a grayish
+stucco made of mud and lime. You may see such houses today in some
+remote parts of the creole country of Louisiana.
+
+As Rene passed along he spoke with a gay French freedom to the
+dames and lasses who chanced to be visible. His air would be
+regarded as violently brigandish in our day; we might even go so
+far as to think his whole appearance comical. His jaunty cap with
+a tail that wagged as he walked, his short trousers and leggins of
+buckskin, and his loose shirt-like tunic, drawn in at the waist
+with a broad belt, gave his strong figure just the dash of
+wildness suited to the armament with which it was weighted. A
+heavy gun lay in the hollow of his shoulder under which hung an
+otter-skin bullet-pouch with its clear powder-horn and white bone
+charger. In his belt were two huge flint-lock pistols and a long
+case-knife.
+
+"Bon jour, Ma'm'selle Adrienne," he cheerily called, waving his
+free hand in greeting to a small, dark lass standing on the step
+of a veranda and indolently swinging a broom. "Comment allez-vous
+auj ourd'hui?"
+
+"J'm'porte tres bien, merci, Mo'sieu Rene," was the quick
+response; "et vous?"
+
+"Oh, I'm as lively as a cricket."
+
+"Going a hunting?"
+
+"No, just up here a little way--just on business--up to Mo'sieu
+Roussillon's for a moment."
+
+"Yes," the girl responded in a tone indicative of something very
+like spleen, "yes, undoubtedly, Mo'sieu de Ronville; your business
+there seems quite pressing of late. I have noticed your
+industrious application to that business."
+
+"Ta-ta, little one," he wheedled, lowering his voice; "you mustn't
+go to making bug-bears out of nothing."
+
+"Bug-bears!" she retorted, "you go on about your business and I'll
+attend to mine," and she flirted into the house.
+
+Rene laughed under his breath, standing a moment as if expecting
+her to come out again; but she did not, and he resumed his walk
+singing softly--
+
+"Elle a les joues vermeilles, vermeilles, Ma belle, ma belle
+petite."
+
+But ten to one he was not thinking of Madamoiselle Adrienne
+Bourcier. His mind, however, must have been absorbingly occupied;
+for in the straight, open way he met Father Beret and did not see
+him until he came near bumping against the old man, who stepped
+aside with astonishing agility and said--
+
+"Dieu vous benisse, mon fils; but what is your great hurry--where
+can you be going in such happy haste?" Rene did not stop to parley
+with the priest. He flung some phrase of pleasant greeting back
+over his shoulder as he trudged on, his heart beginning a tattoo
+against his ribs when the Roussillon place came in sight, and he
+took hold of his mustache to pull it, as some men must do in
+moments of nervousness and bashfulness. If sounds ever have color,
+the humming in his ears was of a rosy hue; if thoughts ever exhale
+fragrance, his brain overflowed with the sweets of violet and
+heliotrope.
+
+He had in mind what he was going to say when Alice and he should
+be alone together. It was a pretty speech, he thought; indeed a
+very thrilling little speech, by the way it stirred his own nerve-
+centers as he conned it over.
+
+Madame Roussillon met him at the door in not a very good humor.
+
+"Is Mademoiselle Alice here?" he ventured to demand.
+
+"Alice? no, she's not here; she's never here just when I want her
+most. V'la le picbois et la grive--see the woodpecker and the
+robin--eating the cherries, eating every one of them, and that
+girl running off somewhere instead of staying here and picking
+them," she railed in answer to the young man's polite inquiry. "I
+haven't seen her these four hours, neither her nor that rascally
+hunchback, Jean. They're up to some mischief, I'll be bound!"
+
+Madame Roussillon puffed audibly between phrases; but she suddenly
+became very mild when relieved of her tirade.
+
+"Mais entrez," she added in a pleasant tone, "come in and tell me
+the news."
+
+Rene's disappointment rushed into his face, but he managed to
+laugh it aside.
+
+"Father Beret has just been telling me," said Madame Roussillon,
+"that our friend Long-Hair made some trouble last night. How about
+it?"
+
+Rene told her what he knew and added that Long-Hair would
+probably never be seen again.
+
+"He was shot, no doubt of it," he went on, "and is now being
+nibbled by fish and turtles. We tracked him by his blood to where
+he jumped into the Wabash. He never came out."
+
+Strangely enough it happened that, at the very time of this chat
+between Madame Roussillon and Rene Alice was bandaging Long-Hair's
+wounded leg with strips of her apron. It was under some willows
+which overhung the bank of a narrow and shallow lagoon or slough,
+which in those days extended a mile or two back into the country
+on the farther side of the river. Alice and Jean went over in a
+pirogue to see if the water lilies, haunting a pond there, were
+yet beginning to bloom. They landed at a convenient spot some
+distance up the little lagoon, made the boat fast by dragging its
+prow high ashore, and were on the point of setting out across a
+neck of wet, grassy land to the pond, when a deep grunt, not
+unlike that of a self-satisfied pig, attracted them to the
+willows, where they discovered Long-Hair, badly wounded, weltering
+in some black mud.
+
+His hiding-place was cunningly chosen, save that the mire troubled
+him, letting him down by slow degrees, and threatening to engulf
+him bodily; and he was now too weak to extricate himself. He
+lifted his head and glared. His face was grimy, his hair matted
+with mud. Alice, although brave enough and quite accustomed to
+startling experiences, uttered a cry when she saw those snaky eyes
+glistening so savagely amid the shadows. But Jean was quick to
+recognize Long-Hair; he had often seen him about town, a figure
+not to be forgotten.
+
+"They've been hunting him everywhere," he said in a half whisper
+to Alice, clutching the skirt of her dress. "It's Long-Hair, the
+Indian who stole the brandy; I know him."
+
+Alice recoiled a pace or two.
+
+"Let's go back and tell 'em," Jean added, still whispering, "they
+want to kill him; Oncle Jazon said so. Come on!"
+
+He gave her dress a jerk; but she did not move any farther back;
+she was looking at the blood oozing from a wound in the Indian's
+leg.
+
+"He is shot, he is hurt, Jean, we must help him," she presently
+said, recovering her self-control, yet still pale. "We must get
+him out of that bad place."
+
+Jean caught Alice's merciful spirit with sympathetic readiness,
+and showed immediate willingness to aid her.
+
+It was a difficult thing to do; but there was a will and of course
+a way. They had knives with which they cut willows to make a
+standing place on the mud. While they were doing this they spoke
+friendly words to Long-Hair, who understood French a little, and
+at last they got hold of his arms, tugged, rested, tugged again,
+and finally managed to help him to a dry place, still under the
+willows, where he could lie more at ease. Jean carried water in
+his cap with which they washed the wound and the stolid savage
+face. Then Alice tore up her cotton apron, in which she had hoped
+to bear home a load of lilies, and with the strips bound the wound
+very neatly. It took a long time, during which the Indian remained
+silent and apparently quite indifferent.
+
+Long-Hair was a man of superior physique, tall, straight, with the
+muscles of a Vulcan; and while he lay stretched on the ground half
+clad and motionless, he would have been a grand model for an
+heroic figure in bronze. Yet from every lineament there came a
+strange repelling influence, like that from a snake. Alice felt
+almost unbearable disgust while doing her merciful task; but she
+bravely persevered until it was finished.
+
+It was now late in the afternoon, and the sun would be setting
+before they could reach home.
+
+"We must hurry back, Jean," Alice said, turning to depart. "It
+will be all we can do to reach the other side in daylight. I'm
+thinking that they'll be out hunting for us too, if we don't move
+right lively. Come."
+
+She gave the Indian another glance when she had taken but a step.
+He grunted and held up something in his hand--something that shone
+with a dull yellow light. It was a small, oval, gold locket which
+she had always worn in her bosom. She sprang and snatched it from
+his palm.
+
+"Thank you," she exclaimed, smiling gratefully. "I am so glad you
+found it."
+
+The chain by which the locket had hung was broken, doubtless by
+some movement while dragging Long-Hair out of the mud, and the
+lid had sprung open, exposing a miniature portrait of Alice,
+painted when she was a little child, probably not two years old.
+It was a sweet baby face, archly bright, almost surrounded with a
+fluff of golden hair. The neck and the upper line of the plump
+shoulders, with a trace of richly delicate lace and a string of
+pearls, gave somehow a suggestion of patrician daintiness.
+
+Long-Hair looked keenly into Alice's eyes, when she stooped to
+take the locket from his hand, but said nothing.
+
+She and Jean now hurried away, and, so vigorously did they paddle
+the pirogue, that the sky was yet red in the west when they
+reached home and duly received their expected scolding from Madame
+Roussillon.
+
+Alice sealed Jean's lips as to their adventure; for she had made
+up her mind to save Long-Hair if possible, and she felt sure that
+the only way to do it would be to trust no one but Father Beret.
+
+It turned out that Long-Hair's wound was neither a broken bone nor
+a cut artery. The flesh of his leg, midway between the hip and the
+knee, was pierced; the bullet had bored a neat hole clean through.
+Father Beret took the case in hand, and with no little surgical
+skill proceeded to set the big Indian upon his feet again. The
+affair had to be cleverly managed. Food, medicines and clothing
+were surreptitiously borne across the river; a bed of grass was
+kept fresh under Long-Hair's back; his wound was regularly
+dressed; and finally his weapons--a tomahawk, a knife, a strong
+bow and a quiver of arrows--which he had hidden on the night of
+his bold theft, were brought to him.
+
+"Now go and sin no more," said good Father Beret; but he well knew
+that his words were mere puffs of articulate wind in the ear of
+the grim and silent savage, who limped away with an air of stately
+dignity into the wilderness.
+
+A load fell from Alice's mind when Father Beret informed her of
+Long-Hair's recovery and departure. Day and night the dread lest
+some of the men should find out his hiding-place and kill him had
+depressed and worried her. And now, when it was all over, there
+still hovered like an elusive shadow in her consciousness a vague
+haunting impression of the incident's immense significance as an
+influence in her life. To feel that she had saved a man from death
+was a new sensation of itself; but the man and the circumstances
+were picturesque; they invited imagination; they furnished an
+atmosphere of romance dear to all young and healthy natures, and
+somehow stirred her soul with a strange appeal.
+
+Long-Hair's imperturbable calmness, his stolid, immobile
+countenance, the mysterious reptilian gleam of his shifty black
+eyes, and the soulless expression always lurking in them, kept a
+fascinating hold on the girl's memory. They blended curiously with
+the impressions left by the romances she had read in M.
+Roussillon's mildewed books.
+
+Long-Hair was not a young man; but it would have been impossible
+to guess near his age. His form and face simply showed long
+experience and immeasurable vigor. Alice remembered with a
+shuddering sensation the look he gave her when she took the locket
+from his hand. It was of but a second's duration, yet it seemed to
+search every nook of her being with its subtle power.
+
+Romancers have made much of their Indian heroes, picturing them as
+models of manly beauty and nobility; but all fiction must be taken
+with liberal pinches of salt. The plain truth is that dark savages
+of the pure blood often do possess the magnetism of perfect
+physical development and unfathomable mental strangeness; but real
+beauty they never have. Their innate repulsiveness is so great
+that, like the snake's charm, it may fascinate; yet an
+indescribable, haunting disgust goes with it. And, after all, if
+Alice had been asked to tell just how she felt toward the Indian
+she had labored so hard to save, she would promptly have said:
+
+"I loathe him as I do a toad!"
+
+Nor would Father Beret, put to the same test, have made a
+substantially different confession. His work, to do which his life
+went as fuel to fire, was training the souls of Indians for the
+reception of divine grace; but experience had not changed his
+first impression of savage character. When he traveled in the
+wilderness he carried the Word and the Cross; but he was also
+armed with a gun and two good pistols, not to mention a dangerous
+knife. The rumor prevailed that Father Beret could drive a nail at
+sixty yards with his rifle, and at twenty snuff a candle with
+either one of his pistols.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE FIRST MAYOR OF VINCENNES
+
+
+Governor Abbott probably never so much as heard of the dame jeanne
+of French brandy sent to him by his creole friend in New Orleans.
+He had been gone from Vincennes several months when the batteau
+arrived, having been recalled to Detroit by the British
+authorities; and he never returned. Meantime the little post with
+its quaint cabins and its dilapidated block-house, called Fort
+Sackville, lay sunning drowsily by the river in a blissful state
+of helplessness from the military point of view. There was no
+garrison; the two or three pieces of artillery, abandoned and
+exposed, gathered rust and cobwebs, while the pickets of the
+stockade, decaying and loosened in the ground by winter freezes
+and summer rains, leaned in all directions, a picture of decay and
+inefficiency.
+
+The inhabitants of the town, numbering about six hundred, lived
+very much as pleased them, without any regular municipal
+government, each family its own tribe, each man a law unto
+himself; yet for mutual protection, they all kept in touch and had
+certain common rights which were religiously respected and
+defended faithfully. A large pasturing ground was fenced in where
+the goats and little black cows of the villagers browsed as one
+herd, while the patches of wheat, corn and vegetables were not
+inclosed at all. A few of the thriftier and more important
+citizens, however, had separate estates of some magnitude,
+surrounding their residences, kept up with care and, if the time
+and place be taken into account, with considerable show of taste.
+
+Monsieur Gaspard Roussillon was looked upon as the aristocrat par
+excellence of Vincennes, notwithstanding the fact that his name
+bore no suggestion of noble or titled ancestry. He was rich and in
+a measure educated; moreover the successful man's patent of
+leadership, a commanding figure and a suave manner, came always to
+his assistance when a crisis presented itself. He traded shrewdly,
+much to his own profit, but invariably with the excellent result
+that the man, white or Indian, with whom he did business felt
+himself especially favored in the transaction. By the exercise of
+firmness, prudence, vast assumption, florid eloquence and a kindly
+liberality he had greatly endeared himself to the people; so that
+in the absence of a military commander he came naturally to be
+regarded as the chief of the town, Mo'sieu' le maire.
+
+He returned from his extended trading expedition about the middle
+of July, bringing, as was his invariable rule, a gift for Alice.
+This time it was a small, thin disc of white flint, with a hole in
+the center through which a beaded cord of sinew was looped. The
+edge of the disc was beautifully notched and the whole surface
+polished so that it shone like glass, while the beads, made of
+very small segments of porcupine quills, were variously dyed,
+making a curiously gaudy show of bright colors.
+
+"There now, ma cherie, is something worth fifty times its weight
+in gold," said M. Roussillon when he presented the necklace to his
+foster daughter with pardonable self-satisfaction. "It is a sacred
+charm-string given me by an old heathen who would sell his soul
+for a pint of cheap rum. He solemnly informed me that whoever wore
+it could not by any possibility be killed by an enemy."
+
+Alice kissed M. Roussillon.
+
+"It's so curious and beautiful," she said, holding it up and
+drawing the variegated string through her fingers. Then, with her
+mischievous laugh, she added; "and I'm glad it is so powerful
+against one's enemy; I'll wear it whenever I go where Adrienne
+Bourcier is, see if I don't!"
+
+"Is she your enemy? What's up between you and la petite Adrienne,
+eh?" M. Roussillon lightly demanded. "You were always the best of
+good friends, I thought. What's happened?"
+
+"Oh, we are good friends," said Alice, quickly, "very good
+friends, indeed; I was but chaffing."
+
+"Good friends, but enemies; that's how it is with women. Who's the
+young man that's caused the coolness? I could guess, maybe!" He
+laughed and winked knowingly. "May I be so bold as to name him at
+a venture?"
+
+"Yes, if you'll be sure to mention Monsieur Rene de Ronville," she
+gayly answered. "Who but he could work Adrienne up into a perfect
+green mist of jealousy?"
+
+"He would need an accomplice, I should imagine; a young lady of
+some beauty and a good deal of heartlessness."
+
+"Like whom, for example?" and she tossed her bright head. "Not me,
+I am sure."
+
+"Poh! like every pretty maiden in the whole world, ma petite
+coquette; they're all alike as peas, cruel as blue jays and as
+sweet as apple-blossoms." He stroked her hair clumsily with his
+large hand, as a heavy and roughly fond man is apt to do, adding
+in an almost serious tone:
+
+"But my little girl is better than most of them, not a foolish
+mischief-maker, I hope."
+
+Alice was putting her head through the string of beads and letting
+the translucent white disc fall into her bosom.
+
+"It's time to change the subject," she said; "tell me what you
+have seen while away. I wish I could go far off and see things.
+Have you been to Detroit, Quebec, Montreal?"
+
+"Yes, I've been to all, a long, hard journey, but reasonably
+profitable. You shall have a goodly dot when you get married, my
+child."
+
+"And did you attend any parties and balls?" she inquired quickly,
+ignoring his concluding remark. "Tell me about them. How do the
+fine ladies dress, and do they wear their hair high with great big
+combs? Do they have long skirts and--"
+
+"Hold up, you double-tongued chatterbox!" he interrupted; "I can't
+answer forty questions at once. Yes, I danced till my legs ached
+with women old and girls young; but how could I remember how they
+were dressed and what their style of coiffure was? I know that
+silk rustled and there was a perfume of eau de Cologne and
+mignonette and my heart expanded and blazed while I whirled like a
+top with a sweet lady in my arms."
+
+"Yes, you must have cut a ravishing figure!" interpolated Madame
+Roussillon with emphatic disapproval, her eyes snapping. "A bull in
+a lace shop. How delighted the ladies must have been!"
+
+"Never saw such blushing faces and burning glances--such
+fluttering breasts, such--"
+
+"Big braggart," Madame Roussillon broke in contemptuously, "it's a
+piastre to a sou that you stood gawping in through a window while
+gentlemen and ladies did the dancing. I can imagine how you looked
+--I can!" and with this she took her prodigious bulk at a waddling
+gait out of the room. "I remember how you danced even when you
+were not clumsy as a pig on ice!" she shrieked back over her
+shoulder.
+
+"Parbleu! true enough, my dear," he called after her, "I should
+think you could--you mind how we used trip it together. You were
+the prettiest dancer them all, and the young fellows all went to
+the swords about you!"
+
+"But tell me more," Alice insisted; "I want to know about what you
+saw in the great towns--in the fine houses--how the ladies looked,
+how they acted--what they said--the dresses they wore--how--"
+
+"Ciel! you will split my ears, child; can't you fill my pipe and
+bring it to me with a coal on it? Then I'll try to tell you what I
+can," he cried, assuming a humorously resigned air. "Perhaps if I
+smoke I can remember everything."
+
+Alice gladly ran to do what he asked. Meantime Jean was out on the
+gallery blowing a flute that M. Roussillon had brought him from
+Quebec.
+
+The pipe well filled and lighted apparently did have the effect to
+steady and encourage M. Roussillon's memory; or if not his memory,
+then his imagination, which was of that fervid and liberal sort
+common to natives of the Midi, and which has been exquisitely
+depicted by the late Alphonse Daudet in Tartarin and Bompard. He
+leaned far back in a strong chair, with his massive legs stretched
+at full length, and gazed at the roof-poles while he talked.
+
+He sympathized fully, in his crude way, with Alice's lively
+curiosity, and his affection for her made him anxious to appease
+her longing after news from the great outside world. If the sheer
+truth must come out, however, he knew precious little about that
+world, especially the polite part of it in which thrived those
+femininities so dear to the heart of an isolated and imaginative
+girl. Still, as he, too, lived in Arcadia, there was no great
+effort involved when he undertook to blow a dreamer's flute.
+
+In the first place he had not been in Quebec or Montreal during
+his absence from home. Most of the time he had spent disposing of
+pelts and furs at Detroit and in extending his trading relations
+with other posts; but what mattered a trifling want of facts when
+his meridional fancy once began to warm up? A smattering of social
+knowledge gained at first hand in his youthful days in France
+while he was a student whose parents fondly expected him to
+conquer the world, came to his aid, and besides he had saturated
+himself all his life with poetry and romance. Scudery, Scarron,
+Prevost, Madame La Fayette and Calprenede were the chief sources
+of his information touching the life and manners, morals and
+gayeties of people who, as he supposed, stirred the surface of
+that resplendent and far-off ocean called society. Nothing suited
+him better than to smoke a pipe and talk about what he had seen
+and done; and the less he had really seen and done the more he had
+to tell.
+
+His broad, almost over-virile, kindly and contented face beamed
+with the warmth of wholly imaginary recollections while he
+recounted with minute circumstantiality to the delighted Alice his
+gallant adventures in the crowded and brilliant ball-rooms of the
+French-Canadian towns. The rolling burr of his bass voice, deep
+and resonant, gave force to the improvised descriptions.
+
+Madame Roussillon heard the heavy booming and presently came
+softly back into the door from the kitchen to listen. She leaned
+against the facing in an attitude of ponderous attention, a hand,
+on her bulging hip. She could not suppress her unbounded
+admiration of her liege lord's manly physique, and jealous to
+fierceness as she was of his experiences so eloquently and
+picturesquely related, her woman's nature took fire with enjoyment
+of the scenes described.
+
+This is the mission of the poet and the romancer--to sponge out
+of existence, for a time, the stiff, refractory, and unlovely
+realities and give in their place a scene of ideal mobility and
+charm. The two women reveled in Gaspard Roussillon's revelations.
+They saw the brilliant companies, the luxurious surroundings,
+heard the rustle of brocade and the fine flutter of laces, the hum
+of sweet voices, breathed in the wafts of costly perfumeries,
+looked on while the dancers whirled and flickered in the confusion
+of lights; and over all and through all poured and vibrated such
+ravishing music as only the southern imagination could have
+conjured up out of nothing.
+
+Alice was absolutely charmed. She sat on a low wooden stool and
+gazed into Gaspard Roussillon's face with dilating eyes in which
+burned that rich and radiant something we call a passionate soul.
+She drank in his flamboyant stream of words with a thirst which
+nothing but experience could ever quench. He felt her silent
+applause and the admiring involuntary absorption that possessed
+his wife; the consciousness of his elementary magnetism augmented
+the flow of his fine descriptions, and he went on and on, until
+the arrival of Father Beret put an end to it all.
+
+The priest, hearing of M. Roussillon's return, had come to inquire
+about some friends living at Detroit. He took luncheon with the
+family, enjoying the downright refreshing collation of broiled
+birds, onions, meal-cakes and claret, ending with a dish of
+blackberries and cream.
+
+M. Roussillon seized the first opportunity to resume his
+successful romancing, and presently in the midst of the meal began
+to tell Father Beret about what he had seen in Quebec.
+
+"By the way," he said, with expansive casualness in his voice, "I
+called upon your old-time friend and co-adjutor, Father
+Sebastien, while up there. A noble old man. He sent you a thousand
+good messages. Was mightily delighted when I told him how happy
+and hale you have always been here. Ah, you should have seen his
+dear old eyes full of loving tears. He would walk a hundred miles
+to see you, he said, but never expected to in this world.
+Blessings, blessings upon dear Father Beret, was what he murmured
+in my ear when we were parting. He says that he will never leave
+Quebec until he goes to his home above--ah!"
+
+The way in which M. Roussillon closed his little speech, his large
+eyes upturned, his huge hands clasped in front of him, was very
+effective.
+
+"I am under many obligations, my son," said Father Beret, "for
+what you tell me. It was good of you to remember my dear old
+friend and go to him for his loving messages to me. I am very,
+very thankful. Help me to another drop of wine, please."
+
+Now the extraordinary feature of the situation was that Father
+Beret had known positively for nearly five years that Father
+Sebastien was dead and buried.
+
+"Ah, yes," M. Roussillon continued, pouring the claret with one
+hand and making a pious gesture with the other; "the dear old man
+loves you and prays for you; his voice quavers whenever he speaks
+of you."
+
+"Doubtless he made his old joke to you about the birth-mark on my
+shoulder," said Father Beret after a moment of apparently
+thoughtful silence. "He may have said something about it in a
+playful way, eh?"
+
+"True, true, why yes, he surely mentioned the same," assented M.
+Roussillon, his face assuming an expression of confused memory;
+"it was something sly and humorous, I mind; but it just escapes my
+recollection. A right jolly old boy is Father Sebastien; indeed
+very amusing at times."
+
+"At times, yes," said Father Beret, who had no birth-mark on his
+shoulder, and had never had one there, or on any other part of his
+person.
+
+"How strange!" Alice remarked, "I, too, have a mark on my
+shoulder--a pink spot, just like a small, five-petaled flower. We
+must be of kin to each other, Father Beret."
+
+The priest laughed.
+
+"If our marks are alike, that would be some evidence of kinship,"
+he said.
+
+"But what shape is yours, Father?"
+
+"I've never seen it," he responded.
+
+"Never seen it! Why?"
+
+"Well, it's absolutely invisible," and he chuckled heartily,
+meantime glancing shrewdly at M. Roussillon out of the tail of his
+eye.
+
+"It's on the back part of his shoulder," quickly spoke up M.
+Roussillon, "and you know priests never use looking-glasses. The
+mark is quite invisible therefore, so far as Father Beret is
+concerned!"
+
+"You never told me of your birth-mark before, my daughter," said
+Father Beret, turning to Alice with sudden interest. "It may some
+day be good fortune to you."
+
+"Why so, Father?"
+
+"If your family name is really Tarleton, as you suppose from the
+inscription on your locket, the birth-mark, being of such singular
+shape, would probably identify you. It is said that these marks
+run regularly in families. With the miniature and the
+distinguishing birth-mark you have enough to make a strong case
+should you once find the right Tarleton family."
+
+"You talk as they write in novels," said Alice. "I've read about
+just such things in them. Wouldn't it be grand if I should turn
+out to be some great personage in disguise!"
+
+The mention of novels reminded Father Beret of that terrible book,
+Manon Lescaut, which he last saw in Alice's possession, and he
+could not refrain from mentioning it in a voice that shuddered.
+
+"Rest easy, Father Beret," said Alice; "that is one novel I have
+found wholly distasteful to me. I tried to read it, but could not
+do it, I flung it aside in utter disgust. You and mother
+Roussillon are welcome to hide it deep as a well, for all I care.
+I don't enjoy reading about low, vile people and hopeless
+unfortunates; I like sweet and lovely heroines and strong, high-
+souled, brave heroes."
+
+"Read about the blessed saints, then, my daughter; you will find
+in them the true heroes and heroines of this world," said Father
+Beret.
+
+M. Roussillon changed the subject, for he always somehow dreaded
+to have the good priest fall into the strain of argument he was
+about to begin. A stray sheep, no matter how refractory, feels a
+touch of longing when it hears the shepherd's voice. M. Roussillon
+was a Catholic, but a straying one, who avoided the confessional
+and often forgot mass. Still, with all his reckless independence,
+and with all his outward show of large and breezy self-
+sufficiency, he was not altogether free from the hold that the
+church had laid upon him in childhood and youth. Moreover, he was
+fond of Father Beret and had done a great deal for the little
+church of St. Xavier and the mission it represented; but he
+distinctly desired to be let alone while he pursued his own
+course; and he had promised the dying woman who gave Alice to him
+that the child should be left as she was, a Protestant, without
+undue influence to change her from the faith of her parents. This
+promise he had kept with stubborn persistence and he meant to keep
+it as long as he lived. Perhaps the very fact that his innermost
+conscience smote him with vague yet telling blows at times for
+this departure from the strict religion of his fathers, may have
+intensified his resistance of the influence constantly exerted
+upon Alice by Father Beret and Madame Roussillon, to bring her
+gently but surely to the church. Perverseness is a force to be
+reckoned with in all original characters.
+
+A few weeks had passed after M. Roussillon's return, when that
+big-hearted man took it into his head to celebrate his successful
+trading ventures with a moonlight dance given without reserve to
+all the inhabitants of Vincennes. It was certainly a democratic
+function that he contemplated, and motley to a most picturesque
+extent.
+
+Rene de Ronville called upon Alice a day or two previous to the
+occasion and duly engaged her as his partenaire; but she insisted
+upon having the engagement guarded in her behalf by a condition so
+obviously fanciful that he accepted it without argument.
+
+"If my wandering knight should arrive during the dance, you
+promise to stand aside and give place to him," she stipulated.
+"You promise that? You see I'm expecting him all the time. I
+dreamed last night that he came on a great bay horse and,
+stooping, whirled me up behind the saddle, and away we went!"
+
+There was a childish, half bantering air in her look; but her
+voice sounded earnest and serious, notwithstanding its delicious
+timbre of suppressed playfulness.
+
+"You promise me?" she insisted.
+
+"Oh, I promise to slink away into a corner and chew my thumb, the
+moment he comes," Rene eagerly assented. "Of course I'm taking a
+great risk, I know; for lords and barons and knights are very apt
+to appear Suddenly in a place like this."
+
+"You may banter and make light if you want to," she said, pouting
+admirably. "I don't care. All the same the laugh will jump to the
+other corner of your mouth, see if it doesn't. They say that what
+a person dreams about and wishes for and waits for and believes
+in, will come true sooner or later."
+
+"If that's so," said Rene, "you and I will get married; for I've
+dreamed it every night of the year, wished for it, waited for it
+and believed in it, and--"
+
+It was a madly sudden rush. He made it on an impulse quite
+irresistible, as hypnotized persons are said to do in response to
+the suggestion of the hypnotist, and his heart was choking his
+throat before he could end his speech. Alice interrupted him with
+a hearty burst of laughter.
+
+"A very pretty twist you give to my words, I must declare," she
+said; "but not new by any means. Little Adrienne Bourcier could
+tell you that. She says that you have vowed to her over and over
+that you dream about her, and wish for her, and wait for her,
+precisely as you have just said to me,"
+
+Rene's brown face flushed to the temples, partly with anger,
+partly with the shock of mingled surprise and fear. He was guilty,
+and the guilt showed in his eyes and paralyzed his tongue, so that
+he sat there before Alice with his under jaw sagging ludicrously.
+
+"Don't you rather think, Monsieur Rene de Ronville," she presently
+added in a calmly advisory tone, "that you had better quit trying
+to say such foolish things to me, and just be my very good friend?
+If you don't, I do, which comes to the same thing. What's more, I
+won't be your partenaire at the dance unless you promise me on
+your word of honor that you will dance two dances with Adrienne to
+every one that you have with me. Do you promise?"
+
+He dared not oppose her outwardly, although in his heart
+resistance amounted to furious revolt and riot.
+
+"I promise anything you ask me to," he said resignedly, almost
+sullenly; "anything for you."
+
+"Well, I ask nothing whatever on my own account," Alice quickly
+replied; "but I do tell you firmly that you shall not maltreat
+little Adrienne Bourcier and remain a friend of mine. She loves
+you, Rene de Ronville, and you have told her that you love her. If
+you are a man worthy of respect you will not desert her. Don't you
+think I am right?"
+
+Like a singed and crippled moth vainly trying to rise once again
+to the alluring yet deadly flame, Rene de Ronville essayed to
+break out of his embarrassment and resume equal footing with the
+girl so suddenly become his commanding superior; but the effort
+disclosed to him as well as to her that he had fallen to rise no
+more. In his abject defeat he accepted the terms dictated by Alice
+and was glad when she adroitly changed her manner and tone in
+going on to discuss the approaching dance.
+
+"Now let me make one request of you," he demanded after a while.
+"It's a small favor; may I ask it?"
+
+"Yes, but I don't grant it in advance."
+
+"I want you to wear, for my sake, the buff gown which they say
+was your grandmother's."
+
+"No, I won't wear it."
+
+"But why, Alice?"
+
+"None of the other girls have anything like such a dress; it would
+not be right for me to put it on and make them all feel that I had
+taken the advantage of them, just because I could; that's why."
+
+"But then none of them is beautiful and educated like you," he
+said; "you'll outshine them anyway."
+
+"Save your compliments for poor pretty little Adrienne," she
+firmly responded, "I positively do not wish to hear them. I have
+agreed to be your partenaire at this dance of Papa Roussillon's,
+but it is understood between us that Adrienne is your sweet-heart.
+I am not, and I'm not going to be, either. So for your sake and
+Adrienne's, as well as out of consideration for the rest of the
+girls who have no fine dresses, I am not going to wear the buff
+brocade gown that belonged to Papa Roussillon's mother long ago. I
+shall dress just as the rest do."
+
+It is safe to say that Rene de Ronville went home with a
+troublesome bee in his bonnet. He was not a bad-hearted fellow.
+Many a right good young man, before him and since, has loved an
+Adrienne and been dazzled by an Alice. A violet is sweet, but a
+rose is the garden's queen. The poor youthful frontiersman ought
+to have been stronger; but he was not, and what have we to say?
+
+As for Alice, since having a confidential talk with Adrienne
+Bourcier recently, she had come to realize what M. Roussillon
+meant when he said; "But my little girl is better than most of
+them, not a foolish mischief-maker, I hope." She saw through the
+situation with a quick understanding of what Adrienne might suffer
+should Rene prove permanently fickle. The thought of it aroused
+all her natural honesty and serious nobleness of character, which
+lay deep under the almost hoydenish levity usually observable in
+her manner. Crude as her sense of life's larger significance was,
+and meager as had been her experience in the things which count
+for most in the sum of a young girl's existence under fair
+circumstances, she grasped intuitively the gist of it all.
+
+The dance did not come off; it had to be postponed indefinitely on
+account of a grave change in the political relations of the little
+post. A day or two before the time set for that function a rumor
+ran through the town that something of importance was about to
+happen. Father Gibault, at the head of a small party, had arrived
+from Kaskaskia, far away on the Mississippi, with the news that
+France and the American Colonies had made common cause against the
+English in the great war of which the people of Vincennes neither
+knew the cause nor cared a straw about the outcome.
+
+It was Oncle Jazon who came to the Roussillon place to tell M.
+Roussillon that he was wanted at the river house. Alice met him at
+the door.
+
+"Come in, Oncle Jazon," she cheerily said, "you are getting to be
+a stranger at our house lately. Come in; what news do you bring?
+Take off your cap and rest your hair, Oncle Jazon."
+
+The scalpless old fighter chuckled raucously and bowed to the best
+of his ability. He not only took off his queer cap, but looked
+into it with a startled gaze, as if he expected something
+infinitely dangerous to jump out and seize his nose.
+
+"A thousand thanks, Ma'm'selle," he presently said, "will ye
+please tell Mo'sieu' Roussillon that I would wish to see 'im?"
+
+"Yes, Oncle Jazon; but first be seated, and let me offer you just
+a drop of eau de vie; some that Papa Roussillon brought back with
+him from Quebec. He says it's old and fine."
+
+She poured him a full glass, then setting the bottle on a little
+stand, went to find M. Roussillon. While she was absent Oncle
+Jazon improved his opportunity to the fullest extent. At least
+three additional glasses of the brandy went the way of the first.
+He grinned atrociously and smacked his corrugated lips; but when
+Gaspard Roussillon came in, the old man was sitting at some
+distance from the bottle and glass gazing indifferently out across
+the veranda. He told his story curtly. Father Gibault, he said,
+had sent him to ask M. Roussillon to come to the river house, as
+he had news of great importance to communicate.
+
+"Ah, well, Oncle Jazon, we'll have a nip of brandy together before
+we go," said the host.
+
+"Why, yes, jes" one agin' the broilin' weather," assented Oncle
+Jazon; "I don't mind jes' one."
+
+"A very rich friend of mine in Quebec gave me this brandy, Oncle
+Jazon," said M. Roussillon, pouring the liquor with a grand
+flourish; "and I thought of you as soon as I got it. Now, says I
+to myself, if any man knows good brandy when he tastes it, it's
+Oncle Jazon, and I'll give him a good chance at this bottle just
+the first of all my friends."
+
+"It surely is delicious," said Oncle Jazon, "very delicious." He
+spoke French with a curious accent, having spent long years with
+English-speaking frontiersmen in the Carolinas and Kentucky, so
+that their lingo had become his own.
+
+As they walked side by side down the way to the river house they
+looked like typical extremes of rough, sun-burned and weather-
+tanned manhood; Oncle Jazon a wizened, diminutive scrap, wrinkled
+and odd in every respect; Gaspard Roussillon towering six feet
+two, wide shouldered, massive, lumbering, muscular, a giant with
+long curling hair and a superb beard. They did not know that they
+were going down to help dedicate the great Northwest to freedom.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+FATHER GIBAULT
+
+
+Great movements in the affairs of men are like tides of the seas
+which reach and affect the remotest and quietest nooks and inlets,
+imparting a thrill and a swell of the general motion. Father
+Gibault brought the wave of the American Revolution to Vincennes.
+He was a simple missionary; but he was, besides, a man of great
+worldly knowledge and personal force. Colonel George Rogers Clark
+made Father Gibault's acquaintance at Kaskaskia, when the fort and
+its garrison surrendered to his command, and, quickly discerning
+the fine qualities of the priest's character, sent him to the post
+on the Wabash to win over its people to the cause of freedom and
+independence. Nor was the task assumed a hard one, as Father
+Gibault probably well knew before he undertook it.
+
+A few of the leading men of Vincennes, presided over by Gaspard
+Roussillon, held a consultation at the river house, and it was
+agreed that a mass meeting should be called bringing all of the
+inhabitants together in the church for the purpose of considering
+the course to be taken under the circumstances made known by
+Father Gibault. Oncle Jazon constituted himself an executive
+committee of one to stir up a noise for the occasion.
+
+It was a great day for Vincennes. The volatile temperament of the
+French frontiersmen bubbled over with enthusiasm at the first hint
+of something new, and revolutionary in which they might be
+expected to take part. Without knowing in the least what it was
+that Father Gibault and Oncle Jazon wanted of them, they were all
+in favor of it at a venture.
+
+Rene de Ronville, being an active and intelligent young man, was
+sent about through the town to let everybody know of the meeting.
+In passing he stepped into the cabin of Father Beret, who was
+sitting on the loose puncheon floor, with his back turned toward
+the entrance and so absorbed in trying to put together a great
+number of small paper fragments that he did not hear or look up.
+
+"Are you not going to the meeting, Father?" Rene bluntly demanded.
+In the hurry that was on him he did not remember to be formally
+polite, as was his habit.
+
+The old priest looked up with a startled face. At the same time he
+swept the fragments of paper together and clutched them hard in
+his right hand. "Yes, yes, my son--yes I am going, but the time
+has not yet come for it, has it?" he stammered. "Is it late?"
+
+He sprang to his feet and appeared confused, as if caught in doing
+something very improper.
+
+Rene wondered at this unusual behavior, but merely said:
+
+"I beg pardon, Father Beret, I did not mean to disturb you," and
+went his way.
+
+Father Beret stood for some minutes as if dazed, then squeezed the
+paper fragments into a tight ball, just as they were when he took
+them from under the floor some time before Rene came in, and put
+it in his pocket. A little later he was kneeling, as we have seen
+him once before, in silent yet fervent prayer, his clasped hands
+lifted toward the crucifix on the wall.
+
+"Jesus, give me strength to hold on and do my work," he murmured
+beseechingly, "and oh, free thy poor servant from bitter
+temptation."
+
+Father Gibault had come prepared to use his eloquence upon the
+excitable Creoles, and with considerable cunning he addressed a
+motley audience at the church, telling them that an American force
+had taken Kaskaskia and would henceforth hold it; that France had
+joined hands with the Americans against the British, and that it
+was the duty of all Frenchmen to help uphold the cause of freedom
+and independence.
+
+"I come," said he, "directly from Colonel George Rogers Clark, a
+noble and brave officer of the American army, who told me the news
+that I have brought to you. He sent me here to say to you that if
+you will give allegiance to his government you shall be protected
+against all enemies and have the full freedom of citizens. I think
+you should do this without a moment's hesitation, as I and my
+people at Kaskaskia have already done. But perhaps you would like
+to have a word from your distinguished fellow-citizen, Monsieur
+Gaspard Roussillon. Speak to your friends, my son, they will be
+glad to take counsel of your wisdom."
+
+There was a stir and a craning of necks. M. Roussillon presently
+appeared near the little chancel, his great form towering
+majestically. He bowed and waved his hand with the air of one who
+accepts distinction as a matter of course; then he took his big
+silver watch and looked at it. He was the only man in Vincennes
+who owned a watch, and so the incident was impressive. Father
+Gibault looked pleased, and already a murmur of applause went
+through the audience. M. Roussillon stroked the bulging crystal of
+the time-piece with a circular motion of his thumb and bowed
+again, clearing his throat resonantly, his face growing purplish
+above his beard.
+
+"Good friends," he said, "what France does all high-class
+Frenchmen applaud." He paused for a shout of approbation, and was
+not disappointed. "The other name for France is glory," he added,
+"and all true Frenchmen love both names. I am a true Frenchman!"
+and he struck his breast a resounding blow with the hand that
+still held the watch. A huge horn button on his buckskin jerkin
+came iu contact with the crystal, and there was a smash, followed
+by a scattered tinkling of glass fragments.
+
+All Vincennes stood breathless, contemplating the irreparable
+accident. M. Roussillon had lost the effect of a great period in
+his speech, but he was quick. Lifting the watch to his ear, he
+listened a moment with superb dignity, then slowly elevating his
+head and spreading his free hand over his heart he said:
+
+"The faithful time-piece still tells off the seconds, and the
+loyal heart of its owner still throbs with patriotism."
+
+Oncle Jazon, who stood in front of the speaker, swung his
+shapeless cap as high as he could and yelled like a savage. Then
+the crowd went wild for a time.
+
+"Vive la France! A bas l' Angleterre!" Everybody shouted at the
+top of his voice.
+
+"What France does we all do," continued M. Roussillon, when the
+noise subsided. "France has clasped hands with George Washington
+and his brave compatriots; so do we."
+
+"Vive Zhorzh Vasinton!" shrieked Oncle Jazon in a piercing treble,
+tiptoeing and shaking his cap recklessly under M. Roussillon's
+nose.
+
+The orator winced and jerked his head back, but nobody saw it,
+save perhaps Father Gibault, who laughed heartily.
+
+Great sayings come suddenly, unannounced and unexpected. They have
+the mysterious force of prophetic accident combined with happy
+economy of phrasing. The southern blood in M. Roussillon's veins
+was effervescing upon his brain; his tongue had caught the fine
+freedom and abandon of inspired oratory. He towered and glowed;
+words fell melodiously from his lips; his gestures were
+compelling, his visage magnetic. In conclusion he said:
+
+"Frenchmen, America is the garden-spot of the world and will one
+day rule it, as did Rome of old. Where freedom makes her home,
+there is the centre of power!"
+
+It was in a little log church on the verge of a hummock
+overlooking a marshy wild meadow. Westward for two thousand miles
+stretched the unbroken prairies, woods, mountains, deserts
+reaching to the Pacific; southward for a thousand miles rolled the
+green billows of the wilderness to the warm Gulf shore; northward
+to the pole and eastward to the thin fringe of settlements beyond
+the mountains, all was houseless solitude.
+
+If the reader should go to Vincennes to-day and walk southward
+along Second Street to its intersection with Church Street, the
+spot then under foot would be probably very near where M.
+Roussillon stood while uttering his great sentence. Mind you, the
+present writer does not pretend to know the exact site of old
+Saint Xavier church. If it could be fixed beyond doubt the spot
+should have an imperishable monument of Indiana stone.
+
+When M, Roussillon ceased speaking the audience again exhausted
+its vocal resources; and then Father Gibault called upon each man
+to come forward and solemnly pledge his loyalty to the American
+cause. Not one of them hesitated.
+
+Meantime a woman was doing her part in the transformation of Post
+Vincennes from a French-English picket to a full-fledged American
+fort and town. Madame Godere, finding out what was about to
+happen, fell to work making a flag in imitation of that under
+which George Washington was fighting. Alice chanced to be in the
+Godere home at the time and joined enthusiastically in the sewing.
+It was an exciting task. Their fingers trembled while they worked,
+and the thread, heavily coated with beeswax, squeaked as they drew
+it through the cloth.
+
+"We shall not be in time," said Madame Godere; "I know we shall
+not. Everything hinders me. My thread breaks or gets tangled and
+my needle's so rusty I can hardly stick it through the cloth. O
+dear!"
+
+Alice encouraged her with both words and work, and they had almost
+finished when Rene came with a staff which he had brought from the
+fort.
+
+"Mon dieu, but we have had a great meeting!" he cried. He was
+perspiring with excitement and fast walking; leaning on the staff
+he mopped his face with a blue handkerchief.
+
+"We heard much shouting and noise," said Madame Godere, "M.
+Roussillon's voice rose loud above the rest. He roared like a
+lion."
+
+"Ah, he was speaking to us; he was very eloquent," Rene replied.
+"But now they are waiting at the fort for the new flag. I have
+come for it."
+
+"It is ready," said Madame Godere.
+
+With flying fingers Alice sewed it to the staff.
+
+"Voici!" she cried, "vive la republique Americaine!" She lifted
+the staff and let the flag droop over her from head to foot.
+
+"Give it to me," said Rene, holding forth a hand for it, "and I'll
+run to the fort with it."
+
+"No," said Alice, her face suddenly lighting up with resolve. "No,
+I am going to take it myself," and without a moment's delay off
+she went.
+
+Rene was so caught by surprise that he stood gazing after her
+until she passed behind a house, where the way turned, the shining
+flag rippling around her, and her moccasins twinkling as she ran.
+
+At the blockhouse, awaiting the moment when the symbol of freedom
+should rise like a star over old Vincennes the crowd had
+picturesquely broken into scattered groups. Alice entered through
+a rent in the stockade, as that happened to be a shorter route
+than through the gate, and appeared suddenly almost in their
+midst.
+
+It was a happy surprise, a pretty and catching spectacular
+apparition of a sort to be thoroughly appreciated by the lively
+French fancy of the audience. The caught the girl's spirit, or it
+caught them, and they made haste to be noisy.
+
+"V'la! V'la! l'p'tite Alice et la bannlere de Zhorzh Vasinton!
+(Look, look, little Alice and George Washington's flag!)" shouted
+Oncle Jazon. He put his wiry little legs through a sort of pas de
+zephyr and winked at himself with concentrated approval.
+
+All the men danced around and yelled till they were hoarse.
+
+By this time Rene had reached Alice's side; but she did not see
+him; she ran into the blockhouse and climbed up a rude ladder-way;
+then she appeared on the roof, still accompanied by Rene, and
+planted the staff in a crack of the slabs, where it stood bravely
+up, the colors floating free.
+
+She looked down and saw M. Roussillon, Father Gibault and Father
+Beret grouped in the centre of the area. They were waving their
+hands aloft at her, while a bedlam of voices sent up applause
+which went through her blood like strong wine. She smiled
+radiantly, and a sweet flush glowed in her cheeks.
+
+No one of all that wild crowd could ever forget the picture
+sketched so boldly at that moment when, after planting the staff,
+Alice stepped back a space and stood strong and beautiful against
+the soft blue sky. She glanced down first, then looked up, her
+arms folded across her bosom. It was a pose as unconsciously taken
+as that of a bird, and the grace of it went straight to the hearts
+of those below.
+
+She turned about to descend, and for the first time saw that Rene
+had followed her. His face was beaming.
+
+"What a girl you are!" he exclaimed, in a tone of exultant
+admiration. "Never was there another like you!"
+
+Alice walked quickly past him without speaking; for down in the
+space where some women were huddled aside from the crowd, looking
+on, she had seen little Adrienne Bourcier. She made haste to
+descend. Now that her impulsively chosen enterprise was completed
+her boldness deserted her and she slipped out through a
+dilapidated postern opposite the crowd. On her right was the
+river, while southward before her lay a great flat plain, beyond
+which rose some hillocks covered with forest. The sun blazed
+between masses of slowly drifting clouds that trailed creeping
+fantastic shadows across the marshy waste.
+
+Alice walked along under cover of the slight landswell which then,
+more plainly marked than it is now, formed the contour line of
+hummock upon which the fort and village stood. A watery swale
+grown full of tall aquatic weeds meandered parallel with the
+bluff, so to call it, and there was a soft melancholy whispering
+of wind among the long blades and stems. She passed the church and
+Father Beret's hut and continued for some distance in the
+direction of that pretty knoll upon which the cemetery is at
+present so tastefully kept. She felt shy now, as if to run away
+and hide would be a great relief. Indeed, so relaxed were her
+nerves that a slight movement in the grass and cat-tail flags near
+by startled her painfully, making her jump like a fawn.
+
+"Little friend not be 'fraid," said a guttural voice in broken
+French. "Little friend not make noise."
+
+At a glance she recognized Long-Hair, the Indian, rising out of
+the matted marsh growth. It was a hideous vision of embodied
+cunning, soullessness and murderous cruelty.
+
+"Not tell white man you see me?" he grunted interrogatively,
+stepping close to her. He looked so wicked that she recoiled and
+lifted her hands defensively.
+
+She trembled from head to foot, and her voice failed her; but she
+made a negative sign and smiled at him, turning as white as her
+tanned face could become.
+
+In his left hand he held his bow, while in his right he half
+lifted a murderous looking tomahawk.
+
+"What new flag mean?" he demanded, waving the bow's end toward the
+fort and bending his head down close to hers. "Who yonder?"
+
+"The great American Father has taken us under his protection," she
+explained. "We are big-knives now." It almost choked her to speak.
+
+"Ugh! heap damn fools," he said with a dark scowl. "Little friend
+much damn fool."
+
+He straightened up his tall form and stood leering at her for some
+seconds, then added:
+
+"Little friend get killed, scalped, maybe."
+
+The indescribable nobility of animal largeness, symmetry and
+strength showed in his form and attitude, but the expression of
+his countenance was absolutely repulsive--cold, hard, beastly.
+
+He did not speak again, but turned quickly, and stooping low,
+disappeared like a great brownish red serpent in the high grass,
+which scarcely stirred as he moved through it.
+
+Somehow that day made itself strangely memorable to Alice. She had
+been accustomed to stirring scenes and sudden changes of
+conditions; but this was the first time that she had ever joined
+actively in a public movement of importance. Then, too, Long-
+Hair's picturesque and rudely dramatic reappearance affected her
+imagination with an indescribable force. Moreover, the pathetic
+situation in the love affair between Rene and Adrienne had taken
+hold of her conscience with a disturbing grip. But the shadowy
+sense of impending events, of which she could form no idea, was
+behind it all. She had not heard of Brandywine, or Bunker Hill, or
+Lexington, or Concord; but something like a waft of their
+significance had blown through her mind. A great change was coming
+into her idyllic life. She was indistinctly aware of it, as we
+sometimes are of an approaching storm, while yet the sky is
+sweetly blue and serene. When she reached home the house was full
+of people to whom M. Roussillon, in the gayest of moods, was
+dispensing wine and brandy.
+
+"Vive Zhorzh Vasinton!" shouted Oncle Jazon as soon as he saw her.
+
+And then they all talked at once, saying flattering things about
+her. Madame Roussillon tried to scold as usual; but the lively
+chattering of the guests drowned her voice.
+
+"I suppose the American commander will send a garrison here," some
+one said to Father Gibault, "and repair the fort."
+
+"Probably," the priest replied, "in a very few weeks. Meantime we
+will garrison it ourselves."
+
+"And we will have M. Roussillon for commander," spoke up Rene de
+Ronville, who was standing by.
+
+"A good suggestion," assented Father Gibault; "let us organize at
+once."
+
+Immediately the word was passed that there would be a meeting at
+the fort that evening for the purpose of choosing a garrison and a
+commander. Everybody went promptly at the hour set. M. Roussillon
+was elected Captain by acclamation, with Rene de Ronville as his
+Lieutenant. It was observed that Oncle Jazon had resumed his
+dignity, and that he looked into his cap several times without
+speaking.
+
+Meantime certain citizens, who had been in close relations with
+Governor Abbott during his stay, quietly slipped out of town,
+manned a batteau and went up the river, probably to Ouiatenon
+first and then to Detroit. Doubtless they suspected that things
+might soon grow too warm for their comfort.
+
+It was thus that Vincennes and Fort Sackville first acknowledged
+the American Government and hoisted the flag which, as long as it
+floated over the blockhouse, was lightly and lovingly called by
+everyone la banniere d'Alice Roussillon.
+
+Father Gibault returned to Fort Kaskaskia and a little later
+Captain Leonard Helm, a jovial man, but past the prime of life,
+arrived at Vincennes with a commission from Col. Clark authorizing
+him to supersede M. Roussillon as commander, and to act as Indian
+agent for the American Government in the Department of the Wabash.
+He was welcomed by the villagers, and at once made himself very
+pleasing to them by adapting himself to their ways and entering
+heartily into their social activities.
+
+M. Roussillon was absent when Captain Helm and his party came.
+Rene de Ronville, nominally in command of the fort, but actually
+enjoying some excellent grouse shooting with a bell-mouthed old
+fowling piece on a distant prairie, could not be present to
+deliver up the post; and as there was no garrison just then
+visible, Helm took possession, without any formalities.
+
+"I think, Lieutenant, that you'd better look around through the
+village and see if you can scare up this Captain what's-his-name,"
+said the new commander to a stalwart young officer who had come
+with him. "I can't think of these French names without getting my
+brain in a twist. Do you happen to recollect the Captain's name,
+Lieutenant?"
+
+"Yes, sir; Gaspard Roussillon it reads in Colonel Clark's order;
+but I am told that he's away on a trading tour," said the young
+man.
+
+"You may be told anything by these hair-tongued parlyvoos," Helm
+remarked. "It won't hurt, anyway, to find out where he lives and
+make a formal call, just for appearance sake, and to enquire about
+his health. I wish you would try it, sir, and let me know the
+result."
+
+The Lieutenant felt that this was a peremptory order and turned
+about to obey promptly.
+
+"And I say, Beverley, come back sober, if you possibly can," Helm
+added in his most genial tone, thinking it a great piece of humor
+to suggest sobriety to a man whose marked difference from men
+generally, of that time, was his total abstinence from
+intoxicating drinks.
+
+Lieutenant Fitzhugh Beverley was a Virginian of Virginians. His
+family had long been prominent in colonial affairs and boasted a
+record of great achievements both in peace and in war. He was the
+only son of his parents and heir to a fine estate consisting of
+lands and slaves; but, like many another of the restless young
+cavaliers of the Old Dominion, he had come in search of adventure
+over into Kentucky, along the path blazed by Daniel Boone; and
+when Clark organized his little army, the young man's patriotic
+and chivalrous nature leaped at the opportunity to serve his
+country under so gallant a commander.
+
+Beverley was not a mere youth, although yet somewhat under thirty.
+Educated abroad and naturally of a thoughtful and studious turn,
+he had enriched his mind far beyond the usual limit among young
+Americans of the very best class in that time; and so he appeared
+older than he really was: an effect helped out by his large and
+powerful form and grave dignity of bearing. Clark, who found him
+useful in emergencies, cool, intrepid, daring to a fault and
+possessed of excellent judgement, sent him with Helm, hoping that
+he would offset with his orderly attention to details the somewhat
+go-as-you-please disposition of that excellent officer.
+
+Beverley set out in search of the French commander's house,
+impressed with no particular respect for him or his office.
+Somehow Americans of Anglo-Saxon blood were slow to recognize any
+good qualities whatever in the Latin Creoles of the West and
+South. It seemed to them that the Frenchman and the Spaniard were
+much too apt to equalize themselves socially and matrimonially
+with Indians and negroes. The very fact that for a century, while
+Anglo-Americans had been in constant bloody warfare with savages,
+Frenchmen had managed to keep on easy and highly profitable
+trading terms with them, tended to confirm the worst implication.
+"Eat frogs and save your scalp," was a bit of contemptuous
+frontier humor indicative of what sober judgement held in reserve
+on the subject.
+
+Intent upon his formal mission, Lieutenant Beverley stalked boldly
+into the inclosure at Roussillon place and was met on the gallery
+by Madame Roussillon in one of her worst moods. She glared at him
+with her hands on her hips, her mouth set irritably aslant upward,
+her eyebrows gathered into a dark knot over her nose. It would be
+hard to imagine a more forbidding countenance; and for
+supplementary effect out popped hunchback Jean to stand behind
+her, with his big head lying back in the hollow of his shoulders
+and his long chin elevated, while he gawped intently up into
+Beverley's face.
+
+"Bon jour, Madame" said the Lieutenant, lifting his hat and
+speaking with a pleasant accent. "Would it be agreeable to Captain
+Roussillon for me to see him a moment?"
+
+Despite Beverley's cleverness in using the French language, he had
+a decided brusqueness of manner and a curt turn of voice not in
+the least Gallic. True, the soft Virginian intonation marked every
+word, and his obeisance was as low as if Madame Roussillon had
+been a queen; but the light French grace was wholly lacking.
+
+"What do you want of my husband?" Madame Roussillon demanded.
+
+"Nothing unpleasant, I assure you, Madame," said Beverley.
+
+"Well, he's not at home, Mo'sieu; he's up the river for a few
+days."
+
+She relaxed her stare, untied her eyebrows, and even let fall her
+hands from her shelf-like hips.
+
+"Thank you, Madame," said Beverley, bowing again, "I am sorry not
+to have seen him."
+
+As he was turning to go a shimmer of brown hair streaked with gold
+struck upon his vision from just within the door. He paused, as if
+in response to a military command, while a pair of gray eyes met
+his with a flash. The cabin room was ill lighted; but the
+crepuscular dimness did not seem to hinder his sight. Beyond the
+girl's figure, a pair of slender swords hung crossed aslant on the
+wall opposite the low door.
+
+Beverley had seen, in the old world galleries, pictures in which
+the shadowy and somewhat uncertain background thus forced into
+strongest projection the main figure, yet without clearly defining
+it. The rough frame of the doorway gave just the rustic setting
+suited to Alice's costume, the most striking part of which was a
+grayish short gown ending just above her fringed buckskin
+moccasins. Around her head she had bound a blue kerchief, a wide
+corner of which lay over her crown like a loose cap. Her bright
+hair hung free upon her shoulders in tumbled half curls. As a
+picture, the figure and its entourage might have been artistically
+effective; but as Beverley saw it in actual life the first
+impression was rather embarrassing. Somehow he felt almost
+irresistibly invited to laugh, though he had never been much given
+to risibility. The blending, or rather the juxtaposition, of
+extremes--a face, a form immediately witching, and a costume odd
+to grotesquery--had made an assault upon his comprehension at
+once so sudden and so direct that his dignity came near being
+disastrously broken up. A splendidly beautiful child comically
+clad would have made much the same half delightful, half
+displeasing impression.
+
+Beverley could not stare at the girl, and no sooner had he turned
+his back upon her than the picture in his mind changed like a
+scene in a kaleidoscope. He now saw a tall, finely developed
+figure and a face delicately oval, with a low, wide forehead,
+arched brows, a straight, slightly tip-tilted nose, a mouth sweet
+and full. dimpled cheeks, and a strong chin set above a faultless
+throat. His imagination, in casting off its first impression, was
+inclined to exaggerate Alice's beauty and to dwell upon its
+picturesqueness. He smiled as he walked back to the fort, and even
+found himself whistling gayly a snatch from a rollicking fiddle-
+tune that he had heard when a boy.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+A FENCING BOUT
+
+
+A few days after Helm's arrival, M. Roussillon returned to
+Vincennes, and if he was sorely touched in his amour propre by
+seeing his suddenly acquired military rank and title drop away, he
+did not let it be known to his fellow citizens. He promptly called
+upon the new commander and made acquaintance with Lieutenant
+Fitzhugh Beverley, who just then was superintending the work of
+cleaning up an old cannon in the fort and mending some breaks in
+the stockade.
+
+Helm formed a great liking for the big Frenchman, whose breezy
+freedom of manner and expansive good humor struck him favorably
+from the beginning. M. Roussillon's ability to speak English with
+considerable ease helped the friendship along, no doubt; at all
+events their first interview ended with a hearty show of good
+fellowship, and as time passed they became almost inseparable
+companions during M. Roussillon's periods of rest from his trading
+excursions among the Indians. They played cards and brewed hot
+drinks over which they told marvelous stories, the latest one
+invariably surpassing all its predecessors.
+
+Helm had an eye to business, and turned M. Roussillon's knowledge
+of the Indians to valuable account, so that he soon had very
+pleasant relations with most of the tribes within reach of his
+agents. This gave a feeling of great security to the people of
+Vincennes. They pursued their narrow agricultural activities with
+excellent results and redoubled those social gayeties which, even
+in hut and cabin under all the adverse conditions of extreme
+frontier life, were dear to the volatile and genial French
+temperament.
+
+Lieutenant Beverley found much to interest him in the quaint town;
+but the piece de resistance was Oncle Jazon, who proved to be both
+fascinating and unmanageable; a hard nut to crack, yet possessing
+a kernel absolutely original in flavor. Beverley visited him one
+evening in his hut--it might better be called den--a curiously
+built thing, with walls of vertical poles set in a quadrangular
+trench dug in the ground, and roofed with grass. Inside and out it
+was plastered with clay, and the floor of dried mud was as smooth
+and hard as concrete paving. In one end there was a wide fireplace
+grimy with soot, in the other a mere peep-hole for a window: a
+wooden bench, a bed of skins and two or three stools were barely
+visible in the gloom. In the doorway Oncle Jazon sat whittling a
+slender billet of hickory into a ramrod for his long flint-lock
+American rifle.
+
+"Maybe ye know Simon Kenton," said the old man, after he and
+Beverley had conversed for a while, "seeing that you are from
+Kentucky--eh?"
+
+"Yes, I do know him well; he's a warm personal friend of mine,"
+said Beverley with quick interest, for it surprised him that Oncle
+Jazon should know anything about Kenton. "Do you know him,
+Monsieur Jazon?"
+
+Oncle Jazon winked conceitedly and sighted along his rudimentary
+ramrod to see if it was straight; then puckering his lips, as if
+on the point of whistling, made an affirmative noise quite
+impossible to spell.
+
+"Well, I'm glad you are acquainted with Kenton," said Beverley.
+"Where did you and he come together?"
+
+Oncle Jazon chuckled reminiscently and scratched the skinless,
+cicatrized spot where his scalp had once flourished.
+
+"Oh, several places," he answered. "Ye see thet hair a hangin'
+there on the wall?" He pointed at a dry wisp dangling under a peg
+in a log barely visible by the bad light. "Well, thet's my scalp,
+he! he! he!" He snickered as if the fact were a most enjoyable
+joke. "Simon Kenton can tell ye about thet little affair! The
+Indians thought I was dead, and they took my hair; but I wasn't
+dead; I was just a givin' 'em a 'possum act. When they was gone I
+got up from where I was a layin' and trotted off. My head was sore
+and ventrebleu! but I was mad, he! he! he!"
+
+All this time he spoke in French, and the English but poorly
+paraphrases his odd turns of expression. His grimaces and grunts
+cannot even be hinted.
+
+It was a long story, as Beverley received it, told scrappily, but
+with certain rude art. In the end Oncle Jazon said with unctuous
+self-satisfaction:
+
+"Accidents will happen. I got my chance at that damned Indian who
+skinned my head, and I jes took a bead on 'im with my old rifle. I
+can't shoot much, never could, but I happened to hit 'im square in
+the lef' eye, what I shot at, and it was a hundred yards. Down he
+tumbles, and I runs to 'im and finds my same old scalp a hangin'
+to his belt. Well, I lifted off his hair with my knife, and untied
+mine from the belt, and then I had both scalps, he! he! he! You
+ask Simon Kenton when ye see 'im. He was along at the same time,
+and they made 'im run the ga'ntlet and pretty nigh beat the life
+out o' 'im. Ventrebleu!"
+
+Beverley now recollected hearing Kenton tell the same grim story
+by a camp-fire in the hills of Kentucky. Somehow it had caught a
+new spirit in the French rendering, which linked it with the old
+tales of adventure that he had read in his boyhood, and it
+suddenly endeared Oncle Jazon to him. The rough old scrap of a man
+and the powerful youth chatted together until sundown, smoking
+their pipes, each feeling for what was best in the other, half
+aware that in the future they would be tested together in the fire
+of wild adventure. Every man is more or less a prophet at certain
+points in his life.
+
+Twilight and moonlight were blending softly when Beverley, on his
+way back to the fort, departing from a direct course, went along
+the river's side southward to have a few moments of reflective
+strolling within reach of the water's pleasant murmur and the
+town's indefinite evening stir. Rich sweetness, the gift of early
+autumn, was on the air blowing softly out of a lilac west and
+singing in the willow fringe that hung here and there over the
+bank.
+
+On the farther side of the river's wide flow, swollen by recent
+heavy rains, Beverley saw a pirogue, in one end of which a dark
+figure swayed to the strokes of a paddle. The slender and shallow
+little craft was bobbing on the choppy waves and taking a zig-zag
+course among floating logs and masses of lighter driftwood, while
+making slow but certain headway toward the hither bank.
+
+Beverley took a bit of punk and a flint and steel from his pocket,
+relit his pipe and stood watching the skilful boatman conduct his
+somewhat dangerous voyage diagonally against the rolling current.
+It was a shifting, hide-and-seek scene, its features appearing and
+disappearing with the action of the waves and the doubtful light
+reflected from fading clouds and sky. Now and again the man stood
+up in his skittish pirogue, balancing himself with care, to use a
+short pole in shoving driftwood out of his way; and more than once
+he looked to Beverley as if he had plunged head-long into the
+dark water.
+
+The spot, as nearly as it can be fixed, was about two hundred
+yards below where the public road-bridge at present spans the
+Wabash. The bluff was then far different from what it is now,
+steeper and higher, with less silt and sand between it and the
+water's edge. Indeed, swollen as the current was, a man could
+stand on the top of the bank and easily leap into the deep water.
+At a point near the middle of the river a great mass of drift-logs
+and sand had long ago formed a barrier which split the stream so
+that one current came heavily shoreward on the side next the town
+and swashed with its muddy foam, making a swirl and eddy just
+below where Beverley stood.
+
+The pirogue rounded the upper angle of this obstruction, not
+without difficulty to its crew of one, and swung into the rapid
+shoreward rush, as was evidently planned for by the steersman, who
+now paddled against the tide with all his might to keep from being
+borne too far down stream for a safe landing place.
+
+Beverley stood at ease idly and half dreamily looking on, when
+suddenly something caused a catastrophe, which for a moment he did
+not comprehend. In fact the man in the pirogue came to grief, as a
+man in a pirogue is very apt to do, and fairly somersaulted
+overboard into the water. Nothing serious would have threatened
+(for the man could swim like an otter) had not a floating, half
+submerged log thrust up some short, stiff stumps of boughs, upon
+the points of which the man struck heavily and was not only hurt,
+but had his clothes impaled securely by one of the ugly spears, so
+that he hung in a helpless position, while the water's motion
+alternately lifted and submerged him, his arms beating about
+wildly.
+
+When Beverley heard a strangling cry for help, he pulled himself
+promptly together, flung off his coat, as if by a single motion,
+and leaped down the bank into the water. He was a swimmer whose
+strokes counted for all that prodigious strength and excellent
+training could afford; he rushed through the water with long
+sweeps, making a semicircle, rounding against the current, so as
+to swing down upon the drowning man.
+
+Less than a half-hour later a rumor by some means spread
+throughout the town that Father Beret and Lieutenant Beverley were
+drowned in the Wabash. But when a crowd gathered to verify the
+terrible news it turned out to be untrue. Gaspard Roussillon had
+once more distinguished himself by an exhibition of heroic nerve
+and muscle.
+
+"Ventrebleu! Quel homme!" exclaimed Oncle Jazon, when told that M.
+Roussillon had come up the bank of the Wabash with Lieutenant
+Beverley under one arm and Father Beret under the other, both men
+apparently dead.
+
+"Bring them to my house immediately," M. Roussillon ordered, as
+soon as they were restored to consciousness; and he shook himself,
+as a big wet animal sometimes does, covering everybody near him
+with muddy water. Then he led the way with melodramatic strides.
+
+In justice to historical accuracy there must be a trifling reform
+of what appeared on the face of things to be grandly true. Gaspard
+Roussillon actually dragged Father Beret and Lieutenant Beverley
+one at a time out of the eddy water and up the steep river bank.
+That was truly a great feat; but the hero never explained. When
+men arrived he was standing between the collapsed forms, panting
+and dripping. Doubtless he looked just as if he had dropped them
+from under his arms, and why shouldn't he have the benefit of a
+great implication?
+
+"I've saved them both," he roared; from which, of course, the
+ready creole imagination inferred the extreme of possible heroic
+performance.
+
+"Bring them to my house immediately," and it was accordingly done.
+
+The procession, headed by M. Roussillon, moved noisily, for the
+French tongue must shake off what comes to it on the thrill of
+every exciting moment. The only silent Frenchman is the dead one.
+
+Father Beret was not only well-nigh drowned, but seriously hurt.
+He lay for a week on a bed in M. Roussillon's house before he
+could sit up. Alice hung over him night and day, scarcely sleeping
+or eating until he was past all danger. As for Beverley, he shook
+off all the effects of his struggle in a little while. Next day he
+was out, as well and strong as ever, busy with the affairs of his
+office. Nor was he less happy on account of what the little
+adventure had cast into his experience. It is good to feel that
+one has done an unselfish deed, and no young man's heart repels
+the freshness of what comes to him when a beautiful girl first
+enters his life.
+
+Naturally enough Alice had some thoughts of Beverley while she was
+so attentively caring for Father Beret. She had never before seen
+a man like him, nor had she read of one. Compared with Rene de
+Ronville, the best youth of her acquaintance, he was in every way
+superior; this was too evident for analysis; but referred to the
+romantic standard taken out of the novels she had read, he somehow
+failed; and yet he loomed bravely in her vision, not exactly a
+knight of the class she had most admired, still unquestionably a
+hero of large proportions.
+
+Beverley stepped in for a few minutes every day to see Father
+Beret, involuntarily lengthening his visit by a sliding ratio as
+he became better acquainted. He began to enjoy the priest's
+conversation, with its sly worldly wisdom cropping up through
+fervid religious sentiments and quaint humor. Alice must have
+interested him more than he was fully aware of; for his eyes
+followed her, as she came and went, with a curious criticism of
+her half-savage costume and her springy, Dryad-like suppleness,
+which reminded him of the shyest and gracefulest wild birds; and
+yet a touch of refinement, the subtlest and best, showed in all
+her ways. He studied her, as he would have studied a strange,
+showy and originally fragrant flower, or a bird of oddly
+attractive plumage. While she said little to him or to anyone else
+in his presence, he became aware of the willfulness and joyous
+lightness which played on her nature's changeable surface. He
+wondered at her influence over Father Beret, whom she controlled
+apparently without effort. But in due time he began to feel a
+deeper character, a broader intelligence, behind her superficial
+sauvagerie; and he found that she really had no mean smattering of
+books in the lighter vein.
+
+A little thing happened which further opened his eyes and
+increased the interest that her beauty and elementary charm of
+style aroused in him gradually, apace with their advancing
+acquaintanceship.
+
+Father Beret had got well and returned to his hut and his round of
+spiritual duties; but Beverley came to Roussillon place every day
+all the same. For a wonder Madame Roussillon liked him, and at
+most times held the scolding side of her tongue when he was
+present. Jean, too, made friendly advances whenever opportunity
+afforded. Of course Alice gave him just the frank cordiality of
+hospitable welcome demanded by frontier conditions. She scarcely
+knew whether she liked him or not; but he had a treasury of
+information from which he was enriching her with liberal
+carelessness day by day. The hungriest part of her mind was being
+sumptuously banqueted at his expense. Mere intellectual greediness
+drew her to him.
+
+Naturally they soon threw off such troubling formalities as at
+first rose between them, and began to disclose to each other their
+true characteristics. Alice found in Beverley a large target for
+the missiles of her clever and tantalizing perversity. He in turn
+practiced a native dignity and an acquired superiority of manner
+to excellent effect. It was a meeting of Greek with Greek in a new
+Arcadia. To him here was Diana, strong, strange, simple, even
+crude almost to naturalness, yet admirably pure in spirit and
+imbued with highest womanly aspirations. To her Beverley
+represented the great outside area of life. He came to her from
+wonderland, beyond the wide circle of houseless woods and
+prairies. He represented gorgeous cities, teeming parks of
+fashion, boulevards, salons, halls of social splendor, the
+theater, the world of woman's dreams.
+
+Now, there is an antagonism, vague yet powerful, generated between
+natures thus cast together from the opposite poles of experience
+and education: an antagonism practically equivalent to the most
+vigorous attraction. What one knows the other is but half aware
+of; neither knowledge nor ignorance being mutual, there is a
+scintillation of exchange, from opposing vantage grounds, followed
+by harmless snaps of thunder. Culture and refinement take on airs--
+it is the deepest artificial instinct of enlightenment to pose--
+in the presence of naturalness; and there is a certain style of
+ignorance which attitudinizes before the gate of knowledge. The
+return to nature has always been the dream of the conventionalized
+soul, while the simple Arcadian is forever longing for the
+maddening honey of sophistication.
+
+Innate jealousies strike together like flint and steel dashing off
+sparks by which nearly everything that life can warm its core
+withal is kindled and kept burning. What I envy in my friend I
+store for my best use. I thrust and parry, not to kill, but to
+learn my adversary's superior feints and guards. And this hint of
+sword play leads back to what so greatly surprised and puzzled
+Beverley one day when he chanced to be examining the pair of
+colechemardes on the wall.
+
+He took one down, and handling it with the indescribable facility
+possible to none save a practical swordsman, remarked:
+
+"There's a world of fascination in these things; I like nothing
+better than a bout at fencing. Does your father practice the art?"
+
+"I have no father, no mother," she quickly said; "but good Papa
+Roussillon does like a little exercise with the colechemarde."
+
+"Well, I'm glad to hear it, I shall ask to teach him a trick or
+two," Beverley responded in the lightest mood. "When will he
+return from the woods?"
+
+"I can't tell you; he's very irregular in such matters," she said.
+Then, with a smile half banter and half challenge, she added; "if
+you are really dying for some exercise, you shall not have to wait
+for him to come home, I assure you, Monsieur Beverley."
+
+"Oh, it's Monsieur de Ronville, perhaps, that you will offer up as
+a victim to my skill and address," he slyly returned; for he was
+suspecting that a love affair in some stage of progress lay
+between her and Rene.
+
+She blushed violently, but quickly overcoming a combined rush of
+surprise and anger, added with an emphasis as charming as it was
+unexpected.
+
+"I myself am, perhaps, swordsman enough to satisfy the impudence
+and vanity of Monsieur Beverley, Lieutenant in the American army."
+
+"Pardon me, Mademoiselle; forgive me, I beg of you," he exclaimed,
+earnestly modulating his voice to sincerest beseechment; "I really
+did not mean to be impudent, nor--"
+
+Her vivacity cleared with a merry laugh.
+
+"No apologies, I command you," she interposed. "We will have them
+after I have taught you a fencing lesson."
+
+From a shelf she drew down a pair of foils and presenting the
+hilts, bade him take his choice.
+
+"There isn't any difference between them that I know of," she
+said, and then added archly; "but you will feel better at last,
+when all is over and the sting of defeat tingles through you, if
+you are conscious of having used every sensible precaution."
+
+He looked straight into her eyes, trying to catch what was in her
+mind, but there was a bewildering glamour playing across those
+gray, opal-tinted wells of mystery, from which he could draw only
+a mischievous smile-glint, direct, daring, irresistible.
+
+"Well," he said, taking one of the foils, "what do you really
+mean? Is it a challenge without room for honorable retreat?"
+
+"The time for parley is past," she replied, "follow me to the
+battle-ground."
+
+She led the way to a pleasant little court in the rear of the
+cabin's yard, a space between two wings and a vine-covered
+trellis, beyond which lay a well kept vineyard and vegetable
+garden. Here she turned about and faced him, poising her foil with
+a fine grace.
+
+"Are you ready?" she inquired.
+
+He tried again to force a way into the depths of her eyes with
+his; but he might as well have attacked the sun; so he stood in a
+confusion of not very well defined feelings, undecided,
+hesitating, half expecting that there would be some laughable turn
+to end the affair.
+
+"Are you afraid, Monsieur Beverley?" she demanded after a short
+waiting in silence.
+
+He laughed now and whipped the air with his foil.
+
+"You certainly are not in earnest?" he said interrogatively. "Do
+you really mean that you want to fence with me?"
+
+"If you think because I'm only a girl you can easily beat me, try
+it," she tauntingly replied making a level thrust toward his
+breast.
+
+Quick as a flash he parried, and then a merry clinking and
+twinkling of steel blades kept time to their swift movements.
+Instantly, by the sure sense which is half sight, half feeling--
+the sense that guides the expert fencer's hand and wrist--Beverley
+knew that he had probably more than his match, and in ten seconds
+his attack was met by a time thrust in opposition which touched
+him sharply.
+
+Alice sprang far back, lowered her point and laughed.
+
+"Je vous salue, Monsieur Beverley!" she cried, with childlike show
+of delight. "Did you feel the button?"
+
+"Yes, I felt it," he said with frank acknowledgment in his voice,
+"it was cleverly done. Now give me a chance to redeem myself."
+
+He began more carefully and found that she, too, was on her best
+mettle; but it was a short bout, as before. Alice seemed to give
+him an easy opening and he accepted it with a thrust; then
+something happened that he did not understand. The point of his
+foil was somehow caught under his opponent's hilt-guard while her
+blade seemed to twist around his; at the same time there was a
+wring and a jerk, the like of which he had never before felt, and
+he was disarmed, his wrist and fingers aching with the wrench they
+had received.
+
+Of course the thing was not new; he had been disarmed before; but
+her trick of doing it was quite a mystery to him, altogether
+different from any that he had ever seen.
+
+"Vous me pardonnerez, Monsieur" she mockingly exclaimed, picking
+up his weapon and offering the hilt to him. "Here is your sword!"
+
+"Keep it," he said, folding his arms and trying to look
+unconcerned, "you have captured it fairly. I am at your mercy; be
+kind to me."
+
+Madame Roussillon and Jean, the hunchback, hearing the racket of
+the foils had come out to see and were standing agape.
+
+"You ought to be ashamed, Alice," said the dame in scolding
+approval of what she had done; "girls do not fence with
+gentlemen."
+
+"This girl does," said Alice.
+
+"And with extreme disaster to this gentleman," said Beverley,
+laughing in a tone of discomfiture and resignation.
+
+"Ah, Mo'sieu', there's nothing but disaster where she goes,"
+complained Madame Roussillon, "she is a destroyer of everything.
+Only yesterday she dropped my pink bowl and broke it, the only one
+I had."
+
+"And just to think," said Beverley, "what would have been the
+condition of my heart had we been using rapiers instead of
+leather-buttoned foils! She would have spitted it through the very
+center."
+
+"Like enough," replied the dame indifferently. "She wouldn't
+wince, either,--not she."
+
+Alice ran into the house with the foils and Beverley followed.
+
+"We must try it over again some day soon," he said; "I find that
+you can show me a few points. Where did you learn to fence so
+admirably? Is Monsieur Roussillon your master?"
+
+"Indeed he isn't," she quickly replied, "he is but a bungling
+swordsman. My master--but I am not at liberty to tell you who has
+taught me the little I know."
+
+"Well, whoever he is I should be glad to have lessons from him."
+
+"But you'll never get them."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because."
+
+"A woman's ultimatum."
+
+"As good as a man's!" she bridled prettily; "and sometimes better--
+at the foils for example. Vous--comprenez, n'est ce pas?"
+
+He laughed heartily.
+
+"Yes, your point reaches me," he said, "but sperat et in saeva
+victus gladiatur arena, as the old Latin poet wisely remarks." The
+quotation was meant to tease her.
+
+"Yes, Montaigne translated that or something in his book," she
+commented with prompt erudition. "I understand it."
+
+Beverley looked amazed.
+
+"What do you know about Montaigne?" he demanded with a blunt
+brevity amounting to something like gruffness.
+
+"Sh', Monsieur, not too loud," she softly protested, looking
+around to see that neither Madame Roussillon nor Jean had followed
+them into the main room. "It is not permitted that I read that old
+book; but they do not hide it from me, because they think I can't
+make out its dreadful spelling."
+
+She smiled so that her cheeks drew their dimples deep into the
+delicately tinted pink-and-brown, where wind and sun and wholesome
+exercise had set the seal of absolute health, and took from a
+niche in the logs of the wall a stained and dog-eared volume. He
+looked, and it was, indeed, the old saint and sinner, Montaigne.
+
+Involuntarily he ran his eyes over the girl from head to foot,
+comparing her show of knowledge with the outward badges of abject
+rusticity, and even wildness, with which she was covered.
+
+"Well," he said, "you are a mystery."
+
+"You think it surprising that I can read a book! Frankly I can't
+understand half of this one. I read it because--well just because
+they want me to read about nothing but sickly old saints and woe-
+begone penitents. I like something lively. What do I care for all
+that uninteresting religious stuff?"
+
+"Montaigne IS decidedly lively in spots," Beverley remarked. "I
+shouldn't think a girl--I shouldn't think you'd particularly enjoy
+his humors."
+
+"I don't care for the book at all," she said, flushing quickly,
+"only I seem to learn about the world from it. Sometimes it seems
+as if it lifted me up high above all this wild, lonely and
+tiresome country, so that I can see far off where things are
+different and beautiful. It is the same with the novels; and they
+don't permit me to read them either; but all the same I do."
+
+When Beverley, taking his leave, passed through the gate at
+Roussillon place, he met Rene de Ronville going in. It was a
+notable coincidence that each young man felt something troublesome
+rise in his throat as he looked into the other's eyes.
+
+A week of dreamy autumn weather came on, during which Beverley
+managed to be with Alice a great deal, mostly sitting on the
+Roussillon gallery, where the fading vine leaves made fairy
+whispering, and where the tempered breeze blew deliciously cool
+from over the distant multi-colored woods. The men of Vincennes
+were gathering their Indian corn early to dry it on the cob for
+grating into winter meal. Many women made wine from the native
+grapes and from the sweeter and richer fruit of imported vines.
+Madame Roussillon and Alice stained their hands a deep purple
+during the pressing season, and Beverley found himself engaged in
+helping them handle the juicy crop, while around the overflowing
+earthen pots the wild bees, wasps and hornets hummed with an
+incessant, jarring monotony.
+
+Jean, the hunchback, gathered ample stores of hickory nuts,
+walnuts, hazel-nuts and pin-oak acorns. Indeed, the whole
+population of the village made a great spurt of industry just
+before the falling of winter; and presently, when every
+preparation had been completed for the dreaded cold season, M.
+Roussillon carried out his long-cherished plan, and gave a great
+party at the river house. After the most successful trading
+experience of all his life he felt irrepressibly liberal.
+
+"Let's have one more roaring good time," he said, "that's what
+life is for."
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE MAYOR'S PARTY
+
+
+Beverley was so surprised and confused in his mind by the ease
+with which he had been mastered at swordplay by a mere girl, that
+he felt as if just coming out of a dream. In fact the whole affair
+seemed unreal, yet so vivid and impressive in all its main
+features, that he could not emerge from it and look it calmly over
+from without. His experience with women had not prepared him for a
+ready understanding and acceptance of a girl like Alice. While he
+was fully aware of her beauty, freshness, vivacity and grace, this
+Amazonian strength of hers, this boldness of spirit, this curious
+mixture of frontier crudeness and a certain adumbration--so to
+call it--of patrician sensibilities and aspirations, affected him
+both pleasantly and unpleasantly. He did not sympathize promptly
+with her semi-barbaric costume; she seemed not gently feminine, as
+compared with the girls of Virginia and Maryland. He resented her
+muscular development and her independent disposition. She was far
+from coarseness, however, and, indeed, a trace of subtle
+refinement, although not conventional, imbued her whole character.
+
+But why was he thinking so critically about her? Had his
+selfishness received an incurable shock from the button of her
+foil? A healthy young man of the right sort is apt to be jealous
+of his physical prowess--touch him there and he will turn the
+world over to right himself in, his own admiration and yours. But
+to be beaten on his highest ground of virility by a dimple-faced
+maiden just leaving her teens could not offer Beverley any open
+way to recoupment of damages.
+
+He tried to shake her out of his mind, as a bit of pretty and
+troublesome rubbish, what time he pursued his not very exacting
+military duties. But the more he shook the tighter she clung, and
+the oftener he went to see her.
+
+Helm was a good officer in many respects, and his patriotism was
+of the best; but he liked jolly company, a glass of something
+strong and a large share of ease. Detroit lay many miles
+northeastward across the wilderness, and the English, he thought,
+would scarcely come so far to attack his little post, especially
+now that most of the Indians in the intervening country had
+declared in favor of the Americans. Recently, too, the weather had
+been favoring him by changing from wet to dry, so that the upper
+Wabash and its tributaries were falling low and would soon be very
+difficult to navigate with large batteaux.
+
+Very little was done to repair the stockade and dilapidated
+remnant of a blockhouse. There were no sufficient barracks, a mere
+shed in one angle serving for quarters, and the old cannon could
+not have been used to any effect in case of attack. As for the
+garrison, it was a nominal quantity, made up mostly of men who
+preferred hunting and fishing to the merest pretense of military
+duty.
+
+Gaspard Roussillon assumed to know everything about Indian affairs
+and the condition of the English at Detroit. His optimistic
+eloquence lulled Helm to a very pleasant sense of security.
+Beverley was not so easy to satisfy; but his suggestions regarding
+military discipline and a vigorous prosecution of repairs to the
+blockhouse and stockade were treated with dilatory geniality by
+his superior officer. The soft wonder of a perfect Indian summer
+glorified land, river and sky. Why not dream and bask? Why not
+drink exhilarating toddies?
+
+Meantime the entertainment to be given by Gaspard Roussillon
+occupied everybody's imagination to an unusual extent. Rene de
+Ronville, remembering but not heeding the doubtful success of his
+former attempt, went long beforehand to claim Alice as his
+partenaire; but she flatly refused him, once more reminding him of
+his obligations to little Adrienne Bourcier. He would not be
+convinced.
+
+"You are bound to me," he said, "you promised before, you know,
+and the party was but put off. I hold you to it; you are my
+partenaire, and I am yours, you can't deny that."
+
+"No you are not my partenaire," she firmly said; then added
+lightly, "Feu mon partenaire, you are dead and buried as my
+partner at that dance."
+
+He glowered in silence for a few moments, then said:
+
+"It is Lieutenant Beverley, I suppose."
+
+She gave him a quick contemptuous look, but turned it instantly
+into one of her tantalising smiles.
+
+"Do you imagine that?" she demanded.
+
+"Imagine it! I know it," he said with a hot flush. "Have I no
+sense?"
+
+"Precious little," she replied with a merry laugh.
+
+"You think so."
+
+"Go to Father Beret, tell him everything, and then ask him what he
+thinks," she said in a calm, even tone, her face growing serious.
+
+There was an awkward silence.
+
+She had touched Rene's vulnerable spot; he was nothing if not a
+devout Catholic, and his conscience rooted itself in what good
+Father Beret had taught him.
+
+The church, no matter by what name it goes, Catholic or
+Protestant, has a saving hold on the deepest inner being of its
+adherents. No grip is so hard to shake off as that of early
+religious convictions. The still, small voice coming down from the
+times "When shepherds watched their flocks by night," in old
+Judea, passes through the priest, the minister, the preacher; it
+echoes in cathedral, church, open-air meeting; it gently and
+mysteriously imparts to human life the distinctive quality which
+is the exponent of Christian civilization. Upon the receptive
+nature of children it makes an impress that forever afterward
+exhales a fragrance and irradiates a glory for the saving of the
+nations.
+
+Father Beret was the humble, self-effacing, never-tiring agent of
+good in his community. He preached in a tender sing-song voice the
+sweet monotonies of his creed and the sublime truths of Christ's
+code. He was indeed the spiritual father of his people. No wonder
+Rene's scowling expression changed to one of abject self-concern
+when the priest's name was suddenly connected with his mood. The
+confessional loomed up before the eyes of his conscience, and his
+knees smote together, spiritually if not physically.
+
+"Now," said Alice, brusquely, but with sweet and gentle firmness,
+"go to your fiancee, go to pretty and good Adrienne, and ask her
+to be your partenaire. Refresh your conscience with a noble
+draught of duty and make that dear little girl overflow with joy.
+Go, Rene de Ronville."
+
+In making over what she said into English, the translation turns
+out to be but a sonorous paraphrase. Her French was of that mixed
+creole sort, a blending of linguistic elegance and patois,
+impossible to imitate. Like herself it was beautiful, crude,
+fascinating, and something in it impressed itself as
+unimpeachable, despite the broken and incongruous diction. Rene
+felt his soul cowering, even slinking; but he fairly maintained a
+good face, and went away without saying another word.
+
+"Ciel, ciel, how beautiful she is!" he thought, as he walked along
+the narrow street in the dreamy sunshine. "But she is not for me,
+not for me."
+
+He shook himself and tried to be cheerful. In fact he hummed a
+Creole ditty, something about
+
+"La belle Jeanette, qu' a brise mon coeur."
+
+Days passed, and at last the time of the great event arrived. It
+was a frosty night, clear, sparkling with stars, a keen breath
+cutting down from the northwest. M. Roussillon, Madame Roussillon,
+Alice and Lieutenant Beverley went together to the river house,
+whither they had been preceded by almost the entire population of
+Vincennes. Some fires had been built outside; the crowd proving
+too great for the building's capacity, as there had to be ample
+space for the dancers. Merry groups hovered around the flaming
+logs, while within the house a fiddle sang its simple and
+ravishing tunes. Everybody talked and laughed; it was a lively
+racket of clashing voices and rhythmical feet.
+
+You would have been surprised to find that Oncle Jazon was the
+fiddler; but there he sat, perched on a high stool in one corner
+of the large room, sawing away as if for dear life, his head
+wagging, his elbow leaping back and forth, while his scalpless
+crown shone like the side of a peeled onion and his puckered mouth
+wagged grotesquely from side to side keeping time to his tuneful
+scraping.
+
+When the Roussillon party arrived it attracted condensed
+attention. Its importance, naturally of the greatest in the
+assembled popular mind, was enhanced--as mathematicians would
+say, to the nth power--by the gown of Alice. It was resplendent
+indeed in the simple, unaccustomed eyes upon which it flashed with
+a buff silken glory. Matrons stared at it; maidens gazed with
+fascinated and jealous vision; men young and old let their eyes
+take full liberty. It was as if a queen, arrayed in a robe of
+state, had entered that dingy log edifice, an apparition of
+dazzling and awe-inspiring beauty. Oncle Jazon caught sight of
+her, and snapped his tune short off. The dancers swung together
+and stopped in confusion. But she, fortified by a woman's
+strongest bulwark, the sense of resplendency, appeared quite
+unconscious of herself.
+
+Little Adrienne, hanging in blissful delight upon Rene's strong
+arm, felt the stir of excitement and wondered what was the matter,
+being too short to see over the heads of those around her.
+
+"What is it? what is it?" she cried, tiptoeing and tugging at her
+companion's sleeve. "Tell me, Rene, tell me, I say."
+
+Rene was gazing in dumb admiration into which there swept a
+powerful anger, like a breath of flame. He recollected how Alice
+had refused to wear that dress when he had asked her, and now she
+had it on. Moreover, there she stood beside Lieutenant Beverley,
+holding his arm, looking up into his face, smiling, speaking to
+him.
+
+"I think you might tell me what has happened," said Adrienne,
+pouting and still plucking at his arm. "I can't see a thing, and
+you won't tell me."
+
+"Oh, it's nothing," he presently answered, rather fretfully. Then
+he stooped, lowered his voice and added; "it's Mademoiselle
+Roussillon all dressed up like a bride or something. She's got on
+a buff silk dress that Mo'sieu' Roussillon's mother had in
+France."
+
+"How beautiful she must look!" cried the girl. "I wish I could see
+her."
+
+Rene put a hand on each side of her slender waist and lifted her
+high, so that her pretty head rose above the crowding people.
+Alice chanced to turn her face that way just then and saw the
+unconventional performance. Her eyes met those of Adrienne and she
+gave a nod of smiling recognition. It was a rose beaming upon a
+gilliflower.
+
+M. Roussillon naturally understood that all this stir and crowding
+to see was but another demonstration of his personal popularity.
+He bowed and waved a vast hand.
+
+But the master of ceremonies called loudly for the dancers to take
+their places. Oncle Jazon attacked his fiddle again with startling
+energy. Those who were not to dance formed a compact double line
+around the wall, the shorter ones in front, the taller in the
+rear. And what a scene it was! but no person present regarded it
+as in any way strange or especially picturesque, save as to the
+gown of Alice, which was now floating and whirling in time to
+Oncle Jazon's mad music. The people outside the house cheerfully
+awaited their turn to go in while an equal number went forth to
+chat and sing around the fires.
+
+Beverley was in a young man's seventh heaven. The angels formed a
+choir circling around his heart, and their song brimmed his
+universe from horizon to horizon.
+
+When he called at Roussillon place, and Alice appeared so
+beautifully and becomingly robed, it was another memorable
+surprise. She flashed a new and subtly stimulating light upon him.
+The old gown, rich in subdued splendor of lace and brocade, was
+ornamented at the throat with a heavy band of pearls, just above
+which could be seen a trace of the gold chain that supported her
+portrait locket. There, too, with a not unbecoming gleam of
+barbaric colors, shone the string of porcupine beads to which the
+Indian charmstone hidden in her bosom was attached. It all
+harmonized with the time, the place, the atmosphere. Anywhere else
+it would have been preposterous as a decorative presentment, but
+here, in this little nook where the coureurs de bois, the half-
+breeds, the traders and the missionaries had founded a centre of
+assembly, it was the best possible expression in the life so
+formed at hap-hazard, and so controlled by the coarsest and
+narrowest influences. To Fitzhugh Beverley, of Beverley Hall, the
+picture conveyed immediately a sweet and pervading influence.
+
+Alice looked superbly tall, stately and self-possessed in her
+transforming costume, a woman of full stature, her countenance
+gravely demure yet reserving near the surface the playful dimples
+and mischievous smiles so characteristic of her more usual manner.
+A sudden mood of the varium et mutabile semper femina had led her
+to wear the dress, and the mood still illuminated her.
+
+Beverley stood before her frankly looking and admiring. The
+underglow in her cheeks deepened and spread over her perfect
+throat; her eyes met his a second, then shyly avoided him. He
+hardly could have been sure which was master, her serenity or her
+girlish delight in being attractively dressed; but there could be
+no doubt as to her self-possession; for, saving the pretty blush
+under his almost rude gaze of admiration, she bore herself as
+firmly as any fine lady he remembered.
+
+They walked together to the river house, she daintily holding up
+her skirts, under the insistent verbal direction of Madame
+Roussillon, and at the same time keeping a light, strangely
+satisfying touch on his arm. When they entered the room there was
+no way for Beverley to escape full consciousness of the excitement
+they aroused; but M. Roussillon's assumption broke the force of
+what would have otherwise been extremely embarrassing.
+
+"It is encouraging, very encouraging," murmured the big man to
+Beverley in the midst of the staring and scrambling and craning of
+necks, "to have my people admire and love me so; it goes to the
+middle of my heart." And again he bowed and waved his hand with an
+all-including gesture, while he swept his eyes over the crowd.
+
+Alice and Beverley were soon in the whirl of the dance, forgetful
+of everything but an exhilaration stirred to its utmost by Oncle
+Jazon's music.
+
+A side remark here may be of interest to those readers who enjoy
+the dream that on some fortunate day they will invade a lonely
+nook, where amid dust and cobwebs, neglected because unrecognized,
+reposes a masterpiece of Stradivari or some other great fiddle-
+maker. Oncle Jazon knew nothing whatever about old violins. He was
+a natural musician, that was all, and flung himself upon his
+fiddle with the same passionate abandon that characterizes a
+healthy boy's assault when a plum pudding is at his mercy. But his
+fiddle was a Carlo Bergonzi; and now let the search be renewed,
+for the precious instrument was certainly still in Vincennes as
+late as 1819, and there is a vague tradition that Governor
+Whitcomb played on it not long before he died. The mark by which
+it may be identified is the single word "Jazon" cut in the back of
+its neck by Oncle Jazon himself.
+
+When their dance was ended Alice and Beverley followed the others
+of their set out into the open air while a fresh stream of eager
+dancers poured in. Beverley insisted upon wrapping Alice in her
+mantle of unlined beaver skin against the searching winter breath.
+They did not go to the fire, but walked back and forth, chatting
+until their turn to dance should come again, pausing frequently to
+exchange pleasantries with some of the people. Curiously enough
+both of them had forgotten the fact that other young men would be
+sure to ask Alice for a dance, and that more than one pretty
+creole lass was rightfully expecting a giddy turn with the
+stalwart and handsome Lieutenant Beverley.
+
+Rene de Ronville before long broke rudely into their selfish dream
+and led Alice into the house. This reminded Beverley of his social
+duty, wherefore seeing little Adrienne Bourcier he made a rush and
+secured her at a swoop from the midst of a scrambling circle of
+mutually hindered young men.
+
+"Allons, ma petite!" he cried, quite in the gay tone of the
+occasion, and swung her lightly along with him.
+
+It was like an eagle dancing with a linnet, or a giant with a
+fairy, when the big Lieutenant led out la petite Adrienne, as
+everybody called her. The honor of Beverley's attention sat
+unappreciated on Adrienne's mind, for all her thoughts went with
+her eyes toward Rene and Alice. Nor was Beverley so absorbed in
+his partner's behalf that he ever for a moment willingly lost
+sight of the floating buff gown, the shining brown hair and the
+beautiful face, which formed, indeed, the center of attraction for
+all eyes.
+
+Father Beret was present, sharing heartily in the merriment of his
+flock. Voices greeted him on all sides with intonations of tender
+respect. The rudest man there was loyal to the kind-hearted
+priest, and would as soon have thought of shooting him as of
+giving him any but the most reverent attention. It is to be noted,
+however, that their understanding of reverence included great
+freedom and levity not especially ecclesiastical in its nature.
+Father Beret understood the conditions around him and had the
+genius to know what not to hear, what not to see; but he never
+failed when a good word or a fatherly touch with his hand seemed
+worth trying on a sheep that appeared to be straying dangerously
+far from the fold. Upon an occasion like this dance at the river
+house, he was no less the faithful priest because of his genial
+sympathy with the happiness of the young people who looked to him
+for spiritual guidance.
+
+It was some time before Beverley could again secure Alice for a
+dance, and he found it annoying him atrociously to see her smile
+sweetly on some buckskin-clad lout who looked like an Indian and
+danced like a Parisian. He did not greatly enjoy most of his
+partners; they could not appeal to any side of his nature just
+then. Not that he at all times stood too much on his aristocratic
+traditions, or lacked the virile traits common to vigorous and
+worldly-minded men; but the contrast between Alice and the other
+girls present was somehow an absolute bar to a democratic freedom
+of the sort demanded by the occasion. He met Father Beret and
+passed a few pleasant words with him.
+
+"They have honored your flag, my son, I am glad to see," the
+priest said, pointing with a smile to where, in one corner, the
+banner that bore Alice's name was effectively draped.
+
+Beverley had not noticed it before, and when he presently got
+possession of Alice he asked her to tell him the story of how she
+planted it on the fort, although he had heard it to the last
+detail from Father Beret just a moment ago. They stood together
+under its folds while she naively sketched the scene for him, even
+down to her picturesquely disagreeable interview with Long-Hair,
+mention of whom led up to the story of the Indian's race with the
+stolen dame jeanne of brandy under his arm on that memorable
+night, and the subsequent services performed for him by Father
+Beret and her, after she and Jean had found him in the mud beyond
+the river.
+
+The dancing went on at a furious pace while they stood there. Now
+and again a youth came to claim her, but she said she was tired
+and begged to rest awhile, smiling so graciously upon each one
+that his rebuff thrilled him as if it had been the most flattering
+gift of tender partiality, while at the same time he suspected
+that it was all for Beverley.
+
+Helm in his most jovial mood was circulating freely among those
+who formed the periphery of the dancing-area; he even ventured a
+few clumsy capers in a cotillion with Madame Godere for partner.
+She danced well; but he, as someone remarked, stumbled all over
+himself.
+
+There was but one thing to mar the evening's pleasure: some of the
+men drank too much and grew boisterous. A quarrel ended in a noisy
+but harmless fight near one of the fires. M. Roussillon rushed to
+the spot, seized the combatants, tousled them playfully, as if
+they had been children, rubbed their heads together, laughed
+stormily and so restored the equilibrium of temper.
+
+It was late when fathers and mothers in the company began to
+suggest adjournment. Oncle Jazon's elbow was tired and the
+enthusiasm generated by his unrecognized Bergonzi became fitful,
+while the relaxing crowd rapidly encroached upon the space set
+apart for the dancers. In the open lamps suspended here and there
+the oil was running low, and the rag wicks sputtered and winked
+with their yellow flames.
+
+"Well," said M. Roussillon, coming to where Alice and Beverley
+stood insulated and isolated by their great delight in each
+other's company, "it's time to go home."
+
+Beverley looked at his watch; it was a quarter to three!
+
+Alice also looked at the watch, and saw engraved and enameled on
+its massive case the Beverley crest, but she did not know what it
+meant. There was something of the sort in the back of her locket,
+she remembered with satisfaction.
+
+Just then there was a peculiar stir in the flagging crowd. Someone
+had arrived, a coureur de bois from the north. Where was the
+commandant? the coureur had something important for him.
+
+Beverley heard a remark in a startled voice about the English
+getting ready for a descent upon the Wabash valley. This broke the
+charm which thralled him and sent through his nerves the bracing
+shock that only a soldier can feel when a hint of coming battle
+reaches him.
+
+Alice saw the flash in his face.
+
+"Where is Captain Helm? I must see him immediately. Excuse me," he
+said, abruptly turning away and looking over the heads of the
+people; "yonder he is, I must go to him."
+
+The coureur de bois, Adolphe Dutremble by name, was just from the
+head waters of the Wabash. He was speaking to Helm when Beverley
+came up. M. Roussillon followed close upon the Lieutenant's heels,
+as eager as he to know what the message amounted to; but Helm took
+the coureur aside, motioning Beverley to join them. M. Roussillon
+included himself in the conference.
+
+After all it was but the gossip of savages that Dutremble
+communicated; still the purport was startling in the extreme.
+Governor Hamilton, so the story ran, had been organizing a large
+force; he was probably now on his way to the portage of the Wabash
+with a flotilla of batteaux, some companies of disciplined
+soldiers, artillery and a strong body of Indians.
+
+Helm listened attentively to Dutremble's lively sketch, then
+cross-questioned him with laconic directness.
+
+"Send Mr. Jazon to me," he said to M. Roussillon, as if speaking
+to a servant.
+
+The master Frenchman went promptly, recognizing Captain Helm's
+right to command, and sympathizing With his unpleasant military
+predicament if the news should prove true.
+
+Oncle Jazon came in a minute, his fiddle and bow clamped under his
+arm, to receive a verbal commission, which sent him with some
+scouts of his own choosing forthwith to the Wabash portage, or far
+enough to ascertain what the English commander was doing.
+
+After the conference Beverley made haste to join Alice; but he
+found that she had gone home.
+
+"One hell of a fix we'll be in if Hamilton comes down here with a
+good force," said Helm.
+
+Beverley felt like retorting that a little forethought, zeal and
+preparation might have lessened the prospective gloom. He had been
+troubled all the time about Helm's utter lack of military
+precaution. True, there was very little material out of which that
+optimistic officer could have formed a body of resistance against
+the army probably at Hamilton's command; but Beverley was young,
+energetic, bellicose, and to him everything seemed possible; he
+believed in vigilance, discipline, activity, dash; he had a great
+faith in the efficacy of enthusiasm.
+
+"We must organize these Frenchmen," he said; "they will make good
+fighters if we can once get them to act as a body. There's no time
+to be lost; but we have time enough in which to do a great deal
+before Hamilton can arrive, if we go at it in earnest."
+
+"Your theory is excellent, Lieutenant, but the practice of it
+won't be worth a damn," Helm replied with perfect good nature.
+"I'd like to see you organize these parly-voos. There ain't a
+dozen of 'em that wouldn't accept the English with open arms. I
+know 'em. They're good hearted, polite and all that; they'll
+hurrah for the flag; that's easy enough; but put 'em to the test
+and they'll join in with the strongest side, see if they don't. Of
+course there are a few exceptions. There's Jazon, he's all right,
+and I have faith in Bosseron, and Legrace, and young Ronville."
+
+"Roussillon--" Beverley began.
+
+"Is much of a blow-hard," Helm interrupted with a laugh. "Barks
+loud, but his biting disposition is probably not vicious."
+
+"He and Father Beret control the whole population at all events,"
+said Beverley.
+
+"Yes, and such a population!"
+
+While joining in Captain Helm's laugh at the expense of Vincennes,
+Beverley took leave to indulge a mental reservation in favor of
+Alice. He could not bear to class her with the crowd of noisy,
+thoughtless, mercurial beings whom he heard still singing gay
+snatches and calling to one another from distance to distance, as
+they strolled homeward in groups and pairs. Nor could the
+impending danger of an enforced surrender to the English and
+Indians drive from his mind her beautiful image, while he lay for
+the rest of the night between sleeping and waking on his primitive
+bed, alternately hearing over again her every phrase and laugh,
+and striving to formulate some definite plan for defending the
+town and fort. His heart was full of her. She had surprised his
+nature and filled it, as with a wonderful, haunting song. His
+youth, his imagination, all that was fresh and spontaneously
+gentle and natural in him, was flooded with the magnetic splendor
+of her beauty. And yet, in his pride (and it was not a false
+pride, but rather a noble regard for his birthright) he vaguely
+realized how far she was from him, how impossible.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE DILEMMA OF CAPTAIN HELM
+
+
+Oncle Jazon, feeling like a fish returned to the water after a
+long and torturing captivity in the open air, plunged into the
+forest with anticipations of lively adventure and made his way
+toward the Wea plains. It was his purpose to get a boat at the
+village of Ouiatenon and pull thence up the Wabash until he could
+find out what the English were doing. He chose for his companions
+on this dangerous expedition two expert coureurs de bois,
+Dutremble and Jacques Bailoup. Fifty miles up the river they fell
+in with some friendly Indians, well known to them all, who were
+returning from the portage.
+
+The savages informed them that there were no signs of an English
+advance in that quarter. Some of them had been as far as the St.
+Joseph river and to within a short distance of Detroit without
+seeing a white man or hearing of any suspicious movements on the
+part of Hamilton. So back came Oncle Jazon with his pleasing
+report, much disappointed that he had not been able to stir up
+some sort of trouble.
+
+It was Helm's turn to laugh.
+
+"What did I tell you?" he cried, in a jolly mood, slapping
+Beverley on the shoulder. "I knew mighty well that it was all a
+big story with nothing in it. What on earth would the English be
+thinking about to march an army away off down here only to capture
+a rotten stockade and a lot of gabbling parly-voos?"
+
+Beverley, while he did not feel quite as confident as his chief,
+was not sorry that things looked a little brighter than he had
+feared they would turn out to be. Secretly, and without
+acknowledging it to himself, he was delighted with the life he was
+living. The Arcadian atmosphere of Vincennes clothed him in its
+mists and dreams. No matter what way the weather blew its breath,
+cold or warm, cloudy or fair, rain or snow, the peace in his soul
+changed not. His nature seemed to hold all of its sterner and
+fiercer traits in abeyance while he domiciled himself absolutely
+within his narrow and monotonous environment. Since the dance at
+the river house a new content, like a soft and diffused sweetness,
+had crept through his blood with a vague, tingling sense of joy.
+
+He began to like walking about rather aimlessly in the town's
+narrow streets, with the mud-daubed cabins on either hand. This
+simple life under low, thatched roofs had a charm. When a door was
+opened he could see a fire of logs on the ample hearth shooting
+its yellow tongues up the sooty chimney-throat. Soft creole voices
+murmured and sang, or jangled their petty domestic discords. Women
+in scant petticoats, leggings and moccasins swept snow from the
+squat verandas, or fed the pigs in little sties behind the cabins.
+Everybody cried cheerily: "Bon jour, Monsieur, comment allez-
+vous?" as he went by, always accompanying the verbal salute with a
+graceful wave of the hand.
+
+When he walked early in the morning a waft of broiling game and
+browning corn scones was abroad. Pots and kettles occupied the
+hearths with glowing coals heaped around and under. Shaggy dogs
+whined at the doors until the mensal remnants were tossed out to
+them in the front yard.
+
+But it was always a glimpse of Alice that must count for
+everything in Beverley's reckonings, albeit he would have
+strenuously denied it. True he went to Roussillon place almost
+every day, it being a fixed part of his well ordered habit, and
+had a talk with her. Sometimes, when Dame Roussillon was very busy
+and so quite off her guard, they read together in a novel, or in
+certain parts of the odd volume of Montaigne. This was done more
+for the sweetness of disobedience than to enjoy the already
+familiar pages.
+
+Now and again they repeated their fencing bout; but never with the
+result which followed the first. Beverley soon mastered Alice's
+tricks and showed her that, after all, masculine muscle is not to
+be discounted at its own game by even the most wonderful womanly
+strength and suppleness. She struggled bravely to hold her vantage
+ground once gained so easily, but the inevitable was not to be
+avoided. At last, one howling winter day, he disarmed her by the
+very trick that she had shown him. That ended the play and they
+ran shivering into the house.
+
+"Ah," she cried, "it isn't fair. You are so much bigger than I;
+you have so much longer arms; so much more weight and power. It
+all counts against me! You ought to be ashamed of yourself!" She
+was rosy with the exhilarating exercise and the biting of the
+frosty breeze. Her beauty gave forth a new ray.
+
+Deep in her heart she was pleased to have him master her so
+superbly; but as the days passed she never said so, never gave
+over trying to make him feel the touch of her foil. She did not
+know that her eyes were getting through his guard, that her
+dimples were stabbing his heart to its middle.
+
+"You have other advantages," he replied, "which far overbalance my
+greater stature and stronger muscles." Then after a pause he
+added: "After all a girl must be a girl."
+
+Something in his face, something in her heart, startled her so
+that she made a quick little move like that of a restless bird.
+
+"You are beautiful and that makes my eyes and my hand uncertain,"
+he went on. "Were I fencing with a man there would be no glamour."
+
+He spoke in English, which he did not often do in conversation
+with her. It was a sign that he was somewhat wrought upon. She
+followed his rapid words with difficulty; but she caught from them
+a new note of feeling. He saw a little pale flare shoot across her
+face and thought she was angry.
+
+"You should not use your dimples to distract my vision," he
+quickly added, with a light laugh. "It would be no worse for me to
+throw my hat in your face!"
+
+His attempt at levity was obviously weak; she looked straight into
+his eyes, with the steady gaze of a simple, earnest nature shocked
+by a current quite strange to it. She did not understand him, and
+she did. Her fine intuition gathered swiftly together a hundred
+shreds of impression received from him during their recent growing
+intimacy. He was a patrician, as she vaguely made him out, a man
+of wealth, whose family was great. He belonged among people of
+gentle birth and high attainments. She magnified him so that he
+was diffused in her imagination, as difficult to comprehend as a
+mist in the morning air--and as beautiful.
+
+"You make fun of me," she said, very deliberately, letting her
+eyes droop; then she looked up again suddenly and continued, with
+a certain naive expression of disappointment gathering in her
+face. "I have been too free with you. Father Beret told me not to
+forget my dignity when in your company. He told me you might
+misunderstand me. I don't care; I shall not fence with you again."
+She laughed, but there was no joyous freedom in the sound.
+
+"Why, Alice--my dear Miss Roussillon, you do me a wrong; I beg a
+thousand pardons if I've hurt you," he cried, stepping nearer to
+her, "and I can never forgive myself. You have somehow
+misunderstood me, I know you have!"
+
+On his part it was exaggerating a mere contact of mutual feelings
+into a dangerous collision. He was as much self-deceived as was
+she, and he made more noise about it.
+
+"It is you who have misunderstood me," she replied, smiling
+brightly now, but with just a faint, pitiful touch of regret, or
+self-blame lingering in her voice. "Father Beret said you would. I
+did not believe him; but--"
+
+"And you shall not believe him," said Beverley. "I have not
+misunderstood you. There has been nothing. You have treated me
+kindly and with beautiful friendliness. You have not done or said
+a thing that Father Beret or anybody else could criticise. And if
+I have said or done the least thing to trouble you I repudiate it--
+I did not mean it. Now you believe me, don't you, Miss
+Roussillon?"
+
+He seemed to be falling into the habit of speaking to her in
+English. She understood it somewhat imperfectly, especially when
+in an earnest moment he rushed his words together as if they had
+been soldiers he was leading at the charge-step against an enemy.
+His manner convinced her, even though his diction fell short.
+
+"Then we'll talk about something else," she said, laughing
+naturally now, and retreating to a chair by the hearthside. "I
+want you to tell me all about yourself and your family, your home
+and everything."
+
+She seated herself with an air of conscious aplomb and motioned
+him to take a distant stool.
+
+There was a great heap of dry logs in the fireplace, with pointed
+flames shooting out of its crevices and leaping into the gloomy,
+cave-like throat of the flue. Outside a wind passed heavily across
+the roof and bellowed in the chimney-top.
+
+Beverley drew the stool near Alice, who, with a charred stick,
+used as a poker, was thrusting at the glowing crevices and sending
+showers of sparks aloft.
+
+"Why, there wouldn't be much to tell," he said, glad to feel
+secure again. "Our home is a big old mansion named Beverley Hall
+on a hill among trees, and half surrounded with slave cabins. It
+overlooks the plantation in the valley where a little river goes
+wandering on its way." He was speaking French and she followed him
+easily now, her eyes beginning to fling out again their natural
+sunny beams of interest. "I was born there twenty-six years ago
+and haven't done much of anything since. You see before you,
+Mademoiselle, a very undistinguished young man, who has signally
+failed to accomplish the dream of his boyhood, which was to be a
+great artist like Raphael or Angelo. Instead of being famous I am
+but a poor Lieutenant in the forces of Virginia."
+
+"You have a mother, father, brothers and sisters?" she
+interrogated. She did not understand his allusion to the great
+artists of whom she knew nothing. She had never before heard of
+them. She leaned the poker against the chimney jamb and turned her
+face toward him.
+
+"Mother, father, and one sister," he said, "no brothers. We were a
+happy little group. But my sister married and lives in Baltimore.
+I am here. Father and mother are alone in the old house. Sometimes
+I am terribly homesick." He was silent a moment, then added: "But
+you are selfish, you make me do all the telling. Now I want you to
+give me a little of your story, Mademoiselle, beginning as I did,
+at the first."
+
+"But I can't," she replied with childlike frankness, "for I don't
+know where I was born, nor my parents' names, nor who I am. You
+see how different it is with me. I am called Alice Roussillon, but
+I suppose that my name is Alice Tarleton; it is not certain,
+however. There is very little to help out the theory. Here is all
+the proof there is. I don't know that it is worth anything."
+
+She took off her locket and handed it to him.
+
+He handled it rather indifferently, for he was just then studying
+the fine lines of her face. But in a moment he was interested.
+
+"Tarleton, Tarleton," he repeated. Then he turned the little disc
+of gold over and saw the enameled drawing on the back,--a crest
+clearly outlined.
+
+He started. The crest was quite familiar.
+
+"Where did you get this?" he demanded in English, and with such
+blunt suddenness that she was startled. "Where did it come from?"
+
+"I have always had it."
+
+"Always? It's the Tarleton crest. Do you belong to that family?"
+
+"Indeed I do not know. Papa Roussillon says he thinks I do."
+
+"Well, this is strange and interesting," said Beverley, rather to
+himself than addressing her. He looked from the miniature to the
+crest and back to the miniature again, then at Alice. "I tell you
+this is strange," he repeated with emphasis. "It is exceedingly
+strange."
+
+Her cheeks flushed quickly under their soft brown and her eyes
+flashed with excitement.
+
+"Yes, I know." Her voice fluttered; her hands were clasped in her
+lap. She leaned toward him eagerly. "It is strange. I've thought
+about it a great deal."
+
+"Alice Tarleton; that is right; Alice is a name of the family.
+Lady Alice Tarleton was the mother of the first Sir Garnett
+Tarleton who came over in the time of Yardley. It's a great
+family. One of the oldest and best in Virginia." He looked at her
+now with a gaze of concentrated interest, under which her eyes
+fell. "Why, this is romantic!" he exclaimed, "absolutely romantic.
+And you don't know how you came by this locket? You don't know who
+was your father, your mother?"
+
+"I do not know anything."
+
+"And what does Monsieur Roussillon know?"
+
+"Just as little."
+
+"But how came he to be taking you and caring for you? He must know
+how he got you, where he got you, of whom he got you? Surely he
+knows--"
+
+"Oh, I know all that. I was twelve years old when Papa Roussillon
+took me, eight years ago. I had been having a hard life, and but
+for him I must have died. I was a captive among the Indians. He
+took me and has cared for me and taught me. He has been very, very
+good to me. I love him dearly."
+
+"And don't you remember anything at all about when, where, how the
+Indians got you?"
+
+"No." She shook her head and seemed to be trying to recollect
+something. "No, I just can't remember; and yet there has always
+been something like a dream in my mind, which I could not quite
+get hold of. I know that I am not a Catholic. I vaguely remember a
+sweet woman who taught me to pray like this: 'Our Father who art
+in heaven, hallowed be Thy name.'"
+
+And Alice went on through the beautiful and perfect prayer, which
+she repeated in English with infinite sweetness and solemnity, her
+eyes uplifted, her hands clasped before her. Beverley could have
+sworn that she was a shining saint, and that he saw an aureole.
+
+"I know," she continued, "that sometime, somewhere, to a very dear
+person I promised that I never, never, never would pray any prayer
+but that. And I remember almost nothing else about that other
+life, which is far off back yonder in the past, I don't know
+where,--sweet, peaceful, shadowy; a dream that I have all but lost
+from my mind."
+
+Beverley's sympathy was deeply moved. He sat for some minutes
+looking at her without speaking. She, too, was pensive and silent,
+while the fire sputtered and sang, the great logs slowly melting,
+the flames tossing wisps of smoke into the chimney still booming
+to the wind.
+
+"I know, too, that I am not French," she presently resumed, "but I
+don't know just how I know it. My first words must have been
+English, for I have always dreamed of talking in that language,
+and my dimmest half recollections of the old days are of a large,
+white house, and a soft-voiced black woman, who sang to me in that
+language the very sweetest songs in the world."
+
+It must be borne in mind that all this was told by Alice in her
+creole French, half bookish, half patois, of which no translation
+can give any fair impression.
+
+Beverley listened, as one who hears a clever reader intoning a
+strange and captivating poem. He was charmed. His imagination
+welcomed the story and furnished it with all that it lacked of
+picturesque completeness. In those days it was no uncommon thing
+for a white child to be found among the Indians with not a trace
+left by which to restore it to its people. He had often heard of
+such a case. But here was Alice right before him, the most
+beautiful girl that he had ever seen, telling him the strangest
+story of all. To his mind it was clear that she belonged to the
+Tarleton family of Virginia. Youth always concludes a matter at
+once. He knew some of the Tarletons; but it was a widely scattered
+family, its members living in almost every colony in America. The
+crest he recognized at a glance by the dragon on the helmet with
+three stars. It was not for a woman to bear; but doubtless it had
+been enameled on the locket merely as a family mark, as was often
+done in America.
+
+"The black woman was your nurse, your mammy," he said. "I know by
+that and by your prayer in English, as well as by your locket,
+that you are of a good old family."
+
+Like most Southerners, he had strong faith in genealogy, and he
+held at his tongue's tip the names of all the old families. The
+Carters, the Blairs, the Fitzhughs, the Hansons, the Randolphs,
+the Lees, the Ludwells, the Joneses, the Beverleys, the Tarletons--
+a whole catalogue of them stretched back in his memory. He knew
+the coat of arms displayed by each house. He could repeat their
+legends.
+
+"I wish you could tell me more," he went on. "Can't you recollect
+anything further about your early childhood, your first
+impressions--the house, the woman who taught you to pray, the old
+black mammy? Any little thing might be of priceless value as
+evidence."
+
+Alice shrugged her shoulders after the creole fashion with
+something of her habitual levity of manner, and laughed. His
+earnestness seemed disproportioned to the subject, as she fancied
+he must view it, although to her it had always been something to
+dream over. It was impossible for her to realize, as he did, the
+importance of details in solving a problem like that involved in
+her past history. Nor could she feel the pathos and almost tragic
+fascination with which her story had touched him.
+
+"There is absolutely nothing more to tell," she said. "All my life
+I have tried to remember more, but it's impossible; I can't get
+any further back or call up another thing. There's no use trying.
+It's all like a dream--probably it is one. I do have such dreams.
+In my sleep I can lift myself into the air, just as easy, and fly
+back to the same big white house that I seem to remember. When you
+told me about your home it was like something that I had often
+seen before. I shall be dreaming about it next!"
+
+Beverley cross-questioned her from every possible point of view;
+he was fascinated with the mystery; but she gave him nothing out
+of which the least further light could be drawn. A half-breed
+woman, it seemed, had been her Indian foster-mother; a silent,
+grave, watchful guardian from whom not a hint of disclosure ever
+fell. She was, moreover, a Christian woman, had received her
+conversion from an English-speaking Protestant missionary. She
+prayed with Alice, thus keeping in the child's mind a perfect
+memory of the Lord's prayer.
+
+"Well," said Beverley at last, "you are more of a mystery to me,
+the longer I know you."
+
+"Then I must grow every day more distasteful to you."
+
+"No, I love mystery."
+
+He went away feeling a new web of interest binding him to this
+inscrutable maiden whose life seemed to him at once so full of
+idyllic happiness and so enshrouded in tantalizing doubt. At the
+first opportunity he frankly questioned M. Roussillon, with no
+helpful result. The big Frenchman told the same meager story. The
+woman was dying in the time of a great epidemic, which killed most
+of her tribe. She gave Alice to M. Roussillon, but told him not a
+word about her ancestry or previous life. That was all.
+
+A wise old man, when he finds himself in a blind alley, no sooner
+touches the terminal wall than he faces about and goes back the
+way he came. Under like circumstances a young man must needs try
+to batter the wall down with his head. Beverley endeavored to
+break through the web of mystery by sheer force. It seemed to him
+that a vigorous attempt could not fail to succeed; but, like the
+fly in the spider's lines, he became more hopelessly bound at
+every move he made. Moreover against his will he was realizing
+that he could no longer deceive himself about Alice. He loved her,
+and the love was mastering him body and soul. Such a confession
+carries with it into an honest masculine heart a sense of
+contending responsibilities. In Beverley's case the clash was
+profoundly disturbing. And now he clutched the thought that Alice
+was not a mere child of the woods, but a daughter of an old family
+of cavaliers!
+
+With coat buttoned close against the driving wind, he strode
+toward the fort in one of those melodramatic moods to which youth
+in all climes and times is subject. It was like a slap in the face
+when Captain Helm met him at the stockade gate and said:
+
+"Well, sir, you are good at hiding."
+
+"Hiding! what do you mean, Captain Helm?" he demanded, not in the
+mildest tone.
+
+"I mean, sir, that I've been hunting you for an hour and more,
+over the whole of this damned town. The English and Indians are
+upon us, and there's no time for fooling. Where are all the men?"
+
+Beverley comprehended the situation in a second. Helm's face was
+congested with excitement. Some scouts had come in with the news
+that Governor Hamilton, at the head of five or six hundred
+soldiers and Indians, was only three or four miles up the river.
+
+"Where are all the men?" Helm repeated.
+
+"Buffalo hunting, most of them," said Beverley.
+
+"What in hell are they off hunting buffaloes for?" raged the
+excited captain.
+
+"You might go to hell and see," Beverley suggested, and they both
+laughed in sheer masculine contempt of a predicament too grave for
+anything but grim mirth.
+
+What could they do? Even Oncle Jazon and Rene de Ronville were off
+with the hunters. Helm sent for M. Roussillon in the desperate
+hope that he could suggest something; but he lost his head and
+hustled off to hide his money and valuables. Indeed the French
+people all felt that, so far as they were concerned, the chief
+thing was to save what they had. They well knew that it mattered
+little which of the two masters held over them--they must shift
+for themselves. In their hearts they were true to France and
+America; but France and America could not now protect them against
+Hamilton; therefore it would be like suicide to magnify patriotism
+or any other sentiment objectionable to the English. So they acted
+upon M. Roussillon's advice and offered no resistance when the new
+army approached.
+
+"My poor people are not disloyal to your flag and your cause,"
+said good Father Beret next morning to Captain Helm, "but they are
+powerless. Winter is upon us. What would you have us do? This
+rickety fort is not available for defense; the men are nearly all
+far away on the plains. Isn't it the part of prudence and common
+sense to make the best of a desperate situation? Should we resist,
+the British and their savage allies would destroy the town and
+commit outrages too horrible to think about. In this case
+diplomacy promises much more than a hopeless fight against an
+overwhelming force."
+
+"I'll fight 'em," Helm ground out between his teeth, "if I have to
+do it single-handed and alone! I'll fight 'em till hell freezes
+over!"
+
+Father Beret smiled grimly, as if he, too, would enjoy a lively
+skirmish on the ice of Tophet, and said:
+
+"I admire your courage, my son. Fighting is perfectly proper upon
+fair occasion. But think of the poor women and children. These old
+eyes of mine have seen some terrible things done by enraged
+savages. Men can die fighting; but their poor wives and daughters--
+ah, I have seen, I have seen!"
+
+Beverley felt a pang of terror shoot through his heart as Father
+Beret's simple words made him think of Alice in connection with an
+Indian massacre.
+
+"Of course, of course it's horrible to think of," said Helm; "but
+my duty is clear, and that flag," he pointed to where la banniere
+d'Alice Roussillon was almost blowing away in the cold wind, "that
+flag shall not come down save in full honor."
+
+His speech sounded preposterously boastful and hollow; but he was
+manfully in earnest; every word came from his brave heart.
+
+Father Beret's grim smile returned, lighting up his strongly
+marked face with the strangest expression imaginable.
+
+"We will get all the women inside the fort," Helm began to say.
+
+"Where the Indians will find them ready penned up and at their
+mercy," quickly interpolated the priest "That will not do."
+
+"Well, then, what can be done?" Beverley demanded, turning with a
+fierce stare upon Father Beret. "Don't stand there objecting to
+everything, with not a suggestion of your own to offer."
+
+"I know what is best for my people," the old man replied softly,
+still smiling, "I have advised them to stay inside their houses
+and take no part in the military event. It is the only hope of
+averting an indiscriminate massacre, and things worse."
+
+The curt phrase, "things worse," went like a bullet-stroke through
+Beverley's heart. It flashed an awful picture upon his vision.
+Father Beret saw his face whiten and his lips set themselves to
+resist a great emotion.
+
+"Do not be angry with me, my son," he said, laying a hand on the
+young man's arm. "I may be wrong, but I act upon long and
+convincing experience."
+
+"Experience or no experience," Helm exclaimed with an oath, "this
+fort must be manned and defended. I am commanding here!"
+
+"Yes, I recognize your authority," responded the priest in a firm
+yet deferential tone, "and I heartily wish you had a garrison; but
+where is your command, Captain Helm?" Then it was that the doughty
+Captain let loose the accumulated profanity with which he had been
+for some time well-nigh bursting. He tiptoed in order to curse
+with extremest violence. His gestures were threatening. He shook
+his fists at Father Beret, without really meaning offence.
+
+"Where is my garrison, you ask! Yes, and I can tell you. It's
+where you might expect a gang of dad blasted jabbering French
+good-for-nothings to be, off high-gannicking around shooting
+buffaloes instead of staying here and defending their wives,
+children, homes and country, damn their everlasting souls! The few
+I have in the fort will sneak off, I suppose."
+
+"The French gave you this post on easy terms, Captain," blandly
+retorted Father Beret.
+
+"Yes, and they'll hand it over to Hamilton, you think, on the same
+basis," cried Helm, "but I'll show you! I'll show you, Mr.
+Priest!"
+
+"Pardon me, Captain, the French are loyal to you and to the flag
+yonder. They have sworn it. Time will prove it. But in the present
+desperate dilemma we must choose the safer horn."
+
+Saying this Father Beret turned about and went his way. He was
+chuckling heartily as he passed out of the gate.
+
+"He is right," said Beverley after a few moments of reflection,
+during which he was wholly occupied with Alice, whose terrified
+face in his anticipation appealed to him from the midst of howling
+savages, smoking cabins and mangled victims of lust and massacre.
+His imagination painted the scene with a merciless realism that
+chilled his blood. All the sweet romance fell away from Vincennes.
+
+"Well, sir, right or wrong, your, duty is to obey orders," said
+Helm with brutal severity.
+
+"We had better not quarrel, Captain," Beverley replied. "I have
+not signified any unwillingness to obey your commands. Give them,
+and you will have no cause to grumble."
+
+"Forgive me, old fellow," cried the impulsive commander. "I know
+you are true as steel. I s'pose I'm wound up too tight to be
+polite. But the time is come to do something. Here we are with but
+five or six men--"
+
+He was interrupted by the arrival of two more half-breed scouts.
+
+Only three miles away was a large flotilla of boats and canoes
+with cannon, a force of Indians on land and the British flag
+flying,--that was the report.
+
+"They are moving rapidly," said the spokesman, "and will be here
+very soon. They are at least six hundred strong, all well armed."
+
+"Push that gun to the gate, and load it to the muzzle, Lieutenant
+Beverley," Helm ordered with admirable firmness, the purple flush
+in his face giving way to a grayish pallor. "We are going to die
+right here, or have the honors of war."
+
+Beverley obeyed without a word. He even loaded two guns instead of
+one--charging each so heavily that the last wad looked as if ready
+to leap from the grimy mouth.
+
+Helm had already begun, on receiving the first report, a hasty
+letter to Colonel Clark at Kaskaskia. He now added a few words and
+at the last moment sent it out by a trusted man, who was promptly
+captured by Hamilton's advance guard. The missive, evidently
+written in installments during the slow approach of the British,
+is still in the Canadian archives, and runs thus:
+
+"Dear Sir--At this time there is an army within three miles of
+this place; I heard of their coming several days beforehand. I
+sent spies to find the certainty--the spies being taken prisoner
+I never got intelligence till they got within three miles of town.
+As I had called the militia and had all assurances of their
+integrity I ordered at the firing of a cannon every man to appear,
+but I saw but few. Captain Buseron behaved much to his honor and
+credit, but I doubt the conduct of a certain gent. Excuse haste,
+as the army is in sight. My determination is to defend the
+garrison, (sic) though I have but twenty-one men but what has left
+me. I refer you to Mr. Wmes (sic) for the rest. The army is within
+three hundred yards of the village. You must think how I feel; not
+four men that I really depend upon; but am determined to act
+brave--think of my condition. I know it is out of my power to
+defend the town, as not one of the militia will take arms, though
+before sight of the army no braver men. There is a flag at a small
+distance, I must conclude.
+
+"Your humble servant,
+
+"Leo'd Helm. Must stop."
+
+"To Colonel Clark."
+
+Having completed this task, the letter shows under what a nervous
+strain, Helm turned to his lieutenant and said:
+
+"Fire a swivel with a blank charge. We'll give these weak-kneed
+parly-voos one more call to duty. Of course not a frog-eater of
+them all will come. But I said that a gun should be the signal.
+Possibly they didn't hear the first one, the damned, deaf,
+cowardly hounds!"
+
+Beverley wheeled forth the swivel and rammed a charge of powder
+home. But when he fired it, the effect was far from what it should
+have been. Instead of calling in a fresh body of militia, it
+actually drove out the few who up to that moment had remained as a
+garrison; so that Captain Helm and his Lieutenant found themselves
+quite alone in the fort, while out before the gate, deployed in
+fine open order, a strong line of British soldiers approached with
+sturdy steps, led by a tall, erect, ruddy-faced young officer.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE HONORS OF WAR
+
+
+Gaspard Roussillon was thoroughly acquainted with savage warfare,
+and he knew all the pacific means so successfully and so long used
+by French missionaries and traders to control savage character;
+but the emergency now upon him was startling. It confused him. The
+fact that he had taken a solemn oath of allegiance to the American
+government could have been pushed aside lightly enough upon
+pressing occasion, but he knew that certain confidential agents
+left in Vincennes by Governor Abbott had, upon the arrival of
+Helm, gone to Detroit, and of course they had carried thither a
+full report of all that happened in the church of St. Xavier, when
+Father Gibault called the people together, and at the fort, when
+the British flag was hauled down and la banniere d'Alice
+Roussillon run up in its place. His expansive imagination did full
+credit to itself in exaggerating the importance of his part in
+handing the post over to the rebels. And what would Hamilton think
+of this? Would he consider it treason? The question certainly bore
+a tragic suggestion.
+
+M. Roussillon lacked everything of being a coward, and treachery
+had no rightful place in his nature. He was, however, so in the
+habit of fighting windmills and making mountains of molehills that
+he could not at first glance see any sudden presentment with a
+normal vision. He had no love for Englishmen and he did like
+Americans, but he naturally thought that Helm's talk of fighting
+Hamilton was, as his own would have been in a like case, talk and
+nothing more. The fort could not hold out an hour, he well knew.
+Then what? Ah, he but too well realized the result.
+
+Resistance would inflame the English soldiers and madden the
+Indians. There would be a massacre, and the belts of savages would
+sag with bloody scalps. He shrugged his shoulders and felt a chill
+creep up his back.
+
+The first thing M. Roussillon did was to see Father Beret and take
+counsel of him; then he hurried home to dig a great pit under his
+kitchen floor in which he buried many bales of fur and all his
+most valuable things. He worked like a giant beaver all night
+long. Meantime Father Beret went about over the town quietly
+notifying the inhabitants to remain in their houses until after
+the fort should surrender, which he was sure would happen the next
+day.
+
+"You will be perfectly safe, my children," he said to them. "No
+harm can come to you if you follow my directions."
+
+Relying implicitly upon him, they scrupulously obeyed in every
+particular.
+
+He did not think it necessary to call at Roussillon place, having
+already given M. Roussillon the best advice he could command.
+
+Just at the earliest break of day, while yet the gloom of night
+scarcely felt the sun's approach, a huge figure made haste along
+the narrow streets in the northern part of the town. If any person
+had been looking out through the little holes, called windows, in
+those silent and rayless huts, it would have been easy to
+recognize M. Roussillon by his stature and his gait, dimly
+outlined as he was. A thought, which seemed to him an inspiration
+of genius, had taken possession of him and was leading him, as if
+by the nose, straight away to Hamilton's lines. He was freighted
+with eloquence for the ear of that commander, and as he strode
+along facing the crisp morning air he was rehearsing under his
+breath, emphasizing his periods in tragic whispers with sweeping
+gestures and liberal facial contortions. So absorbed was he in his
+oratorical soliloquy that he forgot due military precaution and
+ran plump into the face of a savage picket guard who, without
+respect for the great M. Roussillon's dignity, sprang up before
+him, grunted cavernously, flourished a tomahawk and spoke in
+excellent and exceedingly guttural Indian:
+
+"Wah, surrender!"
+
+It is probable that no man ever complied with a modest request in
+a more docile spirit than did M. Roussillon upon that occasion. In
+fact his promptness must have been admirable, for the savage
+grunted approval and straightway conducted him to Hamilton's
+headquarters on a batteau in the river.
+
+The British commander, a hale man of sandy complexion and probably
+under middle age, was in no very pleasant humor. Some of his
+orders had been misunderstood by the chief of his Indian allies,
+so that a premature exposure of his approach had been made to the
+enemy.
+
+"Well, sir, who are you?" he gruffly demanded, when M. Roussillon
+loomed before him.
+
+"I am Gaspard Roussillon, the Mayor of Vincennes," was the lofty
+reply. "I have come to announce to you officially that my people
+greet you loyally and that my town is freely at your command." He
+felt as important as if his statements had been true.
+
+"Humph, that's it, is it? Well, Mr. Mayor, you have my
+congratulations, but I should prefer seeing the military commander
+and accepting his surrender. What account can you give me of the
+American forces, their numbers and condition?"
+
+M. Roussillon winced, inwardly at least, under Hamilton's very
+undeferential air and style of address. It piqued him cruelly to
+be treated as a person without the slightest claim to respect. He
+somehow forgot the rolling and rhythmical eloquence prepared for
+the occasion.
+
+"The American commander naturally would not confide in me,
+Monsieur le Gouverneur, not at all; we are not very friendly; he
+ousted me from office, he offended me--" he was coughing and
+stammering.
+
+"Oh, the devil! what do I care? Answer my question, sir," Hamilton
+gruffly interrupted. "Tell me the number of American troops at the
+fort, sir."
+
+"I don't know exactly. I have not had admittance to the fort. I
+might be deceived as to numbers; but they're strong, I believe,
+Monsieur le Gouverneur, at least they make a great show and much
+noise."
+
+Hamilton eyed the huge bulk before him for a moment, then turning
+to a subaltern said:
+
+"Place this fellow under guard and see that he doesn't get away.
+Send word immediately to Captain Farnsworth that I wish to see him
+at once."
+
+The interview thereupon closed abruptly. Hamilton's emissaries had
+given him a detailed account of M. Roussillon's share in
+submitting Vincennes to rebel dominion, and he was not in the
+least inclined toward treating him graciously.
+
+"I would suggest to you, Monsieur le Gouverneur, that my official
+position demands--" M. Roussillon began; but he was fastened upon
+by two guards, who roughly hustled him aft and bound him so
+rigidly that he could scarcely move finger or toe.
+
+Hamilton smiled coldly and turned to give some orders to a
+stalwart, ruddy young officer who in a canoe had just rowed
+alongside the batteau.
+
+"Captain Farnsworth," he said, acknowledging the military salute,
+"you will take fifty men and make everything ready for a
+reconnaissance in the direction of the fort. We will move down the
+river immediately and choose a place to land. Move lively, we have
+no time to lose."
+
+In the meantime Beverley slipped away from the fort and made a
+hurried call upon Alice at Roussillon place. There was not much
+they could say to each other during the few moments at command.
+Alice showed very little excitement; her past experience had
+fortified her against the alarms of frontier life; but she
+understood and perfectly appreciated the situation.
+
+"What are you going to do?" Beverley demanded in sheer despair. He
+was not able to see any gleam of hope out of the blackness which
+had fallen around him and into his soul.
+
+"What shall you do?" he repeated.
+
+"Take the chances of war," she said, smiling gravely. "It will all
+come out well, no doubt."
+
+"I hope so, but--but I fear not."
+
+His face was gray with trouble. "Helm is determined to fight, and
+that means--"
+
+"Good!" she interrupted with spirit. "I am so glad of that. I wish
+I could go to help him! If I were a man I'd love to fight! I think
+it's just delightful."
+
+"But it is reckless bravado; it is worse than foolishness," said
+Beverley, not feeling her mood. "What can two or three men do
+against an army?"
+
+"Fight and die like men," she replied, her whole countenance
+lighting up. "Be heroic!"
+
+"We will do that, of course; we--I do not fear death; but you--
+you--" His voice choked him.
+
+A gun shot rang out clear in the distance, and he did not finish
+speaking.
+
+"That's probably the beginning," he added in a moment, extending
+both hands to her. "Good bye. I must hurry to the fort. Good bye."
+
+She drew a quick breath and turned so white that her look struck
+him like a sudden and hard blow. He stood for a second, his arms
+at full reach, then:
+
+"My God, Alice, I cannot, cannot leave you!" he cried, his voice
+again breaking huskily.
+
+She made a little movement, as if to take hold of his hands: but
+in an instant she stepped back a pace and said;
+
+"Don't fear about me. I can take care of myself. I'm all right.
+You'd better return to the fort as quickly as you can. It is your
+country, your flag, not me, that you must think of now."
+
+She folded her arms and stood boldly erect.
+
+Never before, in all his life, had he felt such a rebuke. He gave
+her a straight, strong look in the eyes.
+
+"You are right, Alice." he cried, and rushed from the house to the
+fort.
+
+She held her rigid attitude for a little while after she heard him
+shut the front gate of the yard so forcibly that it broke in
+pieces, then she flung her arms wide, as if to clasp something,
+and ran to the door; but Beverley was out of sight. She turned and
+dropped into a chair. Jean came to her out of the next room. His
+queer little face was pale and pinched; but his jaw was set with
+the expression of one who has known danger and can meet it
+somehow.
+
+"Are they going to scalp us?" he half whispered presently, with a
+shuddering lift of his distorted shoulders.
+
+Her face was buried in her hands and she did not answer. Childlike
+he turned from one question to another inconsequently.
+
+"Where did Papa Roussillon go to?" he next inquired. "Is he going
+to fight?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"They'll tear down the fort, won't they?"
+
+If she heard him she did not make any sign.
+
+"They'll kill the Captain and Lieutenant and get the fine flag
+that you set so high on the fort, won't they, Alice?"
+
+She lifted her head and gave the cowering hunchback such a stare
+that he shut his eyes and put up a hand, as if afraid of her. Then
+she impulsively took his little misshapen form in her arms and
+hugged it passionately. Her bright hair fell all over him, almost
+hiding him. Madame Roussillon was lying on a bed in an adjoining
+room moaning diligently, at intervals handling her rosary and
+repeating a prayer. The whole town was silent outside.
+
+"Why don't you go get the pretty flag down and hide it before they
+come?" Jean murmured from within the silken meshes of Alice's
+hair.
+
+In his small mind the gaudy banner was the most beautiful of all
+things. Every day since it was set up he had gone to gaze at it as
+it fluttered against the sky. The men had frequently said in his
+presence that the enemy would take it down if they captured the
+fort.
+
+Alice heard his inquisitive voice; but it seemed to come from far
+off; his words were a part of the strange, wild swirl in her
+bosom. Beverley's look, as he turned and left her, now shook every
+chord of her being. He had gone to his death at her command. How
+strong and true and brave he was! In her imagination she saw the
+flag above him, saw him die like a panther at bay, saw the gay rag
+snatched down and torn to shreds by savage hands. It was the
+tragedy of a single moment, enacted in a flashlight of
+anticipation.
+
+She released Jean so suddenly that he fell to the floor. She
+remembered what she had said to Beverley on the night of the dance
+when they were standing under the flag.
+
+"You made it and set it up," he lightly remarked; "you must see
+that no enemy ever gets possession of it, especially the English."
+
+"I'll take it down and hide it when there's danger of that," she
+said in the same spirit.
+
+And now she stood there looking at Jean, without seeing him, and
+repeated the words under her breath.
+
+"I'll take it down and hide it. They shan't have it."
+
+Madame Roussillon began to call from the other room in a loud,
+complaining voice; but Alice gave no heed to her querulous
+demands.
+
+"Stay here, Jean, and take care of Mama Roussillon," she presently
+said to the hunchback. "I am going out; I'll be back soon; don't
+you dare leave the house while I'm gone; do you hear?"
+
+She did not wait for his answer; but snatching a hood-like fur cap
+from a peg on the wall, she put it on and hastily left the house.
+
+Down at the fort Helm and Beverley were making ready to resist
+Hamilton's attack, which they knew would not be long deferred. The
+two heavily charged cannon were planted so as to cover the space
+in front of the gate, and some loaded muskets were ranged near by
+ready for use.
+
+"We'll give them one hell of a blast," growled the Captain,
+"before they overpower us."
+
+Beverley made no response in words; but he was preparing a bit of
+tinder on the end of a stick with which to fire the cannon. Not
+far away a little heap of logs was burning in the fort's area.
+
+The British officer, already mentioned as at the head of the line
+advancing diagonally from the river's bank, halted his men at a
+distance of three hundred yards from the fort, and seemed to be
+taking a deliberately careful survey of what was before him.
+
+"Let 'em come a little nearer, Lieutenant," said Helm, his jaw
+setting itself like a lion's. "When we shoot we want to hit."
+
+He stooped and squinted along his gun.
+
+"When they get to that weedy spot out yonder," he added, "just
+opposite the little rise in the river bank, we'll turn loose on
+'em."
+
+Beverley had arranged his primitive match to suit his fancy, and
+for probably the twentieth time looked critically to the powder in
+the beveled touch-hole of his old cannon. He and Helm were facing
+the enemy, with their backs to the main area of the stockade, when
+a well known voice attracted their attention to the rear.
+
+"Any room for a feller o' my size in this here crowded place?" it
+demanded in a cracked but cheerful tenor. "I'm kind o' outen
+breath a runnin' to git here."
+
+They turned about. It was Oncle Jazon with his long rifle on his
+shoulder and wearing a very important air. He spoke in English,
+using the backwoods lingo with the ease of long practice.
+
+"As I's a comin' in f'om a huntin' I tuck notice 'at somepin' was
+up. I see a lot o' boats on the river an' some fellers wi' guns a
+scootin' around, so I jes' slipped by 'em all an' come in the back
+way. They's plenty of 'em, I tell you what! I can't shoot much,
+but I tuck one chance at a buck Indian out yander and jes'
+happened to hit 'im in the lef' eye. He was one of the gang 'at
+scalped me down yander in Kaintuck."
+
+The greasy old sinner looked as if he had not been washed since he
+was born. He glanced about with furtive, shifty eyes, grimaced and
+winked, after the manner of an animal just waking from a lazy nap.
+
+"Where's the rest o' the fighters?" he demanded quizzically,
+lolling out his tongue and peeping past Helm so as to get a
+glimpse of the English line. "Where's yer garrison? Have they all
+gone to breakfas'?"
+
+The last question set Helm off again cursing and swearing in the
+most melodramatic rage.
+
+Oncle Jazon turned to Beverley and said in rapid French: "Surely
+the man's not going to fight those fellows yonder?"
+
+Beverley nodded rather gloomily.
+
+"Well," added the old man, fingering his rifle's stock and taking
+another glance through the gate, "I can't shoot wo'th a cent,
+bein' sort o' nervous like; but I'll stan' by ye awhile, jes' for
+luck. I might accidentally hit one of 'em."
+
+When a man is truly brave himself there is nothing that touches
+him like an exhibition of absolutely unselfish gameness in
+another. A rush of admiration for Oncle Jazon made Beverley feel
+like hugging him.
+
+Meantime the young British officer showed a flag of truce, and,
+with a file of men, separated himself from the line, now
+stationary, and approached the stockade. At a hundred yards he
+halted the file and came on alone, waving the white clout. He
+boldly advanced to within easy speaking distance and shouted:
+
+"I demand the surrender of this fort."
+
+"Well, you'll not get it, young man," roared Helm, his profanity
+well mixed in with the words, "not while there's a man of us
+left!"
+
+"Ye'd better use sof' soap on 'im, Cap'n," said Oncle Jazon in
+English, "cussin' won't do no good." While he spoke he rubbed the
+doughty Captain's arm and then patted it gently.
+
+Helm, who was not half as excited as he pretended to be, knew that
+Oncle Jazon's remark was the very essence of wisdom; but he was
+not yet ready for the diplomatic language which the old trooper
+called "soft soap."
+
+"Are you the British commander?" he demanded.
+
+"No," said the officer, "but I speak for him."
+
+"Not to me by a damned sight, sir. Tell your commander that I will
+hear what he has to say from his own mouth. No understrapper will
+be recognized by me."
+
+That ended the conference. The young officer, evidently indignant,
+strode back to his line, and an hour later Hamilton himself
+demanded the unconditional surrender of the fort and garrison.
+
+"Fight for it," Helm stormed forth. "We are soldiers."
+
+Hamilton held a confab with his officers, while his forces, under
+cover of the town's cabins, were deploying so as to form a half
+circle about the stockade. Some artillery appeared and was planted
+directly opposite the gate, not three hundred yards distant. One
+blast of that battery would, as Helm well knew, level a large part
+of the stockade.
+
+"S'posin' I hev' a cannon, too, seein' it's the fashion," said
+Oncle Jazon. "I can't shoot much, but I might skeer 'em. This
+little one'll do me."
+
+He set his rifle against the wall and with Beverley's help rolled
+one of the swivels alongside the guns already in position.
+
+In a few minutes Hamilton returned under the white flag and
+shouted:
+
+"Upon what terms will you surrender?"
+
+"All the honors of war," Helm firmly replied. "It's that or fight,
+and I don't care a damn which!"
+
+Hamilton half turned away, as if done with the parley, then facing
+the fort again, said:
+
+"Very well, sir, haul down your flag."
+
+Helm was dumfounded at this prompt acceptance of his terms. Indeed
+the incident is unique in history.
+
+As Hamilton spoke he very naturally glanced up to where la
+banniere d'Alice Roussillon waved brilliantly. Someone stood
+beside it on the dilapidated roof of the old blockhouse, and was
+already taking it from its place. His aid, Captain Farnsworth, saw
+this, and the vision made his heart draw in a strong, hot flood It
+was a girl in short skirts and moccasins, with a fur hood on her
+head, her face, thrillingly beautiful, set around with fluffs of
+wind-blown brown-gold hair. Farnsworth was too young to be
+critical and too old to let his eyes deceive him. Every detail of
+the fine sketch, with its steel-blue background of sky, flashed
+into his mind, sharp-cut as a cameo. Involuntarily he took off his
+hat.
+
+Alice had come in by way of the postern. She mounted to the roof
+unobserved, and made her way to the flag, just at the moment when
+Helm, glad at heart to accept the easiest way out of a tight
+place, asked Oncle Jazon to lower it.
+
+Beverley was thinking of Alice, and when he looked up he could
+scarcely realize that he saw her; but the whole situation was
+plain the instant she snatched the staff from its place; for he,
+too, recollected what she had said at the river house. The memory
+and the present scene blended perfectly during the fleeting
+instant that she was visible. He saw that Alice was smiling
+somewhat as in her most mischievous moods, and when she jerked the
+staff from its fastening she lifted it high and waved it once,
+twice, thrice defiantly toward the British lines, then fled down
+the ragged roof-slope with it and disappeared. The vision remained
+in Beverley's eyes forever afterward. The English troops, thinking
+that the flag was taken down in token of surrender, broke into a
+wild tumult of shouting.
+
+Oncle Jazon intuitively understood just what Alice was doing, for
+he knew her nature and could read her face. His blood effervesced
+in an instant.
+
+"Vive Zhorzh Vasinton! Vive la banniere d'Alice Roussillon!" he
+screamed, waving his disreputable cap round his scalpless head.
+"Hurrah for George Washington! Hurrah for Alice Roussillon's
+flag!"
+
+It was all over soon. Helm surrendered himself and Beverley with
+full honors. As for Oncle Jazon, he disappeared at the critical
+moment. It was not just to his mind to be a prisoner of war,
+especially under existing conditions; for Hamilton's Indian allies
+had some old warpath scores to settle with him dating back to the
+days when he and Simon Kenton were comrades in Kentucky.
+
+When Alice snatched the banner and descended with it to the
+ground, she ran swiftly out through the postern, as she had once
+before done, and sped along under cover of the low bluff or swell,
+which, terrace-like, bounded the flat "bottom" lands southward of
+the stockade. She kept on until she reached a point opposite
+Father Beret's hut, to which she then ran, the flag streaming
+bravely behind her in the wind, her heart beating time to her
+steps.
+
+It was plainly a great surprise to Father Beret, who looked up
+from his prayer when she rushed in, making a startling clatter,
+the loose puncheons shaking together under her reckless feet.
+
+"Oh, Father, here it is! Hide it, hide it, quick!"
+
+She thrust the flag toward him.
+
+"They shall not have it! They shall never have it!"
+
+He opened wide his shrewd, kindly eyes; but did not fairly
+comprehend her meaning.
+
+She was panting, half laughing, half crying. Her hair, wildly
+disheveled, hung in glorious masses over her shoulders. Her face
+beamed triumphantly,
+
+"They are taking the fort," she breathlessly added, again urging
+the flag upon him, "they're going in, but I got this and ran away
+with it. Hide it, Father, hide it, quick, quick, before they
+come!"
+
+The daring light in her eyes, the witching play of her dimples,
+the madcap air intensified by her attitude and the excitement of
+the violent exercise just ended--something compounded of all
+these and more--affected the good priest strangely. Involuntarily
+he crossed himself, as if against a dangerous charm.
+
+"Mon Dieu, Father Beret," she exclaimed with impatience, "haven't
+you a grain of sense left? Take this flag and hide it, I tell you!
+Don't stay there gazing and blinking. Here, quick! They saw me
+take it, they may be following me. Hurry, hide it somewhere!"
+
+He comprehended now, rising from his knees with a queer smile
+broadening on his face. She put the banner into his hands and gave
+him a gentle push.
+
+"Hide it, I tell you, hide it, you dear old goose!"
+
+Without sneaking he turned the staff over and over in his hand,
+until the flag was closely wrapped around it, then stooping he
+lifted a puncheon and with it covered the gay roll from sight.
+
+Alice caught him in her arms and kissed him vigorously on the
+cheek. Her warm lips made the spot tingle.
+
+"Don't you dare to let any person have it! It's the flag of George
+Washington."
+
+She gave him a strong squeeze.
+
+He pushed her from him with both hands and hastily crossed
+himself; but his eyes were laughing.
+
+"You ought to have seen me; I waved the flag at them--at the
+English--and one young officer took off his hat to me! Oh, Father
+Beret, it was like what is in a novel. They'll get the fort, but
+not the banner! Not the banner! I've saved it, I've saved it!"
+
+Her enthusiasm gave a splendor to her countenance, heightening its
+riches of color and somehow adding to its natural girlish
+expression an audacious sweetness. The triumphant success of her
+undertaking lent the dignity of conscious power to her look, a
+dignity which always sits well upon a young and somewhat
+immaturely beautiful face.
+
+Father Beret could not resist her fervid eloquence, and he could
+not run away from her or stop up his ears while she went on. So he
+had to laugh when she said:
+
+"Oh, if you had seen it all you would have enjoyed it. There was
+Oncle Jazon squatting behind the little swivel, and there were
+Captain Helm and Lieutenant Beverley holding their burning sticks
+over the big cannon ready to shoot--all of them so intent that
+they didn't see me--and yonder came the English officer and his
+army against the three. When they got close to the gate the
+officer called out: 'Surrender!' and then Captain Helm yelled
+back: 'Damned if I do! Come another step and I'll blow you all to
+hell in a second!' I was mightily in hopes that they'd come on; I
+wanted to see a cannon ball hit that English commander right in
+the face; he looked so arrogant."
+
+Father Beret shook his head and tried to look disapproving and
+solemn.
+
+Meantime down at the fort Hamilton was demanding the flag. He had
+seen Alice take it down, and supposed that it was lowered
+officially and would be turned over to him. Now he wanted to
+handle it as the best token of his bloodless but important
+victory.
+
+"I didn't order the flag down until after I had accepted your
+terms," said Helm, "and when my man started to obey, we saw a
+young lady snatch it and run away with it."
+
+"Who was the girl?"
+
+"I do not inform on women," said Helm.
+
+Hamilton smiled grimly, with a vexed look in his eyes, then turned
+to Captain Farnsworth and ordered him to bring up M. Roussillon,
+who, when he appeared, still had his hands tied together.
+
+"Tell me the name of the young woman who carried away the flag
+from the fort. You saw her, you know every soul in this town. Who
+was it, sir?"
+
+It was a hard question for M. Roussillon to answer. Although his
+humiliating captivity had somewhat cowed him, still his love for
+Alice made it impossible for him to give the information demanded
+by Hamilton. He choked and stammered, but finally managed to say:
+
+"I assure you that I don't know--I didn't look--I didn't see--It
+was too far off for me to--I was some-what excited--I--"
+
+"Take him away. Keep him securely bound," said Hamilton. "Confine
+him. We'll see how long it will take to refresh his mind. We'll
+puncture the big windbag."
+
+While this curt scene was passing, the flag of Great Britain rose
+over the fort to the lusty cheering of the victorious soldiers.
+
+Hamilton treated Helm and Beverley with extreme courtesy. He was a
+soldier, gruff, unscrupulous and cruel to a degree; but he could
+not help admiring the daring behavior of these two officers who
+had wrung from him the best terms of surrender. He gave them full
+liberty, on parole of honor not to attempt escape or to aid in any
+way an enemy against him while they were prisoners.
+
+Nor was it long before Helm's genial and sociable disposition won
+the Englishman's respect and confidence to such an extent that the
+two became almost inseparable companions, playing cards, brewing
+toddies, telling stories, and even shooting deer in the woods
+together, as if they had always been the best of friends.
+
+Hamilton did not permit his savage allies to enter the town, and
+he immediately required the French inhabitants to swear allegiance
+to Great Britain, which they did with apparent heartiness, all
+save M. Roussillon, who was kept in close confinement and bound
+like a felon, chafing lugubriously and wearing the air of a
+martyr. His prison was a little log pen in one corner of the
+stockade, much open to the weather, its gaping cracks giving him a
+dreary view of the frozen landscape through which the Wabash
+flowed in a broad steel-gray current. Helm, who really liked him,
+tried in vain to procure his release; but Hamilton was inexorable
+on account of what he regarded as duplicity in M. Roussillon's
+conduct.
+
+"No, I'll let him reflect," he said; "there's nothing like a
+little tyranny to break up a bad case of self-importance. He'll
+soon find out that he has over-rated himself!"
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+M. ROUSSILLON ENTERTAINS COLONEL HAMILTON
+
+
+A day or two after the arrival of Hamilton the absent garrison of
+buffalo hunters straggled back to Vincennes and were duly sworn to
+demean themselves as lawful subjects of Great Britain. Rene de
+Ronville was among the first to take the oath, and it promptly
+followed that Hamilton ordered him pressed into service as a wood-
+chopper and log-hauler during the erection of a new blockhouse,
+large barracks and the making of some extensive repairs of the
+stockade. Nothing could have been more humiliating to the proud
+young Frenchman. Every day he had to report bright and early to a
+burly Irish Corporal and be ordered about, as if he had been a
+slave, cursed at, threatened and forced to work until his hands
+were blistered and his muscles sore. The bitterest part of it all
+was that he had to trudge past both Roussillon place and the
+Bourcier cabin with the eyes of Alice and Adrienne upon him.
+
+Hamilton did not forget M. Roussillon in this connection. The
+giant orator soon found himself face to face with a greater trial
+even than Rene's. He was calmly told by the English commander that
+he could choose between death and telling who it was that stole
+the flag.
+
+"I'll have you shot, sir, to-morrow morning if you prevaricate
+about this thing any longer," said Hamilton, with a right deadly
+strain in his voice. "You told me that you knew every man, woman
+and child in Vincennes at sight. I know that you saw that girl
+take the flag--lying does not serve your turn. I give you until
+this evening to tell me who she is; if you fail, you die at
+sunrise to-morrow."
+
+In fact, it may be that Hamilton did not really purpose to carry
+out this blood-thirsty threat; most probably he relied upon M.
+Roussillon's imagination to torture him successfully; but the
+effect, as time proved, could not be accurately foreseen.
+
+Captain Farnsworth had energy enough for a dozen ordinary men.
+Before he had been in Vincennes twelve hours he had seen every
+nook and corner of its surface. Nor was his activity due
+altogether to military ardor, although he never let pass an
+opportunity to serve the best interests of his commander; all the
+while his mind was on the strikingly beautiful girl whose saucy
+countenance had so dazzled him from the roof-top of the fort, what
+time she wrenched away the rebel flag.
+
+"I'll find her, high or low," he thought, "for I never could fail
+to recognize that face. She's a trump."
+
+It was not in Alice's nature to hide from the English. They had
+held the town and fort before Helm came, and she had not found
+them troublesome under Abbott. She did not know that M. Roussillon
+was a prisoner, the family taking it for granted that he had gone
+away to avoid the English. Nor was she aware that Hamilton felt so
+keenly the disappearance of the flag. What she did know, and it
+gladdened her greatly, was that Beverley had been well treated by
+his captor. With this in her heart she went about Roussillon place
+singing merry snatches of Creole songs; and when at the gate,
+which still hung lop-sided on account of Beverley's force in
+shutting it, she came unexpectedly face to face with Captain
+Farnsworth, there was no great surprise on her part.
+
+He lifted his hat and bowed very politely; but a bold smile broke
+over his somewhat ruddy face. He spoke in French, but in a
+drawling tone and with a bad accent:
+
+"How do you do, Mademoiselle; I am right glad to see you again."
+
+Alice drew back a pace or two. She was quick to understand his
+allusion, and she shrank from him, fearing that he was going to
+inquire about the flag.
+
+"Don't be afraid," he laughed. "I am not so dangerous. I never did
+hurt a girl in all my life. In fact, I am fond of them when
+they're nice."
+
+"I am not in the least afraid," she replied, assuming an air of
+absolute dismissal, "and you don't look a bit ferocious, Monsieur.
+You may pass on, if you please."
+
+He flushed and bit his lip, probably to keep back some hasty
+retort, and thought rapidly for a moment. She looked straight at
+him with eyes that stirred and dazzled him. He was handsome in a
+coarse way, like a fine young animal, well groomed, well fed,
+magnetic, forceful; but his boldness, being of a sort to which she
+had not been accustomed, disturbed her vaguely and strangely.
+
+"Suppose that I don't pass on?" he presently ventured, with just a
+suspicion of insolence in his attitude, but laughing until he
+showed teeth of remarkable beauty and whiteness. "Suppose that I
+should wish to have a little chat with you, Mademoiselle?"
+
+"I have been told that there are men in the world who think
+themselves handsome, and clever, and brilliant, when in fact they
+are but conceited simpletons," she remarked, rather indifferently,
+muffling herself in her fur wrap. "You certainly would be a fairly
+good hitching-post for our horses if you never moved." Then she
+laughed out of the depth of her hood, a perfectly merry laugh, but
+not in the least flattering to Captain Farnsworth's vanity. He
+felt the scorn that it conveyed.
+
+His face grew redder, while a flash from hers made him wish that
+he had been more gracious in his deportment. Here, to his
+surprise, was not a mere creole girl of the wild frontier.
+
+Her superiority struck him with the force of a captivating
+revelation, under the light of which he blinked and winced.
+
+She laid a shapely hand on the broken gate and pushed it open.
+
+"I beg your pardon, Mademoiselle;" his manner softened as he
+spoke; "I beg your pardon; but I came to speak to you about the
+flag--the flag you took away from the fort."
+
+She had been half expecting this; but she was quite unprepared,
+and in spite of all she could do showed embarrassment.
+
+"I have come to get the flag; if you will kindly bring it to me,
+or tell me where it is I--"
+
+She quickly found words to interrupt him with, and at the same
+time by a great effort pulled herself together.
+
+"You have come to the wrong place," she flung in. "I assure you
+that I haven't the flag."
+
+"You took it down, Mademoiselle."
+
+"Oh, did I?"
+
+"With bewitching grace you did, Mademoiselle. I saw and admired.
+Will you fetch it, please?"
+
+"Indeed I won't."
+
+The finality in her voice belied her face, which beamed without a
+ray of stubbornness or perversity. He did not know how to
+interpret her; but he felt that he had begun wrong. He half
+regretted that he had begun at all.
+
+"More depends upon returning that flag than you are probably aware
+of," he presently said in a more serious tone. "In fact, the life
+of one of your townsmen, and a person of some importance here I
+believe, will surely be saved by it. You'd better consider,
+Mademoiselle. You wouldn't like to cause the death of a man."
+
+She did not fairly grasp the purport of his words; yet the change
+in his manner, and the fact that he turned from French to English
+in making the statement, aroused a sudden feeling of dread or dark
+apprehension in her breast. The first distinct thought was of
+Beverley--that some deadly danger threatened him.
+
+"Who is it?" she frankly demanded.
+
+"It's the Mayor, the big man of your town, Monsieur Roussillon, I
+think he calls himself. He's got himself into a tight place. He'll
+be shot to-morrow morning if that flag is not produced. Governor
+Hamilton has so ordered, and what he orders is done."
+
+"You jest, Monsieur."
+
+"I assure you that I speak the plain truth."
+
+"You will probably catch Monsieur Roussillon before you shoot
+him." She tossed her head.
+
+"He is already a prisoner in the fort."
+
+Alice turned pale.
+
+"Monsieur, is this true?" Her voice had lost its happy tone. "Are
+you telling me that to--"
+
+"You can verify it, Mademoiselle, by calling upon the commander at
+the fort. I am sorry that you doubt my veracity. If you will go
+with me I will show you M. Roussillon a tightly bound prisoner."
+
+Jean had crept out of the gate and was standing just behind Alice
+with his feet wide apart, his long chin elevated, his head resting
+far back between his upthrust shoulders, his hands in his pockets,
+his uncanny eyes gazing steadily at Farnsworth. He looked like a
+deformed frog ready to jump.
+
+Alice unmistakably saw truth in the Captain's countenance and felt
+it in his voice. The reality came to her with unhindered effect.
+M. Roussillon's life depended upon the return of the flag. She put
+her hands together and for a moment covered her eyes with them.
+
+"I will go now, Mademoiselle," said Farnsworth; "but I hope you
+will be in great haste about returning the flag."
+
+He stood looking at her. He was profoundly touched and felt that
+to say more would be too brutal even for his coarse nature; so he
+simply lifted his hat and went away.
+
+Jean took hold of Alice's dress as she turned to go back into the
+house.
+
+"Is he going to take the flag? Can he find it? What does he want
+with it? What did you do with the flag, Alice?" he whined, in his
+peculiar, quavering voice. "Where is it?"
+
+Her skirt dragged him along as she walked.
+
+"Where did you put it, Alice?"
+
+"Father Beret hid it under his floor," she answered,
+involuntarily, and almost unconsciously. "I shall have to take it
+back and give it up."
+
+"No--no--I wouldn't," he quavered, dancing across the veranda as
+she quickened her pace and fairly spun him along. "I wouldn't let
+'em have it at all."
+
+Alice's mind was working with lightning speed. Her imagination
+took strong grip on the situation so briefly and effectively
+sketched by Captain Farnsworth. Her decision formed itself
+quickly.
+
+"Stay here, Jean. I am going to the fort. Don't tell Mama
+Roussillon a thing. Be a good boy."
+
+She was gone before Jean could say a word. She meant to face
+Hamilton at once and be sure what danger menaced M. Roussillon. Of
+course, the flag must be given up if that would save her foster
+father any pain; and if his life were in question there could not
+be too great haste on her part.
+
+She ran directly to the stockade gate and breathlessly informed a
+sentinel that she must see Governor Hamilton, into whose presence
+she was soon led. Captain Farnsworth had preceded her but a minute
+or two, and was present when she entered the miserable shed room
+where the commander was having another talk with M. Roussillon.
+
+The meeting was a tableau which would have been comical but for
+the pressure of its tragic possibilities. Hamilton, stern and
+sententious, stood frowning upon M. Roussillon, who sat upon the
+ground, his feet and hands tightly bound, a colossal statue of
+injured innocence.
+
+Alice, as soon as she saw M. Roussillon, uttered a cry of
+sympathetic endearment and flung herself toward him with open
+arms. She could not reach around his great shoulders; but she did
+her best to include the whole bulk.
+
+"Papa! Papa Roussillon!" she chirruped between the kisses that she
+showered upon his weather-beaten face.
+
+Hamilton and Farnsworth regarded the scene with curious and
+surprised interest. M. Roussillon began speaking rapidly; but
+being a Frenchman he could not get on well with his tongue while
+his hands were tied. He could shrug his shoulders; that helped him
+some.
+
+"I am to be shot, MA PETITE," he pathetically growled in his deep
+bass voice; "shot like a dog at sunrise to-morrow."
+
+Alice kissed M. Roussillon's rough cheek once more and sprang to
+her feet facing Hamilton.
+
+"You are not such a fiend and brute as to kill Papa Roussillon,"
+she cried. "Why do you want to injure my poor, good papa?"
+
+"I believe you are the young lady that stole the flag?" Hamilton
+remarked, smiling contemptuously.
+
+She looked at him with a swift flash of indignation as he uttered
+these words.
+
+"I am not a thief. I could not steal what was my own. I helped to
+make that flag. It was named after me. I took it because it was
+mine. You understand me, Monsieur."
+
+"Tell where it is and your father's life will be spared."
+
+She glanced at M. Roussillon.
+
+"No, Alice," said he, with a pathetically futile effort to make a
+fine gesture, "don't do it. I am brave enough to die. You would
+not have me act the coward."
+
+No onlooker would have even remotely suspected the fact that M.
+Roussillon had chanced to overhear a conversation between Hamilton
+and Farnsworth, in which Hamilton stated that he really did not
+intend to hurt M. Roussillon in any event; he merely purposed to
+humiliate the "big wind-bag!"
+
+"Ah, no; let me die bravely for honor's sake--I fear death far
+less than dishonor! They can shoot me, my little one, but they
+cannot break my proud spirit." He tried to strike his breast over
+his heart.
+
+"Perhaps it would be just as well to let him be shot," said
+Hamilton gruffly, and with dry indifference. "I don't fancy that
+he's of much value to the community at best. He'll make a good
+target for a squad, and we need an example."
+
+"Do you mean it?--you ugly English brute--would you murder him?"
+she stamped her foot.
+
+"Not if I get that flag between now and sundown. Otherwise I shall
+certainly have him shot. It is all in your hands, Mademoiselle.
+You can tell me where the flag is." Hamilton smiled again with
+exquisite cruelty.
+
+Farnsworth stood by gazing upon Alice in open admiration. Her
+presence had power in it, to which he was very susceptible.
+
+"You look like a low, dishonorable, soulless tyrant," she said to
+Hamilton, "and if you get my flag, how shall I know that you will
+keep your promise and let Papa Roussillon go free?"
+
+"I am sorry to say that you will have to trust me, unless you'll
+take Captain Farnsworth for security. The Captain is a gentleman,
+I assure you. Will you stand good for my veracity and sincerity,
+Captain Farnsworth?"
+
+The young man smiled and bowed.
+
+Alice felt the irony; and her perfectly frank nature preferred to
+trust rather than distrust the sincerity of others. She looked at
+Farnsworth, who smiled encouragingly.
+
+"The flag is under Father Beret's floor," she said.
+
+"Under the church floor?"
+
+"No, under the floor of his house."
+
+"Where is his house?"
+
+She gave full directions how to reach it.
+
+"Untie the prisoner," Hamilton ordered, and it was quickly done.
+"Monsieur Roussillon, I congratulate you upon your narrow escape.
+Go to the priest's house, Monsieur, and bring me that flag. It
+would be well, I assure you, not to be very long about it. Captain
+Farnsworth, you will send a guard with Monsieur Roussillon, a
+guard of honor, fitting his official dignity, a Corporal and two
+men. The honorable Mayor of this important city should not go
+alone upon so important an errand. He must have his attendants."
+
+"Permit me to go myself and get it," said Alice, "I can do it
+quickly. May I, please, Monsieur?"
+
+Hamilton looked sharply at her.
+
+"Why, certainly, Mademoiselle, certainly. Captain Farnsworth, you
+will escort the young lady."
+
+"It is not necessary, Monsieur."
+
+"Oh, yes, it is necessary, my dear young lady, very necessary; so
+let's not have further words. I'll try to entertain his honor, the
+Mayor, while you go and get the flag. I feel sure, Mademoiselle,
+that you'll return with it in a few minutes. But you must not go
+alone."
+
+Alice set forth immediately, and Farnsworth, try as hard as he
+would, could never reach her side, so swift was her gait.
+
+When they arrived at Father Beret's cabin, she turned and said
+with imperious severity:
+
+"Don't you come in; you stay out here: I'll get it in a minute."
+
+Farnsworth obeyed her command.
+
+The door was wide open, but Father Beret was not inside; he had
+gone to see a sick child in the outskirts of the village. Alice
+looked about and hesitated. She knew the very puncheon that
+covered the flag; but she shrank from lifting it. There seemed
+nothing else to do, however; so, after some trouble with herself,
+she knelt upon the floor and turned the heavy slab over with a
+great thump. The flag did not appear. She peeped under the other
+puncheons. It was not there. The only thing visible was a little
+ball of paper fragments not larger than an egg.
+
+Farnsworth heard her utter a low cry of surprise or dismay, and
+was on the point of going in when Father Beret, coming around the
+corner of the cabin, confronted him. The meeting was so sudden and
+unexpected that both men recoiled slightly, and then, with a
+mutual stare, saluted.
+
+"I came with a young lady to get the flag," said Farnsworth. "She
+is inside. I hope there is no serious intrusion. She says the flag
+is hidden under your floor."
+
+Father Beret said nothing, but frowning as if much annoyed,
+stepped through the doorway to Alice's side, and stooping where
+she knelt, laid a hand on her shoulder as she glanced up and
+recognized him.
+
+"What are you doing, my child?"
+
+"Oh, Father, where is the flag?" It was all that she could say.
+"Where is the flag?"
+
+"Why, isn't it there?"
+
+"No, you see it isn't there! Where is it?"
+
+The priest stood as if dumfounded, gazing into the vacant space
+uncovered by the puncheon.
+
+"Is it gone? Has some one taken it away?"
+
+They turned up all the floor to no avail. La banniere d'Alice
+Roussillon had disappeared, and Captain Farnsworth went forthwith
+to report the fact to his commander. When he reached the shed at
+the angle of the fort he found Governor Hamilton sitting stupid
+and dazed on the ground. One jaw was inflamed and swollen and an
+eye was half closed and bloodshot. He turned his head with a
+painful, irregular motion and his chin sagged.
+
+Farnsworth sprang to him and lifted him to his feet; but he could
+scarcely stand. He licked his lips clumsily.
+
+"What is the matter? What hurt you?"
+
+The Governor rubbed his forehead trying to recollect.
+
+"He struck me," he presently said with difficulty. "He hit me with
+his fist Where--where is he?"
+
+"Who?"
+
+"That big French idiot--that Roussillon--go after him, take him,
+shoot him--quick! I have been stunned; I don't know how long he's
+been gone. Give the alarm--do something!"
+
+Hamilton, as he gathered his wits together, began to foam with
+rage, and his passion gave his bruised and swollen face a terrible
+look.
+
+The story was short, and may be quickly told. M. Roussillon had
+taken advantage of the first moment when he and Hamilton were left
+alone. One herculean buffet, a swinging smash of his enormous fist
+on the point of the Governors jaw, and then he walked out of the
+fort unchallenged, doubtless on account of his lordly and
+masterful air.
+
+"Ziff!" he exclaimed, shaking himself and lifting his shoulders,
+when he had passed beyond hearing of the sentinel at the gate,
+"ziff! I can punch a good stiff stroke yet, Monsieur le
+Gouverneur. Ah, ziff!" and he blew like a porpoise.
+
+Every effort was promptly made to recapture M. Roussillon; but his
+disappearance was absolute; even the reward offered for his scalp
+by Hamilton only gave the Indians great trouble--they could not
+find the man.
+
+Such a beginning of his administration of affairs at Vincennes did
+not put Hamilton into a good humor. He was overbearing and
+irascible at best, and under the irritation of small but
+exceedingly unpleasant experiences he made life well-nigh
+unendurable to those upon whom his dislike chanced to fall.
+Beverley quickly felt that it was going to be very difficult for
+him and Hamilton to get along agreeably. With Helm it was quite
+different; smoking, drinking, playing cards, telling good stories--
+in a word, rude and not unfrequently boisterous conviviality drew
+him and the commandant together.
+
+Under Captain Farnsworth's immediate supervision the fort was soon
+in excellent repair and a large blockhouse and comfortable
+quarters for the men were built. Every day added to the strength
+of the works and to the importance of the post as a strategic
+position for the advance guard of the British army.
+
+Hamilton was ambitious to prove himself conspicuously valuable to
+his country. He was dreaming vast dreams and laying large plans.
+The Indians were soon anxious to gain his favor; and to bind them
+securely to him he offered liberal pay in rum and firearms,
+blankets, trinkets and ammunition for the scalps of rebels. He
+kept this as secret as possible from his prisoners; but Beverley
+soon suspected that a "traffic in hair," as the terrible business
+had been named, was going on. Savages came in from far away with
+scalps yet scarcely dry dangling at their belts. It made the young
+Virginian's blood chill in his heart, and he regretted that he had
+given Hamilton his parole of honor not to attempt to escape.
+
+Among the Indians occasionally reporting to Hamilton with their
+ghastly but valuable trophies was Long-Hair, who slipped into the
+fort and out again rather warily, not having much confidence in
+those Frenchmen who had once upon a time given him a memorable run
+for his life.
+
+Winter shut down, not cold, but damp, changeable, raw. The work on
+the fort was nearly completed, and Rene de Ronville would have
+soon been relieved of his servile and exasperating employment
+under the Irish Corporal; but just at the point of time when only
+a few days' work remained for him, he became furious, on account
+of an insulting remark, and struck the Corporal over the head with
+a handspike. This happened in a wood some miles from town, where
+he was loading logs upon a sled. There chanced to be no third
+person present when the deed was done, and some hours passed
+before they found the officer quite cold and stiff beside the
+sled. His head was crushed to a pulp.
+
+Hamilton, now thoroughly exasperated, began to look upon the
+French inhabitants of Vincennes as all like M. Roussillon and
+Rene, but waiting for an opportunity to strike him unawares. He
+increased his military vigilance, ordered the town patrolled day
+and night, and forbade public gatherings of the citizens, while at
+the same time he forced them to furnish him a large amount of
+provisions.
+
+When little Adrienne Bourcier heard of Renews terrible act,
+followed by his successful escape to the woods, and of the
+tempting reward offered by Hamilton for his scalp, she ran to
+Roussillon place well-nigh crazed with excitement. She had always
+depended upon Alice for advice, encouragement and comfort in her
+troubles; but in the present case there was not much that her
+friend could do to cheer her. With M. Roussillon and Rene both
+fugitives, tracked by wily savages, a price on their heads, while
+every day added new dangers to the French inhabitants of
+Vincennes, no rosy view could possibly be taken of the situation.
+Alice did her best, however, to strengthen her little friend's
+faith in a happy outcome. She quoted what she considered
+unimpeachable authority to support her optimistic argument.
+
+"Lieutenant Beverley says that the Americans will be sure to drive
+Hamilton out of Vincennes, or capture him. Probably they are not
+so very far away now, and Rene may join them and come back to help
+punish these brutal Englishmen. Don't you wish he would, Adrienne?
+Wouldn't it be romantic?"
+
+"He's armed, I know that," said Adrienne, brightening a little,
+"and he's brave, Alice, brave as can be. He came right back into
+town the other night and got his gun and pistols. He was at our
+house, too, and, oh!--"
+
+She burst out crying again. "O Alice! It breaks my heart to think
+that the Indians will kill him. Do you think they will kill him,
+Alice?"
+
+"He'll come nearer killing them," said Alice confidently, with her
+strong, warm arms around the tiny lass; "he's a good woodsman, a
+fine shot--he's not so easy to kill, my dear. If he and Papa
+Roussillon should get together by chance they would be a match for
+all the Indians in the country. Anyway, I feel that it's much
+better for them to take their chances in the woods than to be in
+the hands of Governor Hamilton. If I were a man I'd do just as
+Papa Roussillon and Rene did; I'd break the bigoted head of every
+Englishman that mistreated me, I'll do it, girl as I am, if they
+annoy me, see if I don't!"
+
+She was thinking of Captain Farnsworth, who had been from the
+first untiring in his efforts to gain something more than a
+passing acquaintance. As yet he had not made himself unbearable;
+but Alice's fine intuition led her to the conclusion that she must
+guard against him from the outset.
+
+Adrienne's simple heart could not grasp the romantic criterion
+with which Alice was wont to measure action. Her mind was single,
+impulsive, narrow and direct in all its movements. She loved,
+hated, desired, caressed, repulsed, not for any assignable reason
+more solid or more luminous than "because." She adored Rene and
+wanted him near her. He was a hero in her imagination, no matter
+what he did. Little difference was it to her whether he hauled
+logs for the English or smoked his pipe in idleness by the winter
+fire--what could it matter which flag he served under, so that he
+was true to her? Or whom he served if she could always have him
+coming to see her and calling her his little pet? He might crush
+an Irish Corporal's head every day, if he would but stroke her
+hair and say: "My sweet little one."
+
+"Why couldn't he be quiet and do as your man, Lieutenant Beverley,
+did?" she cried in a sudden change of mood, the tears streaming
+down her cheeks. "Lieutenant Beverley surrendered and took the
+consequences. He didn't kill somebody and run off to be hunted
+like a bear. No wonder you're happy, Alice; I'd be happy, too, if
+Rene were here and came to spend half of every day with me. I--"
+
+"Why, what a silly girl you are!" Alice exclaimed, her face
+reddening prettily. "How foolishly you prattle! I'm sure I don't
+trouble myself about Lieutenant Beverley--what put such absurd
+nonsense into your head, Adrienne?"
+
+"Because, that's what, and you know it's so, too. You love him
+just as much as I love Rene, and that's just all the love in the
+world, and you needn't deny it, Alice Roussillon!"
+
+Alice laughed and hugged the wee, brown-faced mite of a girl until
+she almost smothered her.
+
+It was growing dusk when Adrienne left Roussillon place to go
+home. The wind cut icily across the commons and moaned as it
+whirled around the cabins and cattle-sheds. She ran briskly,
+muffled in a wrap, partly through fear and partly to keep warm,
+and had gone two-thirds of her way when she was brought to an
+abrupt stop by the arms of a man. She screamed sharply, and Father
+Beret, who was coming out of a cabin not far away, heard and knew
+the voice.
+
+"Ho-ho, my little lady!" cried Adrienne's captor in a breezy,
+jocund tone, "you wouldn't run over a fellow, would you?" The
+words were French, but the voice was that of Captain Farnsworth,
+who laughed while he spoke. "You jump like a rabbit, my darling!
+Why, what a lively little chick of a girl it is!"
+
+Adrienne screamed and struggled recklessly.
+
+"Now don't rouse up the town," coaxed the Captain. He was just
+drunk enough to be quite a fool, yet sufficiently sober to imagine
+himself the most proper person in the world. "I don't mean you any
+harm, Mademoiselle; I'll just see you safe home, you know; 'scort
+you to your residence; come on, now--that's a good girl."
+
+Father Beret hurried to the spot, and when in the deepening gloom
+he saw Adrienne flinging herself violently this way and that,
+helplessly trying to escape from the clasp of a man, he did to
+perfection what a priest is supposed to be the least fitted to do.
+Indeed, considering his age and leaving his vocation out of the
+reckoning, his performance was amazing. It is not certain that the
+blow dealt upon Governor Hamilton's jaw by M. Roussillon was a
+stiffer one than that sent straight from the priest's shoulder
+right into the short ribs of Captain Farnsworth, who there-upon
+released a mighty grunt and doubled himself up.
+
+Adrienne recognized her assailant at the first and used his name
+freely during the struggle. When Father Beret appeared she cried
+out to him--
+
+"Oh, Father--Father Beret! help me! help me!"
+
+When Farnsworth recovered from the breath-expelling shock of the
+jab in his side and got himself once more in a vertical position,
+both girl and priest were gone. He looked this way and that,
+rapidly becoming sober, and beginning to wonder how the thing
+could have happened so easily. His ribs felt as if they had been
+hit with a heavy hammer.
+
+"By Jove!" he muttered all to himself, "the old prayer-singing
+heathen! By Jove!" And with this very brilliant and relevant
+observation he rubbed his sore side and went his way to the fort.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+A SWORD AND A HORSE PISTOL
+
+
+We hear much about the "days that tried men's souls"; but what
+about the souls of women in those same days? Sitting in the
+liberal geniality of the nineteenth century's sunset glow, we
+insist upon having our grumble at the times and the manners of our
+generation; but if we had to exchange places, periods and
+experiences with the people who lived in America through the last
+quarter of the eighteenth century, there would be good ground for
+despairing ululations. And if our men could not bear it, if it
+would try their souls too poignantly, let us imagine the effect
+upon our women. No, let us not imagine it; but rather let us give
+full credit to the heroic souls of the mothers and the maidens who
+did actually bear up in the center of that terrible struggle and
+unflinchingly help win for us not only freedom, but the vast
+empire which at this moment is at once the master of the world and
+the model toward which all the nations of the earth are slowly but
+surely tending.
+
+If Alice was an extraordinary girl, she was not aware of it; nor
+had she ever understood that her life was being shaped by
+extraordinary conditions. Of course it could not but be plain to
+her that she knew more and felt more than the girls of her narrow
+acquaintance; that her accomplishments were greater; that she
+nursed splendid dreams of which they could have no proper
+comprehension, but until now she had never even dimly realized
+that she was probably capable of being something more than a mere
+creole lass, the foster daughter of Gaspard Roussillon, trader in
+pelts and furs. Even her most romantic visions had never taken the
+form of personal desire, or ambition in its most nebulous stage;
+they had simply pleased her fresh and natural fancy and served to
+gild the hardness and crudeness of her life,--that was all.
+
+Her experiences had been almost too terrible for belief, viewed at
+our distance from them; she had passed through scenes of
+incredible horror and suffering, but her nature had not been
+chilled, stunted or hardened. In body and in temper her
+development had been sound and beautiful. It was even thus that
+our great-grandmothers triumphed over adversity, hardship,
+indescribable danger. We cannot say that the strong, lithe, happy-
+hearted Alice of old Vincennes was the only one of her kind. Few
+of us who have inherited the faded portraits of our revolutionary
+forbears can doubt that beauty, wit and great lovableness
+flourished in the cabins of pioneers all the way from the Edisto
+to the Licking, from the Connecticut to the Wabash.
+
+Beverley's advent could not fail to mean a great deal in the life
+of a girl like Alice; a new era, as it were, would naturally begin
+for her the moment that his personal influence touched her
+imagination; but it is well not to measure her too strictly by the
+standard of our present taste and the specialized forms of our
+social and moral code. She was a true child of the wilderness, a
+girl who grew, as the wild prairie rose grew, not on account of
+innumerable exigencies, accidents and hardships, but in spite of
+them. She had blushed unseen, and had wasted divine sweets upon a
+more than desert air. But when Beverley came near her, at first
+carelessly droning his masculine monotonies, as the wandering bee
+to the lonely and lovely rose, and presently striking her soul as
+with the wings of Love, there fell a change into her heart of
+hearts, and lo! her haunting and elusive dreams began to condense
+and take on forms that startled her with their wonderful splendor
+and beauty. These she saw all the time, sleeping or waking; they
+made bright summer of the frozen stream and snapping gale, the
+snowdrifts and the sleet. In her brave young heart, swelled the
+ineffable song--the music never yet caught by syrinx or flute or
+violin, the words no tongue can speak.
+
+Ah, here may be the secret of that vigorous, brave, sweet life of
+our pioneer maids, wives, and mothers. It was love that gave those
+tender hearts the iron strength and heroic persistence at which
+the world must forever wonder. And do we appreciate those women?
+Let the Old World boast its crowned kings, its mailed knights, its
+ladies of the court and castle; but we of the New World, we of the
+powerful West, let us brim our cups with the wine of undying
+devotion, and drink to the memory of the Women of the Revolution,
+--to the humble but good and marvelously brave and faithful women
+like those of old Vincennes.
+
+But if Alice was being radically influenced by Beverley, he in
+turn found a new light suffusing his nature, and he was not
+unaware that it came out of her eyes, her face, her smiles, her
+voice, her soul. It was the old, well-known, inexplicable, mutual
+magnetism, which from the first has been the same on the highest
+mountain-top and in the lowest valley. The queen and the milkmaid,
+the king and the hind may come together only to find the king
+walking off with the lowly beauty and her fragrant pail, while
+away stalks the lusty rustic, to be lord and master of the queen.
+Love is love, and it thrives in all climes, under all conditions.
+
+There is an inevitable and curious protest that comes up unbidden
+between lovers; it takes many forms in accordance with particular
+circumstances. It is the demand for equality and perfection. Love
+itself is without degrees--it is perfect--but when shall it see
+the perfect object? It does see it, and it does not see it, in
+every beloved being. Beverley found his mind turning, as on a
+pivot, round and round upon the thought that Alice might be
+impossible to him. The mystery of her life seemed to force her
+below the line of his aristocratic vision, so that he could not
+fairly consider her, and yet with all his heart he loved her.
+Alice, on the other hand, had her bookish ideal to reckon with,
+despite the fact that she daily dashed it contemptuously down. She
+was different from Adrienne Bourcier, who bewailed the absence of
+her un-tamable lover; she wished that Beverley had not, as she
+somehow viewed it, weakly surrendered to Hamilton. His apparently
+complacent acceptance of idle captivity did not comport with her
+dream of knighthood and heroism. She had been all the time half
+expecting him to do something that would stamp him a hero.
+
+Counter protests of this sort are never sufficiently vigorous to
+take a fall out of Love; they merely serve to worry his temper by
+lightly hindering his feet. And it is surprising how Love does
+delight himself with being entangled.
+
+Both Beverley and Alice day by day felt the cord tightening which
+drew their hearts together--each acknowledged it secretly, but
+strove not to evince it openly. Meantime both were as happy and as
+restlessly dissatisfied as love and uncertainty could make them.
+
+Amid the activities in which Hamilton was engaged--his dealings
+with the Indians and the work of reconstructing the fort--he found
+time to worry his temper about the purloined flag. Like every
+other man in the world, he was superstitious, and it had come into
+his head that to insure himself and his plans against disaster, he
+must have the banner of his captives as a badge of his victory. It
+was a small matter; but it magnified itself as he dwelt upon it.
+He suspected that Alice had deceived him. He sharply questioned
+Father Beret, only to be half convinced that the good priest told
+the truth when he said that he knew nothing whatever on the
+subject beyond the fact that the banner had mysteriously
+disappeared from under his floor.
+
+Captain Farnsworth scarcely sympathized with his chief about the
+flag, but he was nothing if not anxious to gain Hamilton's highest
+confidence. His military zeal knew no bounds, and he never let
+pass even the slightest opportunity to show it. Hence his
+persistent search for a clue to the missing banner. He was no
+respecter of persons. He frankly suspected both Alice and Father
+Beret of lying. He would himself have lied under the existing
+circumstances, and he considered himself as truthful and
+trustworthy as priest or maiden.
+
+"I'll get that flag for you," he said to Hamilton, "if I have to
+put every man, woman and child in this town on the rack. It lies,
+I think, between Miss Roussillon and the priest, although both
+insistently deny it. I've thought it over in every way, and I
+can't see how they can both be ignorant of where it is, or at
+least who got it."
+
+Hamilton, since being treated to that wonderful blow on the jaw,
+was apt to fall into a spasm of anger whenever the name Roussillon
+was spoken in his hearing. Involuntarily he would put his hand to
+his cheek, and grimace reminiscently.
+
+"If it's that girl, make her tell," he savagely commanded. "Let's
+have no trifling about it. If it's the priest, then make him tell,
+or tie him up by the thumbs. Get that flag, or show some good
+reason for your failure. I'm not going to be baffled."
+
+The Captain's adventure with Father Beret came just in time to
+make it count against that courageous and bellicose missionary in
+more ways than one. Farnsworth did not tell Hamilton or any other
+person about what the priest had done to him, but nursed his sore
+ribs and his wrath, waiting patiently for the revenge that he
+meant soon to take.
+
+Alice heard from Adrienne the story of Farnsworth's conduct and
+his humiliating discomfiture at the hands of Father Beret. She was
+both indignant and delighted, sympathizing with Adrienne and
+glorying in the priest's vigorous pugilistic achievement.
+
+"Well," she remarked, with one of her infectious trills of
+laughter, "so far the French have the best of it, anyway! Papa
+Roussillon knocked the Governor's cheek nearly off, then Rene
+cracked the Irish Corporal's head, and now Father Beret has taught
+Captain Farnsworth a lesson in fisticuffs that he'll not soon
+forget! If the good work can only go on a little longer we shall
+see every English soldier in Vincennes wearing the mark of a
+Frenchman's blow." Then her mood suddenly changed from smiling
+lightness to almost fierce gravity, and she added:
+
+"Adrienne Bourcier, if Captain Farnsworth ever offers to treat me
+as he did you, mark my words, I'll kill him--kill him, indeed I
+will! You ought to see me!"
+
+"But he won't dare touch you," said Adrienne, looking at her
+friend with round, admiring eyes. "He knows very well that you are
+not little and timid like me. He'd be afraid of you."
+
+"I wish he would try it. How I would love to shoot him into
+pieces, the hateful wretch! I wish he would."
+
+The French inhabitants all, or nearly all, felt as Alice did; but
+at present they were helpless and dared not say or do anything
+against the English. Nor was this feeling confined to the Creoles
+of Vincennes; it had spread to most of the points where trading
+posts existed. Hamilton found this out too late to mend some of
+his mistakes; but he set himself on the alert and organized
+scouting bodies of Indians under white officers to keep him
+informed as to the American movements in Kentucky and along the
+Ohio. One of these bands brought in as captive Colonel Francis
+Vigo, of St. Louis, a Spaniard by birth, an American by adoption,
+a patriot to the core, who had large influence over both Indians
+and Creoles in the Illinois country.
+
+Colonel Vigo was not long held a prisoner. Hamilton dared not
+exasperate the Creoles beyond their endurance, for he knew that
+the savages would closely sympathize with their friends of long
+standing, and this might lead to revolt and coalition against
+him,--a very dangerous possibility. Indeed, at least one of the
+great Indian chieftains had already frankly informed him that he
+and his tribe were loyal to the Americans. Here was a dilemma
+requiring consummate diplomacy. Hamilton saw it, but he was not of
+a diplomatic temper or character. With the Indians he used a
+demoralizing system of bribery, while toward the whites he was too
+often gruff, imperious, repellant. Helm understood the whole
+situation and was quick to take advantage of it. His personal
+relations with Hamilton were easy and familiar, so that he did not
+hesitate to give advice upon all occasions. Here his jovial
+disposition helped him.
+
+"You'd better let Vigo return to St. Louis," he said. They had a
+bowl of something hot steaming between them. "I know him. He's
+harmless if you don't rub him too hard the wrong way. He'll go
+back, if you treat him well, and tell Clark how strong you are
+here and how foolish it would be to think of attacking you. Clark
+has but a handful of men, poorly supplied and tired with long,
+hard marches. If you'll think a moment you cannot fail to
+understand that you'd better be friends with this man Vigo. He and
+Father Gibault and this old priest here, Beret, carry these
+Frenchmen in their pockets. I'm not on your side, understand, I'm
+an American, and I'd blow the whole of you to kingdom come in a
+minute, if I could; but common sense is common sense all the same.
+There's no good to you and no harm to Clark in mistreating, or
+even holding this prisoner. What harm can he do you by going back
+to Clark and telling him the whole truth? Clark knew everything
+long before Vigo reached here. Old Jazon, my best scout, left here
+the day you took possession, and you may bet he got to Kaskaskia
+in short order. He never fails. But he'll tell Clark to stay where
+he is, and Vigo can do no more."
+
+What effect Helm's bold and apparently artless talk had upon
+Hamilton's mind is not recorded; but the meager historical facts
+at command show that Vigo was released and permitted to return
+under promise that he would give no information to the enemy ON
+HIS WAY to Kaskaskia.
+
+Doubtless this bit of careless diplomacy on the Governor's part
+did have a somewhat soothing effect upon a large class of
+Frenchmen at Vincennes; but Farnsworth quickly neutralized it to a
+serious extent by a foolish act while slightly under the influence
+of liquor.
+
+He met Father Beret near Roussillon place, and feeling his ribs
+squirm at sight of the priest, he accosted him insolently,
+demanding information as to the whereabouts of the missing flag.
+
+A priest may be good and true--Father Beret certainly was--and yet
+have the strongest characteristics of a worldly man. This thing of
+being bullied day after day, as had recently been the rule,
+generated nothing to aid in removing a refractory desire from the
+priest's heart--the worldly desire to repeat with great increment
+of force the punch against Famsworth's lower ribs.
+
+"I order you, sir, to produce that rebel flag," said Farnsworth.
+"You will obey forthwith or take the consequences. I am no longer
+in the humor to be trifled with. Do you understand?"
+
+"I might be forced to obey you, if I could," said the priest,
+drawing his robe about him; "but, as I have often told you, my
+son, I do not know where the flag is or who took it. I do not even
+suspect any person of taking it. All that I know about it is the
+simple fact that it is gone."
+
+Father Beret's manner and voice were very mild, but there must
+have been a hint of sturdy defiance somewhere in them. At all
+events Farnsworth was exasperated and fell into a white rage.
+Perhaps it was the liquor he had been drinking that made him
+suddenly desperate.
+
+"You canting old fool!" he cried, "don't lie to me any longer; I
+won't have it. Don't stand there grinning at me. Get that flag, or
+I'll make you."
+
+"What is impossible, my son, is possible to God alone. Apud
+homines hoc impossible est, apud Deum autem omnia possibilia
+sunt."
+
+"None of your Jesuit Latin or logic to me--I am not here to argue,
+but to command. Get that flag. Be in a hurry about it, sir."
+
+He whipped out his sword, and in his half drunken eyes there
+gathered the dull film of murderous passion.
+
+"Put up your weapon, Captain; you will not attack an unarmed
+priest. You are a soldier, and will not dare strike an old,
+defenceless man."
+
+"But I will strike a black-robed and black-hearted French rebel.
+Get that flag, you grinning fool!"
+
+The two men stood facing each other. Father Beret's eyes did not
+stir from their direct, fearless gaze. What Farnsworth had called
+a grin was a peculiar smile, not of merriment, a grayish flicker
+and a slight backward wrinkling of the cheeks. The old man's arms
+were loosely crossed upon his sturdy breast.
+
+"Strike if you must," he said very gently, very firmly. "I never
+yet have seen the man that could make me afraid." His speech was
+slightly sing-song in tone, as it would have been during a prayer
+or a blessing.
+
+"Get the flag then!" raged Farnsworth, in whose veins the heat of
+liquor was aided by an unreasoning choler.
+
+"I cannot," said Father Beret.
+
+"Then take the consequences!"
+
+Farnsworth lifted his sword, not to thrust, but to strike with its
+flat side, and down it flashed with a noisy whack. Father Beret
+flung out an arm and deftly turned the blow aside. It was done so
+easily that Farnsworth sprang back glaring and surprised.
+
+"You old fool!" he cried, leveling his weapon for a direct lunge.
+"You devilish hypocrite!"
+
+It was then that Father Beret turned deadly pale and swiftly
+crossed himself. His face looked as if he saw something startling
+just beyond his adversary. Possibly this sudden change of
+expression caused Farnsworth to hesitate for a mere point of time.
+Then there was the swish of a woman's skirts; a light step
+pattered on the frozen ground, and Alice sprang between the men,
+facing Farnsworth. As she did this something small and yellow,--
+the locket at her throat,--fell and rolled under her feet. Nobody
+saw it.
+
+In her hand she held an immense horse pistol, which she leveled in
+the Captain's face, its flaring, bugle-shaped muzzle gaping not a
+yard from his nose. The heavy tube was as steady as if in a vise.
+
+"Drop that sword!"
+
+That was all she said; but her finger was pressing the trigger,
+and the flint in the backward slanting hammer was ready to click
+against the steel. The leaden slugs were on the point of leaping
+forth.
+
+"Drop that sword!"
+
+The repetition seemed to close the opportunity for delay.
+
+Farnsworth was on his guard in a twinkling. He set his jaw and
+uttered an ugly oath; then quick as lightning he struck sidewise
+at the pistol with his blade. It was a move which might have taken
+a less alert person than Alice unawares; but her training in
+sword-play was ready in her wrist and hand. An involuntary turn,
+the slightest imaginable, set the heavy barrel of her weapon
+strongly against the blow, partly stopping it, and then the gaping
+muzzle spat its load of balls and slugs with a bellow that awoke
+the drowsy old village.
+
+Farnsworth staggered backward, letting fall his sword. There was a
+rent in the clothing of his left shoulder. He reeled; the blood
+spun out; but he did not fall, although he grew white.
+
+Alice stood gazing at him with a look on her face he would never
+forget. It was a look that changed by wonderful swift gradations
+from terrible hate to something like sweet pity. The instant she
+saw him hurt and bleeding, his countenance relaxing and pale, her
+heart failed her. She took a step toward him, her hand opened, and
+with a thud the heavy old pistol fell upon the ground beside her.
+
+Father Beret sprang nimbly to sustain Farnsworth, snatching up the
+pistol as he passed around Alice.
+
+"You are hurt, my son," he gently said, "let me help you." He
+passed his arm firmly under that of Farnsworth, seeing that the
+Captain was unsteady on his feet.
+
+"Lean upon me. Come with me, Alice, my child, I will take him into
+the house."
+
+Alice picked up the Captain's sword and led the way.
+
+It was all done so quickly that Farnsworth, in his half dazed
+condition, scarcely realized what was going on until he found
+himself on a couch in the Roussillon home, his wound (a jagged
+furrow plowed out by slugs that the sword's blade had first
+intercepted) neatly dressed and bandaged, while Alice and the
+priest hovered over him busy with their careful ministrations.
+
+Hamilton and Helm were, as usual, playing cards at the former's
+quarters when a guard announced that Mademoiselle Roussillon
+wished an audience with the Governor.
+
+"Bring the girl in," said Hamilton, throwing down his cards and
+scowling darkly.
+
+"Now you'd better be wise as a serpent and gentle as a dove,"
+remarked Helm. "There is something up, and that gun-shot we heard
+awhile ago may have a good deal to do with it. At any rate, you'll
+find kindness your best card to play with Alice Roussillon just at
+the present stage of the game."
+
+Of course they knew nothing of what had happened to Farnsworth;
+but they had been discussing the strained relations between the
+garrison and the French inhabitants when the roar of Alice's big-
+mouthed pistol startled them. Helm was slyly beating about to try
+to make Hamilton lose sight of the danger from Clark's direction.
+To do this he artfully magnified the insidious work that might be
+done by the French and their Indian friends should they be driven
+to desperation by oppressive or exasperating action on the part of
+the English.
+
+Hamilton felt the dangerous uncertainty upon which the situation
+rested; but, like many another vigorously self-reliant man, he
+could not subordinate his passions to the dictates of policy. When
+Alice was conducted into his presence he instantly swelled with
+anger. It was her father who had struck him and escaped, it was
+she who had carried off the rebel flag at the moment of victory.
+
+"Well, Miss, to what do I owe the honor of this visit?" he
+demanded with a supercilious air, bending a card between his thumb
+and finger on the rude table.
+
+She stood before him tall and straight, well bundled in furs. She
+was not pale; her blood was too rich and brilliant for that; but
+despite a half-smile and the inextinguishable dimples, there was a
+touch of something appealingly pathetic in the lines of her mouth.
+She did not waver or hesitate, however, but spoke promptly and
+distinctly.
+
+"I have come, Monsieur, to tell you that I have hurt Captain
+Farnsworth. He was about to kill Father Beret, and I shot him. He
+is in our house and well cared for. I don't think his wound is
+bad. And--" here she hesitated at last and let her gaze fall,--"so
+here I am." Then she lifted her eyes again and made an inimitable
+French gesture with her shoulders and arms. "You will do as you
+please, Monsieur, I am at your mercy."
+
+Hamilton was astounded. Helm sat staring phlegmatically. Meantime
+Beverley entered the room and stopped hat in hand behind Alice. He
+was flushed and evidently excited; in fact, he had heard of the
+trouble with Farnsworth, and seeing Alice enter the floor of
+Hamilton's quarters he followed her in, his heart stirred by no
+slight emotion. He met the Governor's glare and parried it with
+one of equal haughtiness. The veins on his forehead swelled and
+turned dark. He was in a mood to do whatever desperate act should
+suggest itself.
+
+When Hamilton fairly comprehended the message so graphically
+presented by Alice, he rose from his seat by the fire.
+
+"What's this you tell me?" he blurted. "You say you've shot
+Captain Farnsworth?"
+
+"Oui, Monsieur"
+
+He stared a moment, then his features beamed with hate.
+
+"And I'll have you shot for it, Miss, as sure as you stand there
+in your silly impudence ogling me so brazenly!"
+
+He leaned toward her as he spoke and sent with the words a shock
+of coarse, passionate energy from which she recoiled as if
+expecting a blow to follow it.
+
+An irresistible impulse swept Beverley to Alice's side, and his
+attitude was that of a protector. Helm sprang up.
+
+A Lieutenant came in and respectfully, but with evident over-
+haste, reported that Captain Farnsworth had been shot and was at
+Roussillon place in care of the surgeon.
+
+"Take this girl into custody. Confine her and put a strong guard
+over her."
+
+In giving the order Hamilton jerked his thumb contemptuously
+toward Alice, and at the same time gave Beverley a look of supreme
+defiance and hatred. When Helm began to speak he turned fiercely
+upon him and stopped him with:
+
+"None of your advice, sir. I have had all I want of it. Keep your
+place or I'll make you."
+
+Then to Beverley:
+
+"Retire, sir. When I wish to see you I'll send for you. At present
+you are not needed here."
+
+The English Lieutenant saluted his commander, bowed respectfully
+to Alice and said:
+
+"Come with me, Miss, please."
+
+Helm and Beverley exchanged a look of helpless and enquiring rage.
+It was as if they had said: "What can we do? Must we bear it?"
+Certainly they could do nothing. Any interference on their part
+would be sure to increase Alice's danger, and at the same time add
+to the weight of their own humiliation.
+
+Alice silently followed the officer out of the room. She did not
+even glance toward Beverley, who moved as if to interfere and was
+promptly motioned back by the guard. His better judgement
+returning held him from a rash and futile act, until Hamilton
+spoke again, saying loudly as Alice passed through the door:
+
+"I'll see who's master of this town if I have to shoot every
+French hoyden in it!"
+
+"Women and children may well fear you, Colonel Hamilton," said
+Beverley. "That young lady is your superior."
+
+"You say that to me, sir!"
+
+"It is the best I could possibly say of you."
+
+"I will send you along with the wench if you do not guard your
+language. A prisoner on parole has no license to be a blackguard."
+
+"I return you my parole, sir, I shall no longer regard it as
+binding," said Beverley, by a great effort, holding back a blow;
+"I will not keep faith with a scoundrel who does not know how to
+be decent in the presence of a young girl. You had better have me
+arrested and confined. I will escape at the first opportunity and
+bring a force here to reckon with you for your villainy. And if
+you dare hurt Alice Roussillon I will have you hanged like a dog!"
+
+Hamilton looked at him scornfully, smiling as one who feels safe
+in his authority and means to have his own way with his victim.
+Naturally he regarded Beverley's words as the merest vaporings of
+a helpless and exasperated young man. He saw very clearly that
+love was having a hand in the affair, and he chuckled inwardly,
+thinking what a fool Beverley was.
+
+"I thought I ordered you to leave this room," he said with an air
+and tone of lofty superiority, "and I certainly mean to be obeyed.
+Go, sir, and if you attempt to escape, or in any way break your
+parole, I'll have you shot."
+
+"I have already broken it. From this moment I shall not regard it.
+You have heard my statement. I shall not repeat it. Govern
+yourself accordingly."
+
+With these words Beverley turned and strode out of the house,
+quite beside himself, his whole frame quivering.
+
+Hamilton laughed derisively, then looked at Helm and said:
+
+"Helm, I like you; I don't wish to be unkind to you; but
+positively you must quit breaking in upon my affairs with your
+ready-made advice. I've given you and Lieutenant Beverley too much
+latitude, perhaps. If that young fool don't look sharp he'll get
+himself into a beastly lot of trouble. You'd better give him a
+talk. He's in a way to need it just now."
+
+"I think so myself," said Helm, glad to get back upon fair footing
+with the irascible Governor. "I'll wait until he cools off
+somewhat, and then I can manage him. Leave him to me."
+
+"Well, come walk with me to see what has really happened to
+Farnsworth. He's probably not much hurt, and deserves what he's
+got. That girl has turned his head. I think I understand the whole
+affair. A little love, a little wine, some foolishness, and the
+wench shot him."
+
+Helm genially assented; but they were delayed for some time by an
+officer who came in to consult with Hamilton on some pressing
+Indian affairs. When they reached Roussillon place they met
+Beverley coming out; but he did not look at them. He was scarcely
+aware of them. A little way outside the gate, on going in, he had
+picked up Alice's locket and broken chain, which he mechanically
+put into his pocket. It was all like a dream to him, and yet he
+had a clear purpose. He was going away from Vincennes, or at least
+he would try, and woe be to Hamilton on his coming back. It was so
+easy for an excited young mind to plan great things and to expect
+success under apparently impossible conditions. Beverley gave Jean
+a note for Alice; it was this that took him to Roussillon place;
+and no sooner fell the night than he shouldered a gun furnished
+him by Madame Godere, and guided by the woodsman's fine craft,
+stole away southward, thinking to swim the icy Wabash some miles
+below, and then strike across the plains of Illinois to Kaskaskia.
+
+It was a desperate undertaking; but in those days desperate
+undertakings were rather the rule than the exception. Moreover,
+love was the leader and Beverley the blind follower. Nothing could
+daunt him or turn him back, until he found an army to lead against
+Hamilton. It seems but a romantic burst of indignation, as we look
+back at it, hopelessly foolish, with no possible end but death in
+the wilderness. Still there was a method in love's madness, and
+Beverley, with his superb physique, his knowledge of the
+wilderness and his indomitable self-reliance, was by no means
+without his fighting chance for success.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+MANON LESCAUT. AND A RAPIER-THRUST
+
+
+Beverley's absence was not noticed by Hamilton until late on the
+following day, and even then he scouted Helm's suggestion that the
+young man was possibly carrying out his threat to disregard his
+parole.
+
+"He would be quite justified in doing it; you know that very
+well," said Helm with a laugh, "and he's just the man to undertake
+what is impossible. Of course, however, he'll get scalped for his
+trouble, and that will cost you something, I'm happy to say."
+
+"It's a matter of small importance," Hamilton replied; "but I'll
+wager you the next toddy that he's not at the present moment a
+half-mile from this spot. He may be a fool, I readily grant that
+he is, but even a fool is not going to set out alone in this kind
+of weather to go to where your rebel friends are probably toasting
+their shins by a fire of green logs and half starving over yonder
+on the Mississippi."
+
+"Joking aside, you are doubtless right. Beverley is hot-headed,
+and if he could he'd get even with you devilish quick; but he
+hasn't left Vincennes, I think. Miss Roussillon would keep him
+here if the place were on fire!"
+
+Hamilton laughed dryly. He had thought just what Helm was saying.
+Beverley's attentions to Alice had not escaped his notice.
+
+"Speaking of that girl," he remarked after a moment's silence,
+"what am I do to do with her? There's no place to keep her, and
+Farnsworth insists that she wasn't to blame." He chuckled again
+and added:
+
+"It's true as gospel. He's in love with her, too. Seems to be glad
+she shot him. Says he's ashamed of himself for ever suspecting her
+of anything but being a genuine angel. Why, he's got as flabby as
+a rabbit and mumbles like a fool!"
+
+"Same as you or I at his age," said Helm, taking a chew of
+tobacco. "She IS a pretty thing. Beverley don't know his foot from
+his shoulder-blade when she's anywhere near him. Boys are boys.
+I'm a sort of a boy myself."
+
+"If she'd give up that flag he'd let her go," said Hamilton. "I hate
+like the devil to confine her; it looks brutal, and makes me feel
+like a tyrant."
+
+"Have you ever happened to notice the obvious fact, Governor
+Hamilton, that Alice Roussillon and Father Beret are not all the
+French in Vincennes?"
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"I mean that I don't for a moment believe that either the girl or
+the priest knows a thing about where that flag is. They are both
+as truthful and honorable as people ever get to be. I know them.
+Somebody else got that flag from under the priest's floor. You may
+depend upon that. If Miss Roussillon knew where it is she'd say
+so, and then dare you to make her tell where it's hidden." "Oh,
+the whole devilish town is rotten with treason; that's very clear.
+There's not a loyal soul in it outside of my forces."
+
+"Thank you for not including me among the loyalists."
+
+"Humph, I spoke of these French people; they pretend to be true;
+but I believe they are all traitors,"
+
+"You can manage them if you try. A little jolly kindness goes a
+long way with 'em. _I_ had no trouble while _I_ held the town."
+
+Hamilton bit his lip and was silent. Helm was exasperatingly good
+tempered, and his jocularity was irresistible. While he was yet
+speaking a guard came up followed by Jean, the hunchback, and
+saluting said to Hamilton:
+
+"The lad wants to see the young lady, sir."
+
+Hamilton gazed quizzically at Jean, who planted himself in his
+habitual attitude before him and stared up into his face with the
+grotesque expression which seems to be characteristic of
+hunchbacks and unfledged birds--the look of an embodied and
+hideous joke.
+
+"Well, sir, what will you have?" the Governor demanded.
+
+"I want to see Alice, if you please."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"I want to give her a book to read."
+
+"Ah, indeed. Where is it? Let me see it"
+
+Jean took from the breast of his loose jerkin a small volume, dog-
+eared and mildewed, and handed it to Hamilton. Meantime he stood
+first on one foot, then the other, gnawing his thumb-nail and
+blinking rapidly.
+
+"Well, Helm, just look here!"
+
+"What?"
+
+"Manon Lescaut."
+
+"And what's that?"
+
+"Haven't you ever read it?"
+
+"Read what?"
+
+"This novel--Manon Lescaut."
+
+"Never read a novel in my life. Never expect to."
+
+Hamilton laughed freely at Helm's expense, then turned to Jean and
+gave him back the book.
+
+It would have been quite military, had he taken the precaution to
+examine between the pages for something hidden there, but he did
+not.
+
+"Go, give it to her," he said, "and tell her I send my
+compliments, with great admiration of her taste in literature." He
+motioned the soldier to show Jean to Alice. "It's a beastly French
+story," he added, addressing Helm; "immoral enough to make a
+pirate blush. That's the sort of girl Mademoiselle Roussillon is!"
+
+"I don't care what kind of a book she reads," blurted Helm, "she's
+a fine, pure, good girl. Everybody likes her. She's the good angel
+of this miserable frog-hole of a town. You'd like her yourself, if
+you'd straighten up and quit burning tow in your brain all the
+time. You're always so furious about something that you never have
+a chance to be just to yourself, or pleasant to anybody else."
+
+Hamilton turned fiercely on Helm, but a glimpse of the Captain's
+broad good-humored face heartily smiling, dispelled his anger.
+There was no ground upon which to maintain a quarrel with a person
+so persistently genial and so absurdly frank. And in fact Hamilton
+was not half so bad as his choleric manifestations seemed to make
+him out. Besides, Helm knew just how far to go, just when to stop.
+
+"If I had got furious at you every time there was overwhelming
+provocation for it," Hamilton said, "you'd have been long since
+hanged or shot. I fancy that I have shown angelic forbearance.
+I've given you somewhat more than a prisoner's freedom."
+
+"So you have, so you have," assented Helm. "I've often been
+surprised at your generous partiality in my case. Let's have some
+hot water with something else in it, what do you say? I won't give
+you any more advice for five minutes by your watch."
+
+"But I want some advice at once."
+
+"What about?"
+
+"That girl."
+
+"Turn her loose. That's easy and reputable."
+
+"I'll have to, I presume; but she ought to be punished."
+
+"If you'll think less about punishment, revenge and getting even
+with everybody and everything, you'll soon begin to prosper."
+
+Hamilton winced, but smiled as one quite sure of himself.
+
+Jean followed the soldier to a rickety log pen on the farther side
+of the stockade, where he found the prisoner restlessly moving
+about like a bird in a rustic cage. It had no comforts, that
+gloomy little room. There was no fireplace, the roof leaked, and
+the only furniture consisted of a bench to sit on and a pile of
+skins for bed. Alice looked charmingly forlorn peeping out of the
+wraps in which she was bundled against the cold, her hair fluffed
+and rimpled in shining disorder around her face.
+
+The guard let Jean in and closed the door, himself staying
+outside.
+
+Alice was as glad to see the poor lad as if they had been parted
+for a year. She hugged him and kissed his drawn little face.
+
+"You dear, good Jean!" she murmured, "you did not forget me."
+
+"I brought you something," he whispered, producing the book.
+
+Alice snatched it, looked at it, and then at Jean.
+
+"Why, what did you bring this for? you silly Jean! I didn't want
+this. I don't like this book at all. It's hateful. I despise it.
+Take it back."
+
+"There's something in it for you, a paper with writing on it;
+Lieutenant Beverley wrote it on there. It's shut up between the
+leaves about the middle."
+
+"Sh-s-sh! not so loud, the guard'll hear you," Alice breathlessly
+whispered, her whole manner changing instantly. She was trembling,
+and the color had been whisked from her face, as the flame from a
+candle in a sudden draught.
+
+She found the note and read it a dozen times without a pause, her
+eyes leaping along the lines back and forth with pathetic
+eagerness and concentration. Presently she sat down on the bench
+and covered her face with her hands. A tremor first, then a
+convulsive sobbing, shook her collapsed form. Jean regarded her
+with a drolly sympathetic grimace, elevating his long chin and
+letting his head settle back between his shoulders.
+
+"Oh, Jean, Jean!" she cried at last, looking up and reaching out
+her arms; "O Jean, he is gone, gone, gone!"
+
+Jean stepped closer to her while she sobbed again like a little
+child.
+
+She pulled him to her and held him tightly against her breast
+while she once more read the note through blinding tears. The
+words were few, but to her they bore the message of desolation and
+despair. A great, haunting, hollow voice in her heart repeated
+them until they echoed from vague distance to distance.
+
+It was written with a bit of lead on the half of a mildewed fly-
+leaf torn from the book:
+
+"Dear Alice:
+
+"I am going away. When you read this, think of me as hurrying
+through the wilderness to reach our army and bring it here. Be
+brave, as you always have been; be good, as you cannot help being;
+wait and watch for me; love me, as I love you. I will come. Do not
+doubt it, I will come, and I will crush Hamilton and his command.
+Courage, Alice dear; courage, and wait for me. "Faithfully ever,
+"Beverley."
+
+She kissed the paper with passionate fervor, pouring her tears
+upon it in April showers between which the light of her eyes
+played almost fiercely, so poignant was her sense of a despair
+which bordered upon desperation. "Gone, gone!" It was all she
+could think or say. "Gone, gone."
+
+Jean took the offending novel back home with him, hidden under his
+jerkin; but Beverley's note lay upon Alice's heart, a sweet
+comfort and a crushing weight, when an hour later Hamilton sent
+for her and she was taken before him. Her face was stained with
+tears and she looked pitifully distressed and disheveled; yet
+despite all this her beauty asserted itself with subtle force.
+
+Hamilton felt ashamed looking at her, but put on sternness and
+spoke without apparent sympathy:
+
+"Miss Roussillon, you came near committing a great crime. As it
+is, you have done badly enough; but I wish not to be unreasonably
+severe. I hope you are sorry for your act, and feel like doing
+better hereafter."
+
+She was trembling, but her eyes looked steadily straight into his.
+They were eyes of baby innocence, yet they irradiated a strong
+womanly spirit just touched with the old perverse, mischievous
+light which she could neither banish nor control. When she did not
+make reply, Hamilton continued:
+
+"You may go home now, and I shall expect to have no more trouble
+on your account." He made a gesture indicative of dismissal; then,
+as she turned from him, he added, somewhat raising his voice:
+
+"And further, Miss Roussillon, that flag you took from here must
+positively be returned. See that it is done."
+
+She lifted her head high and walked away, not deigning to give him
+a word.
+
+"Humph! what do you think now of your fine young lady?" he
+demanded, turning to Helm with a sneering curl of his mouth. "She
+gives thanks copiously for a kindness, don't you think?"
+
+"Poor girl, she was scared nearly out of her life," said Helm.
+"She got away from you, like a wounded bird from a snare. I never
+saw a face more pitiful than hers."
+
+"Much pity she needs, and greatly like a wounded bird she acts, I
+must say; but good riddance if she'll keep her place hereafter. I
+despise myself when I have to be hard with a woman, especially a
+pretty one. That girl's a saucy and fascinating minx, and as
+dangerous as twenty men. I'll keep a watch on her movements from
+this on, and if she gets into mischief again I'll transport her to
+Detroit, or give her away to the Indians, She must stop her high-
+handed foolishness."
+
+Helm saw that Hamilton was talking mere wind, VOX ET PRAETEREA
+NIHIL, and he furthermore felt that his babbling signified no harm
+to Alice; but Hamilton surprised him presently by saying:
+
+"I have just learned that Lieutenant Beverley is actually gone.
+Did you know of his departure?"
+
+"What are you saying, sir?"
+
+Helm jumped to his feet, not angry, but excited.
+
+"Keep cool, you need not answer if you prefer silence or evasion.
+You may want to go yourself soon."
+
+Helm burst out laughing, but quickly growing serious said:
+
+"Has Beverley been such a driveling fool as that? Are you in
+earnest?"
+
+"He killed two of my scouts, wounded another, and crossed the
+Wabash in their canoe. He is going straight towards Kaskaskia."
+
+"The idiot! Hurrah for him! If you catch your hare you may roast
+him, but catch him first, Governor!"
+
+"You'll joke out of the other corner of your mouth, Captain Helm,
+if I find out that you gave him aid or countenance in breaking his
+parole."
+
+"Aid or countenance! I never saw him after he walked out of this
+room. You gave him a devil of a sight more aid and countenance
+than I did. What are you talking about! Broke his parole! He did
+no such thing. He returned it to you fairly, as you well know. He
+told you he was going."
+
+"Well, I've sent twenty of my swiftest Indians after him to bring
+him back. I'll let you see him shot. That ought to please you."
+
+"They'll never get him, Governor. I'll bet high on him against
+your twenty scalp-lifters any day. Fitzhugh Beverley is the best
+Indian fighter, Daniel Boone and Simon Kenton excepted, in the
+American colonies."
+
+On her way home Alice met Father Beret, who turned and walked
+beside her. He was so overjoyed at her release that he could
+scarcely speak; but held her hand and stroked it gently while she
+told him her story. It was beginning to rain, a steady, cold
+shower, when they reached the house, and for many days and nights
+thereafter the downfall continued almost incessantly.
+
+"Dear child," said Father Beret, stopping at the gate and looking
+beseechingly into Alice's face, "you must stay at home now--stay
+in the house--it will be horribly dangerous for you to pass about
+in the village after your--after what has happened."
+
+"Do not fear, Father, I will be careful. Aren't you coming in?
+I'll find you a cake and a glass of wine."
+
+"No, child, not now."
+
+"Then good-bye, good-bye," she said, turning from him to run into
+the house. "Come soon, I shall be so lonesome."
+
+On the veranda she suddenly stopped, running her fingers about her
+neck and into her bosom.
+
+"Oh, Father, Father Beret, I've lost my locket!" she cried. "See
+if I dropped it there."
+
+She went back to the gate, searching the ground with her eyes. Of
+course she did not find the locket. It was miles and miles away
+close to the heart of her lover. If she could but have known this,
+it would have comforted her. Beverley had intended to leave it
+with Jean, but in his haste and excitement he forgot; writing the
+note distracted his attention; and so he bore Alice's picture on
+his breast and in his heart while pursuing his long and perilous
+journey.
+
+Four of Hamilton's scouts came upon Beverley twenty miles south of
+Vincennes, but having the advantage of them, he killed two almost
+immediately, and after a running fight, the other two attempted
+escape in a canoe on the Wabash. Here, firing from a bluff, he
+wounded a third. Both then plunged head-foremost into the water,
+and by keeping below the surface, got away. The adventure gave
+Beverley new spirit and self-reliance; he felt that he could
+accomplish anything necessary to his undertaking. In the captured
+pirogue he crossed the river, and, to make his trail hard to find,
+sent the little craft adrift down the current.
+
+Then alone, in the dead of winter, he took his bearings and struck
+across the dreary, houseless plain toward St. Louis.
+
+As soon as Hamilton's discomfited scouts reported to him, he sent
+Long-Hair with twenty picked savages, armed and supplied for
+continuous and rapid marching, in pursuit of Beverley. There was a
+large reward for bringing him in alive, a smaller one for his
+scalp.
+
+When Alice heard of all this, her buoyant and happy nature seemed
+entirely to desert her for a time. She was proud to find out that
+Beverley had shown himself brave and capable; it touched her love
+of heroism; but she knew too much about Indian warfare to hope
+that he could hold his own against Long-Hair, the wiliest and
+boldest of scalp-hunters, and twenty of the most experienced
+braves in Hamilton's forces. He would almost certainly be killed
+and scalped, or captured and brought back to be shot or hanged in
+Vincennes. The thought chilled and curdled her blood.
+
+Both Helm and Father Beret tried to encourage and comfort her by
+representing the probabilities in the fairest light.
+
+"It's like hunting for a needle in a haystack, going out to find a
+man in that wilderness," said Helm with optimistic cheerfulness;
+"and besides Beverley is no easy dose for twenty red niggers to
+take. I've seen him tried at worse odds than that, and he got out
+with a whole skin, too. Don't you fret about him, Miss
+Roussillon."
+
+Little help came to her from attempts of this sort. She might
+brighten up for a while, but the dark dread, and the terrible
+gnawing at her heart, the sinking and despairing in her soul,
+could not be cured.
+
+What added immeasurably to her distress was the attention of
+Farnsworth, whose wound troubled him but a short time. He seemed
+to have had a revelation and a change of spirit since the
+unfortunate rencounter and the subsequent nursing at Alice's
+hands. He was grave, earnest, kindly, evidently striving to play a
+gentle and honorable part. She could feel that he carried a load
+of regret, that he wanted to pay a full price in good for the evil
+that he had done; his sturdy English heart was righting itself
+nobly, yet she but half understood him, until his actions and
+words began to betray his love; and then she hated him
+unreasonably. Realizing this, Farnsworth bore himself more like a
+faithful dog than in the manner hitherto habitual to him. He
+simply shadowed Alice and would not be rebuffed.
+
+There can be nothing more painful to a finely sympathetic nature
+than regret for having done a kindness. Alice experienced this to
+the fullest degree. She had nursed Farnsworth but a little while,
+yet it was a while of sweet influence. Her tender woman nature
+felt the blessedness of doing good to her enemy lying helpless in
+her house and hurt by her own hand. But now she hated the man, and
+with all her soul she was sorry that she had been kind to him; for
+out of her kindness he had drawn the spell of a love under which
+he lived a new life, and all for her. Yet deep down in her
+consciousness the pity and the pathos of the thing hovered
+gloomily and would not be driven out.
+
+The rain in mid-winter gave every prospect a sad, cold, sodden
+gray appearance. The ground was soaked, little rills ran in the
+narrow streets, the small streams became great rivers, the Wabash
+overflowed its banks and made a sea of all the lowlands on either
+side. It was hard on the poor dwellers in the thatched and mostly
+floorless cabins, for the grass roofs gradually let the water
+through and puddles formed on the ground inside. Fuel was distant
+and had to be hauled in the pouring rain; provisions were scarce
+and hunting almost impossible. Many people, especially children,
+were taken ill with colds and fever. Alice found some relief from
+her trouble in going from cabin to cabin and waiting upon the
+sufferers; but even here Farnsworth could not be got rid of; he
+followed her night and day. Never was a good soldier, for he was
+that from head to foot, more lovelorn and love-docile. The maiden
+had completely subdued the man.
+
+About this time, deep in a rainy and pitch-black night, Gaspard
+Roussillon came home. He tapped on the door again and again. Alice
+heard, but she hesitated to speak or move. Was she growing
+cowardly? Her heart beat like a drum. There was but one person in
+all the world that she could think of--it was not M. Roussillon.
+Ah, no, she had well-nigh forgotten her gigantic foster father.
+
+"It is I, ma cherie, it is Gaspard, my love, open the door," came
+in a booming half-whisper from without. "Alice, Jean, it is your
+Papa Roussillon, my dears. Let me in."
+
+Alice was at the door in a minute, unbarring it. M. Roussillon
+entered, armed to the teeth, the water dribbling from his buckskin
+clothes.
+
+"Pouf!" he exclaimed, "my throat is like dust." His thoughts were
+diving into the stores under the floor. "I am famished. Dear
+children, dear little ones! They are glad to see papa! Where is
+your mama?"
+
+He had Alice in his arms and Jean clung to his legs. Madame
+Roussillon, to be sure of no mistake, lighted a lamp with a brand
+that smoldered on the hearth and held it up, then, satisfied as to
+her husband's identity, set it on a shelf and flung herself into
+the affectionate group with clumsy abandon, making a great noise.
+
+"Oh, my dear Gaspard!" she cried as she lunged forward. "Gaspard,
+Gaspard!" Her voice fairly lifted the roof; her great weight,
+hurled with such force, overturned everybody, and all of them
+tumbled in a heap, the rotund and solid dame sitting on top.
+
+"Ouf! not so impetuous, my dear, "puffed M. Roussillon, freeing
+himself from her unpleasant pressure and scrambling to his feet.
+"Really you must have fared well in my absence, Madame, you are
+much heavier." He laughed and lifted her up as if she had been a
+child, kissing her resonantly.
+
+His gun had fallen with a great clatter. He took it from the floor
+and examined it to see if it had been injured, then set it in a
+corner.
+
+"I am afraid we have been making too much noise," said Alice,
+speaking very low. "There is a patrol guard every night now. If
+they should hear you--"
+
+"Shh!" whispered M. Roussillon, "we will be very still. Alice, is
+there something to eat and a drop of wine handy? I have come many
+miles; I am tired, hungry, thirsty,--ziff!"
+
+Alice brought some cold roast venison, a loaf, and a bottle of
+claret. These she set before him on a little table.
+
+"Ah, this is comfort," he said after he had gulped a full cup.
+"Have you all been well?"
+
+Then he began to tell where he had been, what he had seen, and the
+many things he had done. A Frenchman must babble while he eats and
+drinks. A little wine makes him eloquent. He talks with his hands,
+shoulders, eyes. Madame Roussillon, Alice and Jean, wrapped in
+furs, huddled around him to hear. He was very entertaining, and
+they forgot the patrol until a noise startled them. It was the low
+of a cow. They laughed and the master of the house softened his
+voice.
+
+M. Roussillon had been the guest of a great Indian chieftain, who
+was called the "Gate of the Wabash," because he controlled the
+river. The chief was an old acquaintance and treated him well.
+
+"But I wanted to see you all," Gaspard said. "I was afraid
+something might have happened to you. So I came back just to peep
+in. I can't stay, of course; Hamilton would kill me as if I were a
+wolf. I can remain but an hour and then slip out of town again
+before daylight conies. The rain and darkness are my friends."
+
+He had seen Simon Kenton, who said he had been in the neighborhood
+of Vincennes acting as a scout and spy for Clark. Presently and
+quite casually he added:
+
+"And I saw Lieutenant Beverley, too. I suppose you know that he
+has escaped from Hamilton, and--" Here a big mouthful of venison
+interfered.
+
+Alice leaned toward him white and breathless, her heart standing
+still.
+
+Then the door, which had been left unbarred, was flung open and,
+along with a great rush of wind and rain, the patrol guard, five
+in number, sprang in.
+
+M. Roussillon reached his gun with one hand, with the other swung
+a tremendous blow as he leaped against the intruders. Madame
+Roussillon blew out the light. No cave in the depth of earth was
+ever darker than that room. The patrolmen could not see one
+another or know what to do; but M. Roussillon laid about him with
+the strength of a giant. His blows sounded as if they smashed
+bones. Men fell heavily thumping on the floor where he rushed
+along. Some one fired a pistol and by its flash they all saw him;
+but instantly the darkness closed again, and before they could get
+their bearings he was out and gone, his great hulking form making
+its way easily over familiar ground where his would-be captors
+could have proceeded but slowly, even with a light to guide them.
+There was furious cursing among the patrolmen as they tumbled
+about in the room, the unhurt ones trampling their prostrate
+companions and striking wildly at each other in their blindness
+and confusion. At last one of them bethought him to open a dark
+lantern with which the night guards were furnished. Its flame was
+fluttering and gave forth a pale red light that danced weirdly on
+the floors and walls.
+
+Alice had snatched down one of her rapiers when the guards first
+entered. They now saw her facing them with her slender blade
+leveled, her back to the wall, her eyes shining dangerously.
+Madame Roussillon had fled into the adjoining room. Jean had also
+disappeared. The officer, a subaltern, in charge of the guard,
+seeing Alice, and not quickly able to make out that it was a woman
+thus defying him, crossed swords with her. There was small space
+for action; moreover the officer being not in the least a
+swordsman, played awkwardly, and quick as a flash his point was
+down. The rapier entered just below his thread with a dull
+chucking stab. He leaped backward, feeling at the same time a pair
+of arms clasp his legs. It was Jean, and the Lieutenant, thus
+unexpectedly tangled, fell to the floor, breaking but not
+extinguishing the guard's lantern as he went down. The little
+remaining oil spread and flamed up brilliantly, as if eager for
+conflagration, sputtering along the uneven boards.
+
+"Kill that devil!" cried the Lieutenant, in a strangling voice,
+while trying to regain his feet. "Shoot! Bayonet!"
+
+In his pain, rage and haste, he inadvertently set his hand in the
+midst of the blazing oil, which clung to the flesh with a seething
+grip.
+
+"Hell!" he screamed, "fire, fire!"
+
+Two or three bayonets were leveled upon Alice. Some one kicked
+Jean clean across the room, and he lay there curled up in his
+hairy night-wrap looking like an enormous porcupine.
+
+At this point a new performer came upon the stage, a dark-robed
+thing, so active that its outlines changed elusively, giving it no
+recognizable features. It might have been the devil himself, or
+some terrible unknown wild animal clad somewhat to resemble a man,
+so far as the startled guards could make out. It clawed right and
+left, hurled one of them against the wall, dashed another through
+the door into Madame Roussillon's room, where the good woman was
+wailing at the top of her voice, and felled a third with a stroke
+like that of a bear's paw.
+
+Consternation was at high tide when Farnsworth, who always slept
+with an ear open, reached Roussillon place and quickly quieted
+things. He was troubled beyond expression when he found out the
+true state of the affair, for there was nothing that he could do
+but arrest Alice and take her to Hamilton. It made his heart sink.
+He would have thought little of ordering a file of soldiers to
+shoot a man under the same conditions; but to subject her again to
+the Governor's stern cruelty--how could he do it? This time there
+would be no hope for her.
+
+Alice stood before him flushed, disheveled, defiant, sword in
+hand, beautiful and terrible as an angel. The black figure, man or
+devil, had disappeared as strangely as it had come. The sub-
+Lieutenant was having his slight wound bandaged. Men were raging
+and cursing under their breath, rubbing their bruised heads and
+limbs.
+
+"Alice--Mademoiselle Roussillon, I am so sorry for this," said
+Captain Farnsworth. "It is painful, terrible--"
+
+He could not go on, but stood before her unmanned. In the feeble
+light his face was wan and his hurt shoulder, still in bandages,
+drooped perceptibly.
+
+"I surrender to you," she presently said in French, extending the
+hilt of her rapier to him. "I had to defend myself when attacked
+by your Lieutenant there. If an officer finds it necessary to set
+upon a girl with his sword, may not the girl guard her life if she
+can?"
+
+She was short of breath, so that her voice palpitated with a
+touching plangency that shook the man's heart.
+
+Farnsworth accepted the sword; he could do nothing less. His duty
+admitted of no doubtful consideration; yet he hesitated, feeling
+around in his mind for a phrase with which to evade the
+inevitable.
+
+"It will be safer for you at the fort, Mademoiselle; let me take
+you there."
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+A MEETING IN THE WILDERNESS
+
+
+Beverley set out on his mid-winter journey to Kaskaskia with a
+tempest in his heart, and it was, perhaps, the storm's energy that
+gave him the courage to face undaunted and undoubting what his
+experience must have told him lay in his path. He was young and
+strong; that meant a great deal; he had taken the desperate
+chances of Indian warfare many times before this, and the danger
+counted as nothing, save that it offered the possibility of
+preventing him from doing the one thing in life he now cared to
+do. What meant suffering to him, if he could but rescue Alice? And
+what were life should he fail to rescue her? The old, old song
+hummed in his heart, every phrase of it distinct above the tumult
+of the storm. Could cold and hunger, swollen streams, ravenous
+wild beasts and scalp-hunting savages baffle him? No, there is no
+barrier that can hinder love. He said this over and over to
+himself after his rencounter with the four Indian scouts on the
+Wabash. He repeated it with every heart-beat until he fell in with
+some friendly red men, who took him to their camp, where to his
+great surprise he met M. Roussillon. It was his song when again he
+strode off toward the west on his lonely way.
+
+We need not follow him step by step; the monotony of the woods and
+prairies, the cold rains, alternating with northerly winds and
+blinding snow, the constant watchfulness necessary to guard
+against a meeting with hostile savages, the tiresome tramping,
+wading and swimming, the hunger, the broken and wretched sleep in
+frozen and scant wraps,--why detail it all?
+
+There was but one beautiful thing about it--the beauty of Alice as
+she seemed to walk beside him and hover near him in his dreams. He
+did not know that Long-Hair and his band were fast on his track;
+but the knowledge could not have urged him to greater haste. He
+strained every muscle to its utmost, kept every nerve to the
+highest tension. Yonder towards the west was help for Alice; that
+was all he cared for.
+
+But if Long-Hair was pursuing him with relentless greed for the
+reward offered by Hamilton, there were friendly footsteps still
+nearer behind him; and one day at high noon, while he was bending
+over a little fire, broiling some liberal cuts of venison, a
+finger tapped him on the shoulder. He sprang up and grappled Oncle
+Jazon; at the same time, standing near by, he saw Simon Kenton,
+his old-time Kentucky friend. The pungled features of one and the
+fine, rugged face of the other swam as in a mist before Beverley's
+eyes. Kenton was laughing quietly, his strong, upright form
+shaking to the force of his pleasure. He was in the early prime of
+a vigorous life, not handsome, but strikingly attractive by reason
+of a certain glow in his face and a kindly flash in his deep-set
+eyes.
+
+"Well, well, my boy!" he exclaimed, laying his left hand on
+Beverley's shoulder, while in the other he held a long, heavy
+rifle. "I'm glad to see ye, glad to see
+
+"Thought we was Injuns, eh?" said Oncle Jazon. "An' ef we had 'a'
+been we'd 'a' been shore o' your scalp!" The wizzened old creole
+cackled gleefully.
+
+"And where are ye goin'?" demanded Kenton. "Ye're making what
+lacks a heap o' bein' a bee-line for some place or other."
+
+Beverley was dazed and vacant-minded; things seemed wavering and
+dim. He pushed the two men from him and gazed at them without
+speaking. Their presence and voices did not convince him.
+
+"Yer meat's a burnin'," said Oncle Jazon, stooping to turn it on
+the smouldering coals. "Ye must be hungry. Cookin' enough for a
+regiment."
+
+Kenton shook Beverley with rough familiarity, as if to rouse his
+faculties.
+
+"What's the matter? Fitz, my lad, don't ye know Si Kenton? It's
+not so long since we were like brothers, and now ye don't speak to
+me! Ye've not forgot me, Fitz!"
+
+"Mebby he don't like ye as well as ye thought he did," drawled
+Oncle Jazon. "I HEV known o' fellers a bein' mistaken jes' thet
+way."
+
+Beverley got his wits together as best he could, taking in the
+situation by such degrees as seemed at the time unduly slow, but
+which were really mere momentary falterings.
+
+"Why, Kenton! Jazon!" he presently exclaimed, a cordial gladness
+blending with his surprise. "How did you get here? Where did you
+come from?"
+
+He looked from one to the other back and forth with a wondering
+smile breaking over his bronzed and determined face.
+
+"We've been hot on yer trail for thirty hours," said Kenton.
+"Roussillon put us on it back yonder. But what are ye up to? Where
+are ye goin'?"
+
+"I'm going to Clark at Kaskaskia to bring him yonder." He waved
+his hand eastward. "I am going to take Vincennes and kill
+Hamilton."
+
+'Well, ye're taking a mighty queer course, my boy, if ye ever
+expect to find Kaskaskia. Ye're already twenty miles too far
+south."
+
+"Carryin' his gun on the same shoulder all the time," said Oncle
+Jazon, "has made 'im kind o' swing in a curve like. 'Tain't good
+luck no how to carry yer gun on yer lef' shoulder. When you do it
+meks yer take a longer step with yer right foot than ye do with
+yer lef' an' ye can't walk a straight line to save yer liver.
+Ventreblue! La venaison brule encore! Look at that dasted meat
+burnin' agin!"
+
+He jumped back to the fire to turn the scorching cuts.
+
+Beverley wrung Kenton's hand and looked into his eyes, as a man
+does when an old friend comes suddenly out of the past, so to say,
+and brings the freshness and comfort of a strong, true soul to
+brace him in his hour of greatest need.
+
+"Of all men in the world, Simon Kenton, you were the least
+expected; but how glad I am! How thankful! Now I know I shall
+succeed. We are going to capture Vincennes, Kenton, are we not? We
+shall, sha'n't we, Jazon? Nothing, nothing can prevent us, can
+it?"
+
+Kenton heartily returned the pressure of the young man's hand,
+while Oncle Jazon looked up quizzically and said:
+
+"We're a tol'ble 'spectable lot to prevent; but then we might git
+pervented. I've seed better men an' us purty consid'ble pervented
+lots o' times in my life."
+
+In speaking the colloquial dialect of the American backwoodsmen,
+Oncle Jazon, despite years of practice among them, gave to it a
+creole lisp and some turns of pronunciation not to be indicated by
+any form of spelling. It added to his talk a peculiar soft
+drollery. When he spoke French it was mostly that of the COUREURS
+DE BOIS, a PATOIS which still lingers in out-of-the-way nooks of
+Louisiana.
+
+"For my part," said Kenton, "I am with ye, old boy, in anything ye
+want to do. But now ye've got to tell me everything. I see that
+ye're keeping something back. What is it?" He glanced sidewise
+slyly at Oncle Jazon.
+
+Beverley was frank to a fault; but somehow his heart tried to keep
+Alice all to itself. He hesitated; then--
+
+"I broke my parole with Governor Hamilton," he said. "He forced me
+to do it. I feel altogether justified. I told him beforehand that
+I should certainly leave Vincennes and go get a force to capture
+and kill him; and I'll do it, Simon Kenton, I'll do it!"
+
+"I see, I see," Kenton assented, "but what was the row about? What
+did he do to excite ye--to make ye feel justified in breakin' over
+yer parole in that high-handed way? Fitz, I know ye too well to be
+fooled by ye--you've got somethin' in mind that ye don't want to
+tell. Well, then don't tell it. Oncle Jazon and I will go it
+blind, won't we, Jazon?"
+
+"Blind as two moles," said the old man; "but as for thet secret,"
+he added, winking both eyes at once, "I don't know as it's so
+mighty hard to guess. It's always safe to 'magine a woman in the
+case. It's mostly women 'at sends men a trottin' off 'bout
+nothin', sort o' crazy like."
+
+Beverley looked guilty and Oncle Jazon continued: "They's a poo'ty
+gal at Vincennes, an' I see the young man a steppin' into her
+house about fifteen times a day 'fore I lef' the place. Mebbe
+she's tuck up wi' one o' them English officers. Gals is slippery
+an' onsartin'."
+
+"Jazon!" cried Beverley, "stop that instantly, or I'll wring your
+old neck." His anger was real and he meant what he said. He
+clenched his hands and glowered.
+
+Oncle Jazon, who was still squatting by the little fire, tumbled
+over backwards, as if Beverley had kicked him; and there he lay on
+the ground with his slender legs quivering akimbo in the air,
+while he laughed in a strained treble that sounded like the
+whining of a screech-owl.
+
+The old scamp did not know all the facts in Beverley's case, nor
+did he even suspect what had happened; but he was aware of the
+young man's tender feeling for Alice, and he did shrewdly
+conjecture that she was a factor in the problem.
+
+The rude jest at her expense did not seem to his withered and
+toughened taste in the least out of the way. Indeed it was a
+delectable bit of humor from Oncle Jazon's point of view.
+
+"Don't get mad at the old man," said Kenton, plucking Beverley
+aside. "He's yer friend from his heels to his old scalped crown.
+Let him have his fun." Then lowering his voice almost to a whisper
+he continued:
+
+"I was in Vincennes for two days and nights spyin' around. Madame
+Godere hid me in her house when there was need of it. I know how
+it is with ye; I got all the gossip about ye and the young lady,
+as well as all the information about Hamilton and his forces that
+Colonel Clark wants. I'm goin' to Kaskaskia; but I think it quite
+possible that Clark will be on his march to Vincennes before we
+get there; for Vigo has taken him full particulars as to the fort
+and its garrison, and I know that he's determined to capture the
+whole thing or die tryin'."
+
+Beverley felt his heart swell and his blood leap strong in his
+veins at these words.
+
+"I saw ye while I was in Vincennes," Kenton added, "but I never
+let ye see me. Ye were a prisoner, and I had no business with ye
+while your parole held. I felt that it was best not to tempt ye to
+give me aid, or to let ye have knowledge of me while I was a spy.
+I left two days before ye did, and should have been at Kaskaskia
+by this time if I hadn't run across Jazon, who detained me. He
+wanted to go with me, and I waited for him to repair the stock of
+his old gun. He tinkered at it 'tween meals and showers for half a
+week at the Indian village back yonder before he got it just to
+suit him. But I tell ye he's wo'th waiting for any length of time,
+and I was glad to let him have his way."
+
+Kenton, who was still a young man in his early thirties, respected
+Beverley's reticence on the subject uppermost in his mind. Madame
+Godere had told the whole story with flamboyant embellishments;
+Kenton tiad seen Alice, and, inspired with the gossip and a
+surreptitious glimpse of her beauty, he felt perfectly familiar
+with Beverley's condition. He was himself a victim of the tender
+passion to the extent of being an exile from his Virginia home,
+which he had left on account of dangerously wounding a rival. But
+he was well touched with the backwoodsman's taste for joke and
+banter. He and Oncle Jazon, therefore, knowing the main feature of
+Beverley's predicament, enjoyed making the most of their
+opportunity in their rude but perfectly generous and kindly way.
+
+By indirection and impersonal details, as regarded his feelings
+toward Alice, Beverley in due time made his friends understand
+that his whole ambition was centered in rescuing her. Nor did the
+motive fail to enlist their sympathy to the utmost. If all the
+world loves a lover, all men having the best virile instinct will
+fight for a lover's cause. Both Kenton and Oncle Jazon were
+enthusiastic; they wanted nothing better than an opportunity to
+aid in rescuing any girl who had shown so much patriotism and
+pluck. But Oncle Jazon was fond of Alice, and Beverley's story
+affected him peculiarly on her account.
+
+"They's one question I'm a goin' to put to ye, young man," he
+said, after he had heard everything and they had talked it all
+over, "an' I want ye to answer it straight as a bullet f'om yer
+gun."
+
+"Of course, Jazon, go ahead," said Beverley. "I shall be glad to
+answer." But his mind was far away with the gold-haired maiden in
+Hamilton's prison. He scarcely knew what he was saying.
+
+"Air ye expectin' to marry Alice Roussillon?"
+
+The three men were at the moment eating the well broiled venison.
+Oncle Jazon's puckered lips and chin were dripping with the
+fragrant grease and juice, which also flowed down his sinewy,
+claw-like fingers. Overhead in the bare tops of the scrub oaks
+that covered the prairie oasis, the February wind sang a shrill
+and doleful song.
+
+Beverley started as if a blow had been aimed at him. Oncle Jazon's
+question, indeed, was a blow as unexpected as it was direct and
+powerful.
+
+"I know it's poo'ty p'inted," the old man added after a short
+pause, "an' ye may think 'at I ain't got no business askin' it;
+but I have. That leetle gal's a pet o' mine, an' I'm a lookin'
+after her, an' expectin' to see 'at she's not bothered by nobody
+who's not goin' to do right by her. Marryin' is a mighty good
+thing, but--"
+
+"What do ye know about matrimony, ye old raw-headed bachelor?"
+demanded Kenton, who felt impelled to relieve Beverley of the
+embarrassment of an answer. "Ye wouldn't know a wife from a sack
+o' meal!"
+
+"Now don't git too peart an' fast, Si Kenton," cried Oncle Jazon,
+glaring truculently at his friend, but at the same time showing a
+dry smile that seemed to be hopelessly entangled in criss-cross
+wrinkles. "Who told ye I was a bach'lor? Not by a big jump. I've
+been married mighty nigh on to twenty times in my day. Mos'ly
+Injuns, o' course; but a squaw's a wife w'en ye marries her, an' I
+know how it hurts a gal to be dis'p'inted in sich a matter. That's
+w'y I put the question I did. I'm not goin' to let no man give
+sorry to that little Roussillon gal; an' so ye've got my say. Ye
+seed her raise thet flag on the fort, Lieutenant Beverley, an' ye
+seed her take it down an' git away wi' it. You know 'at she
+deserves nothin' but the best; an' by the Holy Virgin, she's got
+to have it, or I'm a goin' to know several reasons why. Thet's
+what made me put the question straight to ye, young man, an' I
+expects a straight answer."
+
+Beverley's face paled; but not with anger. He grasped one of Oncle
+Jazon's greasy hands and gave it such a squeeze that the old
+fellow grimaced painfully.
+
+"Thank you, Oncle Jazon, thank you!" he said, with a peculiar
+husky burr in his voice. "Alice will never suffer if I can help
+it. Let the subject drop now, my friend, until we have saved her
+from the hands of Hamilton." In the power of his emotion he
+continued to grip the old man's hand with increasing severity of
+pressure.
+
+"Ventrebleu! let go! Needn't smash a feller's fingers 'bout it!"
+screeched Oncle Jazon. "I can't shoot wo'th a cent, nohow, an' ef
+ye cripple up my trigger-finger--"
+
+Kenton had been peeping under the low-hanging scrub-oak boughs
+while Oncle Jazon was speaking these last words; and now he
+suddenly interrupted:
+
+"The devil! look yonder!" he growled out in startling tone.
+"Injuns!"
+
+It was a sharp snap of the conversation's thread, and at the same
+time our three friends realized that they had been careless in not
+keeping a better look-out. They let fall the meat they had not
+yet finished eating and seized their guns.
+
+Five or six dark forms were moving toward them across a little
+point of the prairie that cut into the wood a quarter of a mile
+distant.
+
+"Yander's more of 'em," said Oncle Jazon, as if not in the least
+concerned, wagging his head in an opposite direction, from which
+another squad was approaching.
+
+That he duly appreciated the situation appeared only in the
+celerity with which he acted.
+
+Kenton at once assumed command, and his companions felt his
+perfect fitness. There was no doubt from the first as to what the
+Indians meant; but even if there had been it would have soon
+vanished; for in less than three minutes twenty-one savages were
+swiftly and silently forming a circle inclosing the spot where the
+three white men, who had covered themselves as best they could
+with trees, waited in grim steadiness for the worst.
+
+Quite beyond gunshot range, but near enough for Oncle Jazon to
+recognize Long-Hair as their leader, the Indians halted and began
+making signs to one another all round the line. Evidently they
+dreaded to test the marksmanship of such riflemen as they knew
+most border men to be. Indeed, Long-Hair had personal knowledge of
+what might certainly be expected from both Kenton and Oncle Jazon;
+they were terrible when out for fight; the red warriors from
+Georgia to the great lakes had heard of them; their names smacked
+of tragedy. Nor was Beverley without fame among Long-Hair's
+followers, who had listened to the story of his fighting
+qualities, brought to Vincennes by the two survivors of the
+scouting party so cleverly defeated by him.
+
+"The liver-colored cowards," said Kenton, "are afeared of us in a
+shootin'-match; they know that a lot of 'em would have to die if
+they should undertake an open fight with us. It's some sort of a
+sneakin' game they are studyin' about just now."
+
+"I'm a gittin' mos' too ole to shoot wo'th a cent," said Oncle
+Jazon, "but I'd give half o' my scalp ef thet Long-Hair would come
+clost enough fo' me to git a bead onto his lef' eye. It's tol'ble
+plain 'at we're gone goslins this time, I'm thinkin'; still it'd
+be mighty satisfyin' if I could plug out a lef' eye or two 'fore I
+go."
+
+Beverley was silent; the words of his companions were heard by
+him, but not noticed. Nothing interested him save the thought of
+escaping and making his way to Clark. To fail meant infinitely
+more than death, of which he had as small fear as most brave men,
+and to succeed meant everything that life could offer. So, in the
+unlimited selfishness of love, he did not take his companions into
+account.
+
+The three stood in a close-set clump of four or five scrub oaks at
+the highest point of a thinly wooded knoll that sloped down in all
+directions to the prairie. Their view was wide, but in places
+obstructed by the trees.
+
+"Men," said Kenton, after a thoughtful and watchful silence, "the
+thing looks kind o' squally for us. I don't see much of a chance
+to get out of this alive; but we've got to try."
+
+He showed by the density of his voice and a certain gray film in
+his face that he felt the awful gravity of the situation; but he
+was calm and not a muscle quivered.
+
+"They's jes' two chances for us," said Oncle Jazon, "an' them's as
+slim as a broom straw. We've got to stan' here an' fight it out,
+or wait till night an' sneak through atween 'em an' run for it."
+
+"I don't see any hope o' sneakin' through the line," observed
+Kenton. "It's not goin' to be dark tonight."
+
+"Wa-a-l," Oncle Jazon drawled nonchalantly while he took in a quid
+of tobacco, "I've been into tighter squeezes 'an this, many a
+time, an' I got out, too."
+
+"Likely enough," said Kenton, still reflecting while his eyes
+roamed around the circle of savages.
+
+"I fit the skunks in Ferginny 'fore you's thought of, Si Kenton,
+an' down in Car'lina in them hills. If ye think I'm a goin' to be
+scalped where they ain't no scalp, 'ithout tryin' a few dodges,
+yer a dad dasteder fool an' I used to think ye was, an' that's
+makin' a big compliment to ye."
+
+"Well, we don't have to argy this question, Oncle Jazon; they're a
+gittin' ready to run in upon us, and we've got to fight. I say,
+Beverley, are ye ready for fast shootin'? Have ye got a plenty of
+bullets?"
+
+"Yes, Roussillon gave me a hundred. Do you think--"
+
+He was interrupted by a yell that leaped from savage mouth to
+mouth all round the circle, and then the charge began.
+
+"Steady, now," growled Kenton, "let's not be in a hurry. Wait till
+they come nigh enough to hit 'em before we shoot."
+
+The time was short; for the Indians came on at almost race-horse
+speed.
+
+Oncle Jazon fired first, the long, keen crack of his small-bore
+rifle splitting the air with a suggestion of vicious energy, and a
+lithe young warrior, who was outstripping all his fellows, leaped
+high and fell paralyzed.
+
+"Can't shoot wo'th a cent," muttered the old man, deftly beginning
+to reload his gun the while; "but I jes' happened to hit that
+buck. He'll never git my scalp, thet's sartin an' sure."
+
+Beverley and Kenton each likewise dropped an Indian; but the shots
+did not even check the rush. Long-Hair had planned to capture his
+prey, not kill it. Every savage had his orders to take the white
+men alive; Hamilton's larger reward depended on this.
+
+Right on they came, as fast as their nimble legs could carry them,
+yelling like demons; and they reached the grove before the three
+white men could reload their guns. Then every warrior took cover
+behind a tree and began scrambling forward from bole to bole, thus
+approaching rapidly without much exposure.
+
+"Our 'taters is roasted brown," muttered Oncle Jazon. He crossed
+himself. Possibly he prayed; but he was priming his old gun the
+next instant.
+
+Kenton fired again, making a hurried and ineffectual attempt to
+stop the nearest warrior, who saved himself by quickly skipping
+behind a tree. Beverley's gun snapped, the flint failing to make
+fire; but Oncle Jazon bored a little hole through the head of the
+Indian nearest him; and then the final rush was made from every
+direction.
+
+A struggle ensued, which for desperate energy has probably never
+been surpassed. Like three lions at bay, the white men met the
+shock, and lion-like they fought in the midst of seventeen
+stalwart and determined savages.
+
+"Don't kill them, take them alive; throw them down and hold them!"
+was Long-Hair's order loudly shouted in the tongue of his tribe.
+
+Both Kenton and Jazon understood every word and knew the
+significance of such a command from the leader. It naturally came
+into Kenton's mind that Hamilton had been informed of his visit to
+Vincennes and had offered a reward for his capture. This being
+true, death as a spy would be the certain result if he were taken
+back. He might as well die now. As for Beverley, he thought only
+of Alice, yonder as he had left her, a prisoner in Hamilton's
+hands, Oncle Jazon, if he thought at all, probably considered
+nothing but present escape, though he prayed audibly to the
+Blessed Virgin, even while he lay helpless upon the ground, pinned
+down by the weight of an enormous Indian. He could not move any
+part of himself, save his lips, and these mechanically put forth
+the wheezing supplication.
+
+Beverley and Kenton, being young and powerful, were not so easily
+mastered. For a while, indeed, they appeared to be more than
+holding their own. They time and time again scattered the entire
+crowd by the violence of their muscular efforts; and after it had
+finally closed in upon them in a solid body they swayed and swung
+it back and forth and round and round until the writhing, savage
+mass looked as if caught in the vortex of a whirlwind. But such
+tremendous exertion could not last long. Eight to one made too
+great a difference between the contending parties, and the only
+possible conclusion of the struggle soon came. Seized upon by
+desperate, clinging, wolf-like assailants, the white men felt
+their arms, legs and bodies weighted down and their strength fast
+going.
+
+Kenton fell next after Oncle Jazon, and was soon tightly bound
+with rawhide thongs. He lay on his back panting and utterly
+exhausted, while Beverley still kept up the unequal fight.
+
+Long-Hair sprang in at the last moment to make doubly certain the
+securing of his most important captive. He flung his long and
+powerful arms around Beverley from behind and made a great effort
+to throw him upon the ground. The young man, feeling this fresh
+and vigorous clasp, turned himself about to put forth one more
+mighty spurt of power. He lifted the stalwart Indian bodily and
+dashed him headlong against the buttressed root of a tree half a
+rod distant, breaking the smaller bone of his left fore-arm and
+well-nigh knocking him senseless.
+
+It was a fine exhibition of manly strength; but there could be
+nothing gained by it. A blow on the back of his head the next
+instant stretched Beverley face downward and unconscious on the
+ground. The savages turned him over and looked satisfied when they
+found that he was not dead. They bound him with even greater care
+than they had shown in securing the others, while Long-Hair stood
+by stolidly looking on, meantime supporting his broken fore-arm in
+his hand.
+
+"Ugh! dog!" he grunted, and gave Beverley a kick in the side. Then
+turning a fiendish stare upon Oncle Jazon he proceeded to deliver
+against his old, dry ribs three or four like contributions with
+resounding effect. "Polecat! Little old greasy woman!" he snarled,
+"make good fire for warrior to dance by!" Kenton also received his
+full share of the kicks and verbal abuse, after which Long-Hair
+gave orders for fires to be built. Then he looked to his hurt arm
+and had the bone set and bandaged, never so much as wincing the
+while.
+
+It was soon apparent that the Indians purposed to celebrate their
+successful enterprise with a feast. They cooked a large amount of
+buffalo steak; then, each with his hands full of the savory meat,
+they began to dance around the fires, droning meantime an
+atrociously repellant chant.
+
+"They're a 'spectin' to hev a leetle bit o' fun outen us,"
+muttered Oncle Jazon to Beverley, who lay near him. "I onderstan'
+what they're up to, dad dast 'em! More'n forty years ago, in
+Ca'lina, they put me an' Jim Hipes through the ga'ntlet, an' arter
+thet, in Kaintuck, me an' Si Kenton tuck the run. Hi, there, Si!
+where air ye?"
+
+"Shut yer fool mouth," Kenton growled under his breath. "Ye'll
+have that Injun a kickin' our lights out of us again."
+
+Oncle Jazon winked at the gray sky and puckered his mouth so that
+it looked like a nutgall on an old, dry leaf.
+
+"What's the diff'ence?" he demanded. "I'd jest as soon be kicked
+now as arter while; it's got to come anyhow."
+
+Kenton made no response. The thongs were torturing his arms and
+legs. Beverley was silent, but consciousness had returned, and
+with it a sense of despair. All three of the prisoners lay face
+upward quite unable to move, knowing full well that a terrible
+ordeal awaited them. Oncle Jazon's grim humor could not be
+quenched, even by the galling agony of the thongs that buried
+themselves in the flesh, and the anticipation of torture beside
+which death would seem a luxury.
+
+"Yap! Long-Hair, how's yer arm?" he called jeeringly. "Feels pooty
+good, hay?"
+
+Long-Hair, who was not joining in the dance and song, turned when
+he heard these taunting words, and mistaking whence they came,
+went to Beverley's side and kicked him again and again.
+
+Oncle Jazon heard the loud blows, and considered the incident a
+remarkably good joke.
+
+"He, he, he!" he snickered, as soon as Long-Hair walked away
+again. "I does the talkin' an' somebody else gits the thumpin'!
+He, he, he! I always was devilish lucky. Them kicks was good solid
+jolts, wasn't they, Lieutenant? Sounded like they was. He, he,
+he!"
+
+Beverley gave no heed to Oncle Jazon's exasperating pleasantry;
+but Kenton, sorely chafing under the pressure of his bonds, could
+not refrain from making retort in kind.
+
+"I'd give ye one poundin' that ye'd remember, Emile Jazon, if I
+could get to ye, ye old twisted-face, peeled-headed, crooked-
+mouthed, aggravatin' scamp!" he exclaimed, not thinking how high
+his naturally strong voice was lifted. "I can stand any fool but a
+damn fool!"
+
+Long-Hair heard the concluding epithet and understood its meaning.
+Moreover, he thought himself the target at which it was so
+energetically launched. Wherefore he promptly turned back and gave
+Kenton a kicking that made his body resound not unlike a drum.
+
+And here it was that Oncle Jazon overreached himself. He was so
+delighted at Kenton's luck that he broke forth giggling and
+thereby drew against his own ribs a considerable improvement of
+Long-Hair's pedal applications.
+
+"Ventrebleu!" whined the old man, when the Indian had gone away
+again. "Holy Mary! Jee-ru-sa-lem! They's nary bone o' me left
+'at's not splintered as fine as toothpickers! S'pose yer satisfied
+now, ain't ye, Si Kenton? Ef ye ain't I'm shore to satisfy ye the
+fust time I git a chance at ye, ye blab-mouthed eejit!"
+
+Before this conversation was ended a rain began to fall, and it
+rapidly thickened from a desultory shower to a roaring downpour
+that effectually quenched not only the fires around which the
+savages were dancing, but the enthusiasm of the dancers as well.
+During the rest of the afternoon and all night long the fall was
+incessant, accompanied by a cold, panting, wailing southwest wind.
+
+Beverley lay on the ground, face upward, the rawhide strings
+torturing his limbs, the chill of cold water searching his bones.
+He could see nothing but the dim, strange canopy of flying rain,
+against which the bare boughs of the scrub oaks were vaguely
+outlined; he could hear nothing but the cry of the wind and the
+swash of the water which fell upon him and ran under him, bubbling
+and gurgling as if fiendishly exultant.
+
+The night dragged on through its terrible length, dealing out its
+indescribable horrors, and at last morning arrived, with a stingy
+and uncertain gift of light slowly increasing until the dripping
+trees appeared forlornly gray and brown against clouds now
+breaking into masses that gave but little rain.
+
+Beverley lived through the awful trial and even had the hardihood
+to brighten inwardly with the first flash of sunlight that shot
+through a cloud-crack on the eastern horizon. He thought of Alice,
+as he had done all night; but now the thought partook somehow of
+the glow yonder above old Vincennes, although he could only see
+its reflection.
+
+There was great stir among the Indians. Long-Hair stalked about
+scrutinizing the ground. Beverley saw him come near time and again
+with a hideous, inquiring scowl on his face. Grunts and laconic
+exclamations passed from mouth to mouth, and presently the import
+of it all could not be mistaken. Kenton and Jazon were gone--had
+escaped during the night--and the rain had completely obliterated
+their tracks.
+
+The Indians were furious. Long-Hair sent out picked parties of his
+best scouts with orders to scour the country in all directions,
+keeping with himself a few of the older warriors. Beverley was fed
+what he would eat of venison, and Long-Hair made him understand
+that he would have to suffer some terrible punishment on account
+of the action of his companions.
+
+Late in the day the scouts straggled back with the report that no
+track or sign of the fugitives had been discovered, and
+immediately a consultation was held. Most of the warriors,
+including all of the young bucks, demanded a torture entertainment
+as compensation for their exertions and the unexpected loss of
+their own prisoners; for it had been agreed that Beverley belonged
+exclusively to Long-Hair, who objected to anything which might
+deprive him of the great reward offered by Hamilton for the
+prisoner if brought to him alive.
+
+In the end it was agreed that Beverley should be made to run the
+gauntlet, provided that no deadly weapons were used upon him
+during the ordeal.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+A PRISONER OF LOVE
+
+
+Alice put on her warmest clothes and followed Captain Farnsworth
+to the fort, realizing that no pleasant experience awaited her.
+The wind and rain still prevailed when they were ready to set
+forth, and, although it was not extremely cold, a searching chill
+went with every throb that marked the storm's waves. No lights
+shone in the village houses. Overhead a gray gloom covered stars
+and sky, making the darkness in the watery streets seem densely
+black. Farnsworth offered Alice his arm, but she did not accept
+it.
+
+"I know the way better than you do," she said. "Come on, and don't
+be afraid that I am going to run. I shall not play any trick on
+you."
+
+"Very well, Mademoiselle, as you like. I trust you."
+
+He followed her from the house. He was so filled with the
+bitterness of what he was doing that he carried her sword in his
+hand all the way to the fort, quite unaware that its point often
+touched her dress so that she plainly felt it. Indeed, she thought
+he was using that ruffianly and dangerous means of keeping pace
+with her. He had sent the patrol on its rounds, taking upon
+himself the responsibility of delivering her to Hamilton. She
+almost ran, urged by the strange excitement that burned in her
+heart, and he followed somewhat awkwardly, stumbling over the
+unfamiliar way in the rain and darkness.
+
+At every step he was wishing that she would escape from him.
+Coarse as his nature was and distorted by hardening experiences,
+it was rooted in good English honesty and imbued with a chivalric
+spirit. When, as happened too often, he fell under the influence
+of liquor, the bad in him promptly came uppermost; but at all
+other times his better traits made him a good fellow to meet,
+genial, polite, generous, and inclined to recognize the finer
+sentiments of manliness. To march into his commander's presence
+with Alice as his prisoner lacked everything of agreeing with his
+taste; yet he had not been willing to give her over into the hands
+of the patrol. If his regard for military obligation had not been
+exceptionally strong, even for an English soldier, he would have
+given way to the temptation of taking her to some place of hiding
+and safety, instead of brutally subjecting her to Hamilton's harsh
+judgment. He anticipated a trying experience for her on account of
+this new transgression.
+
+They hastened along until a lantern in the fort shot a hazy gleam
+upon them.
+
+"Stop a moment, Mademoiselle," Farnsworth called. "I say, Miss
+Roussillon, stop a moment, please."
+
+Alice halted and turned facing him so short and so suddenly that
+the rapier in his hand pricked through her wraps and slightly
+scratched her arm.
+
+"What do you mean, sir?" she demanded, thinking that he had thrust
+purposely. "Do I deserve this brutality?"
+
+"You mistake me, Miss Roussillon. I cannot be brutal to you now.
+Do not fear me; I only had a word to say."
+
+"Oh, you deem it very polite and gentle to jab me with your sword,
+do you? If I had one in my hand you would not dare try such a
+thing, and you know it very well."
+
+He was amazed, not knowing that the sword-point had touched her.
+He could not see her face, but there was a flash in her voice that
+startled him with its indignant contempt and resentment.
+
+"What are you saying, Miss Roussillon? I don't understand you.
+When did I ever--when did I jab you with my sword? I never thought
+of such a thing."
+
+"This moment, sir, you did, and you know you did. My arm is
+bleeding now."
+
+She spoke rapidly in French; but he caught her meaning, and for
+the first became aware of the rapier in his hand. Even then its
+point was toward her and very near her breast. He lowered it
+instantly while the truth rushed into his mind.
+
+"Forgive me," he murmured, his words barely audible in the tumult
+of wind and rain, but charged with the intensest feeling.
+
+"Forgive me; I did not know--it was an accident--I could not do
+such a thing purposely. Believe me, believe me, Miss Roussillon. I
+did not mean it."
+
+She stood facing him, trying to look right into his eyes. A
+quality in his voice had checked her hot anger. She could only see
+his dim outlines in the dull gleam from the fort's lantern. He
+seemed to be forlornly wretched.
+
+"I should like to believe you," she presently said, "but I cannot.
+You English are all, all despicable, mean, vile!"
+
+She was remembering the young officer who had assaulted her with
+his sword in the house a while ago. And (what a strange thing the
+human brain is!) she at the same time comforted herself with the
+further thought that Beverley would never, never, be guilty of
+rudeness to a woman.
+
+"Some time you shall not say that," Farnsworth responded. "I asked
+you to stop a moment that I might beg you to believe how
+wretchedly sorry I am for what I am doing. But you cannot
+understand me now. Are you really hurt, Miss Roussillon? I assure
+you that it was purely accidental."
+
+"My hurt is nothing," she said.
+
+"I am very glad."
+
+"Well, then, shall we go on to the fort?"
+
+"You may go where you please, Mademoiselle."
+
+She turned her back upon him and without an answering word walked
+straight to the lantern that hung by the gate of the stockade,
+where a sentinel tramped to and fro. A few moments later Captain
+Farnsworth presented her to Hamilton, who had been called from his
+bed when the news of the trouble at Roussillon place reached the
+fort.
+
+"So you've been raising hell again, have you, Miss?" he growled,
+with an ugly frown darkening his face.
+
+"I beg your pardon," said Farnsworth, "Miss Roussillon was not to
+blame for--"
+
+"In your eyes she'd not be to blame, sir, if she burned up the
+fort and all of us in it," Hamilton gruffly interrupted. "Miss,
+what have you been doing? What are you here for? Captain
+Farnsworth, you will please state the particulars of the trouble
+that I have just heard about. And I may as well notify you that I
+wish to hear no special lover's pleading in this girl's behalf."
+
+Farnsworth's face whitened with anger; he bit his lip and a shiver
+ran through his frame; but he had to conquer the passion. In a few
+words, blunt and direct as musket-balls, he told all the
+circumstances of what had taken place, making no concealments to
+favor Alice, but boldly blaming the officer of the patrol,
+Lieutenant Barlow, for losing his head and attacking a young girl
+in her own home.
+
+"I will hear from Barlow," said Hamilton, after listening
+attentively to the story. "But take this girl and confine her.
+Show her no favors. I hold you responsible for her until to-morrow
+morning. You can retire."
+
+There was no room for discussion. Farnsworth saluted and turned to
+Alice.
+
+"Come with me," he gently said.
+
+Hamilton looked after them as they went out of his room, a curious
+smile playing around his firmly set lips.
+
+"She's the most beautiful vixen that I ever saw," he thought. "She
+doesn't look to be a French girl, either--decidedly English." He
+shrugged his shoulders, then laughed dryly. "Farnsworth's as crazy
+as can be, the beggar; in love with her so deep that he can't see
+out. By Jove, she IS a beauty! Never saw such eyes. And plucky to
+beat the devil. I'll bet my head Barlow'll be daft about her
+next!"
+
+Still, notwithstanding the lightness of his inward comments,
+Hamilton regarded the incident as rather serious. He knew that the
+French inhabitants were secretly his bitter enemies, yet probably
+willing, if he would humor their peculiar social, domestic and
+commercial prejudices, to refrain from active hostilities, and
+even to aid him in furnishing his garrison with a large amount of
+needed supplies. The danger just now was twofold; his Indian
+allies were deserting him, and a flotilla loaded with provisions
+and ammunition from Detroit had failed to arrive. He might, if the
+French rose against him and were joined by the Indians, have great
+difficulty defending the fort. It was clear that M. Roussillon had
+more influence with both creoles and savages than any other person
+save Father Beret. Urgent policy dictated that these two men
+should somehow be won over. But to do this it would be necessary
+to treat Alice in such a way that her arrest would aid, instead of
+operating against the desired result,--a thing not easy to manage.
+
+Hamilton was not a man of fine scruples, but he may have been,
+probably was, better than our American historians have made him
+appear. His besetting weakness, which, as a matter of course, he
+regarded as the highest flower of efficiency, was an
+uncontrollable temper, a lack of fine human sympathy and an
+inability to forgive. In his calmest moments, when prudence
+appealed to him, he would resolve to use diplomatic means; but no
+sooner was his opinion questioned or his purpose opposed than
+anger and the thirst for revenge overpowered every gentler
+consideration. He returned to his bed that night fully resolved
+upon a pleasant and successful interview with Alice next morning.
+
+Captain Farnsworth took his fair prisoner straight-way from
+Hamilton's presence to a small room connected with a considerable
+structure in a distant angle of the stockade. Neither he nor Alice
+spoke on the way. With a huge wooden key he unlocked the door and
+stepped aside for her to enter. A dim lamp was burning within, its
+yellowish light flickering over the scant furniture, which
+consisted of a comfortable bed, a table with some books on it,
+three chairs, a small looking-glass on the wall, a guitar and some
+articles of men's clothing hanging here and there. A heap of dull
+embers smouldered in the fireplace. Alice did not falter at the
+threshold, but promptly entered her prison.
+
+"I hope you can be comfortable," said Farnsworth in a low tone.
+"It's the best I can give you."
+
+"Thank you," was the answer spoken quite as if he had handed her a
+glass of water or picked up her handkerchief.
+
+He held the door a moment, while she stopped, with her back toward
+him, in the middle of the room; then she heard him close and lock
+it. The air was almost too warm after her exposure to the biting
+wind and cold dashes of rain. She cast off her outer wraps and
+stood by the fireplace. At a glance she comprehended that the
+place was not the one she had formerly occupied as a prisoner, and
+that it belonged to a man. A long rifle stood in a corner, a
+bullet-pouch and powder-horn hanging on a projecting hickory
+ramrod; a heavy fur top-coat lay across one of the chairs.
+
+Alice felt her situation bitterly enough; but she was not of the
+stuff that turns to water at the touch of misfortune. Pioneer
+women took hardships as a matter of course, and met calamity with
+admirable fortitude. There was no wringing of hands, no frantic
+wailing, no hollow, despairing groan. While life lasted hope
+flourished, even in most tragic surroundings; and not unfrequently
+succor came, at the last verge of destruction, as the fitting
+reward of unconquerable courage. A girl like Alice must be
+accepted in the spirit of her time and surroundings. She was born
+amid experiences scarcely credible now, and bred in an area and an
+atmosphere of incomparable dangers. Naturally she accepted
+conditions of terrible import with a sang froid scarcely possible
+to a girl of our day. She did not cry, she did not sink down
+helpless when she found herself once more imprisoned with some
+uncertain trial before her; but simply knelt and repeated the
+Lord's prayer, then went to bed and slept; even dreamed the dream
+of a maid's first love.
+
+Meantime Farnsworth, who had given Alice his own apartment, took
+what rest he could on the cold ground under a leaky shed hard by.
+His wound, not yet altogether healed, was not benefited by the
+exposure.
+
+In due time next morning Hamilton ordered Alice brought to his
+office, and when she appeared he was smiling with as near an
+approach to affability as his disposition would permit. He rose
+and bowed like a courtier.
+
+"I hope you rested well, Mademoiselle," he said in his best
+French. He imagined that the use of her language would be
+agreeable to begin with.
+
+The moment that Alice saw him wearing that shallow veneering of
+pleasantness on his never prepossessing visage, she felt a mood of
+perversity come over her. She, too. smiled, and he mistook her
+expression for one of reciprocal amenity. She noticed that her
+sword was on his table.
+
+"I am sorry, Monsieur, that I cannot say as much to you," she
+glibly responded. "If you lay upon a bed of needles the whole
+night through, your rest was better than you deserved. My own
+sleep was quite refreshing, thank you."
+
+Instantly Hamilton's choler rose. He tried to suppress it at
+first; but when he saw Alice actually laughing, and Farnsworth
+(who had brought her in) biting his lip furiously to keep from
+adding an uproarious guffaw, he lost all hold of himself. He
+unconsciously picked up the rapier and shook it till its blade
+swished.
+
+"I might have known better than to expect decency from a wench of
+your character," he said. "I hoped to do you a favor; but I see
+that you are not capable of accepting kindness politely."
+
+"I am sure, Monsieur, that I have but spoken the truth plainly to
+you. You would not have me do otherwise, I hope."
+
+Her voice, absolutely witching in its softness, freshness and
+suavity, helped the assault of her eyes, while her dimples
+twinkled and her hair shone. Hamilton felt his heart move
+strangely; but he could not forbear saying in English:
+
+"If you are so devilish truthful, Miss, you will probably tell me
+where the flag is that you stole and hid."
+
+It was always the missing banner that came to mind when he saw
+her.
+
+"Indeed I will do nothing of the sort," she promptly replied.
+"When you see that flag again you will be a prisoner and I will
+wave it high over your head."
+
+She lifted a hand as she spoke and made the motion of shaking a
+banner above him. It was exasperation sweetened almost to delight
+that took hold of the sturdy Briton. He liked pluck, especially in
+a woman; all the more if she was beautiful. Yet the very fact that
+he felt her charm falling upon him set him hard against her, not
+as Hamilton the man, but as Hamilton the commander at Vincennes.
+
+"You think to fling yourself upon me as you have upon Captain
+Farnsworth," he said, with an insulting leer and in a tone of
+prurient innuendo. "I am not susceptible, my dear." This more for
+Farnsworth's benefit than to insult her, albeit he was not in a
+mood to care.
+
+"You are a coward and a liar!" she exclaimed, her face flushing
+with hot shame. "You stand here," she quickly added, turning
+fiercely upon Farnsworth, "and quietly listen to such words! You,
+too, are a coward if you do not make him retract! Oh, you English
+are low brutes!"
+
+Hamilton laughed; but Farnsworth looked dark and troubled, his
+glance going back and forth from Alice to his commander, as if
+another word would cause him to do something terrible.
+
+"I rather think I've heard all that I care to hear from you,
+Miss," Hamilton presently said. "Captain Farnsworth, you will see
+that the prisoner is confined in the proper place, which, I
+suggest to you, is not your sleeping quarters, sir."
+
+"Colonel Hamilton," said Farnsworth in a husky voice, "I slept on
+the ground under a shed last night in order that Miss Roussillon
+might be somewhat comfortable."
+
+"Humph! Well, see that you do not do it again. This girl is guilty
+of harboring a spy and resisting a lawful attempt of my guards to
+capture him. Confine her in the place prepared for prisoners and
+see that she stays there until I am ready to fix her punishment."
+
+"There is no place fit for a young girl to stay in," Farnsworth
+ventured. "She can have no comfort or--"
+
+"Take her along, sir; any place is good enough for her so long as
+she behaves like a--"
+
+"Very well," Farnsworth bluntly interrupted, thus saving Alice the
+stroke of a vile comparison. "Come with me, please, Miss
+Roussillon."
+
+He pulled her toward the door, then dropped the arm he had grasped
+and murmured an apology.
+
+She followed him out, holding her head high. No one looking on
+would have suspected that a sinking sensation in her heart made it
+difficult for her to walk, or that her eyes, shining like stars,
+were so inwardly clouded with distress that she saw her way but
+dimly.
+
+It was a relief to Hamilton when Helm a few minutes later entered
+the room with something breezy to say.
+
+"What's up now, if I may ask?" the jolly American demanded.
+"What's this I hear about trouble with the French women? Have they
+begun a revolution?"
+
+"That elephant, Gaspard Roussillon, came back into town last
+night," said Hamilton sulkily.
+
+"Well, he went out again, didn't he?"
+
+"Yes, but--"
+
+"Stepped on somebody's toe first, eh?"
+
+"The guard tried to capture him, and that girl of his wounded
+Lieutenant Barlow in the neck with a sword. Roussillon fought like
+a tiger and the men swear that the devil himself appeared on the
+scene to help the Frenchman out."
+
+"Moral: Be generous in your dealings with Frenchmen and
+Frenchwomen and so get the devil on your side."
+
+"I've got the girl a prisoner, and I swear to you that I'll have
+her shot this time if--"
+
+"Why not shoot her yourself? You oughtn't to shirk a dirty job
+like that and force it upon your men."
+
+Hamilton laughed and elevated his shoulders as if to shake off an
+annoying load. Just then a young officer with a white bandage
+around his neck entered and saluted. He was a small, soft-haired,
+blue-eyed man of reckless bearing, with marks of dissipation
+sharply cut into his face. He saluted, smiling self-consciously.
+
+"Well, Barlow," said Hamilton, "the kitten scratched you, did
+she?"
+
+"Yes, slightly, and I don't think I've been treated fairly in the
+matter, sir."
+
+"How so?"
+
+"I stood the brunt and now Captain Farnsworth gets the prize." He
+twisted his mouth in mock expression of maudlin disappointment.
+"I'm always cheated out of the sweets. I never get anything for
+gallant conduct on the field."
+
+"Poor boy! It is a shame. But I say, Lieutenant, has Roussillon
+really escaped, or is he hidden somewhere in town? Have you been
+careful?"
+
+"Oh, it's the Indians. They all swear by these Frenchmen. You
+can't get any help from them against a fellow like Roussillon. In
+fact they aid him; he's among them now."
+
+"Moral again," Helm interposed; "keep on the good side of the
+French!"
+
+"That's sensible talk, sir," assented Barlow.
+
+"Bah!" exclaimed Hamilton. "You might as well talk of keeping on
+the good side of the American traitors--a bloody murrain seize the
+whole race!"
+
+"That's what I say," chimed in the Lieutenant, with a sly look at
+Helm.
+
+"They have been telling me a cock-and-bull story concerning the
+affair at the Roussillon cabin," Hamilton said, changing his
+manner. "What is this about a disguised and wonderful man who
+rushed in and upset the whole of you. I want no romancing; give me
+the facts."
+
+Barlow's dissolute countenance became troubled.
+
+"The facts," he said, speaking with serious deliberation, "are not
+clear. It was like a clap of thunder, the way that man performed.
+As you say, he did fling the whole squad all of a heap, and it was
+done that quickly," he snapped his thumb and finger
+demonstratively with a sharp report; "nobody could understand it."
+
+Hamilton looked at his subaltern with a smile of unlimited
+contempt and said:
+
+"A pretty officer of His Majesty's army, you are, Lieutenant
+Barlow! First a slip of a girl shows herself your superior with
+the sword and wounds you, then a single man wipes up the floor of
+a house with you and your guard, depriving you at the same time of
+both vision and memory, so that you cannot even describe your
+assailant!"
+
+"He was dressed like a priest," muttered Barlow, evidently
+frightened at his commander's scathing comment. "That was all
+there was to see."
+
+"A priest! Some of the men say the devil. I wonder--" Hamilton
+hesitated and looked at the floor.
+
+"This Father Beret, he is too old for such a thing, isn't he?"
+
+"I have thought of him--it was like him--but he is, as you say,
+very old to be so tremendously strong and active. Why, I tell you
+that men went from his hands against the walls and floor as if
+shot out of a mortar. It was the strangest and most astounding
+thing I ever heard of."
+
+A little later Barlow seized a favorable opportunity and withdrew.
+The conversation was not to his liking.
+
+Hamilton sent for Father Beret and had a long talk with him, but
+the old man looked so childishly inoffensive in spirit and so
+collapsed physically that it seemed worse than foolishness to
+accuse him of the exploit over which the entire garrison was
+wondering. Farnsworth sat by during the interview. He looked the
+good priest curiously and critically over from head to foot,
+remembering, but not mentioning, the most unclerical punch in the
+side received from that energetic right arm now lying so flabbily
+across the old man's lap.
+
+When the talk ended and Father Beret humbly took his leave,
+Hamilton turned to Farnsworth and said:
+
+"What do you think of this affair? I have cross-questioned all
+the men who took part in it, and every one of them says simply
+priest or devil. I think old Beret is both; but plainly he
+couldn't hurt a chicken, you can see that at a glance."
+
+Farnsworth smiled, rubbing his side reminiscently; but he shook
+his head.
+
+"I'm sure it's puzzling, indeed."
+
+Hamilton sat in thoughtful silence for a while, then abruptly
+changed the subject.
+
+"I think, Captain, that you had better send out Lieutenant Barlow
+and some of the best woodsmen to kill some game. We need fresh
+venison, and, by George! I'm not going to depend upon these French
+traitors any longer. I have set my foot down; they've got to do
+better or take the consequences." He paused for a breath, then
+added: "That girl has done too much to escape severest punishment.
+The garrison will be demoralized if this thing goes on without an
+example of authority rigidly enforced. I am resolved that there
+shall be a startling and effective public display of my power to
+punish. She shot you; you seem to be glad of it, but it was a
+grave offence. She has stabbed Barlow; that is another serious
+crime; but worst of all she aided a spy and resisted arrest. She
+must be punished."
+
+Farnsworth knew Hamilton's nature, and he now saw that Alice was
+in dreadful danger of death or something even worse. Whenever his
+chief talked of discipline and the need of maintaining his
+authority, there was little hope of softening his decisions.
+Moreover, the provocation to apply extreme measures really seemed
+sufficient, regarded from a military point of view, and Captain
+Farnsworth was himself, under ordinary circumstances, a
+disciplinarian of the strictest class. The fascination, however,
+by which Alice held him overbore every other influence, and his
+devotion to her loosened every other tie and obligation to a most
+dangerous extent. No sooner had he left headquarters and given
+Barlow his instructions touching the hunting expedition, than his
+mind began to wander amid visions and schemes by no means
+consistent with his military obligations. In order to reflect
+undisturbed he went forth into the dreary, lane-like streets of
+Vincennes and walked aimlessly here and there until he met Father
+Beret.
+
+Farnsworth saluted the old man, and was passing him by, when
+seeing a sword in his hand, half hidden in the folds of his worn
+and faded cassock, he turned and addressed him.
+
+"Why are you armed this morning, Father?" he demanded very
+pleasantly. "Who is to suffer now?"
+
+"I am not on the war-path, my son," replied the priest. "It is but
+a rapier that I am going to clean of rust spots that are gathering
+on its blade."
+
+"Is it yours, Father? Let me see it." He held out his hand.
+
+"No, not mine."
+
+Father Beret seemed not to notice Farnsworth's desire to handle
+the weapon, and the young man, instead of repeating his words,
+reached farther, nearly grasping the scabbard.
+
+"I cannot let you take it, my son," said Father Beret "You have
+its mate, that should satisfy you."
+
+"No, Colonel Hamilton took it," Farnsworth quickly replied. "If I
+could I would gladly return it to its owner. I am not a thief,
+Father, and I am ashamed of--of--what I did when I was drunk."
+
+The priest looked sharply into Farnsworth's eyes and read there
+something that reassured him. His long experience had rendered him
+adept at taking a man's value at a glance. He slightly lifted his
+face and said: "Ah, but the poor little girl! why do you persecute
+her? She really does not deserve it. She is a noble child. Give
+her back to her home and her people. Do not soil and spoil her
+sweet life."
+
+It was the sing-song voice used by Father Beret in his sermons and
+prayers; but something went with it indescribably touching.
+Farnsworth felt a lump rise in his throat and his eyes were ready
+to show tears. "Father," he said, with difficulty making his words
+distinct, "I would not harm Miss Roussillon to save my own life,
+and I would do anything--" he paused slightly, then added with
+passionate force; "I would do anything, no matter what, to save
+her from the terrible thing that now threatens her."
+
+Father Beret's countenance changed curiously as he gazed at the
+young man and said:
+
+"If you really mean what you say, you can easily save her, my
+son."
+
+"Father, by all that is holy, I mean just what I say."
+
+"Swear not at all, my son, but give me your hand."
+
+The two men stood with a tight grip between them and exchanged a
+long, steady, searching gaze.
+
+A drizzling rain had begun to fall again, with a raw wind creeping
+from the west.
+
+"Come with me to my house, my son," Father Beret presently added;
+and together they went, the priest covering Alice's sword from the
+rain with the folds of his cassock.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+VIRTUE IN A LOCKET
+
+
+Long-Hair stood not upon ceremony in conveying to Beverley the
+information that he was to run the gauntlet, which, otherwise
+stated, meant that the Indians would form themselves in two
+parallel lines facing each other about six feet apart, and that
+the prisoner would be expected to run down the length of the space
+between, thus affording the warriors an opportunity, greatly
+coveted and relished by their fiendish natures, to beat him
+cruelly during his flight. This sort of thing was to the Indians,
+indeed, an exquisite amusement, as fascinating to them as the
+theater is to more enlightened people. No sooner was it agreed
+upon that the entertainment should again be undertaken than all
+the younger men began to scurry around getting everything ready
+for it. Their faces glowed with a droll cruelty strange to see,
+and they further expressed their lively expectations by playful
+yet curiously solemn antics.
+
+The preparations were simple and quickly made. Each man armed
+himself with a stick three feet long and about three-quarters of
+an inch in diameter. Rough weapons they were, cut from boughs of
+scrub-oak, knotty and tough as horn. Long-Hair unbound Beverley
+and stripped his clothes from his body down to the waist. Then the
+lines formed, the Indians in each row standing about as far apart
+as the width of the space in which the prisoner was to run. This
+arrangement gave them free use of their sticks and plenty of room
+for full swing of their lithe bodies.
+
+In removing Beverley's clothes Long-Hair found Alice's locket
+hanging over the young man's heart. He tore it rudely off and
+grunted, glaring viciously, first at it, then at Beverley. He
+seemed to be mightily wrought upon.
+
+"White man damn thief," he growled deep in his throat; "stole from
+little girl!"
+
+He put the locket in his pouch and resumed his stupidly
+indifferent expression.
+
+When everything was ready for the delightful entertainment to
+begin, Long-Hair waved his tomahawk three times over Beverley's
+head, and pointing down between the waiting lines said:
+
+"Ugh, run!"
+
+But Beverley did not budge. He was standing erect, with his arms,
+deeply creased where the thongs had sunk, folded across his
+breast. A rush of thoughts and feelings had taken tumultuous
+possession of him and he could not move or decide what to do. A
+mad desire to escape arose in his heart the moment that he saw
+Long-Hair take the locket. It was as if Alice had cried to him and
+bidden him make a dash for liberty.
+
+"Ugh, run!"
+
+The order was accompanied with a push of such violence from Long-
+Hair's left elbow that Beverley plunged and fell, for his limbs,
+after their long and painful confinement in the raw-hide bonds,
+were stiff and almost useless. Long-Hair in no gentle voice bade
+him get up. The shock of falling seemed to awaken his dormant
+forces; a sudden resolve leaped into his brain. He saw that the
+Indians had put aside their bows and guns, most of which were
+leaning against the boles of trees here and yonder. What if he
+could knock Long-Hair down and run away? This might possibly be
+easy, considering the Indian's broken arm. His heart jumped at the
+possibility. But the shrewd savage was alert and saw the thought
+come into his face.
+
+"You try git 'way, kill dead!" he snarled, lifting his tomahawk
+ready for a stroke. "Brains out, damn!"
+
+Beverley glanced down the waiting and eager lines. Swiftly he
+speculated, wondering what would be his chance for escape were he
+to break through. But he did not take his own condition into
+account.
+
+"Ugh, run!"
+
+Again the elbow of Long-Hair's hurt arm pushed him toward the
+expectant rows of Indians, who flourished their clubs and uttered
+impatient grunts.
+
+This time he did not fall; but in trying to run he limped stiffly
+at first, his legs but slowly and imperfectly regaining their
+strength and suppleness from the action. Just before reaching the
+lines, however, he stopped short. Long-Hair, who was close behind
+him, took hold of his shoulder and led him back to the starting
+place. The big Indian's arm must have given him pain when he thus
+used it, but he did not wince. "Fool--kill dead!" he repeated two
+or three times, holding his tomahawk on high with threatening
+motions and frequent repetitions of his one echo from the
+profanity of civilization. He was beginning to draw his mouth down
+at the corners, and his eyes were narrowed to mere slits.
+
+Beverley understood now that he could not longer put off the
+trial. He must choose between certain death and the torture of the
+gauntlet, as frontiersmen named this savage ordeal. An old man
+might have preferred the stroke of the hatchet to such an
+infliction as the clubs must afford, considering that, even after
+all the agony, his captivity and suffering would be only a little
+nearer its end. Youth, however, has faith in the turn of fortune's
+wheel, and faith in itself, no matter how dark the prospect. Hope
+blows her horn just over the horizon, and the strain bids the
+young heart take courage and beat strong. Moreover, men were men,
+who led the van in those days on the outmost lines of our march to
+the summit of the world. Beverley was not more a hero than any
+other young, brave, unconquerable patriot of the frontier army.
+His situation simply tried him a trifle harder than was common.
+But it must be remembered that he had Love with him, and where
+Love is there can be no cowardice, no surrender.
+
+Long-Hair once again pushed him and said
+
+"Ugh, run!"
+
+Beverley made a direct dash for the narrow lane between the braced
+and watchful lines. Every warrior lifted his club; every copper
+face gleamed stolidly, a mask behind which burned a strangely
+atrocious spirit. The two savages standing at the end nearest
+Beverley struck at him the instant he reached than, but they taken
+quite by surprise when he checked himself between them and,
+leaping this way and that, swung out two powerful blows, left and
+right, stretching one of them flat and sending the other reeling
+and staggering half a dozen paces backward with the blood
+streaming from his nose.
+
+This done, Beverley turned to run away, but his breath was already
+short and his strength rapidly going.
+
+Long-Hair, who was at his heels, leaped before him when he had
+gone but a few steps and once more flourished the tomahawk. To
+struggle was useless, save to insist upon being brained outright,
+which just then had no part in Beverley's considerations. Long-
+Hair kicked his victim heavily, uttering laconic curses meanwhile,
+and led him back again to the starting-point.
+
+A genuine sense of humor seems almost entirely lacking in the mind
+of the American Indian. He smiles at things not in the least
+amusing to us and when he laughs, which is very seldom, the cause
+of his merriment usually lies in something repellantly cruel and
+inhuman. When Beverley struck his two assailants, hurting them so
+that one lay half stunned, while the other spun away from his fist
+with a smashed nose, all the rest of the Indians grunted and
+laughed raucously in high delight. They shook their clubs, danced,
+pointed at their discomfited fellows and twisted their painted
+faces into knotted wrinkles, their eyes twinkling with devilish
+expression of glee quite indescribable.
+
+"Ugh, damn, run!" said Long-Half, this time adding a hard kick to
+the elbow-shove he gave Beverley.
+
+The young man, who had borne all he could, now turned upon him
+furiously and struck straight from the shoulder, setting the whole
+weight of his body into the blow. Long-Hair stepped out of the way
+and quick as a flash brought the flat side of his tomahawk with
+great force against Beverley's head. This gave the amusement a
+sudden and disappointing end, for the prisoner fell limp and
+senseless to the ground. No more running the gauntlet for him that
+day. Indeed it required protracted application of the best Indian
+skill to revive him so that he could fairly be called a living
+man. There had been no dangerous concussion, however, and on the
+following morning camp was broken.
+
+Beverley, sore, haggard, forlornly disheveled, had his arms bound
+again and was made to march apace with his nimble enemies, who set
+out swiftly eastward, their disappointment at having their sport
+cut short, although bitter enough, not in the least indicated by
+any facial expression or spiteful act.
+
+Was it really a strange thing, or was it not, that Beverley's mind
+now busied itself unceasingly with the thought that Long-Hair had
+Alice's picture in his pouch? One might find room for discussion
+of a cerebral problem like this; but our history cannot be delayed
+with analyses and speculations; it must run its direct course
+unhindered to the end. Suffice it to record that, while tramping
+at Long-Hair's side and growing more and more desirous of seeing
+the picture again, Beverley began trying to converse with his
+taciturn captor. He had a considerable smattering of several
+Indian dialects, which he turned upon Long-Hair to the best of
+his ability, but apparently without effect. Nevertheless he
+babbled at intervals, always upon the same subject and always
+endeavoring to influence that huge, stolid, heartless savage in
+the direction of letting him see again the child face of the
+miniature.
+
+A stone, one of our travel-scarred and mysterious western granite
+bowlders brought from the far north by the ancient ice, would show
+as much sympathy as did the face of Long-Hair. Once in a while he
+gave Beverley a soulless glance and said "damn" with utter
+indifference. Nothing, however, could quench or even in the
+slightest sense allay the lover's desire. He talked of Alice and
+the locket with constantly increasing volubility, saying over and
+over phrases of endearment in a half-delirious way, not aware that
+fever was fermenting his blood and heating his brain. Probably he
+would have been very ill but for the tremendous physical exercise
+forced upon him. The exertion kept him in a profuse perspiration
+and his robust constitution cast off the malarial poison. Meantime
+he used every word and phrase, every grunt and gesture of Indian
+dialect that he could recall, in the iterated and reiterated
+attempt to make Long-Hair understand what he wanted.
+
+When night came on again the band camped under some trees beside a
+swollen stream. There was no rain falling, but almost the entire
+country lay under a flood of water. Fires of logs were soon
+burning brightly on the comparatively dry bluff chosen by the
+Indians. The weather was chill, but not cold. Long-Hair took
+great pains, however, to dry Beverley's clothes and see that he
+had warm wraps and plenty to eat. Hamilton's large reward would
+not be forthcoming should the prisoner die, Beverley was good
+property, well worth careful attention. To be sure his scalp, in
+the worst event, would command a sufficient honorarium, but not
+the greatest. Beverley thought of all this while the big Indian
+was wrapping him snugly in skins and blankets for the night, and
+there was no comfort in it, save that possibly if he were returned
+to Hamilton he might see Alice again before he died.
+
+A fitful wind cried dolefully in the leafless treetops, the stream
+hard by gave forth a rushing sound, and far away some wolves
+howled like lost souls. Worn out, sore from head to foot,
+Beverley, deep buried in the blankets and skins, soon fell into a
+profound sleep. The fires slowly crumbled and faded; no sentinel
+was posted, for the Indians did not fear an attack, there being no
+enemies that they knew of nearer than Kaskaskia. The camp
+slumbered as one man.
+
+At about the mid-hour of the night Long-Hair gently awoke his
+prisoner by drawing a hand across his face, then whispered in his
+ear:
+
+"Damn, still!"
+
+Beverley tried to rise, uttering a sleepy ejaculation under his
+breath. "No talk," hissed Long-Hair. "Still!"
+
+There was something in his voice that not only swept the last film
+of sleep out of Beverley's brain, but made it perfectly clear to
+him that a very important bit of craftiness was being performed;
+just what its nature was, however, he could not surmise. One thing
+was obvious, Long-Hair did not wish the other Indians to know of
+the move he was making. Deftly he slipped the blankets from around
+Beverley, and cut the thongs at his ankles.
+
+"Still!" he whispered. "Come 'long."
+
+Under such circumstances a competent mind acts with lightning
+celerity. Beverley now understood that Long-Hair was stealing him
+away from the other savages and that the big villain meant to
+cheat them out of their part of the reward. Along with this
+discovery came a fresh gleam of hope. It would be far easier to
+escape from one Indian than from nearly a score. Ah, he would
+follow Long-Hair, indeed he would! The needed courage came with
+the thought, and so with immense labor he crept at the heels of
+that crawling monster. It was a painful process, for his arms were
+still fast bound at the wrists with the raw-hide strings; but
+what was pain to him? He shivered with joy, thinking of what might
+happen. The voice of the wind overhead and the noisy bubbling of
+the stream near by were cheerful and cheering sounds to him now.
+So much can a mere shadow of hope do for a human soul on the verge
+of despair! Already he was planning or trying to plan some way by
+which he could kill Long-Hair when they should reach a safe
+distance from the sleeping camp.
+
+But how could the thing be done? A man with his hands tied, though
+they are in front of him, is in no excellent condition to cope
+with a free and stalwart savage armed to the teeth. Still
+Beverley's spirits rose with every rod of distance that was added
+to their slow progress.
+
+Their course was nearly parallel with that of the stream, but
+slightly converging toward it, and after they had gone about a
+furlong they reached the bank. Here Long-Hair stopped and, without
+a word, cut the thongs from Beverley's wrists. This was
+astounding; the young man could scarcely realize it, nor was he
+ready to act.
+
+"Swim water," Long-Hair said in a guttural murmur barely audible.
+"Swim, damn!"
+
+Again it was necessary for Beverley's mind to act swiftly and with
+prudence. The camp was yet within hailing distance. A false move
+now would bring the whole pack howling to the rescue. Something
+told him to do as Long-Hair ordered, so with scarcely a
+perceptible hesitation he scrambled down the bushy bank and
+slipped into the water, followed by Long-Hair, who seized him by
+one arm when he began to swim, and struck out with him into the
+boiling and tumbling current.
+
+Beverley had always thought himself a master swimmer, but Long-
+Hair showed him his mistake. The giant Indian, with but one hand
+free to use, fairly rushed through that deadly cold and turbulent
+water, bearing his prisoner with him despite the wounded arm, as
+easily as if towing him at the stern of a pirogue. True, his
+course was down stream for a considerable distance, but even when
+presently he struck out boldly for the other bank, breasting a
+current in which few swimmers could have lived, much less made
+headway, he still swung forward rapidly, splitting the waves and
+scarcely giving Beverley freedom enough so that he could help in
+the progress. It was a long, cold struggle, and when at last they
+touched the sloping low bank on the other side, Long-Hair had
+fairly to lift his chilled and exhausted prisoner to the top.
+
+"Ugh, cold," he grunted, beginning to pound and rub Beverley's
+arms, legs and body. "Make warm, damn heap!"
+
+All this he did with his right hand, holding the tomahawk in his
+left.
+
+It was a strange, bewildering experience out of which the young
+man could not see in any direction far enough to give him a hint
+upon which to act. In a few minutes Long-Hair jerked him to his
+feet and said:
+
+"Go."
+
+It was just light enough to see that the order had a tomahawk to
+enforce it withal. Long-Hair indicated the direction and drove
+Beverley onward as fast as he could.
+
+"Try run 'way, kill, damn!" he kept repeating, while with his left
+hand on the young man's shoulder he guided him from behind
+dexterously through the wood for some distance. Then he stopped
+and grunted, adding his favorite expletive, which he used with not
+the least knowledge of its meaning. To him the syllable "damn" was
+but a mouthful of forcible wind.
+
+They had just emerged from a thicket into an open space, where the
+ground was comparatively dry. Overhead the stars were shining in
+great clusters of silver and gold against a dark, cavernous
+looking sky, here and there overrun with careering black clouds.
+Beverley shivered, not so much with cold as on account of the
+stress of excitement which amounted to nervous rigor. Long-Hair
+faced him and leaned toward him, until his breathing was audible
+and his massive features were dimly outlined. A dragon of the
+darkest age could not have been more repulsive.
+
+"Ugh, friend, damn!"
+
+Beverley started when these words were followed by a sentence in
+an Indian dialect somewhat familiar to him, a dialect in which he
+had tried to talk with Long-Hair during the day's march. The
+sentence, literally translated, was:
+
+"Long-Hair is friendly now."
+
+A blow in the face could not have been so surprising. Beverley not
+only started, but recoiled as if from a sudden and deadly
+apparition. The step between supreme exhilaration and utter
+collapse is now and then infinitesimal. There are times, moreover,
+when an expression on the face of Hope makes her look like the
+twin sister of Despair. The moment falling just after Long-Hair
+spoke was a century condensed in a breath.
+
+"Long-Hair is friendly now; will white man be friendly?"
+
+Beverley heard, but the speech seemed to come out of vastness and
+hollow distance; he could not realize it fairly. He felt as if in
+a dream, far off somewhere in loneliness, with a big, shadowy form
+looming before him. He heard the chill wind in the thickets round
+about, and beyond Long-Hair rose a wall of giant trees.
+
+"Ugh, not understand?" the savage presently demanded in his broken
+English.
+
+"Yes, yes," said Beverley, "I understand."
+
+"Is the white man friendly now?" Long-Hair then repeated in his
+own tongue, with a certain insistence of manner and voice.
+
+"Yes, friendly."
+
+Beverley said this absently in a tone of perfunctory dryness. His
+throat was parched, his head seemed to waver. But he was beginning
+to comprehend that Long-Hair, for some inscrutable reason of his
+own, was desirous of making a friendship between them. The thought
+was bewildering.
+
+Long-Hair fumbled in his pouch and took out Alice's locket, which
+he handed to Beverley. "White man love little girl?" he inquired
+in a tone that bordered upon tenderness, again speaking in Indian.
+
+Beverley clutched the disk as soon as he saw it gleam in the star-
+light.
+
+"White man going to have little girl for his squaw--eh?"
+
+"Yes, yes," cried Beverley without hearing his own voice. He was
+trying to open the locket but his hands were numb and trembling.
+When at last he did open it he could not see the child face
+within, for now even the star-light was shut off by a scudding
+black cloud.
+
+"Little girl saved Long-Hair's life. Long-Hair save white warrior
+for little girl."
+
+A dignity which was almost noble accompanied these simple
+sentences. Long-Hair stood proudly erect, like a colossal dark
+statue in the dimness.
+
+The great truth dawned upon Beverley that here was a
+characteristic act. He knew that an Indian rarely failed to repay
+a kindness or an injury, stroke for stroke, when opportunity
+offered. Long-Hair was a typical Indian. That is to say, a type of
+inhumanity raised to the last power; but under his hideous
+atrocity of nature lay the indestructible sense of gratitude so
+fixed and perfect that it did its work almost automatically.
+
+It must be said, and it may or may not be to the white man's
+shame, that Beverley did not respond with absolute promptness and
+sincerity to Long-Hair's generosity. He had suffered terribly at
+the hands of this savage. His arms and legs were raw from the
+biting of the thongs; his body ached from the effect of blows and
+kicks laid upon him while bound and helpless. Perhaps he was not a
+very emotional man. At all events there was no sudden recognition
+of the favor he was receiving. And this pleased Long-Hair, for the
+taste of the American Indian delights in immobility of countenance
+and reserve of feeling under great strain.
+
+"Wait here a little while," Long-Hair presently said, and without
+lingering for reply, turned away and disappeared in the wood.
+Beverley was free to run if he wished to, and the thought did
+surge across his mind; but a restraining something, like a hand
+laid upon him, would not let his limbs move. Down deep in his
+heart a calm voice seemed to be repeating Long-Hair's Indian
+sentence--"Wait here a little while."
+
+A few minutes later Long-Hair returned bearing two guns,
+Beverley's and his own, the latter, a superb weapon given him by
+Hamilton. He afterward explained that he had brought these, with
+their bullet-pouches and powder-horns, to a place of concealment
+near by before he awoke Beverley. This meant that he had swum the
+cold river three times since night-fall; once over with the guns
+and accouterments; once back to camp, then over again with
+Beverley! All this with a broken arm, and to repay Alice for her
+kindness to him.
+
+Beverley may have been slow, but at last his appreciation was,
+perhaps, all the more profound. As best he could he expressed it
+to Long-Hair, who showed no interest whatever in the statement.
+Instead of responding in Indian, he said "damn" without emphasis.
+It was rather as if he had yawned absently, being bored.
+
+Delay could not be thought of. Long-Hair explained briefly that he
+thought. Beverley must go to Kaskaskia. He had come across the
+stream in the direction of Vincennes in order to set his warriors
+at fault. The stream must be recrossed, he said, farther down, and
+he would help Beverley a certain distance on his way, then leave
+him to shift for himself. He had a meager amount of parched corn
+and buffalo meat in his pouch, which would stay hunger until they
+could kill some game. Now they must go.
+
+The resilience of a youthful and powerful physique offers many a
+problem to the biologist. Vital force seems to find some
+mysterious reservoir of nourishment hidden away in the nerve-
+centers. Beverley set out upon that seemingly impossible
+undertaking with renewed energy. It could not have been the ounce
+of parched corn and bit of jerked venison from which he drew so
+much strength; but on the other hand, could it have been the
+miniature of Alice, which he felt pressing over his heart once
+more, that afforded a subtle stimulus to both mind and body? They
+flung miles behind them before day-dawn, Long-Hair leading,
+Beverley pressing close at his heels. Most of the way led over
+flat prairies covered with water, and they therefore left no track
+by which they could be followed.
+
+Late in the forenoon Long-Hair killed a deer at the edge of a
+wood. Here they made a fire and cooked a supply which would last
+them for a day or two, and then on they went again. But we cannot
+follow them step by step. When Long-Hair at last took leave of
+Beverley, the occasion had no ceremony. It was an abrupt,
+unemotional parting. The stalwart Indian simply said in his own
+dialect, pointing westward:
+
+"Go that way two days. You will find your friends."
+
+Then, without another look or word, he turned about and stalked
+eastward at a marvelously rapid gait. In his mind he had a good
+tale to tell his warrior companions when he should find them
+again: how Beverley escaped that night and how he followed him a
+long, long chase, only to lose him at last under the very guns of
+the fort at Kaskaskia. But before he reached his band an incident
+of some importance changed his story to a considerable degree. It
+chanced that he came upon Lieutenant Barlow, who, in pursuit of
+game, had lost his bearings and, far from his companions, was
+beating around quite bewildered in a watery solitude. Long-Hair
+promptly murdered the poor fellow and scalped him with as little
+compunction as he would have skinned a rabbit; for he had a clever
+scheme in his head, a very audacious and outrageous scheme, by
+which he purposed to recoup, to some extent, the damages sustained
+by letting Beverley go.
+
+Therefore, when he rejoined his somewhat disheartened and
+demoralized band he showed them the scalp and gave them an
+eloquent account of how he tore it from Beverley's head after a
+long chase and a bloody hand to hand fight. They listened,
+believed, and were satisfied.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+FATHER BERET'S OLD BATTLE
+
+
+The room in which Alice was now imprisoned formed part of the
+upper story of a building erected by Hamilton in one of the four
+angles of the stockade. It had no windows and but two oblong port-
+holes made to accommodate a small swivel, which stood darkly
+scowling near the middle of the floor. From one of these apertures
+Alice could see the straggling roofs and fences of the dreary
+little town, while from the other a long reach of watery prairie,
+almost a lake, lay under view with the rolling, muddy Wabash
+gleaming beyond. There seemed to be no activity of garrison or
+townspeople. Few sounds broke the silence of which the cheerless
+prison room seemed to be the center.
+
+Alice felt all her courage and cheerfulness leaving her. She was
+alone in the midst of enemies. No father or mother, no friend--a
+young girl at the mercy of soldiers, who could not be expected to
+regard her with any sympathy beyond that which is accompanied with
+repulsive leers and hints. Day after day her loneliness and
+helplessness became more agonizing. Farnsworth, it is true, did
+all he could to relieve the strain of her situation; but Hamilton
+had an eye upon what passed and soon interfered. He administered a
+bitter reprimand, under which his subordinate writhed in
+speechless anger and resentment.
+
+"Finally, Captain Farnsworth," he said in conclusion, "you will
+distinctly understand that this girl is my prisoner, not yours;
+that I, not you, will direct how she is to be held and treated,
+and that hereafter I will suffer no interference on your part. I
+hope you fully understand me, sir, and will govern yourself
+accordingly."
+
+Smarting, or rather smothering, under the outrageous insult of
+these remarks, Farnsworth at first determined to fling his
+resignation at the Governor's feet and then do whatever desperate
+thing seemed most to his mood. But a soldier's training is apt to
+call a halt before the worst befalls in such a case. Moreover, in
+the present temptation, Farnsworth had a special check and
+hindrance. He had had a conference with Father Beret, in which the
+good priest had played the part of wisdom in slippers, and of
+gentleness more dove-like than the dove's. A very subtle
+impression, illuminated with the "hope that withers hope," had
+come of that interview; and now Farnsworth felt its restraint. He
+therefore saluted Hamilton formally and walked away.
+
+Father Beret's paternal love for Alice,--we cannot characterize it
+more nicely than to call it paternal,--was his justification for
+a certain mild sort of corruption insinuated by him into the heart
+of Farnsworth. He was a crafty priest, but his craft was always
+used for a good end. Unquestionably Jesuitic was his mode of
+circumventing the young man's military scruples by offering him a
+puff of fair weather with which to sail toward what appeared to be
+the shore of delight. He saw at a glance that Farnsworth's love
+for Alice was a consuming passion in a very ardent yet decidedly
+weak heart. Here was the worldly lever with which Father Beret
+hoped to raze Alice's prison and free her from the terrible doom
+with which she was threatened.
+
+The first interview was at Father Beret's cabin, to which, as will
+be remembered, the priest and Farnsworth went after their meeting
+in the street. It actually came to nothing, save an indirect
+understanding but half suggested by Father Beret and never openly
+sanctioned by Captain Farnsworth. The talk was insinuating on the
+part of the former, while the latter slipped evasively from every
+proposition, as if not able to consider it on account of a curious
+obtuseness of perception. Still, when they separated they shook
+hands and exchanged a searching look perfectly satisfactory to
+both.
+
+The memory of that interview with the priest was in Farnsworth's
+mind when, boiling with rage, he left Hamilton's presence and went
+forth into the chill February air. He passed out through the
+postern and along the sodden and queachy aedge of the prairie,
+involuntarily making his way to Father Beret's cabin. His
+indignation was so great that he trembled from head to foot at
+every step. The door of the place was open and Father Beret was
+eating a frugal meal of scones and sour wine (of his own make, he
+said), which he hospitably begged to share with his visitor. A
+fire smouldered on the hearth, and a flat stone showed, by the
+grease smoking over its hot surface, where the cakes had been
+baked.
+
+"Come in, my son," said the priest, "and try the fare of a poor
+old man. It is plain, very plain, but good." He smacked his lips
+sincerely and fingered another scone. "Take some, take some."
+
+Farnsworth was not tempted. The acid bouquet of the wine filled
+the room with a smack of vinegar, and the smoke from rank
+scorching fat and wheat meal did not suggest an agreeable feast.
+
+"Well, well, if you are not hungry, my son, sit down on the stool
+there and tell me the news."
+
+Farnsworth took the low seat without a word, letting his eyes
+wander over the walls. Alice's rapier, the mate to that now worn
+by Hamilton, hung in its curiously engraved scabbard near one
+corner. The sight of it inflamed Farnsworth.
+
+"It's an outrage," he broke forth. "Governor Hamilton sent a man
+to Roussillon place with orders to bring him the scabbard of Miss
+Roussillon's sword, and he now wears the beautiful weapon as if he
+had come by it honestly. Damn him!"
+
+"My dear, dear son, you must not soil your lips with such
+language!" Father Beret let fall the half of a well bitten cake
+and held up both hands.
+
+"I beg your pardon, Father; I know I ought to be more careful in
+your presence; but--but--the beastly, hellish scoundrel--"
+
+"Bah! doucement, mon fils, doucement." The old man shook his head
+and his finger while speaking. "Easy, my son, easy. You would be a
+fine target for bullets were your words to reach Hamilton's ears.
+You are not permitted to revile your commander."
+
+"Yes, I know; but how can a man restrain himself under such
+abominable conditions?"
+
+Father Beret shrewdly guessed that Hamilton had been giving the
+Captain fresh reason for bitter resentment. Moreover, he was sure
+that the moving cause had been Alice. So, in order to draw out
+what he wished to hear, he said very gently:
+
+"How is the little prisoner getting along?"
+
+Farnsworth ground his teeth and swore; but Father Beret appeared
+not to hear; he bit deep into a scone, took a liberal sip of the
+muddy red wine and added:
+
+"Has she a comfortable place? Do you think Governor Hamilton would
+let me visit her?"
+
+"It is horrible!" Farnsworth blurted. "She's penned up as if she
+were a dangerous beast, the poor girl. And that damned scoundrel--
+"
+
+"Son, son!"
+
+"Oh, it's no use to try, I can't help it, Father. The whelp--"
+
+"We can converse more safely and intelligently if we avoid
+profanity, and undue emotion, my son. Now, if you will quit
+swearing, I will, and if you will be calm, so will I."
+
+Farnsworth felt the sly irony of this absurdly vicarious
+proposition. Father Beret smiled with a kindly twinkle in his
+deep-set eyes.
+
+"Well, if you don't use profane language, Father, there's no
+telling how much you think in expletives. What is your opinion of
+a man who tumbles a poor, defenseless girl into prison and then
+refuses to let her be decently cared for? How do you express
+yourself about him?"
+
+"My son, men often do things of which they ought to be ashamed. I
+heard of a young officer once who maltreated a little girl that he
+met at night in the street. What evil he would have done, had not
+a passing kind-hearted man reminded him of his honor by a friendly
+punch in the ribs, I dare not surmise."
+
+"True, and your sarcasm goes home as hard as your fist did,
+Father. I know that I've been a sad dog all my life. Miss
+Roussillon saved you by shooting me, and I love her for it. Lay
+on, Father, I deserve more than you can give me."
+
+"Surely you do, my son, surely you do; but my love for you will
+not let me give you pain. Ah, we priests have to carry all men's
+loads. Our backs are broad, however, very broad, my son."
+
+"And your fists devilish heavy, Father, devilish heavy."
+
+The gentle smile again flickered over the priest's weather-beaten
+face as he glanced sidewise at Farnsworth and said:
+
+"Sometimes, sometimes, my son, a carnal weapon must break the way
+for a spiritual one. But we priests rarely have much physical
+strength; our dependence is upon--"
+
+"To be sure; certainly," Farnsworth interrupted, rubbing his side,
+"your dependence is upon the first thing that offers. I've had
+many a blow; but yours was the solidest that ever jarred tny
+mortal frame, Father Beret."
+
+The twain began to laugh. There is nothing like a reminiscence to
+stir up fresh mutual sympathy.
+
+"If your intercostals were somewhat sore for a time, on account of
+a contact with priestly knuckles, doubtless there soon set in a
+corresponding uneasiness in the region of your conscience. Such
+shocks are often vigorously alterative and tonic--eh, my son?"
+
+"You jolted me sober, Father, and then I was ashamed of myself.
+But where does all your tremendous strength lie? You don't look
+strong."
+
+While speaking Farnsworth leaned near Father Beret and grasped his
+arm. The young man started, for his fingers, instead of closing
+around a flabby, shrunken old man's limb, spread themselves upon a
+huge, knotted mass of iron muscles. With a quick movement Father
+Beret shook off Farnsworth's hand, and said:
+
+"I am no Samson, my son. Non sum qualis eram." Then, as if
+dismissing a light subject for a graver one, he sighed and added;
+"I suppose there is nothing that can be done for little Alice."
+
+He called the tall, strong girl "little Alice," and so she seemed
+to him. He could not, without direct effort, think of her as a
+magnificently maturing woman. She had always been his spoiled pet
+child, perversely set against the Holy Church, but dear to him
+nevertheless.
+
+"I came to you to ask that very question, Father," said
+Farnsworth.
+
+"And what do I know? Surely, my son, you see how utterly helpless
+an old priest is against all you British. And besides--"
+
+"Father Beret," Farnsworth huskily interrupted, "is there a place
+that you know of anywhere in which Miss Roussillon could be
+hidden, if--"
+
+"My dear son."
+
+"But, Father, I mean it."
+
+"Mean what? Pardon an old man's slow understanding. What are you
+talking about, my son?"
+
+Father Beret glanced furtively about, then quickly stepped through
+the doorway, walked entirely around the house and came in again
+before Farnsworth could respond. Once more seated on his stool he
+added interrogatively:
+
+"Did you think you heard something moving outside?"
+
+"No."
+
+"You were saying something when I went out. Pardon my
+interruption."
+
+Farnsworth gave the priest a searching and not wholly confiding
+look.
+
+"You did not interrupt me, Father Beret. I was not speaking. Why
+are you so watchful? Are you afraid of eavesdroppers?"
+
+"You were speaking recklessly. Your words were incendiary:
+ardentia verba. My son, you were suggesting a dangerous thing.
+Your life would scarcely satisfy the law were you convicted of
+insinuating such treason. What if one of your prowling guards had
+overheard you? Your neck and mine might feel the halter. Quod
+avertat dominus." He crossed himself and in a solemn voice added
+in English:
+
+"May the Lord forbid! Ah, my son, we priests protect those we
+love."
+
+"And I, who am not fit to tie a priest's shoe, do likewise.
+Father, I love Alice Roussillon."
+
+"Love is a holy thing, my son. Amare divinum est et humanum."
+
+"Father Beret, can you help me?"
+
+"Spiritually speaking, my son?"
+
+"I mean, can you hide Mademoiselle Roussillon in some safe place,
+if I take her out of the prison yonder? That's just what I mean.
+Can you do it?"
+
+"Your question is a remarkable one. Have you thought upon it from
+all directions, my son? Think of your position, your duty as an
+officer."
+
+A shrewd polemical expression beamed from Father Beret's eyes, and
+a very expert physiogomist might have suspected duplicity from
+certain lines about the old man's mouth.
+
+"I simply know that I cannot stand by and see Alice--Mademoiselle
+Roussillon, forced to suffer treatment too beastly for an Indian
+thief. That's the only direction there is for me to look at it
+from, and you can understand my feelings if you will; you know
+that very well, Father Beret. When a man loves a girl, he loves
+her; that's the whole thing.".
+
+The quiet, inscrutable half-smile flickered once more on Father
+Beret's face; but he sat silent some time with a sinewy forefinger
+lying alongside his nose. When at last he spoke it was in a tone
+of voice indicative of small interest in what he was saying. His
+words rambled to their goal with the effect of happy accident.
+
+"There are places in this neighborhood in which a human being
+would be as hard to find as the flag that you and Governor
+Hamilton have so diligently and unsuccessfully been in quest of
+for the past month or two. Really, my son, this is a mysterious
+little town."
+
+Farnsworth's eyes widened and a flush rose in his swarthy cheeks.
+
+"Damn the flag!" he exclaimed. "Let it lie hidden forever; what do
+I care? I tell you, Father Beret, that Alice Roussillon is in
+extreme danger. Governor Hamilton means to put some terrible
+punishment on her. He has a devil's vindictiveness. He showed it
+to me clearly awhile ago."
+
+"You showed something of the same sort to me, once upon a time, my
+son."
+
+"Yes, I did, Father Beret, and I got a load of slugs in my
+shoulder for it from that brave girl's pistol. She saved your
+life. Now I ask you to help me save hers; or, if not her life,
+what is infinitely more, her honor."
+
+"Her honor!" cried Father Beret, leaping to his feet so suddenly
+and with such energy that the cabin shook from base to roof. "What
+do you say, Captain Farnsworth? What do you mean?"
+
+The old man was transformed. His face was terrible to see, with
+its narrow, burning eyes deep under the shaggy brows, its dark
+veins writhing snakelike on the temples and forehead, the
+projected mouth and chin, the hard lines of the jaws, the iron-
+gray gleam from all the features--he looked like an aged tiger
+stiffened for a spring.
+
+Farnsworth was made of right soldierly stuff; but he felt a
+distinct shiver flit along his back. His past life had not lacked
+thrilling adventures and strangely varied experiences with
+desperate men. Usually he met sudden emergencies rather calmly,
+sometimes with phlegmatic indifference. This passionate outburst
+on the priest's part, however, surprised him and awed him, while
+it stirred his heart with a profound sympathy unlike anything he
+had ever felt before.
+
+Father Beret mastered himself in a moment, and passing his hand
+over his face, as if to brush away the excitement, sat down again
+on his stool. He appeared to collapse inwardly.
+
+"You must excuse the weakness of an old man, my son," he said, in
+a voice hoarse and shaking. "But tell me what is going to be done
+with Alice. Your words--what you said--I did not understand."
+
+He rubbed his forehead slowly, as one who has difficulty in trying
+to collect his thoughts.
+
+"I do not know what Governor Hamilton means to do, Father Beret.
+It will be something devilish, however,--something that must not
+happen," said Farnsworth.
+
+Then he recounted all that Hamilton had done and said. He
+described the dreary and comfortless room in which Alice was
+confined, the miserable fare given her, and how she would be
+exposed to the leers and low remarks of the soldiers. She had
+already suffered these things, and now that she could no longer
+have any protection, what was to become of her? He did not attempt
+to overstate the case; but presented it with a blunt sincerity
+which made a powerfully realistic impression.
+
+Father Beret, like most men of strong feeling who have been
+subjected to long years of trial, hardship, multitudinous dangers
+and all sorts of temptation, and who have learned the lessons of
+self-control, had an iron will, and also an abiding distrust of
+weak men. He saw Farnsworth's sincerity; but he had no faith in
+his constancy, although satisfied that while resentment of
+Hamilton's imperiousness lasted, he would doubtless remain firm in
+his purpose to aid Alice. Let that wear off, as in a short time it
+would, and then what? The old man studied his companion with eyes
+that slowly resumed their expression of smouldering and almost
+timid geniality. His priestly experience with desperate men was
+demanding of him a proper regard for that subtlety of procedure
+which had so often compassed most difficult ends.
+
+He listened in silence to Farnsworth's story. When it came to an
+end he began to offer some but half relevant suggestions in the
+form of indirect cross-questions, by means of which he gradually
+drew out a minute description of Alice's prison, the best way to
+reach it, the nature of its door-fastenings, where the key was
+kept, and everything, indeed, likely to be helpful to one
+contemplating a jail delivery. Farnsworth was inwardly delighted.
+He felt Father Beret's cunning approach to the central object and
+his crafty method of gathering details.
+
+The shades of evening thickened in the stuffy cabin room while the
+conversation went on. Father Beret presently lifted a puncheon in
+one corner of the floor and got out a large bottle, which bore a
+mildewed and faded French label, and with it a small iron cup.
+There was just light enough left to show a brownish sparkle when,
+after popping out the cork, he poured a draught in the fresh cup
+and in his own.
+
+"We may think more clearly, my son, if we taste this old liquor. I
+have kept it a long while to offer upon a proper occasion. The
+occasion is here."
+
+A ravishing bouquet quickly imbued the air. It was itself an
+intoxication.
+
+"The Brothers of St. Martin distilled this liquor," Father Beret
+added, handing the cup to Farnsworth, "not for common social
+drinking, my son, but for times when a man needs extraordinary
+stimulation. It is said to be surpassingly good, because St.
+Martin blessed the vine."
+
+The doughty Captain felt a sudden and imperious thirst seize his
+throat. The liquor flooded his veins before his lips touched the
+cup. He had been abstaining lately; now his besetting appetite
+rushed upon him. At one gulp he took in the fiery yet smooth and
+captivating draught. Nor did he notice that Father Beret, instead
+of joining him in the potation, merely lifted his cup and set it
+down again, smacking his lips gusto.
+
+There followed a silence, during which the aromatic breath of the
+bottle increased its dangerous fascination. Then Father Beret
+again filled Farnsworth's cup and said:
+
+"Ah, the blessed monks, little thought they that their matchless
+brew would ever be sipped in a poor missionary's hut on the
+Wabash! But, after all, my son, why not here as well as in sunny
+France? Our object justifies any impropriety of time and place."
+
+"You are right, Father. I drink to our object. Yes, I say, to our
+object."
+
+In fact, the drinking preceded his speech, and his tongue already
+had a loop in it The liquor stole through him, a mist of
+bewildering and enchanting influence. The third cup broke his
+sentences into unintelligible fragments; the fourth made his
+underjaw sag loosely, the fifth and sixth, taken in close
+succession, tumbled him limp on the floor, where he slept
+blissfully all night long, snugly covered with some of Father
+Beret's bed clothes.
+
+"Per casum obliquum, et per indirectum," muttered the priest, when
+he had returned the bottle and cup to their hiding-place." The end
+justifies the means. Sleep well, my son. Ah, little Alice, little
+Alice, your old Father will try--will try!"
+
+He fumbled along the wall in the dark until he found the rapier,
+which he took down; then he went out and sat for some time
+motionless beside the door, while the clouds thickened overhead.
+It was late when he arose and glided away shadow-like toward the
+fort, over which the night hung black, chill and drearily silent.
+The moon was still some hours high, smothered by the clouds; a fog
+slowly drifted from the river.
+
+Meantime Hamilton and Helm had spent a part of the afternoon and
+evening, as usual, at cards. Helm broke off the game and went to
+his quarters rather early for him, leaving the Governor alone and
+in a bad temper, because Farnsworth, when he had sent for him,
+could not be found. Three times his orderly returned in as many
+hours with the same report; the Captain had not been seen or heard
+of. Naturally this sudden and complete disappearance, immediately
+after the reprimand, suggested to Hamilton an unpleasant
+possibility. What if Farnsworth had deserted him? Down deep in his
+heart he was conscious that the young man had good cause for
+almost any desperate action. To lose Captain Farnsworth, however,
+would be just now a calamity. The Indians were drifting over
+rapidly to the side of the Americans, and every day showed that
+the French could not long be kept quiet.
+
+Hamilton sat for some time after Helm's departure, thinking over
+what he now feared was a foolish mistake. Presently he buckled on
+Alice's rapier, which he had lately been wearing as his own, and
+went out into the main area of the stockade. A sentinel was
+tramping to and fro at the gate, where a hazy lantern shone. The
+night was breathless and silent. Hamilton approached the soldier
+on duty and asked him if he had seen Captain Farnsworth, and
+receiving a negative reply, turned about puzzled and thoughtful to
+walk back and forth in the chill, foggy air.
+
+Presently a faint yellow light attracted his attention. It shone
+through a porthole in an upper room of the block-house at the
+farther angle of the stockade. In fact, Alice was reading by a
+sputtering lamp a book Farnsworth had sent her, a volume of
+Ronsard that he had picked up in Canada. Hamilton made his way in
+that direction, at first merely curious to know who was burning
+oil so late; but after a few paces he recognized where the light
+came from, and instantly suspected that Captain Farnsworth was
+there. Indeed he felt sure of it. Somehow he could not regard
+Alice as other than a saucy hoyden, incapable of womanly virtue.
+His experience with the worst element of Canadian French life and
+his peculiar cast of mind and character colored his impression of
+her. He measured her by the women with whom the coureurs de bois
+and half-breed trappers consorted in Detroit and at the posts
+eastward to Quebec.
+
+Alice, unable to sleep, had sought forgetfulness of her bitter
+captivity in the old poet's charming lyrics. She sat on the floor,
+some blankets and furs drawn around her, the book on her lap, the
+stupidly dull lamp hanging beside her on a part of the swivel. Her
+hair lay loose over her neck and shoulders and shimmered around
+her face with a cloud-like effect, giving to the features in their
+repose a setting that intensified their sweetness and sadness. In
+a very low but distinct voice was reading, with a slightly
+quavering emotion:
+
+    "Mignonne, allons voir si la rose,
+    Que ce matin avoit desclose
+    Sa robe de pourpe au soleil."
+
+When Hamilton, after stealthily mounting the rough stairway which
+led to her door, peeped in through a space between the slabs and
+felt a stroke of disappointment, seeing at a glance that
+Farnsworth was not there. He gazed for some time, not without a
+sense of villainy, while she continued her sweetly monotonous
+reading. If his heart had been as hard as the iron swivel-balls
+that lay beside Alice, he must still have felt a thrill of
+something like tender sympathy. She now showed no trace of the
+vivacious sauciness which had heretofore always marked her
+features when she was in his presence. A dainty gentleness,
+touched with melancholy, gave to her face an appealing look all
+the more powerful on account of its unconscious simplicity of
+expression.
+
+The man felt an impulse pure and noble, which would have borne him
+back down the ladder and away from the building, had not a
+stronger one set boldly in the opposite direction. There was a
+short struggle with the seared remnant of his better nature, and
+then he tried to open the door; but it was locked.
+
+Alice heard the slight noise and breaking off her reading turned
+to look. Hamilton made another effort to enter before he
+recollected that the wooden key, or notched lever, that controlled
+the cumbrous wooden lock, hung on a peg beside the door. He felt
+for it along the wall, and soon laid his hand on it. Then again he
+peeped through to see Alice, who was now standing upright near the
+swivel. She had thrown her hair back from her face and neck; the
+lamp's flickering light seemed suddenly to have magnified her
+stature and enhanced her beauty. Her book lay on the tumbled wraps
+at her feet, and in either hand she grasped a swivel-shot.
+
+Hamilton's combative disposition came to the aid of his baser
+passion when he saw once more a defiant flash from his prisoner's
+face. It was easy for him to be fascinated by opposition. Helm had
+profited by this trait as much as others had suffered by it; but,
+in the case of Alice, Hamilton's mingled resentment and admiration
+were but a powerful irritant to the coarsest and most dangerous
+side of his nature.
+
+After some fumbling and delay he fitted the key with a steady hand
+and moved the wooden bolt creaking and jolting from its slot. Then
+flinging the clumsy door wide open, he stepped in.
+
+Alice started when she recognized the midnight intruder, and a
+second deeper look into his countenance made her brave heart
+recoil, while with a sinking sensation her breath almost stopped.
+It was but a momentary weakness, however, followed by vigorous
+reaction.
+
+"What are you here for, sir?" she demanded. "What do you want?"
+
+"I am neither a burglar nor a murderer, Mademoiselle," he
+responded, lifting his hat and bowing, with a smile not in the
+least reassuring.
+
+"You look like both. Stop where you are!"
+
+"Not so loud, my dear Miss Roussillon; I am not deaf. And besides
+the garrison needs to sleep."
+
+"Stop, sir; not another step."
+
+She poised herself, leaning slightly backward, and held the iron
+ball in her right hand ready to throw it at him.
+
+He halted, still smiling villainously.
+
+"Mademoiselle, I assure you that your excitement is quite
+unnecessary. I am not here to harm you."
+
+"You cannot harm me, you cowardly wretch!"
+
+"Humph! Pride goes before a fall, wench," he retorted, taking a
+half-step backward. Then a thought arose in his mind which added a
+new shade to the repellent darkness of his countenance.
+
+"Miss Roussillon," he said in English and with a changed voice,
+which seemed to grow harder, each word deliberately emphasized, "I
+have come to break some bad news to you."
+
+"You would scarcely bring me good news, sir, and I am not curious
+to hear the bad."
+
+He was silent for a little while, gazing at her with the sort of
+admiration from which a true woman draws away appalled. He saw how
+she loathed him, saw how impossible it was for him to get a line
+nearer to her by any turn of force or fortune. Brave, high-
+headed, strong as a young leopard, pure and sweet as a rose, she
+stood before him fearless, even aggressive, showing him by every
+line of her face and form that she felt her infinite superiority
+and meant to maintain it. Her whole personal expression told him
+he was defeated; therefore he quickly seized upon a suggestion
+caught from a transaction with Long-Hair, who had returned a few
+hours before from his pursuit of Beverley.
+
+"It pains me, I assure you, Miss Roussillon, to tell you what will
+probably grieve you deeply," he presently added; "but I have not
+been unaware of your tender interest in Lieutenant Beverley, and
+when I had bad news from him, I thought it my duty to inform you."
+
+He paused, feeling with a devil's satisfaction the point of his
+statement go home to the girl's heart.
+
+The wind was beginning to blow outside, shaking open the dark
+clouds and letting gleams of moonlight flicker on the thinning
+fog. A ghostly ray came through a crack between the logs and lit
+Alice's face with a pathetic wanness. She moved her lips as if
+speaking, but Hamilton heard no sound.
+
+"The Indian, Long-Hair, whom I sent upon Lieutenant Beverley's
+trail, reported to me this afternoon that his pursuit had been
+quite successful. He caught his game."
+
+Alice's voice came to her now. She drew in a quivering breath of
+relief.
+
+"Then he is here--he is--you have him a prisoner again?"
+
+"A part of him, Miss Roussillon. Enough to be quite sure that
+there is one traitor who will trouble his king no more. Mr. Long-
+Hair brought in the Lieutenant's scalp."
+
+Alice received this horrible statement in silence; but her face
+blanched and she stood as if frozen by the shock. The shifty moon-
+glimmer and the yellow glow of the lamp showed Hamilton to what an
+extent his devilish cruelty hurt her, and somehow it chilled him
+as if by reflection; but he could not forego another thrust.
+
+"He deserved hanging, and would have got it had he been brought to
+me alive. So after all, you should be satisfied. He escaped my
+vengeance and Long-Hair got his pay. You see I am the chief
+sufferer."
+
+These words, however, fell without effect upon the girl's ears, in
+which was booming the awful, storm-like roar of her excitement.
+She did not see her persecutor standing there; her vision,
+unhindered by walls and distance, went straight away to a place in
+the wilderness, where all mangled and disfigured Beverley lay
+dead. A low cry broke from her lips; she dropped the heavy swivel-
+balls; and then, like a bird, swiftly, with a rustling swoop, she
+went past Hamilton and down the stair.
+
+For perhaps a full minute the man stood there motionless,
+stupefied, amazed; and when at length he recovered himself, it was
+with difficulty that he followed her. Everything seemed to hinder
+him. When he reached the open air, however, he quickly regained
+his activity of both mind and body, and looked in all directions.
+The clouds were breaking into parallel masses with streaks of sky
+between. The moon hanging aslant against the blue peeped forth
+just in time to show him a flying figure which, even while he
+looked, reached the postern, opened it and slipped through.
+
+With but a breath of hesitation between giving the alarm and
+following Alice silently and alone, he chose the latter. He was a
+swift runner and light footed. With a few bounds he reached the
+little gate, which was still oscillating on its hinges, darted
+through and away, straining every muscle in desperate pursuit,
+gaining rapidly in the race, which bore eastward along the course
+twice before chosen by Alice in leaving the stockade.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+A MARCH THROUGH COLD WATER
+
+
+On the fifth day of February, 1779, Colonel George Rogers Clark
+led an army across the Kaskaskia River and camped. This was the
+first step in his march towards the Wabash. An army! Do not smile.
+Fewer than two hundred men, it is true, answered the roll-call,
+when Father Gibault lifted the Cross and blessed them; but every
+name told off by the company sergeants belonged to a hero, and
+every voice making response struck a full note in the chorus of
+freedom's morning song.
+
+It was an army, small indeed, but yet an army; even though so
+rudely equipped that, could we now see it before us, we might
+wonder of what use it could possibly be in a military way.
+
+We should nevertheless hardly expect that a hundred and seventy of
+our best men, even if furnished with the latest and most deadly
+engines of destruction, could do what those pioneers cheerfully
+undertook and gloriously accomplished in the savage wilderness
+which was to be the great central area of the United States of
+America.
+
+We look back with a shiver of awe at the three hundred Spartans
+for whom Simonides composed his matchless epitaph. They wrought
+and died gloriously; that was Greek. The one hundred and seventy
+men, who, led by the backwoodsman, Clark, made conquest of an
+empire's area for freedom in the west, wrought and lived
+gloriously; that was American. It is well to bear in mind this
+distinction by which our civilization separates itself from that
+of old times. Our heroism has always been of life--our heroes have
+conquered and lived to see the effect of conquest. We have fought
+all sorts of wars and have never yet felt defeat. Washington,
+Jackson, Taylor, Grant, all lived to enjoy, after successful war,
+a triumphant peace. "These Americans," said a witty Frenchman,
+"are either enormously lucky, or possessed of miraculous vitality.
+You rarely kill them in battle, and if you wound them their wounds
+are never mortal. Their history is but a chain of impossibilities
+easily accomplished. Their undertakings have been without
+preparation, their successes in the nature of stupendous
+accidents." Such a statement may appear critically sound from a
+Gallic point of view; but it leaves out the dominant element of
+American character, namely, heroic efficiency. From the first we
+have had the courage to undertake, the practical common sense
+which overcomes the lack of technical training, and the vital
+force which never flags under the stress of adversity.
+
+Clark knew, when he set out on his march to Vincennes, that he was
+not indulging a visionary impulse. The enterprise was one that
+called for all that manhood could endure, but not more. With the
+genius of a born leader he measured his task by his means. He knew
+his own courage and fortitude, and understood the best capacity of
+his men. He had genius; that is, he possessed the secret of
+extracting from himself and from his followers the last refinement
+of devotion to purpose. There was a certainty, from first to last,
+that effort would not flag at any point short of the top-most
+possible strain.
+
+The great star of America was no more than a nebulous splendor on
+the horizon in 1779. It was a new world forming by the law of
+youth. The men who bore the burdens of its exacting life were
+mostly stalwart striplings who, before the down of adolescence
+fairly sprouted on their chins, could swing the ax, drive a plow,
+close with a bear or kill an Indian. Clark was not yet twenty-
+seven when he made his famous campaign. A tall, brawny youth,
+whose frontier experience had enriched a native character of the
+best quality, he marched on foot at the head of his little column,
+and was first to test every opposing danger. Was there a stream to
+wade or swim? Clark enthusiastically shouted, "Come on!" and in he
+plunged. Was there a lack of food? "I'm not hungry," he cried.
+"Help yourselves, men!" Had some poor soldier lost his blanket?
+"Mine is in my way," said Clark. "Take it, I'm glad to get rid of
+it!" His men loved him, and would die rather than fall short of
+his expectations.
+
+The march before them lay over a magnificent plain, mostly
+prairie, rich as the delta of the Nile, but extremely difficult to
+traverse. The distance, as the route led, was about a hundred and
+seventy miles. On account of an open and rainy winter all the
+basins and flat lands were inundated, often presenting leagues of
+water ranging in depth from a few inches to three of four feet.
+Cold winds blew, sometimes with spits of snow and dashes of sleet,
+while thin ice formed on the ponds and sluggish streams. By day
+progress meant wading ankle-deep, knee-deep, breast-deep, with an
+occasional spurt of swimming. By night the brave fellows had to
+sleep, if sleep they could, on the cold ground in soaked clothing
+under water-heavy blankets. They flung the leagues behind them,
+however, cheerfully stimulating one another by joke and challenge,
+defying all the bitterness of weather, all the bitings of hunger,
+all the toil, danger and deprivation of a trackless and houseless
+wilderness, looking only eastward, following their youthful and
+intrepid commander to one of the most valuable victories gained by
+American soldiers during the War of the Revolution.
+
+Colonel Clark understood perfectly the strategic importance of
+Vincennes as a post commanding the Wabash, and as a base of
+communication with the many Indian tribes north of the Ohio and
+east of the Mississippi. Francis Vigo (may his name never fade!)
+had brought him a comprehensive and accurate report of Hamilton's
+strength and the condition of the fort and garrison. This
+information confirmed his belief that it would be possible not
+only to capture Vincennes, but Detroit as well.
+
+Just seven days after the march began, the little army encamped
+for a night's rest at the edge of a wood; and here, just after
+nightfall, when the fires were burning merrily and the smell of
+broiling buffalo steaks burdened the damp air, a wizzened old man
+suddenly appeared, how or from where nobody had observed He was
+dirty and in every way disreputable in appearance, looking like an
+animated mummy, bearing a long rifle on his shoulder, and walking
+with the somewhat halting activity of a very old, yet vivacious
+and energetic simian. Of course it was Oncle Jason, "Oncle Jazon
+sui generis," as Father Beret had dubbed him.
+
+"Well, here I am!" he cried, approaching the fire by which Colonel
+Clark and some of his officers were cooking supper, "but ye can't
+guess in a mile o' who I am to save yer livers and lights."
+
+He danced a few stiff steps, which made the water gush out of his
+tattered moccasins, then doffed his nondescript cap and nodded his
+scalpless head in salutation to the commander.
+
+Clark looked inquiringly at him, while the old fellow grimaced and
+rubbed his shrunken chin.
+
+"I smelt yer fat a fryin' somepin like a mile away, an' it set my
+in'ards to grumblin' for a snack; so I jes thought I'd drap in on
+ye an' chaw wittles wi' ye."
+
+"Your looks are decidedly against you," remarked the Colonel with
+a dry smile. He had recognized Oncle Jazon after a little sharp
+scrutiny. "I suppose, however, that we can let you gnaw the bones
+after we've got off the meat."
+
+"Thank 'ee, thank 'ee, plenty good. A feller 'at's as hongry as I
+am kin go through a bone like a feesh through water."
+
+Clark laughed and said:
+
+"I don't see any teeth that you have worth mentioning, but your
+gums may be unusually sharp."
+
+"Ya-a-s, 'bout as sharp as yer wit, Colonel Clark, an' sharper'n
+yer eyes, a long shot. Ye don't know me, do ye? Take ernother
+squint at me, an' see'f ye kin 'member a good lookin' man!"
+
+"You have somewhat the appearance of an old scamp by the name of
+Jazon that formerly loafed around with a worthless gun on his
+shoulder, and used to run from every Indian he saw down yonder in
+Kentucky." Clark held out his hand and added cordially:
+
+"How are you, Jazon, my old friend, and where upon earth have you
+come from?"
+
+Oncle Jazon pounced upon the hand and gripped it in his own
+knotted fingers, gazing delightedly up into Clark's bronzed and
+laughing face.
+
+"Where'd I come frum? I come frum ever'wheres. Fust time I ever
+got lost in all my born days. Fve been a trompin' 'round in the
+water seems like a week, crazy as a pizened rat, not a knowin'
+north f'om south, ner my big toe f'om a turnip! Who's got some
+tobacker?"
+
+Oncle Jazon's story, when presently he told it, interested Clark
+deeply. In the first place he was glad to hear that Simon Kenton
+had once more escaped from the Indians; and the news from
+Beverley, although bad enough, left room for hope. Frontiersmen
+always regarded the chances better than even, so long as there was
+life. Oncle Jazon, furthermore, had much to tell about the
+situation at Vincennes, the true feeling of the French
+inhabitants, the lukewarm friendship of the larger part of the
+Indians for Hamilton, and, indeed, everything that Clark wished to
+know regarding the possibilities of success in his arduous
+undertaking. The old man's advent cheered the whole camp. He soon
+found acquaintances and friends among the French volunteers from
+Kaskaskia, with whom he exchanged creole gestures and chatter with
+a vivacity apparently inexhaustible. He and Kenton had, with wise
+judgement, separated on escaping from the Indian camp, Kenton
+striking out for Kentucky, while Oncle Jazon went towards
+Kaskaskia.
+
+The information that Beverley would be shot as soon as he was
+returned to Hamilton, caused Colonel Clark serious worry of mind.
+Not only the fact that Beverley, who had been a charming friend
+and a most gallant officer, was now in such imminent danger, but
+the impression (given by Oncle Jazon's account) that he had broken
+his parole, was deeply painful to the brave and scrupulously
+honorable commander. Still, friendship rose above regret, and
+Clark resolved to push his little column forward all the more
+rapidly, hoping to arrive in time to prevent the impending
+execution.
+
+Next morning the march was resumed at the break of dawn; but a
+swollen stream caused some hours of delay, during which Beverley
+himself arrived from the rear, a haggard and weirdly unkempt
+apparition. He had been for three days following hard on the
+army's track, which he came to far westward. Oncle Jazon saw him
+first in the distance, and his old but educated eyes made no
+mistake.
+
+"Yander's that youngster Beverley," he exclaimed. "Ef it ain't I'm
+a squaw!"
+
+Nor did he parley further on the subject; but set off at a rickety
+trot to meet and assist the fagged and excited young man.
+
+Clark had given Oncle Jazon his flask, which contained a few gills
+of whisky. This was the first thing offered to Beverley; who
+wisely took but a swallow. Oncle Jazon was so elated that he waved
+his cap on high, and unconsciously falling into French, yelled in
+a piercing voice:
+
+"VIVE ZHORSH VASINTON! VIVE LA BANNIERE D'ALICE ROUSSILLON!"
+
+Seeing Beverley reminded him of Alice and the flag. As for
+Beverley, the sentiment braced him, and the beloved name brimmed
+his heart with sweetness.
+
+Clark went to meet them as they came in. He hugged the gaunt
+Lieutenant with genuine fervor of joy, while Oncle Jazon ran
+around them making a series of grotesque capers. The whole
+command, hearing Oncle Jazon's patriotic words, set up a wild
+shouting on the spur of a general impression that Beverley came as
+a messenger bearing glorious news from Washington's army in the
+east.
+
+It was a great relief to Clark when he found out that his favorite
+Lieutenant had not broken his parole; but had instead boldly
+resurrendered himself, declaring the obligation no longer binding,
+and notifying Hamilton of his intention to go away with the
+purpose of returning and destroying him and his command. Clark
+laughed heartily when this explanation brought out Beverley's
+tender interest in Alice; but he sympathized cordially; for he
+himself knew what love is.
+
+Although Beverley was half starved and still suffering from the
+kicks and blows given him by Long-Hair and his warriors, his
+exhausting run on the trail of Clark aad his band had not worked
+him serious harm. All of the officers and men did their utmost to
+serve him. He was feasted without stint and furnished with
+everything that the scant supply of clothing on the pack horses
+could afford for his comfort. He promptly asked for an assignment
+to duty in his company and took his place with such high
+enthusiasm that his companions regarded him with admiring wonder.
+None of them save Clark and Oncle Jazon suspected that love for a
+fair-haired girl yonder in Vincennes was the secret of his amazing
+zeal and intrepidity.
+
+In one respect Clark's expedition was sadly lacking in its
+equipment for the march. It had absolutely no means of
+transporting adequate supplies. The pack-horses were not able to
+carry more than a little extra ammunition, a few articles of
+clothing, some simple cooking utensils and such tools as were
+needed in improvising rafts and canoes. Consequently, although
+buffalo and deer were sometimes plentiful, they furnished no
+lasting supply of meat, because it could not be transported; and
+as the army neared Vincennes wild animals became scarce, so that
+the men began to suffer from hunger when within but a few days of
+their journey's end.
+
+Clark made almost superhuman efforts in urging forward his
+chilled, water-soaked, foot-sore command; and when hunger added
+its torture to the already disheartening conditions, his courage
+and energy seemed to burn stronger and brighter. Beverley was
+always at his side ready to undertake any task, accept any risk;
+his ardor made his face glow, and he seemed to thrive upon
+hardships. The two men were a source of inspiration--their
+followers could not flag and hesitate while under the influence of
+their example.
+
+Toward the end of the long march a decided fall of temperature
+added ice to the water through which our dauntless patriots waded
+and swam for miles. The wind shifted northwesterly, taking on a
+searching chill. Each gust, indeed, seemed to shoot wintry
+splinters into the very marrow of the men's bones. The weaker ones
+began to show the approach of utter exhaustion just at the time
+when a final spurt of unflinching power was needed. True, they
+struggled heroically; but nature was nearing the inexorable limit
+of endurance. Without food, which there was no prospect of
+getting, collapse was sure to come.
+
+Standing nearly waist-deep in freezing water and looking out upon
+the muddy, sea-like flood that stretched far away to the channel
+of the Wabash and beyond, Clark turned to Beverley and said,
+speaking low, so as not to be overheard by any other of his
+officers or men:
+
+"Is it possible, Lieutenant Beverley, that we are to fail, with
+Vincennes almost in sight of us?"
+
+"No, sir, it is not possible," was the firm reply. "Nothing must,
+nothing can stop us. Look at that brave child! He sets the heroic
+example."
+
+Beverley pointed, as he spoke, at a boy but fourteen years old,
+who was using his drum as a float to bear him up while he
+courageously swam beside the men.
+
+Clark's clouded face cleared once more. "You are right," he said,
+"come on! we must win or die."
+
+"Sergeant Dewit," he added, turning to an enormously tall and
+athletic man near by, "take that little drummer and his drum on
+your shoulder and lead the way. And, sergeant, make him pound that
+drum like the devil beating tan-bark!"
+
+The huge man caught the spirit of his commander's order. In a
+twinkling he had the boy astride of his neck with the kettle-drum
+resting on his head, and then the rattling music began. Clark
+followed, pointing onward with his sword. The half frozen and
+tottering soldiers sent up a shout that went back to where Captain
+Bowman was bringing up the rear under orders to shoot every man
+that straggled or shrank from duty.
+
+Now came a time when not a mouthful of food was left. A whole day
+they floundered on, starving, growing fainter at every step, the
+temperature falling, the ice thickening. They camped on high land;
+and next morning they heard Hamilton's distant sunrise gun boom
+over the water.
+
+"One half-ration for the men," said Clark, looking disconsolately
+in the direction whence the sound had come. "Just five mouthfuls
+apiece, even, and I'll have Hamilton and his fort within forty-
+eight hours."
+
+"We will have the provisions, Colonel, or I will die trying to get
+them," Beverley responded "Depend upon me."
+
+They had constructed some canoes in which to transport the weakest
+of the men.
+
+"I will take a dugout and some picked fellows. We will pull to the
+wood yonder, and there we shall find some kind of game which has
+been forced to shelter from the high water."
+
+It was a cheerful view of a forlorn hope. Clark grasped the hand
+extended by Beverley and they looked encouragement into each
+other's eyes.
+
+Oncle Jazon volunteered to go in the pirogue. He was ready for
+anything, everything.
+
+"I can't shoot wo'th a cent," he whined, as they took their places
+in the cranky pirogue; "but I might jes' happen to kill a squir'l
+or a elephant or somepin 'nother."
+
+"Very well," shouted Clark in a loud, cheerful voice, when they
+had paddled away to a considerable distance, "bring the meat to
+the woods on the hill yonder," pointing to a distant island-like
+ridge far beyond the creeping flood. "We'll be there ready to eat
+it!"
+
+He said this for the ears of his men. They heard and answered with
+a straggling but determined chorus of approval. They crossed the
+rolling current of the Wabash by a tedious process of ferrying,
+and at last found themselves once more wading in back-water up to
+their armpits, breaking ice an inch thick as they went. It was the
+closing struggle to reach the high wooded lands. Many of them fell
+exhausted; but their stronger comrades lifted them, holding their
+heads above water, and dragged them on.
+
+Clark, always leading, always inspiring, was first to set foot on
+dry land. He shouted triumphantly, waved his sword, and then fell
+to helping the men out of the freezing flood. This accomplished,
+he ordered fires built; but there was not a soldier of them all
+whose hands could clasp an ax-handle, so weak and numbed with cold
+were they. He was not to be baffled, however. If fire could not be
+had, exercise must serve its purpose. Hastily pouring some powder
+into his hand he dampened it and blacked his face. "Victory, men,
+victory!" he shouted, taking off his hat and beginning to leap and
+dance. "Come on! We'll have a war dance and then a feast, as soon
+as the meat arrives that I have sent for. Dance! you brave lads,
+dance! Victory! victory!"
+
+The strong men, understanding their Colonel's purpose, took hold
+of the delicate ones; and the leaping, the capering, the tumult of
+voices and the stamping of slushy moccasins with which they
+assaulted that stately forest must have frightened every wild
+thing thereabout into a deadly rigor, dark's irrepressible energy
+and optimism worked a veritable charm upon his faithful but almost
+dying companions in arms. Their trust in him made them feel sure
+that food would soon be forthcoming. The thought afforded a
+stimulus more potent than wine; it drove them into an ecstasy of
+frantic motion and shouting which soon warmed them thoroughly.
+
+It is said that fortune favors the brave. The larger meaning of
+the sentence may be given thus: God guards those who deserve His
+protection. History tells us that just when Clark halted his
+command almost in sight of Vincennes--just when hunger was about
+to prevent the victory so close to his grasp--a party of his
+scouts brought in the haunch of a buffalo captured from some
+Indians. The scouts were Lieutenant Beverley and Oncle Jazon. And
+with the meat they brought Indian kettles in which to cook it.
+
+With consummate forethought Clark arranged to prevent his men
+doing themselves injury by bolting their food or eating it half-
+cooked. Broth was first made and served hot; then small bits of
+well broiled steak were doled out, until by degrees the fine
+effect of nourishment set in, and all the command felt the fresh
+courage of healthy reaction.
+
+"I ain't no gin'ral, nor corp'ral, nor nothin'," remarked Oncle
+Jazon to Colonel Clark, "but 'f I's you I'd h'ist up every dad
+dinged ole flag in the rig'ment, w'en I got ready to show myself
+to 'em, an' I'd make 'em think, over yander at the fort, 'at I had
+'bout ninety thousan' men. Hit'd skeer that sandy faced Gov'nor
+over there till he'd think his back-bone was a comin' out'n 'im by
+the roots."
+
+Clark laughed, but his face showed that the old man's suggestion
+struck him forcibly and seriously.
+
+"We'll see about that presently, Oncle Jazon. Wait till we reach
+the hill yonder, from which the whole town can observe our
+manoeuvres, then we'll try it, maybe."
+
+Once more the men were lined up, the roll-call gone through with
+satisfactorily, and the question put: "Are we ready for another
+plunge through the mud and water?"
+
+The answer came in the affirmative, with a unanimity not to be
+mistaken. The weakest heart of them all beat to the time of the
+charge step. Again Clark and Beverley clasped hands and took the
+lead.
+
+When they reached the next high ground they gazed in silence
+across a slushy prairie plot to where, on a slight elevation, old
+Vincennes and Fort Sackville lay in full view.
+
+Beverley stood apart. A rush of sensations affected him so that he
+shook like one whose strength is gone. His vision was blurred.
+Fort and town swimming in a mist were silent and still. Save the
+British flag twinkling above Hamilton's headquarters, nothing
+indicated that the place was not deserted. And Alice? With the
+sweet name's echo Beverley's heart bounded high, then sank
+fluttering at the recollection that she was either yonder at the
+mercy of Hamilton, or already the victim of an unspeakable
+cruelty. Was it weakness for him to lift his clasped hands
+heavenward and send up a voiceless prayer?
+
+While he stood thus Oncle Jazon came softly to his side and
+touched his arm. Beverley started.
+
+"The nex' thing'll be to shoot the everlastin' gizzards outen 'em,
+won't it?" the old man inquired. "I'm jes' a eetchin' to git a
+grip onto that Gov'nor. Ef I don't scelp 'em I'm a squaw."
+
+Beverley drew a deep breath and came promptly. back from his
+dream. It was now Oncle Jazon's turn to assume a reflective,
+reminiscent mood. He looked about him with an expression of vague
+half tenderness on his shriveled features.
+
+"I's jes' a thinkin' how time do run past a feller," he presently
+remarked. "Twenty-seven years ago I camped right here wi' my wife--
+ninth one, ef I 'member correct--jes' fresh married to 'r; sort
+o' honey-moon. 'Twus warm an' sunshiny an' nice. She wus a poorty
+squaw, mighty poorty, an' I wus as happy as a tomtit on a sugar-
+trough. We b'iled sap yander on them nobs under the maples. It wus
+glor'us. Had some several wives 'fore an' lots of 'm sence; but
+she wus sweetes' of 'm all. Strange how a feller 'members sich
+things an' feels sort o' lonesome like!"
+
+The old man's mouth drooped at the corners and he hitched up his
+buckskin trousers with a ludicrous suggestion of pathos in every
+line of his attitude. Unconsciously he sidled closer to Beverley,
+remotely feeling that he was giving the young man very effective
+sympathy, well knowing that Alice was the sweet burden of his
+thoughts. It was thus Oncle Jazon honestly tried to fortify his
+friend against what probably lay in store for him.
+
+But Beverley failed to catch the old man's crude comfort thus
+flung at him. The analogy was not apparent. Oncle Jazon probably
+felt that his kindness had been ineffectual, for he changed his
+tone and added:
+
+"But I s'pose a young feller like ye can't onderstan' w'at it is
+to love a 'oman an' 'en hev 'er quit ye for 'nother feller, an'
+him a buck Injin. Wall, wall, wall, that's the way it do go! Of
+all the livin' things upon top o' this yere globe, the mos'
+onsartin', crinkety-crankety an' slippery thing is a young 'oman
+'at knows she's poorty an' 'at every other man in the known world
+is blind stavin' crazy in love wi' 'er, same as you are. She'll
+drop ye like a hot tater 'fore ye know it, an' 'en look at ye jes'
+pine blank like she never knowed ye afore in her life. It's so,
+Lieutenant, shore's ye'r born. I know, for I've tried the odd
+number of 'em, an' they're all jes' the same."
+
+By this time Beverley's ears were deaf to Oncle Jazon's querulous,
+whining voice, and his thoughts once more followed his wistful
+gaze across the watery plain to where the low roofs of the creole
+town appeared dimly wavering in the twilight of eventide, which
+was fast fading into night. The scene seemed unsubstantial; he
+felt a strange lethargy possessing his soul; he could not realize
+the situation. In trying to imagine Alice, she eluded him, so that
+a sort of cloudy void fell across his vision with the effect of
+baffling and benumbing it. He made vain efforts to recall her
+voice, things that she had said to him, her face, her smiles; all
+he could do was to evoke an elusive, tantalizing, ghostly
+something which made him shiver inwardly with a haunting fear that
+it meant the worst, whatever the worst might be. Where was she?
+Could she be dead, and this the shadowy message of her fate?
+
+Darkness fell, and a thin fog began to drift in wan streaks above
+the water. Not a sound, save the suppressed stir of the camp,
+broke the wide, dreary silence. Oncle Jazon babbled until
+satisfied that Beverley was unappreciative, or at least
+unresponsive.
+
+"Got to hev some terbacker," he remarked, and shambled away in
+search of it among his friends.
+
+A little later Clark approached hastily and said:
+
+"I have been looking for you. The march has begun. Bowman and
+Charleville are moving; come, there's no time to lose."
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+A DUEL BY MOONLIGHT
+
+
+When Hamilton, after running some distance, saw that he was
+gaining upon Alice and would soon overtake her, it added fresh
+energy to his limbs. He had quickly realized the foolishness of
+what he had done in visiting the room of his prisoner at so late
+an hour in the night. What would his officers and men think? To
+let Alice escape would be extremely embarrassing, and to be seen
+chasing her would give good ground for ridicule on the part of his
+entire command. Therefore his first thought, after passing through
+the postern and realizing fully what sort of predicament
+threatened him, was to recapture her and return her to the prison
+room in the block-house without attracting attention. This now
+promised to be an easier task than he had at first feared; for in
+the moonlight, which on account of the dispersing clouds, was fast
+growing stronger, he saw her seem to falter and weaken. Certainly
+her flight was checked and took an eccentric turn, as if some
+obstruction had barred her way. He rushed on, not seeing that, as
+Alice swerved, a man intervened. Indeed he was within a few
+strides of laying his hand on her when he saw her make the strange
+movement. It was as if, springing suddenly aside, she had become
+two persons instead of one. But instantly the figures coincided
+again, and in becoming taller faced about and confronted him.
+
+Hamilton stopped short in his tracks. The dark figure was about
+five paces from him. It was not Alice, and a sword flashed dimly
+but unmistakably in a ray of the moon. The motion visible was that
+of an expert swordsman placing himself firmly on his legs, with
+his weapon at guard.
+
+Alice saw the man in her path just in time to avoid running
+against him. Lightly as a flying bird, when it whisks itself in a
+short semicircle past a tree or a bough, she sprang aside and
+swung around to the rear of him, where she could continue her
+course toward the town. But in passing she recognized him. It was
+Father Beret, and how grim he looked! The discovery was made in
+the twinkling of an eye, and its effect was instantaneous, not
+only checking the force of her flight, but stopping her and
+turning her about to gaze before she had gone five paces farther.
+
+Hamilton's nerve held, startled as he was, when he realized that
+an armed man stood before him. Naturally he fell into the error of
+thinking that he had been running after this fellow all the way
+from the little gate, where, he supposed, Alice had somehow given
+him the slip. It was a mere flash of brain-light, so to call it,
+struck out by the surprise of this curious discovery. He felt his
+bellicose temper leap up furiously at being balked in a way so
+unexpected and withal so inexplicable. Of course he did not stand
+there reasoning it all out. The rush of impressions came, and at
+the same time he acted with promptness. Changing the rapier, which
+he held in his right hand, over into his left, he drew a small
+pistol from the breast of his coat and fired. The report was sharp
+and loud; but it caused no uneasiness or inquiry in the fort,
+owing to the fact that Indians invariably emptied their guns when
+coming into the town.
+
+Hamilton's aim, although hasty, was not bad. The bullet from his
+weapon cut through Father Beret's clothes between his left arm and
+his body, slightly creasing the flesh on a rib. Beyond him it
+struck heavily and audibly. Alice fell limp and motionless to the
+soft wet ground, where cold puddles of water were splintered over
+with ice. She lay pitifully crumpled, one arm outstretched in the
+moonlight. Father Beret heard the bullet hit her, and turned in
+time to see her stagger backward with a hand convulsively pressed
+over her heart. Her face, slightly upturned as she reeled, gave
+the moon a pallid target for its strengthening rays. Sweet,
+beautiful, its rigid features flashed for a second and then half
+turned away from the light and went down.
+
+Father Beret uttered a short, thin cry and moved as if to go to
+the fallen girl, but just then he saw Hamilton's sword pass over
+again into his right hand, and knew that there was no time for
+anything but death or fight. The good priest did not shirk what
+might have made the readiest of soldiers nervous. Hamilton was
+known to be a great swordsman and proud of the distinction. Father
+Beret had seen him fence with Farnsworth in remarkable form,
+touching him at will, and in ministering to the men in the fort he
+had heard them talk of the Governor's incomparable skill.
+
+A priest is, in perhaps all cases but the last out of a thousand,
+a man of peace, not to be forced into a fight; but the exceptional
+one out of the ten hundred it is well not to stir up if you are
+looking for an easy victim. Hamilton was in the habit of
+considering every antagonist immediately conquerable. His
+domineering spirit could not, when opposed, reckon with any
+possibility of disaster. As he sprang toward Father Beret there
+was a mutual recognition and, we speak guardedly, something that
+sounded exactly like an exchange of furious execrations. As for
+Father Beret's words, they may have been a mere priestly formula
+of objurgation.
+
+The moon was accommodating. With a beautiful white splendor it
+entered a space of cloudless sky, where it seemed to slip along
+the dusky blue surface among the stars, far over in the west.
+
+"It's you, is it?" Hamilton exclaimed between teeth that almost
+crushed one another. "You prowling hypocrite of hell!"
+
+Father Beret said something. It was not complimentary, and it
+sounded sulphurous, if not profane. Remember, however, that a
+priest can scarcely hope to be better than Peter, and Peter did
+actually make the Simon pure remark when hard pressed. At all
+events Father Beret said something with vigorous emphasis, and met
+Hamilton half way.
+
+Both men, stimulated to the finger-tips by a draught of imperious
+passion, fairly plunged to the inevitable conflict. Ah, if Alice
+could have seen her beautiful weapons cross, if she could have
+heard the fine, far-reaching clink, clink, clink, while sparks
+leaped forth, dazzling even in the moonlight; if she could have
+noted the admirable, nay, the amazing, play, as the men, regaining
+coolness to some extent, gathered their forces and fell cautiously
+to the deadly work, it would have been enough to change the cold
+shimmer of her face to a flash of warm delight. For she would have
+understood every feint, longe, parry, and seen at a glance how
+Father Beret set the pace and led the race at the beginning. She
+would have understood; for Father Beret had taught her all she
+knew about the art of fencing.
+
+Hamilton quickly felt, and with a sense of its strangeness, the
+priest's masterly command of his weapon. The surprise called up
+all his caution and cleverness. Before he could adjust himself to
+such an unexpected condition he came near being spitted outright
+by a pretty pass under his guard. The narrow escape, while it put
+him on his best mettle, sent a wave of superstition through his
+brain. He recalled what Barlow had jocularly said about the doings
+of the devil-priest or priest-devil at Roussillon place on that
+night when the patrol guard attempted to take Gaspard Roussillon.
+Was this, indeed, Father Beret, that gentle old man, now before
+him, or was it an avenging demon from the shades?
+
+The thought flitted electrically across his mind, while he deftly
+parried, feinted, longed, giving his dark antagonist all he could
+do to meet the play. Priest or devil, he thought, he cared not
+which, he would reach its vitals presently. Yet there lingered
+with him a haunting half-fear, or tenuous awe, which may have
+aided, rather than hindered his excellent swordsmanship.
+
+Under foot it was slushy with mud, water and ice, the consistency
+varying from a somewhat solid crust to puddles that half inundated
+Hamilton's boots and quite overflowed Father Beret's moccasins. An
+execrable field for the little matter in hand. They gradually
+shifted position. Now it was the Governor, then the priest, who
+had advantage as to the light. For some time Father Beret seemed
+quite the shiftier and surer fighter, but (was it his age telling
+on him?) he lost perceptibly in suppleness. Still Hamilton failed
+to touch him. There was a baffling something in the old man's
+escape now and again from what ought to have been an inevitable
+stroke. Was it luck? It seemed to Hamilton more than that--a sort
+of uncanny evasion. Or was it supreme mastery, the last and
+subtlest reach of the fencer's craft?
+
+Youth forced age slowly backward in the struggle, which at times
+took on spurts so furious that the slender blades, becoming mere
+glints of acicular steel, split the moonlight back and forth, up
+and down, so that their meetings, following one another in a well-
+nigh continuous stroke, sent a jarring noise through the air.
+Father Beret lost inch by inch, until the fighting was almost over
+the body of Alice; and now for the first time Hamilton became
+aware of that motionless something with the white, luminous face
+in profile against the ground; but he did not let even that
+unsettle his fencing gaze, which followed the sunken and dusky
+eyes of his adversary. A perspiration suddenly flooded his body,
+however, and began to drip across his face. His arm was tiring. A
+doubt crept like a chill into his heart. Then the priest appeared
+to add a cubit to his stature and waver strangely in the soft
+light. Behind him, low against the sky, a wide winged owl shot
+noiselessly across just above the prairie.
+
+The soul of a true priest is double: it is the soul of a saint and
+the soul of a worldly man. What is most beautiful in this duality
+is the supreme courage with which the saintly spirit attacks the
+worldly and so often heroically masters it. In the beginning of
+the fight Father Beret let a passion of the earthly body take him
+by storm. It was well for Governor Henry Hamilton that the priest
+was so wrought upon as to unsettle his nerves, otherwise there
+would have been an evil heart impaled midway of Father Beret's
+rapier. A little later the saintly spirit began to assert itself,
+feebly indeed, but surely. Then it was that Father Beret seemed to
+be losing agility for a while as he backstepped away from
+Hamilton's increasing energy of assault. In his heart the priest
+was saying: "I will not murder him. I must not do that. He
+deserves death, but vengeance is not mine. I will disarm him."
+Step by step he retreated, playing erratically to make an opening
+for a trick he meant to use.
+
+It was singularly loose play, a sort of wavering, shifty,
+incomprehensible show of carelessness, that caused Hamilton to
+entertain a doubt, which was really a fear, as to what was going
+to happen; for, notwithstanding all this neglect of due precaution
+on the priest's part, to touch him seemed impossible, miraculously
+so, and every plan of attack dissolved into futility in the most
+maddening way.
+
+"Priest, devil or ghost!" raged Hamilton, with a froth gathering
+around his mouth; "I'll kill you, or--"
+
+He made a longe, when his adversary left an opening which appeared
+absolutely beyond defence. It was a quick, dextrous, vicious
+thrust. The blade leaped toward Father Beret's heart with a
+twinkle like lightning.
+
+At that moment, although warily alert and hopeful that his
+opportunity was at hand, Father Beret came near losing his life;
+for as he side-stepped and easily parried Hamilton's thrust, which
+he had invited, thinking to entangle his blade and disarm him, he
+caught his foot in Alice's skirt and stumbled, nearly falling
+across her. It would have been easy for Hamilton to run him
+through, had he instantly followed up the advantage. But the
+moonlight on Alice's face struck his eyes, and by that indirect
+ray of vision which is often strangely effective, he recognized
+her lying there. It was a disconcerting thing for him, but he
+rallied instantly and sprang aside, taking a new position just in
+time to face Father Beret again. A chill crept up his back. The
+horror which he could not shake off enraged him beyond measure.
+Gathering fresh energy, he renewed the assault with desperate
+steadiness the highest product of absolutely molten fury.
+
+Father Beret felt the dangerous access of power in his
+antagonist's arm, and knew that a crisis had arrived. He could not
+be careless now. Here was a swordsman of the best school calling
+upon him for all the skill and strength and cunning that he could
+command. Again the saintly element was near being thrown aside by
+the worldly in the old man's breast. Alice lying there seemed
+mutely demanding that he avenge her. A riotous something in his
+blood clamored for a quick and certain act in this drama by
+moonlight--a tragic close by a stroke of terrible yet perfectly
+fitting justice.
+
+There was but the space of a breath for the conflict in the
+priest's heart, yet during that little time he reasoned the case
+and quoted scripture to himself.
+
+"Domine, percutimus in gladio?" rang through his mind. "Lord,
+shall we smite with the sword?"
+
+Hamilton seemed to make answer to this with a dazzling display of
+skill. The rapiers sang a strange song above the sleeping girl, a
+lullaby with coruscations of death in every keen note.
+
+Father Beret was thinking of Alice. His brain, playing double,
+calculated with lightning swiftness the chances and movements of
+that whirlwind rush of fight, while at the same time it swept
+through a retrospect of all the years since Alice came into his
+life. How he had watched her grow and bloom; how he had taught
+her, trained her mind and soul and body to high things, loved her
+with a fatherly passion unbounded, guarded her from the coarse and
+lawless influences of her surroundings. Like the tolling of an
+infinitely melancholy bell, all this went through his breast and
+brain, and, blending with a furious current of whatever passions
+were deadly dangerous in his nature, swept as a storm bearing its
+awful force into his sword-arm.
+
+The Englishman was a lion, the priest a gladiator. The stars aloft
+in the vague, dark, yet splendid, amphitheater were the audience.
+It was a question. Would the thumbs go down or up? Life and death
+held the chances even; but it was at the will of Heaven, not of
+the stars. "Hoc habet" must follow the stroke ordered from beyond
+the astral clusters and the dusky blue.
+
+Hamilton pressed, nay rushed, the fight with a weight and at a
+pace which could not last. But Father Beret withstood him so
+firmly that he made no farther headway; he even lost some ground a
+moment later.
+
+"You damned Jesuit hypocrite!" he snarled; "you lowest of a vile
+brotherhood of liars!"
+
+Then he rushed again, making a magnificent show of strength,
+quickness and accuracy. The sparks hissed and crackled from the
+rasping and ringing blades.
+
+Father Beret was, in truth, a Jesuit, and as such a zealot; but he
+was not a liar or a hypocrite. Being human, he resented an insult.
+The saintly spirit in him was strong, yet not strong enough to
+breast the indignation which now dashed against it. For a moment
+it went down.
+
+"Liar and scoundrel yourself!" he retorted, hoarsely forcing the
+words out of his throat. "Spawn of a beastly breed!"
+
+Hamilton saw and felt a change pass over the spirit of the old
+priest's movements. Instantly the sword leaping against his own
+seemed endowed with subtle cunning and malignant treachery. Before
+this it had been difficult enough to meet the fine play and hold
+fairly even; now he was startled and confused; but he rose to the
+emergency with admirable will power and cleverness.
+
+"Murderer of a poor orphan girl!" Father Beret added with a hot
+concentrated accent; "death is too good for you."
+
+Hamilton felt nearer his grave than ever before in all his wild
+experience, for somehow doom, shadowy and formless, like the
+atmosphere of an awful dream, enmisted those words; but he was no
+weakling to quit at the height of desperate conflict. He was
+strong, expert, and game to the middle of his heart.
+
+"I'll add a traitor Jesuit to my list of dead," he panted forth,
+rising yet again to the extremest tension of his power.
+
+As he did this Father Beret settled himself as you have seen a
+mighty horse do in the home stretch of a race. Both men knew that
+the moment had arrived for the final act in their impromptu play.
+It was short, a duel condensed and crowded into fifteen seconds of
+time, and it was rapid beyond the power of words to describe. A
+bystander, had there been one, could not have seen what was
+finally done or how it was done. Father Beret's sword seemed to be
+revolving--it was a halo in front of Hamilton for a mere point of
+time. The old priest seemed to crouch and then make a quick motion
+as if about to leap backward. A wrench and a snip, as of something
+violently jerked from a fastening, were followed by a semicircular
+flight of Hamilton's rapier over Father Beret's head to stick in
+the ground ten feet behind him. The duel was over, and the whole
+terrible struggle had occupied less than three minutes.
+
+With his wrist strained and his fingers almost broken, Hamilton
+stumbled forward and would have impaled himself had not Father
+Beret turned the point of his weapon aside as he lowered it.
+
+"Surrender, or die!"
+
+That was a strange order for a priest to make, but there could be
+no mistaking its authority or the power behind it. Hamilton
+regained his footing and looked dazed, wheezing and puffing like a
+porpoise, but he clearly understood what was demanded of him.
+
+"If you call out I'll run you through," Father Beret added, seeing
+him move his lips as if to shout for help.
+
+The level rapier now reinforced the words. Hamilton let the breath
+go noiselessly from his mouth and waved his hand in token of
+enforced submission.
+
+"Well, what do you want me to do?" he demanded after a short
+pause. "You seem to have me at your mercy. What are your terms?"
+
+Father Beret hesitated. It was a question difficult to answer.
+
+"Give me your word as a British officer that you will never again
+try to harm any person, not an open, armed enemy, in this town."
+
+Hamilton's gorge rose perversely. He erected himself with lofty
+reserve and folded his arms. The dignity of a Lieutenant Governor
+leaped into him and took control. Father Beret correctly
+interpreted what he saw.
+
+"My people have borne much," he said, "and the killing of that
+poor child there will be awfully avenged if I but say the word.
+Besides, I can turn every Indian in this wilderness against you in
+a single day. You are indeed at my mercy, and I will be merciful
+if you will satisfy my demand."
+
+He was trembling with emotion while he spoke and the desire to
+kill the man before him was making a frightful struggle with his
+priestly conscience; but conscience had the upper hand. Hamilton
+stood gazing fixedly, pale as a ghost, his thoughts becoming more
+and more clear and logical. He was in a bad situation. Every word
+that Father Beret had spoken was true and went home with force.
+There was no time for parley or subterfuge; the sword looked as
+if, eager to find his heart, it could not be held back another
+moment. But the wan, cold face of the girl had more power than the
+rapier's hungry point. It made an abject coward of him.
+
+"I am willing to give you my word," he presently said. "And let me
+tell you," he went on more rapidly, "I did not shoot at her. She
+was behind you,"
+
+"Your word as a British officer?"
+
+Hamilton again stiffened and hesitated, but only for the briefest
+space, then said:
+
+"Yes, my word as a British officer."
+
+Father Beret waved his hand with impatience.
+
+"Go, then, back to your place in the fort and disturb, my people
+no more. The soul of this poor little girl will haunt you forever.
+Go!"
+
+Hamilton stood a little while gazing at the face of Alice with the
+horrible wistfulness of remorse. What would he not have given to
+rub his eyes and find it all a dream?
+
+He turned away; a cloud scudded across the moon; here and yonder
+in the dim town cocks crowed with a lonesome, desultory effect.
+
+Father Beret plucked up the rapier that he had wrenched from
+Hamilton's hand. It suggested something.
+
+"Hold!" he called out, "give me the scabbard of this sword."
+Hamilton, who was striding vigorously in the direction of the
+fort, turned about as the priest hastened to him.
+
+"Give me the scabbard of this rapier; I want it. Take it off."
+
+The command was not gently voiced. A hoarse, half-whisper winged
+every word with an imperious threat.
+
+Hamilton obeyed. His hands were not firm; his fingers fumbled
+nervously; but he hurried, and Father Beret soon had the rapier
+sheathed and secured at his belt beside its mate.
+
+A good and true priest is a burden-bearer. His motto is: Alter
+alterius onera portate; bear ye one another's burdens. His soul is
+enriched with the cast-off sorrows of those whom he relieves.
+Father Beret scarcely felt the weight of Alice's body when he
+lifted it from the ground, so heavy was the pressure of his grief.
+All that her death meant, not only to him, but to every person who
+knew her, came into his heart as the place of refuge consecrated
+for the indwelling of pain. He lifted her and bore her as far
+toward Roussillon place as he could; but his strength fell short
+just in front of the little Bourcier cottage, and half dead he
+staggered across the veranda to the door, where he sank exhausted.
+
+After a breathing spell he knocked. The household, fast asleep,
+did not hear; but he persisted until the door was opened to him
+and his burden.
+
+ Captain Farnsworth unclosed his bloodshot eyes, at about eight
+o'clock in the morning, quite confused as to his place and
+surroundings. He looked about drowsily with a sheepish half-
+knowledge of having been very drunk. A purring in his head and a
+dull ache reminded him of an abused stomach. He yawned and
+stretched himself, then sat up, running a hand through his tousled
+hair. Father Beret was on his knees before the cross, still as a
+statue, his clasped hands extended upward.
+
+Farnsworth's face lighted with recognition, and he smiled rather
+bitterly. He recalled everything and felt ashamed, humiliated,
+self-debased. He had outraged even a priest's hospitality with his
+brutish appetite, and he hated himself for it. Disgust nauseated
+his soul apace with the physical sinking and squirming that grew
+upon him.
+
+"I'm a shabby, worthless dog!" he muttered, with petulant accent;
+"why don't you kick me out, Father?"
+
+The priest turned a collapsed and bloodless gray face upon him,
+smiled in a tired, perfunctory way, crossed himself absently and
+said:
+
+"You have rested well, my son. Hard as the bed is, you have done
+it a compliment in the way of sleeping. You young soldiers
+understand how to get the most out of things."
+
+"You are too generous, Father, and I can't appreciate it. I know
+what I deserve, and you know it, too. Tell me what a brute and
+fool I am; it will do me good. Punch me a solid jolt in the ribs,
+like the one you gave me not long ago."
+
+"Qui sine peccato est, primus lapidem mittat" said the priest.
+"Let him who is without sin cast the first stone."
+
+He had gone to the hearth and was taking from the embers an
+earthen saucer, or shallow bowl, in which some fragrant broth
+simmered and steamed.
+
+"A man who has slept as long as you have, my son, usually has a
+somewhat delicate appetite. Now, here is a soup, not especially
+satisfying to the taste of a gourmet like yourself, but possessing
+the soothing quality that is good for one just aroused from an
+unusual nap. I offer it, my son, propter stomachum tuum, et
+frequentes tuas infirmitates (on account of thy stomach, and thine
+often infirmities). This soup will go to the right spot."
+
+While speaking he brought the hot bowl to Farnsworth and set it on
+the bedcover before him, then fetched a big horn spoon.
+
+The fragrance of pungent roots and herbs, blent with a savory waft
+of buffalo meat, greeted the Captain's sense, and the anticipation
+itself cheered his aching throat. It made him feel greedy and in a
+hurry. The first spoonful, a trifle bitter, was not so pleasant at
+the beginning, but a moment after he swallowed it a hot prickling
+set in and seemed to dart through him from extremity to extremity.
+
+Slowly, as he ate, the taste grew more agreeable, and all the
+effects of his debauch disappeared. It was like magic; his blood
+warmed and glowed, as if touched with mysterious fire.
+
+"What is this in this soup, Father Beret, that makes it so
+searching and refreshing?" he demanded, when the bowl was empty.
+
+Father Beret shook his head and smiled drolly.
+
+"That I cannot divulge, my son, owing to a promise I had to make
+to the aged Indian who gave me the secret. It is the elixir of the
+Miamis. Only their consecrated medicine men hold the recipe. The
+stimulation is but temporary."
+
+Just then someone knocked on the door. Father Beret opened it to
+one of Hamilton's aides,
+
+"Your pardon, Father, but hearing Captain Farnsworth's voice I
+made bold to knock."
+
+"What is it, Bobby?" Farnsworth called out.
+
+"Nothing, only the Governor has been having you looked for in
+every nook and corner of the fort and town. You'd better report at
+once, or hell be having us drag the river for your body."
+
+"All right, Lieutenant, go back and keep mum, that's a dear boy,
+and I'll shuffle into Colonel Hamilton's august presence before
+many minutes."
+
+The aide laughed and went his way whistling a merry tune.
+
+"Now I am sure to get what I deserve, with usury at forty per cent
+in advance," said Farnsworth dryly, shrugging his shoulders with
+undissembled dread of Hamilton's wrath. But the anticipation was
+not realized. The Governor received Farnsworth stiffly enough, yet
+in a way that suggested a suppressed desire to avoid explanations
+on the Captain's part and a reprimand on his own. In fact,
+Hamilton was hoping that something would turn up to shield him
+from the effect of his terrible midnight adventure, which seemed
+the darker the more he thought of it. He had a slow, numb
+conscience, lying deep where it was hard to reach, and when a
+qualm somehow entered it he endured in secret what most men would
+have cast off or confessed. He was haunted, if not with remorse,
+at least by a dread of something most disagreeable in connection
+with what he had done. Alice's white face had impressed itself
+indelibly on his memory, so that it met his inner vision at every
+turn. He was afraid to converse with Farnsworth lest she should
+come up for discussion; consequently their interview was curt and
+formal.
+
+It was soon discovered that Alice had escaped from the stockade,
+and some show of search was made for her by Hamilton's order, but
+Farnsworth looked to it that the order was not carried out. He
+thought he saw at once that his chief knew where she was. The
+mystery perplexed and pained the young man, and caused him to fear
+all sorts of evil; but there was a chance that Alice had found a
+safe retreat and he knew that nothing but ill could befall her if
+she were discovered and brought back to the fort. Therefore his
+search for her became his own secret and for his own heart's ease.
+And doubtless he would have found her; for even handicapped and
+distorted love like his is lynx-eyed and sure on the track of its
+object; but a great event intervened and swept away his
+opportunity.
+
+Hamilton's uneasiness, which was that of a strong, misguided
+nature trying to justify itself amid a confusion of unmanageable
+doubts and misgivings, now vented itself in a resumption of the
+repairs he had been making at certain points in the fort. These he
+completed just in time for the coming of Clark.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE ATTACK
+
+
+It has already been mentioned that Indians, arriving singly or in
+squads, to report at Hamilton's headquarters, were in the habit of
+firing their guns before entering the town or the fort, not only
+as a signal of their approach, but in order to rid their weapons
+of their charges preliminary to cleaning them before setting out
+upon another scalp-hunting expedition. A shot, therefore, or even
+a volley, heard on the outskirts of the village, was not a
+noticeable incident in the daily and nightly experience of the
+garrison. Still, for some reason, Governor Hamilton started
+violently when, just after nightfall, five or six rifles cracked
+sharply a short distance from the stockade.
+
+He and Helm with two other officers were in the midst of a game of
+cards, while a kettle, swinging on a crane in the ample fire-
+place, sang a shrill promise of hot apple-jack toddy.
+
+"By Jove!" exclaimed Farnsworth, who, although not in the game,
+was amusing himself with looking on; "you jump like a fine lady! I
+almost fancied I heard a bullet hit you."
+
+"You may all jump while you can," remarked Helm. "That's Clark,
+and your time's short--He'll have this fort tumbling on your heads
+before daylight of to-morrow morning comes."
+
+As he spoke he arose from his seat at the card table and went to
+look after the toddy, which, as an expert, he had under
+supervision.
+
+Hamilton frowned. The mention of Clark was disturbing. Ever since
+the strange disappearance of Lieutenant Barlow he had nursed the
+fear that possibly Clark's scouts had captured him and that the
+American forces might be much nearer than Kaskaskia. Besides, his
+nerves were unruly, as they had been ever since the encounter with
+Father Beret; and his vision persisted in turning back upon the
+accusing cold face of Alice, lying in the moonlight. One little
+detail of that scene almost maddened him at times; it was a
+sheeny, crinkled wisp of warm looking hair looped across the cheek
+in which he had often seen a saucy dimple dance when Alice spoke
+or smiled. He was bad enough, but not wholly bad, and the thought
+of having darkened those merry eyes and stilled those sweet
+dimples tore through him with a cold, rasping pang.
+
+"Just as soon as this toddy is properly mixed and tempered," said
+Helm, with a magnetic jocosity beaming from his genial face, "I'm
+going to propose a toast to the banner of Alice Roussillon, which
+a whole garrison of British braves has been unable to take!"
+
+"If you do I'll blow a hole through you as big as the south door
+of hell," said Hamilton, in a voice fairly shaken to a husky
+quaver with rage. "You may do a great many insulting things; but
+not that."
+
+Helm was in a half stooping attitude with a ladle in one hand, a
+cup in the other. He had met Hamilton's glowering look with a
+peculiarly innocent smile, as if to say: "What in the world is the
+matter now? I never felt in a better humor in all my life. Can't
+you take a joke, I wonder?" He did not speak, however, for a
+rattling volley of musket and rifle shots hit the top of the clay-
+daubed chimney, sending down into the toddy a shower of soot and
+dirt.
+
+In a wink every man was on his feet and staring.
+
+"Gentlemen," said Helm, with an impressive oath, "that is Clark's
+soldiers, and they will take your fort; but they ought not to have
+spoiled this apple toddy!" "Oh, the devil!" said Hamilton,
+forcibly resuming a calm countenance, "it is only a squad of
+drunken Indians coming in. We'll forego excitement; there's no
+battle on hand, gentlemen."
+
+"I'm glad you think so, Governor Hamilton," Helm responded, "but I
+should imagine that I ought to know the crack of a Kentucky rifle.
+I've heard one occasionally in my life. Besides, I got a whiff of
+freedom just now."
+
+"Captain Helm is right," observed Farnsworth. "That is an attack."
+
+Another volley, this time nearer and more concentrated, convinced
+Hamilton that he was, indeed, at the opening of a fight. Even
+while he was giving some hurried orders to his officers, a man was
+wounded at one of the port-holes. Then came a series of yells,
+answered by a ripple of sympathetic French shouting that ran
+throughout the town. The patrol guards came straggling in,
+breathless with excitement. They swore to having seen a thousand
+men marching across the water-covered meadows.
+
+Hamilton was brave. The approach of danger stirred him like a
+trumpet-strain. His fighting blood rose to full tide, and he gave
+his orders with the steadiness and commanding force of a born
+soldier. The officers hastened to their respective positions. On
+all sides sounds indicative of rapid preparations for the fight
+mingled into a confused strain of military energy. Men marched to
+their places; cannon were wheeled into position, and soon enough
+the firing began in good earnest.
+
+Late in the afternoon a rumor of Clark's approach had gone abroad
+through the village; but not a French lip breathed it to a friend
+of the British. The creoles were loyal to the cause of freedom;
+moreover, they cordially hated Hamilton, and their hearts beat
+high at the prospect of a change in masters at the fort. Every
+cabin had its hidden gun and supply of ammunition, despite the
+order to disarm issued by Hamilton. There was a hustling to bring
+these forth, which was accompanied with a guarded yet
+irrepressible chattering, delightfully French and infinitely
+volatile.
+
+"Tiens! je vais frotter mon fusil. J'ai vu un singe!" said Jaques
+Bourcier to his daughter, the pretty Adrienne, who was coming out
+of the room in which Alice lay.
+
+"I saw a monkey just now; I must rub up my gun!" He could not be
+solemn; not he. The thought of an opportunity to get even with
+Hamilton was like wine in his blood.
+
+If you had seen those hardy and sinewy Frenchmen gliding in the
+dusk of evening from cottage to cottage, passing the word that the
+Americans had arrived, saying airy things and pinching one another
+as they met and hurried on, you would have thought something very
+amusing and wholly jocund was in preparation for the people of
+Vincennes.
+
+There was a current belief in the town that Gaspard Roussillon
+never missed a good thing and always somehow got the lion's share.
+He went out with the ebb to return on the flood. Nobody was
+surprised, therefore, when he suddenly appeared in the midst of
+his friends, armed to the teeth and emotionally warlike to suit
+the occasion. Of course he took charge of everybody and
+everything. You could have heard him whisper a bowshot away.
+
+"Taisons!" he hissed, whenever he met an acquaintance. "We will
+surprise the fort and scalp the whole garrison. Aux armes! les
+Americains viennent d'arriver!"
+
+At his own house he knocked and called in vain. He shook the door
+violently; for he was thinking of the stores under the floor, of
+the grimy bottles, of the fragrant Bordeaux--ah, his throat, how
+it throbbed! But where was Madame Roussillon? Where was Alice?
+"Jean! Jean!" he cried, forgetting all precaution, "come here, you
+scamp, and let me in this minute!"
+
+A profoundly impressive silence gave him to understand that his
+home was deserted.
+
+"Chiff! frightened and gone to stay with Madame Godere, I suppose--
+and I so thirsty! Bah! hum, hum, apres le vin la bataille, ziff!"
+
+He kicked in the door and groped his way to the liquors. While he
+hastily swigged and smacked he heard the firing begin with a
+crackling, desultory volley. He laughed jovially, there in the
+dark, between draughts and deep sighs of enjoyment.
+
+"Et moi aussi," he murmured, like the vast murmur of the sea, "I
+want to be in that dance! Pardonnez, messieurs. Moi, je veux
+danser, s'il vous plait."
+
+And when he had filled himself he plunged out and rushed away,
+wrought up to the extreme fighting pitch of temper. Diable! if he
+could but come across that Lieutenant Barlow, how he would smash
+him and mangle him! In magnifying his prowess with the lens of
+imagination he swelled and puffed as he lumbered along.
+
+The firing sounded as if it were between the fort and the river;
+but presently when one of Hamilton's cannon spoke, M. Roussillon
+saw the yellow spike of flame from its muzzle leap directly toward
+the church, and he thought it best to make a wide detour to avoid
+going between the firing lines. Once or twice he heard the whine
+of a stray bullet high overhead. Before he had gone very far he
+met a man hurrying toward the fort. It was Captain Francis
+Maisonville, one of Hamilton's chief scouts, who had been out on a
+reconnoissance and, cut off from his party by some of Clark's
+forces, was trying to make his way to the main gate of the
+stockade.
+
+M. Roussillon knew Maisonville as a somewhat desperate character,
+a leader of Indian forays and a trader in human scalps. Surely the
+fellow was legitimate prey.
+
+"Ziff! diable de gredin!" he snarled, and leaping upon him choked
+him to the ground, "Je vais vous scalper immediatement!"
+
+Clark's plan of approach showed masterly strategy. Lieutenant
+Bailey, with fourteen regulars, made a show of attack on the east,
+while Major Bowman led a company through the town, on a line near
+where Main street in Vincennes is now located, to a point north of
+the stockade. Charleville, a brave creole, who was at the head of
+some daring fellows, by a brilliant dash got position under cover
+of a natural terrace at the edge of the prairie, opposite the
+fort's southwestern angle. Lieutenant Beverley, in whom the
+commander placed highest confidence, was sent to look for a supply
+of ammunition, and to gather up all the Frenchmen in the town who
+wished to join in the attack. Oncle Jazon and ten other available
+men went with him.
+
+They all made a great noise when they felt that the place was
+completely invested. Nor can we deny, much as we would like to,
+the strong desire for vengeance which raised those shouting voices
+and nerved those steady hearts to do or die in an undertaking
+which certainly had a desperate look. Patriotism of the purest
+strain those men had, and that alone would have borne them up; but
+the recollection of smouldering cabin homes in Kentucky, of women
+and children murdered and scalped, of men brave and true burned at
+the stake, and of all the indescribable outrages of Indian warfare
+incited and rewarded by the commander of the fort yonder, added to
+patriotism the terrible urge of that dark passion which clamors
+for blood to quench the fire of wrath. Not a few of those wet,
+half-frozen, emaciated soldiers of freedom had experienced the
+soul rending shock of returning from a day's hunting in the forest
+to find home in ashes and loved ones brutally murdered and
+scalped, or dragged away to unspeakable outrage under
+circumstances too harrowing for description, the bare thought of
+which turns our blood cold, even at this distance. Now the
+opportunity had arrived for a stroke of retaliation. The thought
+was tremendously stimulating.
+
+Beverley, with the aid of Oncle Jazon, was able to lead his little
+company as far as the church before the enemy saw him. Here a
+volley from the nearest angle of the stockade had to be answered,
+and pretty soon a cannon began to play upon the position.
+
+"We kin do better some'rs else," was Oncle Jazon's laconic remark
+flung back over his shoulder, as he moved briskly away from the
+spot just swept by a six-pounder. "Come this yer way, Lieutenant.
+I hyer some o' the fellers a talkin' loud jes' beyant Legrace's
+place. They ain't no sort o' sense a tryin' to hit anything a
+shootin' in the dark nohow."
+
+When they reached the thick of the town there was a strange stir
+in the dusky streets. Men were slipping from house to house,
+arming themselves and joining their neighbors. Clark had sent an
+order earlier in the evening forbidding any street demonstration
+by the inhabitants; but he might as well have ordered the wind not
+to blow or the river to stand still. Oncle Jazon knew every man
+whose outlines he could see or whose voice he heard. He called
+each one by name:
+
+"Here, Roger, fall in!--Come Louis, Alphonse, Victor, Octave--
+venez ici, here's the American army, come with me!" His rapid
+French phrases leaped forth as if shot from a pistol, and his
+shrill voice, familiar to every ear in Vincennes, drew the creole
+militiamen to him, and soon Beverley's company had doubled its
+numbers, while at the same time its enthusiasm and ability to make
+a noise had increased in a far greater proportion. In accordance
+with an order from Clark they now took position near the northeast
+corner of the stockade and began firing, although in the darkness
+there was but little opportunity for marksmanship.
+
+Oncle Jazon had found citizens Legrace and Bosseron, and through
+them Clark's men were supplied with ammunition, of which they
+stood greatly in need, their powder having got wet during their
+long, watery march. By nine o'clock the fort was completely
+surrounded, and from every direction the riflemen and musketeers
+were pouring in volley after volley. Beverley with his men took
+the cover of a fence and some houses sixty yards from the
+stockade. Here to their surprise they found themselves below the
+line of Hamilton's cannon, which, being planted on the second
+floor of the fort, could not be sufficiently depressed to bear
+upon them. A well directed musket fire, however, fell from the
+loopholes of the blockhouses, the bullets rattling merrily against
+the cover behind which the attacking forces lay.
+
+Beverley was thinking of Alice during every moment of all this
+stir and tumult He feared that she might still be a prisoner in
+the fort exposed to the very bullets that his men were discharging
+at every crack and cranny of those loosely constructed buildings.
+Should he ever see her again? Would she care for him? What would
+be the end of all this terrible suspense? Those remote forebodings
+of evils, formless, shadowy, ineffable, which have harried the
+lover's heart since time began, crowded all pleasant anticipations
+out of his mind.
+
+Clark, in passing hurriedly from company to company around the
+line, stopped for a little while when he found Beverley.
+
+"Have you plenty of ammunition?" was his first inquiry.
+
+"A mighty sight more'n we kin see to shoot with," spoke up Oncle
+Jazon. "It's a right smart o' dad burn foolishness to be wastin'
+it on nothin'; seems like to me 'at we'd better set the dasted
+fort afire an' smoke the skunks out!"
+
+"Speak when you are spoken to, my man," said the Colonel a trifle
+hotly, and trying by a sharp scrutiny to make him out in the gloom
+where he crouched.
+
+"Ventrebleu! I'm not askin' YOU, Colonel Clark, nor no other man,
+when I shill speak. I talks whenever I gits ready, an' I shoots
+jes' the same way. So ye'd better go on 'bout yer business like a
+white man! Close up yer own whopper jawed mouth, ef ye want
+anything shet up!"
+
+"Oho! is that you, Jazon? You're so little I didn't know you!
+Certainly, talk your whole damned under jaw off, for all I care,"
+Clark replied, assuming a jocose tone. Then turning again to
+Beverley: "Keep up the firing and the noise; the fort will be ours
+in the morning."
+
+"What's the use of waiting till morning?" Beverley demanded with
+impatience. "We can tear that stockade to pieces with our hands in
+half an hour."
+
+"I don't think so, Lieutenant. It is better to play for the sure
+thing. Keep up the racket, and be ready for 'em if they rush out.
+We must not fail to capture the hair-buyer General."
+
+He passed on, with something cheerful to say whenever he found a
+squad of his devoted men. He knew how to humor and manage those
+independent and undisciplined yet heroically brave fellows. What
+to see and hear, what to turn aside as a joke, what to insist upon
+with inflexible mastery, he knew by the fine instantaneous sense
+of genius. There were many men of Oncle Jazon's cast, true as
+steel, but refractory as flint, who could not be dominated by any
+person, no matter of what stamp or office. To them an order was an
+insult; but a suggestion pleased and captured them. Strange as it
+may seem, theirs was the conquering spirit of America--the spirit
+which has survived every turn of progress and built up the great
+body of our independence.
+
+Beverley submitted to Clark's plan with what patience he could,
+and all night long fired shot for shot with the best riflemen in
+his squad. It was a fatiguing performance, with apparently little
+result beyond forcing the garrison now and again to close the
+embrasures. thus periodically silencing the cannon. Toward the
+close of the night a relaxation showed itself in the shouting and
+firing all round the line. Beverley's men, especially the creoles,
+held out bravely in the matter of noise; but even they flagged at
+length, their volatility simmering down to desultory bubbling and
+half sleepy chattering and chaffing.
+
+Beverley leaned upon a rude fence, and for a time neglected to
+reload his hot rifle. Of course he was thinking of Alice,--he
+really could not think in any other direction; but it gave him a
+shock and a start when he presently heard her name mentioned by a
+little Frenchman near him on the left.
+
+"There'll never be another such a girl in Post Vincennes as Alice
+Roussillon," the fellow said in the soft creole patois, "and to
+think of her being shot like a dog!"
+
+"And by a man who calls himself a Governor, too!" said another.
+"Ah, as for myself, I'm in favor of burning him alive when we
+capture him. That's me!"
+
+"Et moi aussi," chimed in a third voice. "That poor girl must be
+avenged. The man who shot her must die. Holy Virgin, but if
+Gaspard Roussillon were only here!"
+
+"But he is here; I saw him just after dark. He was in great
+fighting temper, that terrible man. Ouf! but I should not like to
+be Colonel Hamilton and fall in the way of that Gaspard
+Roussillon!"
+
+"Morbleu! I should say not. You may leave me out of a chance like
+that! I shouldn't mind seeing Gaspard handle the Governor, though.
+Ah, that would be too good! He'd pay him up for shooting
+Mademoiselle Alice."
+
+Beverley could scarcely hold himself erect by the fence; the
+smoky, foggy landscape swam round him heavy and strange. He
+uttered a groan, which brought Oncle Jazon to his side in a hurry.
+
+"Qu' avez-vous? What's the matter?" the old man demanded with
+quick sympathy. "Hev they hit ye? Lieutenant, air ye hurt much?"
+
+Beverley did not hear the old man's words, did not feel his kindly
+touch.
+
+"Alice! Alice!" he murmured, "dead, dead!"
+
+"Ya-as," drawled Oncle Jazon, "I hearn about it soon as I got
+inter town. It's a sorry thing, a mighty sorry thing. But mebby I
+won't do a little somepin' to that--"
+
+Beverley straightened himself and lifted his gun, forgetting that
+he had not reloaded it since firing last. He leveled it at the
+fort and touched the trigger. Simultaneously with his movement an
+embrasure opened and a cannon flashed, its roar flanked on either
+side by a crackling of British muskets. Some bullets struck the
+fence and flung splinters into Oncle Jazon's face. A cannon ball
+knocked a ridge pole from the roof of a house hard by, and sent it
+whirling through the air.
+
+"Ventrebleu!--et apres? What the devil next? Better knock a
+feller's eyes out!" the old man cried. "I ain't a doin' nothin' to
+ye!"
+
+He capered around rubbing his leathery face after the manner of a
+scalded monkey. Beverley was struck in the breast by a flattened
+and spent ball that glanced from a fence-picket. The shock caused
+him to stagger and drop his gun; but he quickly picked it up and
+turned to his companion.
+
+"Are you hurt, Oncle Jazon?" he inquired. "Are you hurt?"
+
+"Not a bit--jes' skeert mos' into a duck fit. Thought a cannon
+ball had knocked my whole dang face down my throat! Nothin' but a
+handful o' splinters in my poorty count'nance, makin' my head feel
+like a porc'-pine. But I sort o' thought I heard somepin' give
+you a diff."
+
+"Something did hit me," said Beverley, laying a hand on his
+breast, "but I don't think it was a bullet. They seem to be
+getting our range at last. Tell the men to keep well under cover.
+They must not expose themselves until we are ready to charge."
+
+The shock had brought him back to his duty as a leader of his
+little company, and with the funeral bell of all his life's
+happiness tolling in his agonized heart he turned afresh to
+directing the fire upon the block-house.
+
+About this time a runner came from Clark with an order to cease
+firing and let a returning party of British scouts under Captain
+Lamothe re-enter the fort unharmed. A strange order it seemed to
+both officers and men; but it was implicitly obeyed. Clark's
+genius here made another fine strategic flash. He knew that unless
+he let the scouts go back into the stockade they would escape by
+running away, and might possibly organize an army of Indians with
+which to succor Hamilton. But if they were permitted to go inside
+they could be captured with the rest of the garrison; hence his
+order.
+
+A few minutes passed in dead silence; then Captain Lamothe and his
+party marched close by where Beverley's squad was lying concealed.
+It was a difficult task to restrain the creoles, for some of them
+hated Lamothe. Oncle Jazon squirmed like a snake while they filed
+past all unaware that an enemy lurked so near. When they reached
+the fort, ladders were put down for them and they began to clamber
+over the wall, crowding and pushing one another in wild haste.
+Oncle Jazon could hold in no longer.
+
+"Ya! ya! ya I" he yelled. "Look out! the ladder is a fallin' wi'
+ye!"
+
+Then all the lurking crowd shouted as one man, and, sure enough,
+down came a ladder--men and all in a crashing heap.
+
+"Silence! silence!" Beverley commanded; but he could not check the
+wild jeering and laughing, while the bruised and frightened scouts
+hastily erected their ladder again, fairly tumbling over one
+another in their haste to ascend, and so cleared the wall, falling
+into the stockade to join the garrison.
+
+"Ventrebleu!" shrieked Oncle Jazon. "They've gone to bed; but
+we'll wake 'em up at the crack o' day an' give 'em a breakfas' o'
+hot lead!"
+
+Now the fighting was resumed with redoubled spirit and noise, and
+when morning came, affording sufficient light to bring out the
+"bead sights" on the Kentucky rifles, the matchless marksmen in
+Clark's band forced the British to close the embrasures and
+entirely cease trying to use their cannon; but the fight with
+small arms went merrily on until the middle of the forenoon.
+
+Meantime Gaspard Roussillon had tied Francis Maisonville's hands
+fast and hard with the strap of his bullet-pouch.
+
+"Now, I'll scalp you," he said in a rumbling tone, terrible to
+hear. And with his words out came his hunting knife from its
+sheath.
+
+"O have mercy, my dear Monsieur Roussillon!" cried the panting
+captive; "have mercy!"
+
+"Mercy! yes, like your Colonel's, that's what you'll get. You
+stand by that forban, that scelerat, that bandit, and help him.
+Oh, yes, you'll get mercy! Yes, the same mercy that he showed to
+my poor little Alice! Your scalp, Monsieur, if you please! A small
+matter; it won't hurt much!"
+
+"But, for the sake of old friendship, Gaspard, for the sake--"
+
+"Ziff! poor little Alice!"
+
+"But I swear to you that I--"
+
+"Tout de meme, Monsieur, je vais vous scalper maintenant."
+
+In fact he had taken off a part of Maisonville's scalp, when a
+party of soldiers, among whom was Maisonville's brother, a brave
+fellow and loyal to the American cause, were attracted by his
+cries and came to his rescue.
+
+M. Roussillon struggled savagely, insisting upon completing his
+cruel performance; but he was at last overpowered, partly by brute
+force and partly by the pleading of Maisonville's brother, and
+made to desist. The big man wept with rage when he saw the
+bleeding prisoner protected. "Eh bien! I'll keep what I've got,"
+he roared, "and I'll take the rest of it next time."
+
+He shook the tuft of hair at Maisonville and glared like a mad
+bull.
+
+Two or three other members of Lamothe's band were captured about
+the same time by some of the French militiamen; and Clark, when on
+his round cheering and directing his forces, discovered that these
+prisoners were being used as shields. Some young creoles, gay with
+drink and the stimulating effect of fight, had bound the poor
+fellows and were firing from behind them! Of course the commander
+promptly put an end to this cruelty; but they considered it
+exquisite fun while it lasted. It was in broad daylight, and they
+knew that the English in the fort could see what they were doing.
+
+"It's shameful to treat prisoners in this way," said Clark. "I
+will not permit it. Shoot the next man that offers to do such a
+thing!"
+
+One of the creole youths, a handsome, swarthy Adonis in buckskin,
+tossed his shapely head with a debonair smile and said:
+
+"To be sure, mon Colonel! but what have they been doing to us? We
+have amused them all winter; it's but fair that they should give
+us a little fun now."
+
+Clark shrugged his broad shoulders and passed on. He understood
+perfectly what the people of Vincennes had suffered under
+Hamilton's brutal administration.
+
+At nine o'clock an order was passed to cease firing, and a flag of
+truce was seen going from Clark's headquarters to the fort. It was
+a peremptory demand for unconditional surrender. Hamilton refused,
+and fighting was fiercely resumed from behind rude breastworks
+meantime erected. Every loop-hole and opening of whatever sort was
+the focus into which the unerring backwoods rifles sent their
+deadly bullets. Men began to fall in the fort, and every moment
+Hamilton expected an assault in force on all sides of the
+stockade. This, if successful, would mean inevitable massacre.
+Clark had warned him of the terrible consequences of holding out
+until the worst should come. "For," said he in his note to the
+Governor, "if I am obliged to storm, you may depend upon such
+treatment as is justly due to a murderer."
+
+Historians have wondered why Hamilton became so excited and acted
+so strangely after receiving the note. The phrase, "justly due to
+a murderer," is the key to the mystery. When he read it his heart
+sank and a terrible fear seized him. "Justly due to a murderer!"
+ah, that calm, white, beautiful girlish face, dead in the
+moonlight, with the wisp of shining hair across it! "Such
+treatment as is justly due to a murderer!" Cold drops of sweat
+broke out on his forehead and a shiver went through his body.
+
+During the truce Clark's weary yet still enthusiastic besiegers
+enjoyed a good breakfast prepared for them by the loyal dames of
+Vincennes. Little Adrienne Bourcier was one of the handmaidens of
+the occasion. She brought to Beverley's squad a basket, almost as
+large as herself, heaped high with roasted duck and warm wheaten
+bread, while another girl bore two huge jugs of coffee, fragrant
+and steaming hot. The men cheered them lustily and complimented
+them without reserve, so that before their service was over their
+faces were glowing with delight
+
+And yet Adrienne's heart was uneasy, and full of longing to hear
+something of Rene de Ronville. Surely some one of her friends must
+know something about him. Ah, there was Oncle Jazon! Doubtless he
+could tell her all that she wanted to know. She lingered, after
+the food was distributed, and shyly inquired.
+
+"Hain't seed the scamp," said Oncle Jazon, only he used the patois
+most familiar to the girl's ear. "Killed an' scelped long ago, I
+reckon."
+
+His mouth was so full that he spoke mumblingly and with utmost
+difficulty. Nor did he glance at Adrienne, whose face took on as
+great pallor as her brown complexion could show.
+
+Beverley ate but little of the food. He sat apart on a piece of
+timber that projected from the rough breastwork and gave himself
+over to infinite misery of spirit, which was trebled when he took
+Alice's locket from his bosom, only to discover that the bullet
+which struck him had almost entirely destroyed the face of the
+miniature.
+
+He gripped the dinted and twisted case and gazed at it with the
+stare of a blind man. His heart almost ceased to beat and his
+breath had the rustling sound we hear when a strong man dies of a
+sudden wound. Somehow the defacement of the portrait was taken by
+his soul as the final touch of fate, signifying that Alice was
+forever and completely obliterated from his life. He felt a blur
+pass over his mind. He tried in vain to recall the face and form
+so dear to him; he tried to imagine her voice; but the whole
+universe was a vast hollow silence. For a long while he was cold,
+staring, rigid; then the inevitable collapse came, and he wept as
+only a strong man can who is hurt to death, yet cannot die.
+
+Adrienne approached him, thinking to speak to him about Rene; but
+he did not notice her, and she went her way, leaving beside him a
+liberal supply of food.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+ALICE'S FLAG
+
+
+Governor Hamilton received the note sent him by Colonel Clark and
+replied to it with curt dignity; but his heart was quaking. As a
+soldier he was true to the military tradition, and nothing could
+have induced him to surrender his command with dishonor.
+
+"Lieutenant-Governor Hamilton," he wrote to Clark, "begs leave to
+acquaint Colonel Clark that he and his garrison are not disposed
+to be awed into any action unworthy of British subjects."
+
+"Very brave words," said Helm, when Hamilton read the note to him,
+"but you'll sing a milder tune before many minutes, or you and
+your whole garrison will perish in a bloody heap. Listen to those
+wild yells! Clark has enough men to eat you all up for breakfast.
+You'd better be reasonable and prudent. It's not bravery to court
+massacre."
+
+Hamilton turned away without a word and sent the message; but Helm
+saw that he was excited, and could be still further wrought up.
+
+"You are playing into the hands of your bitterest enemies, the
+frog-eaters," he went on. "These creoles, over whom you've held a
+hot poker all winter, are crazy to be turned loose upon you; and
+you know that they've got good cause to feel like giving you the
+extreme penalty. They'll give it to you without a flinch if they
+get the chance. You've done enough."
+
+Hamilton whirled about and glared ferociously.
+
+"Helm, what do you mean?" he demanded in a voice as hollow as it
+was full of desperate passion.
+
+The genial Captain laughed, as if he had heard a good joke.
+
+"You won't catch any fish if you swear, and you look blasphemous,"
+he said with the lightness of humor characteristic of him at all
+times. "You'd better say a prayer or two. Just reflect a moment
+upon the awful sins you have committed and--"
+
+A crash of coalescing volleys from every direction broke off his
+levity. Clark was sending his response to Hamilton's lofty note.
+The guns of freedom rang out a prophecy of triumph, and the
+hissing bullets clucked sharply as they entered the solid logs of
+the walls or whisked through an aperture and bowled over a man.
+The British musketeers returned the fire as best they could, with
+a courage and a stubborn coolness which Helm openly admired,
+although he could not hide his satisfaction whenever one of them
+was disabled.
+
+"Lamothe and his men are refusing to obey orders," said Farnsworth
+a little later, hastily approaching Hamilton, his face flushed and
+a gleam of hot anger in his eyes. "They're in a nasty mood; I can
+do nothing with them; they have not fired a shot."
+
+"Mutiny?" Hamilton demanded.
+
+"Not just that. They say they do not wish to fire on their kinsmen
+and friends. They are all French, you know, and they see their
+cousins, brothers, uncles and old acquaintances out there in
+Clark's rabble. I can do nothing with them."
+
+"Shoot the scoundrels, then!"
+
+"It will be a toss up which of us will come out on top if we try
+that. Besides, if we begin a fight inside, the Americans will make
+short work of us."
+
+"Well, what in hell are we to do, then?"
+
+"Oh, fight, that's all," said Farnsworth apathetically turning to
+a small loop-hole and leveling a field glass through it. "We might
+make a rush from the gates and stampede them," he presently added.
+Then he uttered an exclamation of great surprise.
+
+"There's Lieutenant Beverley out there," he exclaimed.
+
+"You're mistaken, you're excited," Hamilton half sneeringly
+remarked, yet not without a shade of uneasiness in his expression.
+"You forget, sir."
+
+"Look for yourself, it's easily settled," and Farnsworth proffered
+the glass. "He's there, to a certainty, sir."
+
+"I saw Beverley an hour ago," said Helm. "I knew all the time that
+he'd be on hand."
+
+It was a white lie. Captain Helm was as much surprised as his
+captors at what he heard; but he could not resist the temptation
+to be annoying.
+
+Hamilton looked as Farnsworth directed, and sure enough, there was
+the young Virginian Lieutenant, standing on a barricade, his hat
+off, cheering his men with a superb show of zeal. Not a hair of
+his head was missing, so far as the glass could be relied upon to
+show.
+
+Oncle Jazon's quick old eyes saw the gleam of the telescope tube
+in the loop-hole.
+
+"I never could shoot much," he muttered, and then a little bullet
+sped with absolute accuracy from his disreputable looking rifle
+and shattered the object-lens, just as Hamilton moved to withdraw
+the glass, uttering an ejaculation of intense excitement.
+
+"Such devils of marksmen!" said he, and his face was haggard.
+"That infernal Indian lied."
+
+"I could have told you all the time that the scalp Long-Hair
+brought to you was not Beverley's," said Helm indifferently. "I
+recognized Lieutenant Barlow's hair as soon as I saw it."
+
+This was another piece of off-hand romance. Helm did not dream
+that he was accidentally sketching a horrible truth.
+
+"Barlow's!" exclaimed Farnsworth.
+
+"Yes, Barlow's, no mistake--"
+
+Two more men reeled from a port-hole, the blood spinning far out
+of their wounds. Indeed, through every aperture in the walls the
+bullets were now humming like mad hornets.
+
+"Close that port-hole!" stormed Hamilton; then turning to
+Farnsworth he added: "We cannot endure this long. Shut up every
+place large enough for a bullet to get through. Go all around,
+give strict orders to all. See that the men do not foolishly
+expose themselves. Those ruffians out there have located every
+crack."
+
+His glimpse of Beverley and the sinister remark of Helm had
+completely unmanned him before his men fell. Now it rushed upon
+him that if he would escape the wrath of the maddened creoles and
+the vengeance of Alice's lover, he must quickly throw himself upon
+the mercy of Clark. It was his only hope. He chafed inwardly, but
+bore himself with stern coolness. He presently sought Farnsworth,
+pulled him aside and suggested that something must be done to
+prevent an assault and a massacre. The sounds outside seemed to
+forebode a gathering for a desperate rush, and in his heart he
+felt all the terrors of awful anticipation.
+
+"We are completely at their mercy, that is plain," he said,
+shrugging his shoulders and gazing at the wounded men writhing in
+their agony. "What do you suggest?"
+
+Captain Farnsworth was a shrewd officer. He recollected that
+Philip Dejean, justice of Detroit, was on his way down the Wabash
+from that post, and probably near at hand, with a flotilla of men
+and supplies. Why not ask for a few days of truce? It could do no
+harm, and if agreed to, might be their salvation. Hamilton jumped
+at the thought, and forthwith drew up a note which he sent out
+with a white flag. Never before in all his military career had he
+been so comforted by a sudden cessation of fighting. His soul
+would grovel in spite of him. Alice's cold face now had Beverley's
+beside it in his field of inner vision--a double assurance of
+impending doom, it seemed to him.
+
+There was short delay in the arrival of Colonel Clark's reply,
+hastily scrawled on a bit of soiled paper. The request for a truce
+was flatly refused; but the note closed thus:
+
+"If Mr. Hamilton is Desirous of a Conferance with Col. Clark he
+will meet him at the Church with Captn. Helms."
+
+The spelling was not very good, and there was a redundancy of
+capital letters; yet Hamilton understood it all; and it was very
+difficult for him to conceal his haste to attend the proposed
+conference. But he was afraid to go to the church--the thought
+chilled him. He could not face Father Beret, who would probably be
+there. And what if there should be evidences of the funeral?--what
+if?--he shuddered and tried to break away from the vision in his
+tortured brain.
+
+He sent a proposition to Clark to meet him on the esplanade before
+the main gate of the fort; but Clark declined, insisting upon the
+church. And thither he at last consented to go. It was an immense
+brace to his spirit to have Helm beside him during that walk,
+which, although but eighty yards in extent, seemed to him a matter
+of leagues. On the way he had to pass near the new position taken
+up by Beverley and his men. It was a fine test of nerve, when the
+Lieutenant's eyes met those of the Governor. Neither man permitted
+the slightest change of countenance to betray his feelings. In
+fact, Beverley's face was as rigid as marble; he could not have
+changed it.
+
+But with Oncle Jazon it was a different affair. He had no dignity
+to preserve, no fine military bearing to sustain, no terrible tug
+of conscience, no paralyzing grip of despair on his heart. When he
+saw Hamilton going by, bearing himself so superbly, it affected
+the French volatility in his nature to such an extent that his
+tongue could not be controlled.
+
+"Va t'en, bete, forban, meurtrier! Skin out f'om here! beast,
+robber, murderer!" he cried, in his keen screech-owl voice. "I'll
+git thet scelp o' your'n afore sundown, see 'f I don't! Ye onery
+gal-killer an' ha'r buyer!"
+
+The blood in Hamilton's veins caught no warmth from these remarks;
+but he held his head high and passed stolidly on, as if he did not
+hear a word. Helm turned the tail of an eye upon Oncle Jazon and
+gave him a droll, quizzical wink of approval. In response the old
+man with grotesque solemnity drew his buckhorn handled knife,
+licked its blade and returned it to its sheath,--a bit of
+pantomime well understood and keenly enjoyed by the onlooking
+creoles.
+
+"Putois! coquin!" they jeered, "goujat! poltron!"
+
+Beverley heard the taunting racket, but did not realize it, which
+was well enough, for he could not have restrained the bitter
+effervescence. He stood like a statue, gazing fixedly at the now
+receding figure, the lofty, cold-faced man in whom centered his
+hate of hates. Clark had requested him to be present at the
+conference in the church; but he declined, feeling that he could
+not meet Hamilton and restrain himself. Now he regretted his
+refusal, half wishing that--no, he could not assassinate an enemy
+under a white flag. In his heart he prayed that there would be no
+surrender, that Hamilton would reject every offer. To storm the
+fort and revel in butchering its garrison seemed the only
+desirable thing left for him in life.
+
+Father Beret was, indeed, present at the church, as Hamilton had
+dreaded; and the two duelists gave each other a rapier-like eye-
+thrust. Neither spoke, however, and Clark immediately demanded a
+settlement of the matter in hand. He was brusque and imperious to
+a degree, apparently rather anxious to repel every peaceful
+advance.
+
+It was a laconic interview, crisp as autumn ice and bitter as
+gallberries. Colonel Clark had no respect whatever for Hamilton,
+to whom he had applied the imperishable adjective "hair-buyer
+General." On the other hand Governor Hamilton, who felt keenly the
+disgrace of having to equalize himself officially and discuss
+terms of surrender with a rough backwoodsman, could not conceal
+his contempt of Clark.
+
+The five men of history, Hamilton, Helm, Hay, Clark and Bowman,
+were not distinguished diplomats. They went at their work rather
+after the hammer-and-tongs fashion. Clark bluntly demanded
+unconditional surrender. Hamilton refused. They argued the matter.
+Helm put in his oar, trying to soften the situation, as was his
+custom on all occasions, and received from Clark a stinging
+reprimand, with the reminder that he was nothing but a prisoner on
+parole, and had no voice at all in settling the terms of
+surrender.
+
+"I release him, sir," said Hamilton. "He is no longer a prisoner.
+I am quite willing to have Captain Helm join freely in our
+conference."
+
+"And I refuse to permit his acceptance of your favor," responded
+Clark. "Captain Helm, you will return with Mr. Hamilton to the
+fort and remain his captive until I free you by force. Meantime
+hold your tongue."
+
+Father Beret, suave looking and quiet, occupied himself at the
+little altar, apparently altogether indifferent to what was being
+said; but he lost not a word of the talk.
+
+"Qui habet aures audiendi, audiat," he inwardly repeated, smiling
+blandly. "Gaudete in illa die, et exultate!"
+
+Hamilton rose to go; deep lines of worry creased his face; but
+when the party had passed outside, he suddenly turned upon Clark
+and said:
+
+"Why do you demand impossible terms of me?"
+
+"I will tell you, sir," was the stern answer, in a tone in which
+there was no mercy or compromise. "I would rather have you refuse.
+I desire nothing so much as an excuse to wreak full and bloody
+vengeance on every man in that fort who has engaged in the
+business of employing savages to scalp brave, patriotic men and
+defenseless women and children. The cries of the widows and the
+fatherless on our frontiers require the blood of the Indian
+partisans at my hands. If you choose to risk the massacre of your
+garrison to save those despicable red-handed partisans, have your
+pleasure. What you have done you know better than I do. I have a
+duty to perform. You may be able to soften its nature. I may take
+it into my head to send for some of our bereaved women to witness
+my terrible work and see that it is well done, if you insist upon
+the worst."
+
+Major Hay, who was Hamilton's Indian agent, now, with some
+difficulty clearing his throat, spoke up.
+
+"Pray, sir," said he, "who is it that you call Indian partisans?"
+"Sir," replied Clark, seeing that his words had gone solidly home,
+"I take Major Hay to be one of the principals."
+
+This seemed to strike Hay with deadly force, dark's report says
+that he was "pale and trembling, scarcely able to stand," and that
+"Hamilton blushed, and, I observed, was much affected at his
+behavior. "Doubtless, if the doughty American commander had known
+more about the Governor's feelings just then, he would have added
+that an awful fear, even greater than the Indian agent's, did more
+than anything else to congest the veins in his face.
+
+The parties separated without reaching an agreement; but the end
+had come. The terror in Hamilton's soul was doubled by a wild
+scene enacted under the walls of his fort; a scene which, having
+no proper place in this story, strong as its historical interest
+unquestionably is, must be but outlined. A party of Indians
+returning from a scalping expedition in Kentucky and along the
+Ohio, was captured on the outskirts of the town by some of Clark's
+men, who proceeded to kill and scalp them within full view of the
+beleaguered garrison, after which their mangled bodies were flung
+into the river.
+
+If the British commander needed further wine of dread to fill his
+cup withal, it was furnished by ostentatious marshaling of the
+American forces for a general assault. His spirit broke
+completely, so that it looked like a godsend to him when Clark
+finally offered terms of honorable surrender, the consummation of
+which was to be postponed until the following morning. He accepted
+promptly, appending to the articles of capitulation the following
+reasons for his action: "The remoteness from succor; the state and
+quantity of provisions, etc.; unanimity of officers and men in its
+expediency; the honorable terms allowed; and, lastly, the
+confidence in a generous enemy."
+
+Confidence in a generous enemy! Abject fear of the vengeance just
+wreaked upon his savage emissaries would have been the true
+statement. Beverley read the paper when Clark sent for him; but he
+could not join in the extravagant delight of his fellow officers
+and their brave men. What did all this victory mean to him?
+Hamilton to be treated as an honorable prisoner of war, permitted
+to strut forth from the feat with his sword at his side, his head
+up--the scalp-buyer, the murderer of Alice! What was patriotism
+to the crushed heart of a lover? Even if his vision had been able
+to pierce the future and realize the splendor of Anglo-Saxon
+civilization which was to follow that little triumph at Vincennes,
+what pleasure could it have afforded him? Alice, Alice, only
+Alice; no other thought had influence, save the recurring surge of
+desire for vengeance upon her murderer.
+
+And yet that night Beverley slept, and so forgot his despair for
+many hours, even dreamed a pleasant dream of home, where his
+childhood was spent, of the stately old house on the breezy hill-
+top overlooking a sunny plantation, with a little river lapsing
+and shimmering through it. His mother's dear arms were around him,
+her loving breath stirred his hair; and his stalwart, gray-headed
+father sat on the veranda comfortably smoking his pipe, while away
+in the wide fields the negroes sang at the plow and the hoe.
+Sweeter and sweeter grew the scene, softer the air, tenderer the
+blending sounds of the water-murmur, leaf-rustle, bird-song, and
+slave-song, until hand in hand he wandered with Alice in greening
+groves, where the air was trembling with the ecstacy of spring.
+
+A young officer awoke him with an order from Clark to go on duty
+at once with Captains Worthington and Williams, who, under Colonel
+Clark himself, were to take possession of the fort. Mechanically
+he obeyed. The sun was far up, shining between clouds of a leaden,
+watery hue, by the time everything was ready for the important
+ceremony. Beside the main gate of the stockade two companies of
+patriots under Bowman and McCarty were drawn up as guards, while
+the British garrison filed out and was taken in charge. This bit
+of formality ended, Governor Hamilton, attended by some of his
+officers, went back into the fort and the gate was closed.
+
+Clark now gave orders that preparations be made for hauling down
+the British flag and hoisting the young banner of liberty in its
+place, when everything should be ready for a salute of thirteen
+guns from the captured battery.
+
+Helm's round face was beaming. Plainly it showed that his
+happiness was supreme. He dared not say anything, however; for
+Clark was now all sternness and formality; it would be dangerous
+to take any liberties; but he could smile and roll his quid of
+tobacco from cheek to cheek.
+
+Hamilton and Farnsworth, the latter slightly wounded in the left
+arm, which was bandaged, stood together somewhat apart from their
+fellow officers, while preliminary steps for celebrating their
+defeat and capture were in progress. They looked forlorn enough to
+have excited deep sympathy under fairer conditions.
+
+Outside the fort the creoles were beginning a noise of jubilation.
+The rumor of what was going to be done had passed from mouth to
+mouth, until every soul in the town knew and thrilled with
+expectancy. Men, women and children came swarming to see the
+sight, and to hear at close range the crash of the cannon. They
+shouted, in a scattering way at first, then the tumult grew
+swiftly to a solid rolling tide that seemed beyond all comparison
+with the population of Vincennes. Hamilton heard it, and trembled
+inwardly, afraid lest the mob should prove too strong for the
+guard.
+
+One leonine voice roared distinctly, high above the noise. It was
+a sound familiar to all the creoles,--that bellowing shout of
+Gaspard Roussillon's. He was roaming around the stockade, having
+been turned back by the guard when he tried to pass through the
+main gate.
+
+"They shut me out!" he bellowed furiously. "I am Gaspard
+Roussillon, and they shut me out, me! Ziff! me voici! je vais
+entrer immediatement, moi!"
+
+He attracted but little attention, however; the people and the
+soldiery were all too excited by the special interest of the
+occasion, and too busy with making a racket of their own, for any
+individual, even the great Roussillon, to gain their eyes or ears.
+He in turn scarcely heard the tumult they made, so self-centered
+were his burning thoughts and feelings. A great occasion in
+Vincennes and he, Gaspard Roussillon, not recognized as one of the
+large factors in it! Ah, no, never! And he strode along the wall
+of the stockade, turning the corners and heavily shambling over
+the inequalities till he reached the postern. It was not fastened,
+some one having passed through just before him.
+
+"Ziff!" he ejaculated, stepping into the area and shaking himself
+after the manner of a dusty mastiff. "C'est moi! Gaspard
+Roussillon!" His massive under jaw was set like that of a vise,
+yet it quivered with rage, a rage which was more fiery
+condensation of self-approval than anger.
+
+Outside the shouting, singing and huzzahs gathered strength and
+volume, until the sound became a hoarse roar. Clark was uneasy; he
+had overheard much of a threatening character during the siege.
+The creoles were, he knew, justly exasperated, and even his own
+men had been showing a spirit which might easily be fanned into a
+dangerous flame of vengeance. He was very anxious to have the
+formalities of taking possession of the fort over with, so that he
+could the better control his forces. Sending for Beverley he
+assigned him to the duty of hauling down the British flag and
+running up that of Virginia. It was an honor of no doubtful sort,
+which under different circumstances would have made the
+Lieutenant's heart glow. As it was, he proceeded without any sense
+of pride or pleasure, moving as a mere machine in performing an
+act significant beyond any other done west of the mountains, in
+the great struggle for American independence and the control of
+American territory.
+
+Hamilton stood a little way from the foot of the tall flag-pole,
+his arms folded on his breast, his chin slightly drawn in, his
+brows contracted, gazing steadily at Beverley while he was untying
+the halyard, which had been wound around the pole's base about
+three feet above the ground. The American troops in the fort were
+disposed so as to form three sides of a hollow square, facing
+inward. Oncle Jazon, serving as the ornamental extreme of one
+line, was conspicuous for his outlandish garb and unmilitary
+bearing. The silence inside the stockade offered a strong contrast
+to the tremendous roar of voices outside. Clark made a signal, and
+at the tap of a drum, Beverley shook the ropes loose and began to
+lower the British colors. Slowly the bright emblem of earth's
+mightiest nation crept down in token of the fact that a handful of
+back-woodsmen had won an empire by a splendid stroke of pure
+heroism. Beverley detached the flag, and saluting, handed it to
+Colonel Clark. Hamilton's breast heaved and his iron jaws
+tightened their pressure until the lines of his cheeks were deep
+furrows of pain.
+
+Father Beret, who had just been admitted, quietly took a place at
+one side near the wall. There was a fine, warm, benignant smile on
+his old face, yet his powerful shoulders drooped as if weighted
+down with a heavy load. Hamilton was aware when he entered, and
+instantly the scene of their conflict came into his memory with
+awful vividness, and he saw Alice lying outstretched, stark and,
+cold, the shining strand of hair fluttering across her pallid
+cheek. Her ghost overshadowed him.
+
+Just then there was a bird-like movement, a wing-like rustle, and
+a light figure flitted swiftly across the area. All eyes were
+turned upon it. Hamilton recoiled, as pale as death, half lifting
+his hands, as if to ward off a deadly blow, and then a gay flag
+was flung out over his head. He saw before him the girl he had
+shot; but her beautiful face was not waxen now, nor was it cold or
+lifeless. The rich red blood was strong under the browned, yet
+delicate skin, the eyes were bright and brave, the cherry lips,
+slightly apart, gave a glimpse of pearl white teeth, and the
+dimples,--those roguish dimples,--twinkled sweetly.
+
+Colonel Clark looked on in amazement, and in spite of himself, in
+admiration. He did not understand; the sudden incident bewildered
+him; but his virile nature was instantly and wholly charmed.
+Something like a breath of violets shook the tenderest chords of
+his heart.
+
+Alice stood firmly, a statue of triumph, her right arm
+outstretched, holding the flag high above Hamilton's head; and
+close by her side the little hunchback Jean was posed in his most
+characteristic attitude, gazing at the banner which he himself had
+stolen and kept hidden for Alice's sake, and because he loved it.
+
+There was a dead silence for some moments, during which Hamilton's
+face showed that he was ready to collapse; then the keen voice of
+Oncle Jazon broke forth:
+
+"Vive Zhorzh Vasinton! Vim la banniere d'Alice Roussillon!"
+
+He sprang to the middle of the area and flung his old cap high in
+air, with a shrill war-whoop.
+
+"H'ist it! h'ist it! hissez la banniere de Mademoiselle Alice
+Roussillon! Voila, que c'est glorieuse, cette banniere la! H'ist
+it! h'ist it!"
+
+He was dancing with a rickety liveliness, his goatish legs and
+shriveled body giving him the look of an emaciated satyr.
+
+Clark had been told by some of his creole officers the story of
+how Alice raised the flag when Helm took the fort, and how she
+snatched it from Hamilton's hand, as it were, and would not give
+it up when he demanded it. The whole situation pretty soon began
+to explain itself, as he saw what Alice was doing. Then he heard
+her say to Hamilton, while she slowly swayed the rippling flag
+back and forth:
+
+"I said, as you will remember, Monsieur le Gouverneur, that when
+you next should see this flag, I should wave it over your head.
+Well, look, I am waving it! Vive la republique! Vive George
+Washington! What do you think of it, Monsieur le Gouverneur?"
+
+The poor little hunchback Jean took off his cap and tossed it in
+rhythmical emphasis, keeping time to her words.
+
+And now from behind the hollow square came a mighty voice:
+
+"C'est moi, Gaspard Roussillon; me voici, messieurs!"
+
+There was a spirit in the air which caught from Alice a thrill of
+romantic energy. The men in the ranks and the officers in front of
+them felt a wave of irresistible sympathy sweep through their
+hearts. Her picturesque beauty, her fine temper, the fitness of
+the incident to the occasion, had an instantaneous power which
+moved all men alike.
+
+"Raise her flag! Run up the young lady's flag!" some one shouted,
+and then every voice seemed to echo the words. Clark was a young
+man of noble type, in whose veins throbbed the warm chivalrous
+blood of the cavaliers. A waft of the suddenly prevailing
+influence bore him also quite off his feet. He turned to Beverley
+and said:
+
+"Do it! It will have a great effect. It is a good idea; get the
+young lady's flag and her permission to run it up."
+
+Before he finished speaking, indeed at the first glance, he saw
+that Beverley, like Hamilton, was white as a dead man; and at the
+same time it came to his memory that his young friend had confided
+to him during the awful march through the prairie wilderness, a
+love-story about this very Alice Roussillon. In the worry and
+stress of the subsequent struggle, he had forgotten the tender
+basis upon which Beverley had rested his excuse for leaving
+Vincennes. Now, it all reappeared in justification of what was
+going on. It touched the romantic core of his southern nature.
+
+"I say, Lieutenant Beverley," he repeated, "beg the young lady's
+permission to use her flag upon this glorious occasion; or shall I
+do it for you?"
+
+There were no miracles in those brave days, and the strain of life
+with its terrible realities braced all men and women to meet
+sudden explosions of surprise, whether of good or bad effect, with
+admirable equipoise; but Beverley's trial, it must be admitted,
+was extraordinary; still he braced himself quickly and his whole
+expression changed when Clark moved to go to Alice. For he
+realized now that it was, indeed, Alice in flesh and blood,
+standing there, the center of admiration, filling the air with her
+fine magnetism and crowning a great triumph with her beauty. He
+gave her a glad, flashing smile, as if he had just discovered her,
+and walked straight to her, his hands extended. She was not
+looking toward him; but she saw him and turned to face him. Hers
+was the advantage; for she had known, for some hours, of his
+presence in Vincennes, and had prepared herself to meet him
+courageously and with maidenly reserve.
+
+There is no safety, however, where Love lurks. Neither Beverley
+nor Alice was as much agitated at Hamilton, yet they both forgot,
+what he remembered, that a hundred grim frontier soldiers were
+looking on. Hamilton had his personal and official dignity to
+sustain, and he fairly did it, under what a pressure of
+humiliating and surprising circumstances we can fully comprehend.
+Not so with the two young people, standing as it were in a
+suddenly bestowed and incomparable happiness, on the verge of a
+new life, each to the other an unexpected, unhoped-for
+resurrection from the dead. To them there was no universe save the
+illimitable expanse of their love. In that moment of meeting, all
+that they had suffered on account of love was transfused and
+poured forth,--a glowing libation for love's sake,--a flood before
+which all barriers broke.
+
+Father Beret was looking on with a strange fire in his eyes, and
+what he feared would happen, did happen. Alice let the flag fall
+at Hamilton's feet, when Beverley came near her smiling that
+great, glad smile, and with a joyous cry leaped into his
+outstretched arms.
+
+Jean snatched up the fallen banner and ran to Colonel Clark with
+it. Two minutes later it was made fast and the halyard began to
+squeak through the rude pulley at the top of the pole. Up, up,
+climbed the gay little emblem of glory, while the cannon crashed
+from the embrasures of the blockhouse hard by, and outside the
+roar of voices redoubled. Thirteen guns boomed the salute, though
+it should have been fourteen,--the additional one for the great
+Northwestern Territory, that day annexed to the domain of the
+young American Republic. The flag went up at old Vincennes never
+to come down again, and when it reached its place at the top of
+the staff, Beverley and Alice stood side by side looking at it,
+while the sun broke through the clouds and flashed on its shining
+folds, and love unabashed glorified the two strong young faces.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+SOME TRANSACTIONS IN SCALPS
+
+
+History would be a very orderly affair, could the dry-as-dust
+historians have their way, and doubtless it would be thrillingly
+romantic at every turn if the novelists were able to control its
+current. Fortunately neither one nor the other has much influence,
+and the result, in the long run, is that most novels are
+shockingly tame, while the large body of history is loaded down
+with picturesque incidents, which if used in fiction, would be
+thought absurdly romantic and improbable.
+
+Were our simple story of old Vincennes a mere fiction, we should
+hesitate to bring in the explosion of a magazine at the fort with
+a view to sudden confusion and, by that means, distracting
+attention from our heroine while she betakes herself out of a
+situation which, although delightful enough for a blessed minute,
+has quickly become an embarrassment quite unendurable. But we
+simply adhere to the established facts in history. Owing to some
+carelessness there was, indeed, an explosion of twenty-six six-
+pound cartridges, which made a mighty roar and struck the newly
+installed garrison into a heap, so to say, scattering things
+terribly and wounding six men, among them Captains Bowman and
+Worthington.
+
+After the thunderous crash came a momentary silence, which
+embraced both the people within the fort and the wild crowd
+outside. Then the rush and noise were indescribable. Even Clark
+gave way to excitement, losing command of himself and, of course,
+of his men. There was a stampede toward the main gate by one wing
+of the troops in the hollow square. They literally ran over
+Beverley and Alice, flinging them apart and jostling them hither
+and yonder without mercy. Of course the turmoil quickly subsided.
+Clark and Beverley got hold of themselves and sang out their
+peremptory orders with excellent effect. It was like oil on raging
+water; the men obeyed in a straggling way, getting back into ranks
+as best they could.
+
+"Ventrebleu!" squeaked Oncle Jazon, "ef I didn't think the ole
+world had busted into a million pieces!"
+
+He was jumping up and down not three feet from Beverley's toes,
+waving his cap excitedly.
+
+"But wasn't I skeert! Ya, ya, ya! Vive la banniere d'Alice
+Roussillon! Vive Zhorzh Vasinton!"
+
+Hearing Alice's name caused Beverley to look around. Where was
+she? In the distance he saw Father Beret hurrying to the spot
+where some of the men burnt and wounded by the explosion were
+being stripped and cared for. Hamilton still stood like a statue.
+He appeared to be the only cool person in the fort.
+
+"Where is Alice?--Miss Roussillon--where did Miss Roussillon go?"
+Beverley exclaimed, staring around like a lost man. "Where is
+she?"
+
+"D'know," said Oncle Jazon, resuming his habitual expression of
+droll dignity, "she shot apast me jes' as thet thing busted loose,
+an' she went like er hummin' bird, skitch!--jes' thet way--an' I
+didn't see 'r no more. 'Cause I was skeert mighty nigh inter seven
+fits; 'spect that 'splosion blowed her clean away! Ventrebleu!
+never was so plum outen breath an' dead crazy weak o' bein'
+afeard!"
+
+"Lieutenant Beverley," roared Clark in his most commanding tone,
+"go to the gate and settle things there. That mob outside is
+trying to break in!"
+
+The order was instantly obeyed, but Beverley had relapsed. Once
+more his soul groped in darkness, while the whole of his life
+seemed unreal, a wavering, misty, hollow dream. And yet his
+military duty was all real enough. He knew just what to do when he
+reached the gate.
+
+"Back there at once!" he commanded, not loudly, but with intense
+force, "back there!" This to the inward surging wedge of excited
+outsiders. Then to the guard.
+
+"Shoot the first man who crosses the line!"
+
+"Ziff! me voici! moi! Gaspard Roussillon. Laissez-moi passer,
+messieurs."
+
+A great body hurled itself frantically past Beverley and the
+guard, going out through the gateway against the wall of the
+crowd, bearing everything before it and shouting:
+
+"Back, fools! you'll all be killed--the powder is on fire! Ziff!
+run!"
+
+Wild as a March hare, he bristled with terror and foamed at the
+mouth. He stampeded the entire mass. There was a wild howl; a rush
+in the other direction followed, and soon enough the esplanade and
+all the space back to the barricades and beyond were quite
+deserted.
+
+Alice was not aware that a serious accident had happened.
+Naturally she thought the great, rattling, crashing noise of the
+explosion a mere part of the spectacular show. When the rush
+followed, separating her and Beverley, it was a great relief to
+her in some way; for a sudden recognition of the boldness of her
+action in the little scene just ended, came over her and
+bewildered her. An impulse sent her running away from the spot
+where, it seemed to her, she had invited public derision. The
+terrible noises all around her were, she now fancied, but the
+jeering and hooting of rude men who had seen her unmaidenly
+forwardness.
+
+With a burning face she flew to the postern and slipped out, once
+more taking the course which had become so familiar to her feet.
+She did not slacken her speed until she reached the Bourcier
+cabin, where she had made her home since the night when Hamilton's
+pistol ball struck her. The little domicile was quite empty of its
+household, but Alice entered and flung herself into a chair, where
+she sat quivering and breathless when Adrienne, also much excited,
+came in, preceded by a stream of patois that sparkled
+continuously.
+
+"The fort is blown up!" she cried, gesticulating in every
+direction at once, her petite figure comically dilated with the
+importance of her statement. "A hundred men are killed, and the
+powder is on fire!"
+
+She pounced into Alice's arms, still talking as fast as her tongue
+could vibrate, changing from subject to subject without rhyme or
+reason, her prattle making its way by skips and shies until what
+was really upper-most in her sweet little heart disclosed itself.
+
+"And, O Alice! Rene has not come yet!"
+
+She plunged her dusky face between Alice's cheek and shoulder;
+Alice hugged her sympathetically and said:
+
+"But Rene will come, I know he will, dear."
+
+"Oh, but do you know it? is it true? who told you? when will he
+come? where is he? tell me about him!"
+
+Her head popped up from her friend's neck and she smiled
+brilliantly through the tears that were still sparkling on her
+long black lashes.
+
+"I didn't mean that I had heard from him, and I don't know where
+he is; but--but they always come back."
+
+"You say that because your man--because Lieutenant Beverley has
+returned. It is always so. You have everything to make you happy,
+while I--I--"
+
+Again her eyes spilled their shower, and she hid her face in her
+hands which Alice tried in vain to remove.
+
+"Don't cry, Adrienne. You didn't see me crying--"
+
+"No, of course not; you didn't have a thing to cry about.
+Lieutenant Beverley told you just where he was going and just
+what--"
+
+"But think, Adrienne, only think of the awful story they told--
+that he was killed, that Governor Hamilton had paid Long-Hair for
+killing him and bringing back his scalp--oh dear, just think! And
+I thought it was true."
+
+"Well, I'd be willing to think and believe anything in the world,
+if Rene would come back," said Adrienne, her face, now uncovered,
+showing pitiful lines of suffering. "O Alice, Alice, and he never,
+never will come!"
+
+Alice exhausted every device to cheer, encourage and comfort her.
+Adrienne had been so good to her when she lay recovering from the
+shock of Hamilton's pistol bullet, which, although it came near
+killing her, made no serious wound--only a bruise, in fact. It was
+one of those fortunate accidents, or providentially ordered
+interferences, which once in a while save a life. The stone disc
+worn by Alice chanced to lie exactly in the missile's way, and
+while it was not broken, the ball, already somewhat checked by
+passing through several folds of Father Beret's garments,
+flattened itself upon it with a shock which somehow struck Alice
+senseless.
+
+Here again, history in the form of an ancient family document (a
+letter written in 1821 by Alice herself), gives us the curious
+brace of incidents, to wit, the breaking of the miniature on
+Beverley's breast by a British musket-ball, and the stopping of
+Hamilton's bullet over Alice's heart by the Indian charm-stone.
+
+"Which shows the goodness of God," the letter goes on, "and also
+seems to sustain the Indian legend concerning the stone, that
+whoever might wear it could not be killed. Unquestionable (sic)
+Mr. Hamilton's shot, which was aimed at poor, dear old Father
+Beret, would have pierced my heart, but for that charm-stone. As
+for my locket, it did not, as some have reported, save Fitzhugh's
+life when the musket-ball was stopped. The ball was so spent that
+the blow was only hard enough to spoil temporary (sic) the face of
+the miniature, which was afterwards restored fairly well by an
+artist in Paris. When it did actually save Fitzhugh's life was out
+on the Illinois plain. The savage, Long-Hair, peace to his memory,
+worked the miracle of restoring to me--" Here a fold in the paper
+has destroyed a line of the writing.
+
+The letter is a sacred family paper, and there is not
+justification for going farther into its faded and, in some parts,
+almost obliterated writing. But so much may pass into these pages
+as a pleasant authentication of what otherwise might be altogether
+too sweet a double nut for the critic's teeth to crack.
+
+While Adrienne and Alice were still discussing the probability of
+Rene de Ronville's return, M. Roussillon came to the door. He was
+in search of Madame, his wife, whom he had not yet seen.
+
+He gathered the two girls in his mighty arms, tousling them with
+rough tenderness. Alice returned his affectionate embrace and told
+him where to find Madame Roussillon, who was with Dame Godere,
+probably at her house.
+
+"Nobody killed," he said, in answer to Alice's inquiry about the
+catastrophe at the fort. "Some of 'em hurt and burnt a little.
+Great big scare about nearly nothing. Ziff! my children, you
+should have seen me quiet things. I put out my hands, this way--
+omme ca--pouf! It was all over. The people went home."
+
+His gestures indicated that he had borne back an army with open
+hands. Then he chucked Adrienne under the chin with his finger and
+added in his softest voice:
+
+"I saw somebody's lover the other day, over yonder in the Indian
+village. He spoke to me about somebody--eh, ma petite, que
+voulez-vous dire?"
+
+"Oh, Papa Roussillon! we were just talking about Rene!" cried
+Alice. "Have you seen him?"
+
+"I saw you, you little minx, jumping into a man's arms right under
+the eyes of a whole garrison! Bah! I could not believe it was my
+little Alice!"
+
+He let go a grand guffaw, which seemed to shake the cabin's walls.
+Alice blushed cherry red. Adrienne, too bashful to inquire about
+Rene, was trembling with anxiety. The truth was not in Gaspard
+Roussillon, just then; or if it was it stayed in him, for he had
+not seen Rene de Ronville. It was his generous desire to please
+and to appear opulent of knowledge and sympathy that made him
+speak. He knew what would please Adrienne, so why not give her at
+least a delicious foretaste? Surely, when a thing was so cheap,
+one need not be so parsimonious as to withhold a mere
+anticipation. He was off before the girls could press him into
+details, for indeed he had none.
+
+"There now, what did I tell you?" cried Alice, when the big man
+was gone. "I told you Rene would come. They always come back!"
+
+Father Beret came in a little later. As soon as he saw Alice he
+frowned and began to shake his head; but she only laughed, and
+imitating his hypocritical scowl, yet fringing it with a twinkle
+of merry lines and dimples, pointed a taper finger at him and
+exclaimed:
+
+"You bad, bad, man! why did you pretend to me that Lieutenant
+Beverley was dead? What sinister ecclesiastical motive prompted
+you to describe how Long-Hair scalped him? Ah, Father--"
+
+The priest laid a broad hand over her saucy mouth. "Something or
+other seems to have excited you mightily, ma fille, you are a
+trifle impulsively inclined to-day."
+
+"Yes, Father Beret; yes I know, and I am ashamed. My heart shrinks
+when I think of what I did; but I was so glad, such a grand joy
+came all over me when I saw him, so strong and brave and
+beautiful, coming toward me, smiling that warm, glad smile and
+holding out his arms--ah, when I saw all that--when I knew for
+sure that he was not dead--I, why, Father--I just had to, I
+couldn't help it!"
+
+Father Beret laughed in spite of himself, but quickly managed to
+resume his severe countenance.
+
+"Ta! ta!" he exclaimed, "it was a bold thing for a little girl to
+do."
+
+"So it was, so it was. But it was also a bold thing for him to do--
+to come back after he was dead and scalped and look so handsome
+and grand! I'm ashamed and sorry, Father; but--but, I'm afraid I
+might do it again if--well, I don't care if I did--so there, now!"
+
+"But what in the world are you talking about?" interposed
+Adrienne. Evidently they were discussing a most interesting matter
+of which she knew nothing, and that did not suit her feminine
+curiosity. "Tell me." She pulled Father Beret's sleeve. "Tell me,
+I say!"
+
+It is probable that Father Beret would have pretended to betray
+Alice's source of mingled delight and embarrassment, had not the
+rest of the Bourcier household returned in time to break up the
+conversation. A little later Alice gave Adrienne a vividly
+dramatic account of the whole scene.
+
+"Ah, mon Dieu!" exclaimed the petite brunette, after she had heard
+the exciting story. "That was just like you, Alice. You always do
+superb things. You were born to do them. You shoot Captain
+Farnsworth, you wound Lieutenant Barlow, you climb onto the fort
+and set up your flag--you take it down again and run away with it--
+you get shot and you do not die--you kiss your lover right before
+a whole garrison! Bon Dieu! if I could but do all those things!
+"She clasped her tiny hands before her and added rather
+dejectedly: "But I couldn't, I couldn't. I couldn't kiss a man in
+that way!"
+
+Late in the evening news came to Roussillon place, where Gaspard
+Roussillon was once more happy in the midst of his little family,
+that the Indian Long-Hair had just been brought to the fort, and
+would be shot on the following day. A scouting party captured him
+as he approached the town, bearing at his belt the fresh scalp of
+a white man. He would have been killed forthwith, but Clark, who
+wished to avoid a repetition of the savage vengeance meted out to
+the Indians on the previous day, had given strict orders that all
+prisoners should be brought into the fort, where they were to have
+a fair trial by court martial.
+
+Both Helm and Beverley were at Roussillon place, the former
+sipping wine and chatting with Gaspard, the latter, of course,
+hovering around Alice, after the manner of a hungry bee around a
+particularly sweet and deliciously refractory flower. It was
+raining slowly, the fine drops coming straight down through the
+cold, still February air; but the two young people found it
+pleasant enough for them on the veranda, where they walked back
+and forth, making fair exchange of the exciting experiences which
+had befallen them during their long separation. Between the lines
+of these mutual recitals sweet, fresh echoes of the old, old story
+went from heart to heart, an amoebaean love-bout like that of
+spring birds calling tenderly back and forth in the blooming
+Maytime woods.
+
+Both Captain Helm and M. Roussillon were delighted to hear of
+Long-Hair's capture and certain fate, but neither of them regarded
+the news as of sufficient importance to need much comment. They
+did not think of telling Beverley and Alice. Jean, however, lying
+awake in his little bed, overheard the conversation, which he
+repeated to Alice next morning with great circumstantiality.
+
+Having the quick insight bred of frontier experience, Alice
+instantly caught the terrible significance of the dilemma in which
+she and Beverley would be placed by Long-Hair's situation.
+Moreover, something in her heart arose with irresistible power
+demanding the final, the absolute human sympathy and gratitude. No
+matter what deeds Long-Hair had committed that were evil beyond
+forgiveness, he had done for her the all-atoning thing. He had
+saved Beverley and sent him back to her.
+
+With a start and a chill of dread, she thought: "What if it is
+already too late!"
+
+But her nature could not hesitate. To feel the demand of an
+exigency was to act. She snatched a wrap from its peg on the wall
+and ran as fast as she could to the fort. People who met her
+flying along wondered, staring after her, what could be urging her
+so that she saw nobody, checked herself for nothing, ran splashing
+through the puddles in the street, gazing ahead of her, as if
+pursuing some flying object from which she dared not turn her
+eyes.
+
+And there was, indeed, a call for her utmost power of flight, if
+she would be of any assistance to Long-Hair, who even then stood
+bound to a stake in the fort's area, while a platoon of riflemen,
+those unerring shots from Kentucky and Virginia, were ready to
+make a target of him at a range of but twenty yards.
+
+Beverley, greatly handicapped by the fact that the fresh scalp of
+a white man hung at Long-Hair's belt, had exhausted every possible
+argument to avert or mitigate the sentence promptly spoken by the
+court martial of which Colonel Clark was the ruling spirit. He had
+succeeded barely to the extent of turning the mode of execution
+from tomahawking to shooting. All the officers in the fort
+approved killing the prisoner, and it was difficult for Colonel
+Clark to prevent the men from making outrageous assaults upon him,
+so exasperated were they at sight of the scalp.
+
+Oncle Jazon proved to be one of the most refractory among those
+who demanded tomahawking and scalping as the only treatment due
+Long-Hair. The repulsive savage stood up before them stolid,
+resolute, defiant, proudly flaunting the badge which testified to
+his horrible efficiency as an emissary of Hamilton's. It had been
+left in his belt by Clark's order, as the best justification of
+his doom.
+
+"L' me hack 'is damned head," Oncle Jazon pleaded. "I jes' hankers
+to chop a hole inter it. An' besides I want 'is scelp to hang up
+wi' mine an' that'n o' the Injun what scelped me. He kicked me in
+the ribs, the stinkin' varmint"
+
+Beverley pleaded eloquently and well, but even the genial Major
+Helm laughed at his sentiment of gratitude to a savage who at best
+but relented at the last moment, for Alice's sake, and concluded
+not to sell him to Hamilton. It is due to the British commander to
+record here that he most positively and with what appeared to be
+high sincerity, denied the charge of having offered rewards for
+the taking of human scalps. He declared that his purposes and
+practices were humane, and that while he did use the Indians as
+military allies, his orders to them were that they must forego
+cruel modes of warfare and refrain from savage outrage upon
+prisoners. Certainly the weight of contemporary testimony seems
+overwhelmingly against him, but we enter his denial. Long-Hair
+himself, however, taunted him with accusations of unfaithfulness
+in carrying out some very inhuman contracts, and to add a terrible
+sting, volunteered the statement that poor Barlow's scalp had
+served his turn in the place of Beverley's.
+
+With conditions so hideous to contend against, Beverley, of
+course, had no possible means of succoring the condemned savage.
+
+"Him a kickin' yer ribs clean inter ye, an' a makin' ye run the
+ga'ntlet, an' here ye air a tryin' to save 'is life!" whined Oncle
+Jazon, "W'y man, I thought ye hed some senterments! Dast 'is Injin
+liver, I kin feel them kicks what he guv me till yit. Ventrebleu!
+que diable voulez-vous?"
+
+Clark simply pushed Beverley's pleadings aside as not worth a
+moment's consideration. He easily felt the fine bit of gratitude
+at the bottom of it all; but there was too much in the other side
+of the balance; justice, the discipline and confidence of his
+little army, and the claim of the women and children on the
+frontier demanded firmness in dealing with a case like Long-
+Hair's.
+
+"No, no," he said to Beverley, "I would do anything in the world
+for you, Fitz, except to swerve an inch from duty to my country
+and the defenceless people down yonder in Kentucky, I can't do it.
+There's no use to press the matter further. The die is cast. That
+brute's got to be killed, and killed dead. Look at him--look at
+that scalp! I'd have him killed if I dropped dead for it the next
+instant."
+
+Beverley shuddered. The argument was horribly convincing, and yet,
+somehow, the desire to save Long-Hair overbore everything else in
+his mind. He could not cease his efforts; it seemed to him as if
+he were pleading for Alice herself. Captain Farnsworth, strange to
+say, was the only man in the fort who leaned to Beverley's side;
+but he was reticent, doubtless feeling that his position as a
+British prisoner gave him no right to speak, especially when every
+lip around him was muttering something about "infamous scalp-
+buyers and Indian partisans," with whom he was prominently counted
+by the speakers.
+
+As Clark had said, the die was cast. Long-Hair, bound to a stake,
+the scalp still dangling at his side, grimly faced his
+executioners, who were eager to fire. He appeared to be proud of
+the fact that he was going to be killed.
+
+"One thing I can say of him," Helm remarked to Beverley; "he's the
+grandest specimen of the animal--I might say the brute--man that
+I ever saw, red, white or black. Just look at his body and limbs!
+Those muscles are perfectly marvelous."
+
+"He saved my life, and I must stand here and see him murdered,"
+the young man replied with intense bitterness. It was all that he
+could think, all that he could say. He felt inefficient and
+dejected, almost desperate.
+
+Clark himself, not willing to cast responsibility upon a
+subordinate, made ready to give the fatal order. Turning to Long-
+Hair first, he demanded of him as well as he could in the Indian
+dialect of which he had a smattering, what he had to say at his
+last moment.
+
+The Indian straightened his already upright form, and, by a strong
+bulging of his muscles, snapped the thongs that bound him.
+Evidently he had not tried thus to free himself; it was rather a
+spasmodic expression of savage dignity and pride. One arm and both
+his legs still were partially confined by the bonds, but his right
+hand he lifted, with a gesture of immense self-satisfaction, and
+pointed at Hamilton.
+
+"Indian brave; white man coward," he said, scowling scornfully.
+"Long-Hair tell truth; white man lie, damn!"
+
+Hamilton's countenance did not change its calm, cold expression.
+Long-Hair gazed at him fixedly for a long moment, his eyes
+flashing most concentrated hate and contempt. Then he tore the
+scalp from his belt and flung it with great force straight toward
+the captive Governor's face. It fell short, but the look that went
+with it did not, and Hamilton recoiled.
+
+At that moment Alice arrived. Her coming was just in time to
+interrupt Clark, who had turned to the waiting platoon with the
+order of death on his lips. She made no noise, save the fluttering
+of her skirts, and her loud and rapid panting on account of her
+long, hard run. She sprang before Long-Hair and faced the platoon.
+
+"You cannot, you shall not kill this man!" she cried in a voice
+loaded with excitement. "Put away those guns!"
+
+Woman never looked more thrillingly beautiful to man than she did
+just then to all those rough, stern backwoodsmen. During her
+flight her hair had fallen down, and it glimmered like soft
+sunlight around her face. Something compelling flashed out of her
+eyes, an expression between a triumphant smile and a ray of
+irresistible beseechment. It took Colonel Clark's breath when he
+turned and saw her standing there, and heard her words.
+
+"This man saved Lieutenant Beverley's life," she presently added,
+getting better control of her voice, and sending into it a
+thrilling timbre; "you shall not harm him--you must not do it!"
+
+Beverley was astounded when he saw her, the thing was so
+unexpected, so daring, and done with such high, imperious force;
+still it was but a realization of what he had imagined she would
+be upon occasion. He stood gazing at her, as did all the rest,
+while she faced Clark and the platoon of riflemen. To hear his own
+name pass her quivering lips, in that tone and in that connection,
+seemed to him a consecration.
+
+"Would you be more savage than your Indian prisoner?" she went on,
+"less grateful than he for a life saved? I did him a small, a very
+small, service once, and in memory of that he saved Lieutenant
+Beverley's life, because--because--" she faltered for a single
+breath, then added clearly and with magnetic sweetness--"because
+Lieutenant Beverley loved me, and because I loved him. This Indian
+Long-Hair showed a gratitude that could overcome his strongest
+passion. You white men should be ashamed to fall below his
+standard."
+
+Her words went home. It was as if the beauty of her face, the
+magnetism of her lissome and symmetrical form, the sweet fire of
+her eyes and the passionate appeal of her voice gave what she said
+a new and irresistible force of truth. When she spoke of
+Beverley's love for her, and declared her love for him, there was
+not a manly heart in all the garrison that did not suddenly beat
+quicker and feel a strange, sweet waft of tenderness. A mother,
+somewhere, a wife, a daughter, a sister, a sweetheart, called
+through that voice of absolute womanhood.
+
+"Beverley, what can I do?" muttered Clark, his bronze face as pale
+as it could possibly become.
+
+"Do!" thundered Beverley, "do! you cannot murder that man.
+Hamilton is the man you should shoot! He offered large rewards, he
+inflamed the passions and fed the love of rum and the cupidity of
+poor wild men like the one standing yonder. Yet you take him
+prisoner and treat him with distinguished consideration. Hamilton
+offered a large sum for me taken alive, a smaller one for my
+scalp. Long-Hair saved me. You let Hamilton stand yonder in
+perfect safety while you shoot the Indian. Shame on you, Colonel
+Clark! shame on you, if you do it."
+
+Alice stood looking at the stalwart commander while Beverley was
+pouring forth his torrent of scathing reference to Hamilton, and
+she quickly saw that Clark was moved. The moment was ripe for the
+finishing stroke. They say it is genius that avails itself of
+opportunity. Beverley knew the fight was won when he saw what
+followed. Alice suddenly left Long-Hair and ran to Colonel Clark,
+who felt her warm, strong arms loop round him for a single point
+of time never to be effaced from his memory; then he saw her
+kneeling at his feet, her hands upstretched, her face a glorious
+prayer, while she pleaded the Indian's cause and won it.
+
+Doubtless, while we all rather feel that Clark was weak to be thus
+swayed by a girl, we cannot quite blame him. Alice's flag was over
+him; he had heard her history from Beverley's cunning lips; he
+actually believed that Hamilton was the real culprit, and besides
+he felt not a little nauseated with executing Indians. A good
+excuse to have an end of it all did not go begging.
+
+But Long-Hair was barely gone over the horizon from the fort, as
+free and as villainous a savage as ever trod the earth, when a
+discovery made by Oncle Jazon caused Clark to hate himself for
+what he had done.
+
+The old scout picked up the scalp, which Long-Hair had flung at
+Hamilton, and examined it with odious curiosity. He had lingered
+on the spot with no other purpose than to get possession of that
+ghastly relic. Since losing his own scalp the subject of
+crownlocks had grown upon his mind until its fascination was
+irresistible. He studied the hair of every person he saw, as a
+physiognomist studies faces. He held the gruesome thing up before
+him, scrutinizing it with the expression of a connoisseur who has
+discovered, on a grimy canvas, the signature of an old master.
+
+"Sac' bleu!" he presently broke forth. "Well I'll be--Look'ee yer,
+George Clark! Come yer an' look. Ye've been sold ag'in. Take a
+squint, ef ye please!"
+
+Colonel Clark, with his hands crossed behind him, his face
+thoughtfully contracted, was walking slowly to and fro a little
+way off. He turned about when Oncle Jazon spoke.
+
+"What now, Jazon?"
+
+"A mighty heap right now, that's what; come yer an' let me show
+ye. Yer a fine sort o' eejit, now ain't ye!"
+
+The two men walked toward each other and met. Oncle Jazon held up
+the scalp with one hand, pointing at it with the index finger of
+the other.
+
+"This here scalp come off'n Rene de Ronville's head."
+
+"And who is he?"
+
+"Who's he? Ye may well ax thet. He wuz a Frenchman. He wuz a fine
+young feller o' this town. He killed a Corp'ral o' Hamilton's an'
+tuck ter the woods a month or two ago. Hamilton offered a lot o'
+money for 'im or 'is scalp, an' Long-Hair went in fer gittin' it.
+Now ye knows the whole racket. An' ye lets that Injun go. An' thet
+same Injun he mighty nigh kicked my ribs inter my stomach!"
+
+Oncle Jazon's feelings were visible and audible; but Clark could
+not resent the contempt of the old man's looks and words. He felt
+that he deserved far more than he was receiving. Nor was Oncle
+Jazon wrong. Rene de Ronville never came back to little Adrienne
+Bourcier, although, being kept entirely ignorant of her lover's
+fate, she waited and dreamed and hoped throughout more than two
+years, after which there is no further record of her life.
+
+Clark, Beverley and Oncle Jazon consulted together and agreed
+among themselves that they would hold profoundly secret the story
+of the scalp. To have made it public would have exasperated the
+creoles and set them violently against Clark, a thing heavy with
+disaster for all his future plans. As it was, the release of Long-
+Hair caused a great deal of dissatisfaction and mutinous talk.
+Even Beverley now felt that the execution ordered by the commander
+ought to have been sternly carried out.
+
+A day or two later, however, the whole dark affair was closed
+forever by a bit of confidence on the part of Oncle Jazon when
+Beverley dropped into his hut one evening to have a smoke with
+him.
+
+The rain was over, the sky shone like one vast luminary, with a
+nearly full moon and a thousand stars reinforcing it. Up from the
+south poured one of those balmy, accidental wind floods, sometimes
+due in February on the Wabash, full of tropical dream-hints, yet
+edged with a winter chill that smacks of treachery. Oncle Jazon
+was unusually talkative; he may have had a deep draught of liquor;
+at all events Beverley had little room for a word.
+
+"Well, bein' as it's twixt us, as is bosom frien's," the old
+fellow presently said, "I'll jes' show ye somepin poorty."
+
+He pricked the wick of a lamp and took down his bunch of scalps.
+
+"I hev been a addin' one more to keep company o' mine an' the
+tothers."
+
+He separated the latest acquisition from the rest of the wisp and
+added, with a heinous chuckle:
+
+"This'n's Long-Hair's!"
+
+And so it was. Beverley knocked the ashes from his pipe and rose
+to go.
+
+"Wen they kicks yer Oncle Jazon's ribs," the old man added,
+"they'd jes' as well lay down an' give up, for he's goin' to
+salervate 'em."
+
+Then, after Beverley had passed out of the cabin, Oncle Jazon
+chirruped after him:
+
+"Mebbe ye'd better not tell leetle Alice. The pore leetle gal hev
+hed worry 'nough."
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+CLARK ADVISES ALICE
+
+
+A few days after the surrender of Hamilton, a large boat, the
+Willing, arrived from Kaskaskia. It was well manned and heavily
+armed. Clark fitted it out before beginning his march and expected
+it to be of great assistance to him in the reduction of the fort,
+but the high waters and the floating driftwood delayed its
+progress, so that its disappointed crew saw Alice's flag floating
+bright and high when their eyes first looked upon the dull little
+town from far down the swollen river. There was much rejoicing,
+however, when they came ashore and were enthusiastically greeted
+by the garrison and populace. A courier whom they picked up on the
+Ohio came with them. He bore dispatches from Governor Henry of
+Virginia to Clark and a letter for Beverley from his father. With
+them appeared also Simon Kenton, greatly to the delight of Oncle
+Jazon, who had worried much about his friend since their latest
+fredaine--as he called it--with the Indians. Meantime an
+expedition under Captain Helm had been sent up the river with the
+purpose of capturing a British flotilla from Detroit.
+
+Gaspard Roussillon, immediately after Clark's victory, thought he
+saw a good opening favorable to festivity at the river house, for
+which he soon began to make some of his most ostentatious
+preparations. Fate, however, as usual in his case, interfered.
+Fate seemed to like pulling the big Frenchman's ear now and again,
+as if to remind him of the fact--which he was apt to forget--that
+he lacked somewhat of omnipotence.
+
+"Ziff! Je vais donner un banquet a tout le moonde, moi!" he cried,
+hustling and bustling hither and thither.
+
+A scout from up the river announced the approach of Philip Dejean
+with his flotilla richly laden, and what little interest may have
+been gathering in the direction of M. Roussillon's festal
+proposition vanished like the flame of a lamp in a puff of wind
+when this news reached Colonel Clark and became known in the town.
+
+Beverley and Alice sat together in the main room of the Roussillon
+cabin--you could scarcely find them separated during those happy
+days--and Alice was singing to the soft tinkle of a guitar, a
+Creole ditty with a merry smack in its scarcely intelligible
+nonsense. She knew nothing about music beyond what M. Roussillon,
+a jack of all trades, had been able to teach her,--a few simple
+chords to accompany her songs, picked up at hap-hazard. But her
+voice, like her face and form, irradiated witchery. It was sweet,
+firm, deep, with something haunting in it--the tone of a hermit
+thrush, marvelously pure and clear, carried through a gay strain
+like the mocking-bird's. Of course Beverley thought it divine; and
+when a message came from Colonel Clark bidding him report for duty
+at once, he felt an impulse toward mutiny of the rankest sort. He
+did not dream that a military expedition could be on hand; but
+upon reaching headquarters, the first thing he heard was:
+
+"Report to Captain Helm. You are to go with him up the river and
+intercept a British force. Move lively, Helm is waiting for you,
+probably."
+
+There was no time for explanations. Evidently Clark expected
+neither questions nor delay. Beverley's love of adventure and his
+patriotic desire to serve his country came to his aid vigorously
+enough; still, with Alice's love-song ringing in his heart, there
+was a cord pulling him back from duty to the sweetest of all
+life's joys.
+
+Helm was already at the landing, where a little fleet of boats was
+being prepared. A thousand things had to be done in short order.
+All hands were stimulated to highest exertion with the thought of
+another fight. Swivels were mounted in boats, ammunition and
+provisions stored abundantly, flags hoisted and oars dipped. Never
+was an expedition of so great importance more swiftly organized
+and set in motion, nor did one ever have a more prosperous voyage
+or completer triumph. Philip Dejean, Justice of Detroit, with his
+men, boats and rich cargo, was captured easily, with not a shot
+fired, nor a drop of blood spilled in doing it.
+
+If Alice could have known all this before it happened, she would
+probably have saved herself from the mortification of a rebuke
+administered very kindly, but not the less thoroughly, by Colonel
+Clark.
+
+The rumor came to her--a brilliant creole rumor, duly inflated--
+that an overwhelming British force was descending the river, and
+that Beverley with a few men, not sufficient to base the
+expedition on a respectable forlorn hope, would be sent to meet
+them. Her nature, as was its wont, flared into high indignation.
+What right had Colonel Clark to send her lover away to be killed
+just at the time when he was all the whole world to her? Nothing
+could be more outrageous. She would not suffer it to be done; not
+she!
+
+Colonel Clark greeted her pleasantly, when she came somewhat
+abruptly to him, where he was directing a squad of men at work
+making some repairs in the picketing of the fort. He did not
+observe her excitement until she began to speak, and then it was
+noticeable only, and not very strongly, in her tone. She forgot to
+speak English, and her French was Greek to him.
+
+"I am glad to see you, Mademoiselle," he said, rather
+inconsequently, lifting his hat and bowing with rough grace, while
+he extended his right hand cordially. "You have something to say
+to me? Come with me to my office."
+
+She barely touched his fingers.
+
+"Yes, I have something to say to you. I can tell it here," she
+said, speaking English now with softest Creole accent. "I wanted--
+I came to--" It was not so easy as she had imagined it would be to
+utter what she had in mind. Clark's steadfast, inscrutable eyes,
+kindly yet not altogether sympathetic, met her own and beat them
+down. Her voice failed.
+
+He offered her his arm and gravely said:
+
+"We will go to my office. I see that you have some important
+communication to make. There are too many ears here."
+
+Of a sudden she felt like running home. Somehow the situation
+broke upon her with a most embarrassing effect. She did not take
+Clark's arm, and she began to tremble. He appeared unconscious of
+this, and probably was, for his mind had a fine tangle of great
+schemes in it just then; but he turned toward his office, and
+bidding her follow him, walked away in that direction.
+
+She was helpless. Not the slightest trace of her usual brilliant
+self-assertion was at her command. Saving the squad of men sawing
+and hacking, digging and hammering, the fort appeared as deserted
+as her mind. She stood gazing after Clark. He did not look back,
+but strode right on. If she would speak with him, she must follow.
+It was a surprise to her, for heretofore she had always had her
+own way, even if she found it necessary to use force. And where
+was Beverley? Where was the garrison? Colonel Clark did not seem
+to be at all concerned about the approach of the British--and yet
+those repairs--perhaps he was making ready for a desperate
+resistance! She did not move until he reached the door of his
+office where he stopped and stepped aside, as if to let her pass
+in first; he even lifted his hat, then looked a trifle surprised
+when he saw that she was not near him, frowned slightly, changed
+the frown to a smile and said, lifting his voice so that she felt
+a certain imperative meaning in it:
+
+"Did I walk too fast for you? I beg your pardon, Mademoiselle."
+
+He stood waiting for her, as a father waits for a lagging, wilful
+child.
+
+"Come, please," he added, "if you have something to say to me; my
+time just now is precious--I have a great deal to do."
+
+She was not of a nature to retreat under fire, and yet the panic
+in her breast came very near mastering her will. Clark saw a look
+in her face which made him speak again:
+
+"I assure you, Mademoiselle, that you need not feel embarrassed.
+You can rely upon me to--"
+
+She made a gesture that interrupted him; at the same time she
+almost ran toward him, gathering in breath, as one does who is
+about to force out a desperately resisting and riotous thought.
+The strong, grave man looked at her with a full sense of her
+fascination, and at the same time he felt a vague wish to get away
+from her, as if she were about to cast unwelcome responsibility
+upon him.
+
+"Where is Lieutenant Beverley?" she demanded, now close to Clark,
+face to face, and gazing straight into his eyes. "I want to see
+him." Her tone suggested intensest excitement. She was trembling
+visibly.
+
+Clark's face changed its expression. He suddenly recalled to mind
+Alice's rapturous public greeting of Beverley on the day of the
+surrender. He was a cavalier, and it did not agree with his sense
+of high propriety for girls to kiss their lovers out in the open
+air before a gazing army. True enough, he himself had been
+hoodwinked by Alice's beauty and boldness in the matter of Long-
+Hair. He confessed this to himself mentally, which may have
+strengthened his present disapproval of her personal inquiry about
+Beverley. At all events he thought she ought not to be coming into
+the stockade on such an errand.
+
+"Lieutenant Beverley is absent acting under my orders he said,
+with perfect respectfulness, yet in a tone suggesting military
+finality. He meant to set an indefinite yet effective rebuke in
+his words.
+
+"Absent?" she echoed. "Gone? You sent him away to be killed! You
+had no right--you--"
+
+"Miss Roussillon," said Clark, becoming almost stern, "you had
+better go home and stay there; young girls oughtn't to run around
+hunting men in places like this."
+
+His blunt severity of speech was accompanied by a slight frown and
+a gesture of impatience.
+
+Alice's face blazed red to the roots of her sunny hair; the color
+ebbed, giving place to a pallor like death. She began to tremble,
+and her lips quivered pitifully, but she braced herself and tried
+to force back the choking sensation in her throat.
+
+"You must not misconstrue my words," Clark quickly added; "I
+simply mean that men will not rightly understand you. They will
+form impressions very harmful to you. Even Lieutenant Beverley
+might not see you in the right light."
+
+"What--what do you mean?" she gasped, shrinking from him, a
+burning spot reappearing under the dimpled skin of each cheek.
+
+"Pray, Miss, do not get excited. There is nothing to make you
+cry." He saw tears shining in her eyes. "Beverley is not in the
+slightest danger. All will be well, and he'll come back in a few
+days. The expedition will be but a pleasure trip. Now you go home.
+Lieutenant Beverley is amply able to take care of himself. And let
+me tell you, if you expect a good man to have great confidence in
+you, stay home and let him hunt you up instead of you hunting him.
+A man likes that better."
+
+It would be impossible to describe Alice's feelings, as they just
+then rose like a whirling storm in her heart. She was humiliated,
+she was indignant, she was abashed; she wanted to break forth with
+a tempest of denial, self-vindication, resentment; she wanted to
+cry with her face hidden in her hands. What she did was to stand
+helplessly gazing at Clark, with two or three bright tears on
+either cheek, her hands clenched, her eyes flashing. She was going
+to say some wild thing; but she did not; her voice lodged fast in
+her throat. She moved her lips, unable to make a sound.
+
+Two of Clark's officers relieved the situation by coming up to get
+orders about some matter of town government, and Alice scarcely
+knew how she made her way home. Every vein in her body was humming
+like a bee when she entered the house and flung herself into a
+chair.
+
+She heard Madame Roussillon and Father Beret chatting in the
+kitchen, whence came a fragrance of broiling buffalo steak
+besprinkled with garlic. It was Father Beret's favorite dish,
+wherefore his tongue ran freely--almost as freely as that of his
+hostess, and when he heard Alice come in, he called gayly to her
+through the kitchen door:
+
+"Come here, ma fille, and lend us old folks your appetite; nous
+avons une tranche a la Bordelaise!"
+
+"I am not hungry," she managed to say, "you can eat it without
+me."
+
+The old man's quick ears caught the quaver of trouble in her
+voice, much as she tried to hide it. A moment later he was
+standing beside her with his hand on her head.
+
+"What is the matter now, little one?" he tenderly demanded. "Tell
+your old Father."
+
+She began to cry, laying her face in her crossed arms, the tears
+gushing, her whole frame aquiver, and heaving great sobs. She
+seemed to shrink like a trodden flower. It touched Father Beret
+deeply.
+
+He suspected that Beverley's departure might be the cause of her
+trouble; but when presently she told him what had taken place in
+the fort, he shook his head gravely and frowned.
+
+"Colonel Clark was right, my daughter," he said after a short
+silence, "and it is time for you to ponder well upon the
+significance of his words. You can't always be a wilful,
+headstrong little girl, running everywhere and doing just as you
+please. You have grown to be a woman in stature--you must be one
+in fact. You know I told you at first to be careful how you acted
+with--"
+
+"Father, dear old Father!" she cried, springing from her seat and
+throwing her arms around his neck. "Have I appeared forward and
+unwomanly? Tell me, Father, tell me! I did not mean to do
+anything--"
+
+"Quietly, my child, don't give way to excitement." He gently put
+her from him and crossed himself--a habit of his when suddenly
+perplexed--then added:
+
+"You have done no evil; but there are proprieties which a young
+woman must not overstep. You are impulsive, too impulsive; and it
+will not do to let a young man see that you--that you--"
+
+"Father, I understand," she interrupted, and her face grew very
+pale.
+
+Madame Roussillon came to the door, flushed with stooping over the
+fire, and announced that the steak was ready.
+
+"Bring the wine, Alice," she added, "a bottle of Bordeaux."
+
+She stood for a breath of two, her red hands on her hips, looking
+first at Father Beret, then at Alice.
+
+"Quarreling again about the romances?" she inquired. "She's been
+at it again?--she's found 'em again?"
+
+"Yes," said Father Beret, with a queer, dry smile, "more romance.
+Yes, she's been at it again! Now fetch the Bordeaux, little one."
+
+The following days were cycles of torture to Alice. She groveled
+in the shadow of a great dread. It seemed to her that Beverley
+could not love her, could not help looking upon her as a poor,
+wild, foolish girl, unworthy of consideration. She magnified her
+faults and crudities, she paraded before her inner vision her
+fecent improprieties, as they had been disclosed to her, until she
+saw herself a sort of monstrosity at which all mankind was gazing
+with disgust. Life seemed dry and shriveled, a mere jaundiced
+shadow, while her love for Beverley took on a new growth,
+luxuriant, all-embracing, uncontrollable. The ferment of spirit
+going on in her breast was the inevitable process of self-
+recognition which follows the terrible unfolding of the passion-
+flower, in a nature almost absolutely simple and unsophisticated.
+
+Vincennes held its breath while waiting for news from Helm's
+expedition. Every day had its nimble, yet wholly imaginary account
+of what had happened, skipping from mouth to mouth, and from cabin
+to cabin. The French folk ran hither and thither in the persistent
+rain, industriously improving the dramatic interest of each
+groundless report. Alice's disturbed imagination reveled in the
+kaleidoscopic terrors conjured up by these swift changes of the
+form and color of the stories "from the front," all of them more
+or less tragic. To-day the party is reported as having been
+surprised and massacred to a man--to-morrow there has been a great
+fight, many killed, the result in doubt--next day the British are
+defeated, and so on. The volatile spirit of the Creoles fairly
+surpassed itself in ringing the changes on stirring rumors.
+
+Alice scarcely left the house during the whole period of
+excitement and suspense. Like a wounded bird, she withdrew herself
+from the light and noisy chatter of her friends, seeking only
+solitude and crepuscular nooks in which to suffer silently. Jean
+brought her every picturesque bit of the ghastly gossip, thus
+heaping coals on the fire of her torture. But she did not grow
+pale and thin. Not a dimple fled from cheek or chin, not a ray of
+saucy sweetness vanished from her eyes. Her riant health was
+unalterable. Indeed, the only change in her was a sudden ripening
+and mellowing of her beauty, by which its colors, its lines, its
+subtle undercurrents of expression were spiritualized, as if by
+some powerful clarifying process.
+
+Tremendous is the effect of a soul surprised by passion and
+brought hard up against an opposing force which dashes it back
+upon itself with a flare and explosion of self-revealment. Nor
+shall we ever be able to foretell just how small a circumstance,
+just how slight an exigency, will suffice to bring on the great
+change. The shifting of a smile to the gloom of a frown, the snap
+of a string on the lute of our imagination, just at the point when
+a rich melody is culminating; the waving of a hand, a vanishing
+face--any eclipse of tender, joyous expectation--dashes a nameless
+sense of despair into the soul. And a young girl's soul--who shall
+uncover its sacred depths of sensitiveness, or analyze its
+capacity for suffering under such a stroke?
+
+On the fifth day of March, back came the victorious Helm, having
+surrounded and captured seven boats, richly loaded with provisions
+and goods, and Dejean's whole force. Then again the little Creole
+town went wild with rejoicing. Alice heard the news and the noise;
+but somehow there was no response in her heart. She dreaded to
+meet Beverley; indeed, she did not expect him to come to her. Why
+should he?
+
+M. Roussillon, who had volunteered to accompany Helm, arrived in a
+mood of unlimited proportions, so far as expressing self-
+admiration and abounding delight was concerned. You would have
+been sure that he had done the whole deed single-handed, and
+brought the flotilla and captives to town on his back. But Oncle
+Jazon for once held his tongue, being too disgusted for words at
+not having been permitted to fire a single shot. What was the use
+of going to fight and simply meeting and escorting down the river
+a lot of non-combatants?
+
+There is something inscrutably delightful about a girl's way of
+thinking one thing and doing another. Perversity, thy name is
+maidenhood; and maidenhood, thy name is delicious inconsequence!
+When Alice heard that Beverley had come back, safe, victorious, to
+be greeted as one of the heroes of an important adventure, she
+immediately ran to her room frightened and full of vague, shadowy
+dread, to hide from him, yet feeling sure that he would not come!
+Moreover, she busied herself with the preposterous task of putting
+on her most attractive gown--the buff brocade which she wore that
+evening at the river house--how long ago it seemed!--when Beverley
+thought her the queenliest beauty in the world. And she was
+putting it on so as to look her prettiest while hiding from him!
+
+It is a toss-up where happiness will make its nest. The palace,
+the hut, the great lady's garden, the wild lass's bower,--skip
+here, alight there,--the secret of it may never be told. And love
+and beauty find lodgment, by the same inexplicable route, in the
+same extremes of circumstances. The wind bloweth where it listeth,
+finding many a matchless flower and many a ravishing fragrance in
+the wildest nooks of the world.
+
+No sooner did Beverley land at the little wharf than, rushing to
+his quarters, he made a hasty exchange of water-soaked apparel for
+something more comfortable, and then bolted in the direction of
+Roussillon place.
+
+Now Alice knew by the beating of her heart that he was coming. In
+spite of all she could do, trying to hold on hard and fast to her
+doubt and gloom, a tide of rich sweetness began to course through
+her heart and break in splendid expectation from her eyes, as they
+looked through the little unglazed window toward the fort. Nor had
+she long to wait. He came up the narrow wet street, striding like
+a tall actor in the height of a melodrama, his powerful figure
+erect as an Indian's, and his face glowing with the joy of a
+genuine, impatient lover, who is proud of himself because of the
+image he bears in his heart.
+
+When Alice flung wide the door (which was before Beverley could
+cross the veranda), she had quite forgotten how she had gowned and
+bedecked herself; and so, without a trace of self-consciousness,
+she flashed upon him a full-blown flower--to his eyes the
+loveliest that ever opened under heaven.
+
+Gaspard Roussillon, still overflowing with the importance of his
+part in the capture of Dejean, came puffing homeward just in time
+to see a man at the door holding Alice a-tiptoe in his arms.
+
+"Ziff!" he cried, as he pushed open the little front gate of the
+yard, "en voila assez, vogue la galere!"
+
+The two forms disappeared within the house, as if moved by his
+roaring voice.
+
+The letter to Beverley from his father was somewhat disturbing. It
+bore the tidings of his mother's failing health. This made it
+easier for the young Lieutenant to accept from Clark the
+assignment to duty with a party detailed for the purpose of
+escorting Hamilton, Farnsworth and several other British officers
+to Williamsburg, Virginia. It also gave him a most powerful
+assistance in persuading Alice to marry him at once, so as to go
+with him on what proved to be a delightful wedding journey through
+the great wilderness to the Old Dominion. Spring's verdure burst
+abroad on the sunny hills as they slowly went their way; the
+mating birds sang in every blooming brake and grove by which they
+passed, and in their joyous hearts they heard the bubbling of
+love's eternal fountain.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+AND SO IT ENDED
+
+
+Our story must end here, because at this point its current flows
+away forever from old Vincennes; and it was only of the post on
+the Wabash that we set out to make a record. What befell Alice and
+Beverley after they went to Virginia we could go on to tell; but
+that would be another story. Suffice it to say, they lived happily
+ever after, or at least somewhat beyond three score and ten, and
+left behind them a good name and numerous descendants.
+
+How Alice found out her family in Virginia, we are not informed;
+but after a lapse of some years from the date of her marriage,
+there appears in one of her letters a reference to an estate
+inherited from her Tarleton ancestors, and her name appears in old
+records signed in full, Alice Tarleton Beverley. A descendant of
+hers still treasures the locket, with its broken miniature and
+battered crest, which won Beverley's life from Long-Hair, the
+savage. Beside it, as carefully guarded, is the Indian charm-stone
+that stopped Hamilton's bullet over Alice's heart The rapiers have
+somehow disappeared, and there is a tradition in the Tarleton
+family that they were given by Alice to Gaspard Roussillon, who,
+after Madame Roussillon's death in 1790, went to New Orleans,
+where he stayed a year or two before embarking for France, whither
+he took with him the beautiful pair of colechemardes and Jean the
+hunchback.
+
+Oncle Jazon lived in Vincennes many years after the war was over;
+but he died at Natchez, Mississippi, when ninety-three years old.
+He said, with almost his last breath, that he couldn't shoot very
+well, even in his best days; but that he had, upon various
+occasions, "jes' kind o' happened to hit a Injun in the lef' eye."
+They used to tell a story, as late as General Harrison's stay in
+Vincennes, about how Oncle Jazon buried his collection of scalps,
+with great funeral solemnity, as his part of the celebration of
+peace and independence about the year 1784.
+
+Good old Father Beret died suddenly soon after Alice's marriage
+and departure for Virginia. He was found lying face downward on
+the floor of his cabin. Near him, on a smooth part of a puncheon,
+were the mildewed fragments of a letter, which he had been
+arranging, as if to read its contents. Doubtless it was the same
+letter brought to him by Rene de Ronville, as recorded in an early
+chapter of our story. The fragments were gathered up and buried
+with him. His dust lies under the present Church of St. Xavier,--
+the dust of as noble a man and as true a priest as ever sacrificed
+himself for the good of humanity.
+
+In after years Simon Kenton visited Beverley and Alice in their
+Virginia home. To his dying day he was fond of describing their
+happy and hospitable welcome and the luxuries to which they
+introduced him. They lived in a stately white mansion on a hill
+overlooking a vast tobacco plantation, where hundreds of negro
+slaves worked and sang by day and frolicked by night. Their oldest
+child was named Fitzhugh Gaspard. Kenton died in 1836.
+
+There remains but one little fact worth recording before we close
+the book. In the year 1800, on the fourth of July, a certain
+leading French family of Vincennes held a patriotic reunion,
+during which a little old flag was produced and its story told.
+Some one happily proposed that it be sent to Mrs. Alice Tarleton
+Beverley with a letter of explanation, and in profound recognition
+of the glorious circumstances which made it the true flag of the
+great Northwest,
+
+And so it happened that Alice's little banner went to Virginia and
+is still preserved in an old mansion not very far from Monticello;
+but it seems likely that the Wabash Valley will soon again possess
+the precious relic. The marriage engagement of Miss Alice Beverley
+to a young Indiana officer, distinguished for his patriotism and
+military ardor, has been announced at the old Beverley homestead
+on the hill, and the high contracting parties have planned that
+the wedding ceremony shall take place under the famous little
+flag, on the anniversary of dark's capture of Post Vincennes. When
+the bride shall be brought to her new home on the banks of the
+Wabash, the flag will come with her; but Oncle Jazon will not be
+on hand with his falsetto shout: "VIVE LA BANNIERE D'ALICE
+ROUSSILLON! VIVE ZHORZZH VASINTON!"
+
+
+End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Alice of Old Vincennes
+by Maurice Thompson
+
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