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diff --git a/old/1048.txt b/old/1048.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2d158f6 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/1048.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6080 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Ruling Passion, by Henry van Dyke + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Ruling Passion + +Author: Henry van Dyke + +Posting Date: August 3, 2008 [EBook #1048] +Release Date: September, 1997 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RULING PASSION *** + + + + +Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer + + + + + +THE RULING PASSION + +by Henry van Dyke + + + + +A WRITER'S REQUEST OF HIS MASTER + + +Let me never tag a moral to a story, nor tell a story without a meaning. +Make me respect my material so much that I dare not slight my work. Help +me to deal very honestly with words and with people because they are +both alive. Show me that as in a river, so in a writing, clearness is +the best quality, and a little that is pure is worth more than much that +is mixed. Teach me to see the local colour without being blind to the +inner light. Give me an ideal that will stand the strain of weaving into +human stuff on the loom of the real. Keep me from caring more for books +than for folks, for art than for life. Steady me to do my full stint of +work as well as I can: and when that is done, stop me, pay what wages +Thou wilt, and help me to say, from a quiet heart, a grateful AMEN. + + + + +PREFACE + + +In every life worth writing about there is a ruling passion,--"the very +pulse of the machine." Unless you touch that, you are groping around +outside of reality. + +Sometimes it is romantic love: Natures masterpiece of interested +benevolence. In almost all lives this passion has its season of empire. +Therefore, and rightly, it is the favourite theme of the storyteller. +Romantic love interests almost everybody, because almost everybody knows +something about it, or would like to know. + +But there are other passions, no less real, which also have their place +and power in human life. Some of them come earlier, and sometimes they +last longer, than romantic love. They play alongside of it and are mixed +up with it, now checking it, now advancing its flow and tingeing it with +their own colour. + +Just because love is so universal, it is often to one of the other +passions that we must look for the distinctive hue, the individual +quality of a life-story. Granted, if you will, that everybody must fall +in love, or ought to fall in love, How will he do it? And what will +he do afterwards? These are questions not without interest to one who +watches the human drama as a friend. The answers depend upon those +hidden and durable desires, affections, and impulses to which men and +women give themselves up for rule and guidance. + +Music, nature, children, honour, strife, revenge, money, pride, +friendship, loyalty, duty,--to these objects and others like them the +secret power of personal passion often turns, and the life unconsciously +follows it, as the tides in the sea follow the moon in the sky. + +When circumstances cross the ruling passion, when rocks lie in the way +and winds are contrary, then things happen, characters emerge, slight +events are significant, mere adventures are transformed into a real +plot. What care I how many "hair-breadth 'scapes" and "moving accidents" +your hero may pass through, unless I know him for a man? He is but +a puppet strung on wires. His kisses are wooden and his wounds bleed +sawdust. There is nothing about him to remember except his name, and +perhaps a bit of dialect. Kill him or crown him,--what difference does +it make? + +But go the other way about your work: + + "Take the least man of all mankind, as I; + Look at his head and heart, find how and why + He differs from his fellows utterly,"-- + +and now there is something to tell, with a meaning. + +If you tell it at length, it is a novel,--a painting. If you tell it in +brief, it is a short story,--an etching. But the subject is always the +same: the unseen, mysterious, ruling passion weaving the stuff of human +nature into patterns wherein the soul is imaged and revealed. + +To tell about some of these ruling passions, simply, clearly, and +concretely, is what I want to do in this book. The characters are +chosen, for the most part, among plain people, because their feelings +are expressed with fewer words and greater truth, not being costumed for +social effect. The scene is laid on Nature's stage because I like to be +out-of-doors, even when I am trying to think and learning to write. + +"Avalon," Princeton, July 22, 1901. + + + +CONTENTS + + I. A Lover of Music + + II. The Reward of Virtue + + III. A Brave Heart + + IV. The Gentle Life + + V. A Friend of Justice + + VI. The White Blot + + VII. A Year of Nobility + + VIII. The Keeper of the Light + + + + + +I. A LOVER OF MUSIC + + + + +I + +He entered the backwoods village of Bytown literally on the wings of the +wind. It whirled him along like a big snowflake, and dropped him at the +door of Moody's "Sportsmen's Retreat," as if he were a New Year's gift +from the North Pole. His coming seemed a mere chance; but perhaps there +was something more in it, after all. At all events, you shall hear, if +you will, the time and the manner of his arrival. + +It was the last night of December, some thirty-five years ago. All the +city sportsmen who had hunted the deer under Bill Moody's direction had +long since retreated to their homes, leaving the little settlement +on the border of the Adirondack wilderness wholly under the social +direction of the natives. + +The annual ball was in full swing in the dining-room of the hotel. At +one side of the room the tables and chairs were piled up, with their +legs projecting in the air like a thicket of very dead trees. + +The huge stove in the southeast corner was blushing a rosy red through +its thin coat of whitewash, and exhaling a furious dry heat flavoured +with the smell of baked iron. At the north end, however, winter reigned; +and there were tiny ridges of fine snow on the floor, sifted in by the +wind through the cracks in the window-frames. + +But the bouncing girls and the heavy-footed guides and lumbermen who +filled the ball-room did not appear to mind the heat or the cold. They +balanced and "sashayed" from the tropics to the arctic circle. They +swung at corners and made "ladies' change" all through the temperate +zone. They stamped their feet and did double-shuffles until the floor +trembled beneath them. The tin lamp-reflectors on the walls rattled like +castanets. + +There was only one drawback to the hilarity of the occasion. The +band, which was usually imported from Sandy River Forks for such +festivities,--a fiddle, a cornet, a flute, and an accordion,--had not +arrived. There was a general idea that the mail-sleigh, in which the +musicians were to travel, had been delayed by the storm, and might +break its way through the snow-drifts and arrive at any moment. But Bill +Moody, who was naturally of a pessimistic temperament, had offered a +different explanation. + +"I tell ye, old Baker's got that blame' band down to his hotel at +the Falls now, makin' 'em play fer his party. Them music fellers is +onsartin; can't trust 'em to keep anythin' 'cept the toon, and they +don't alluz keep that. Guess we might uz well shet up this ball, or go +to work playin' games." + +At this proposal a thick gloom had fallen over the assembly; but it +had been dispersed by Serena Moody's cheerful offer to have the small +melodion brought out of the parlour, and to play for dancing as well as +she could. The company agreed that she was a smart girl, and prepared to +accept her performance with enthusiasm. As the dance went on, there were +frequent comments of approval to encourage her in the labour of love. + +"Sereny's doin' splendid, ain't she?" said the other girls. + +To which the men replied, "You bet! The playin' 's reel nice, and good +'nough fer anybody--outside o' city folks." + +But Serena's repertory was weak, though her spirit was willing. There +was an unspoken sentiment among the men that "The Sweet By and By" was +not quite the best tune in the world for a quadrille. A Sunday-school +hymn, no matter how rapidly it was rendered, seemed to fall short of +the necessary vivacity for a polka. Besides, the wheezy little organ +positively refused to go faster than a certain gait. Hose Ransom +expressed the popular opinion of the instrument, after a figure in which +he and his partner had been half a bar ahead of the music from start to +finish, when he said: + +"By Jolly! that old maloney may be chock full o' relijun and po'try; but +it ain't got no DANCE into it, no more 'n a saw-mill." + + +This was the situation of affairs inside of Moody's tavern on New Year's +Eve. But outside of the house the snow lay two feet deep on the level, +and shoulder-high in the drifts. The sky was at last swept clean of +clouds. The shivering stars and the shrunken moon looked infinitely +remote in the black vault of heaven. The frozen lake, on which the ice +was three feet thick and solid as rock, was like a vast, smooth bed, +covered with a white counterpane. The cruel wind still poured out of the +northwest, driving the dry snow along with it like a mist of powdered +diamonds. + +Enveloped in this dazzling, pungent atmosphere, half blinded and +bewildered by it, buffeted and yet supported by the onrushing torrent +of air, a man on snow-shoes, with a light pack on his shoulders, emerged +from the shelter of the Three Sisters' Islands, and staggered straight +on, down the lake. He passed the headland of the bay where Moody's +tavern is ensconced, and probably would have drifted on beyond it, to +the marsh at the lower end of the lake, but for the yellow glare of the +ball-room windows and the sound of music and dancing which came out to +him suddenly through a lull in the wind. + +He turned to the right, climbed over the low wall of broken ice-blocks +that bordered the lake, and pushed up the gentle slope to the open +passageway by which the two parts of the rambling house were joined +together. Crossing the porch with the last remnant of his strength, he +lifted his hand to knock, and fell heavily against the side door. + +The noise, heard through the confusion within, awakened curiosity and +conjecture. + +Just as when a letter comes to a forest cabin, it is turned over and +over, and many guesses are made as to the handwriting and the authorship +before it occurs to any one to open it and see who sent it, so was this +rude knocking at the gate the occasion of argument among the rustic +revellers as to what it might portend. Some thought it was the arrival +of the belated band. Others supposed the sound betokened a descent of +the Corey clan from the Upper Lake, or a change of heart on the part of +old Dan Dunning, who had refused to attend the ball because they would +not allow him to call out the figures. The guesses were various; but +no one thought of the possible arrival of a stranger at such an hour +on such a night, until Serena suggested that it would be a good plan +to open the door. Then the unbidden guest was discovered lying benumbed +along the threshold. + +There was no want of knowledge as to what should be done with a +half-frozen man, and no lack of ready hands to do it. They carried him +not to the warm stove, but into the semi-arctic region of the parlour. +They rubbed his face and his hands vigorously with snow. They gave him +a drink of hot tea flavoured with whiskey--or perhaps it was a drink of +whiskey with a little hot tea in it--and then, as his senses began to +return to him, they rolled him in a blanket and left him on a sofa to +thaw out gradually, while they went on with the dance. + +Naturally, he was the favourite subject of conversation for the next +hour. + +"Who is he, anyhow? I never seen 'im before. Where'd he come from?" +asked the girls. + +"I dunno," said Bill Moody; "he didn't say much. Talk seemed all froze +up. Frenchy, 'cordin' to what he did say. Guess he must a come from +Canady, workin' on a lumber job up Raquette River way. Got bounced out +o' the camp, p'raps. All them Frenchies is queer." + +This summary of national character appeared to command general assent. + +"Yaas," said Hose Ransom, "did ye take note how he hung on to that pack +o' his'n all the time? Wouldn't let go on it. Wonder what 't wuz? Seemed +kinder holler 'n light, fer all 'twuz so big an' wropped up in lots o' +coverin's." + +"What's the use of wonderin'?" said one of the younger boys; "find out +later on. Now's the time fer dancin'. Whoop 'er up!" + +So the sound of revelry swept on again in full flood. The men and maids +went careering up and down the room. Serena's willing fingers laboured +patiently over the yellow keys of the reluctant melodion. But the +ancient instrument was weakening under the strain; the bellows creaked; +the notes grew more and more asthmatic. + +"Hold the Fort" was the tune, "Money Musk" was the dance; and it was a +preposterously bad fit. The figure was tangled up like a fishing-line +after trolling all day without a swivel. The dancers were doing their +best, determined to be happy, as cheerful as possible, but all out of +time. The organ was whirring and gasping and groaning for breath. + +Suddenly a new music filled the room. + +The right tune--the real old joyful "Money Musk," played jubilantly, +triumphantly, irresistibly--on a fiddle! + +The melodion gave one final gasp of surprise and was dumb. + +Every one looked up. There, in the parlour door, stood the stranger, +with his coat off, his violin hugged close under his chin, his right arm +making the bow fly over the strings, his black eyes sparkling, and his +stockinged feet marking time to the tune. + +"DANSEZ! DANSEZ," he cried, "EN AVANT! Don' spik'. Don' res'! Ah'll +goin' play de feedle fo' yo' jess moch yo' lak', eef yo' h'only DANSE!" + +The music gushed from the bow like water from the rock when Moses +touched it. Tune followed tune with endless fluency and variety--polkas, +galops, reels, jigs, quadrilles; fragments of airs from many lands--"The +Fisher's Hornpipe," "Charlie is my Darling," "Marianne s'en va-t-au +Moulin," "Petit Jean," "Jordan is a Hard Road to Trabbel," woven +together after the strangest fashion and set to the liveliest cadence. + +It was a magical performance. No one could withstand it. They all danced +together, like the leaves on the shivering poplars when the wind blows +through them. The gentle Serena was swept away from her stool at the +organ as if she were a little canoe drawn into the rapids, and Bill +Moody stepped high and cut pigeon-wings that had been forgotten for +a generation. It was long after midnight when the dancers paused, +breathless and exhausted. + +"Waal," said Hose Ransom, "that's jess the hightonedest music we ever +had to Bytown. You 're a reel player, Frenchy, that's what you are. +What's your name? Where'd you come from? Where you goin' to? What +brought you here, anyhow?" + +"MOI?" said the fiddler, dropping his bow and taking a long breath. +"Mah nem Jacques Tremblay. Ah'll ben come fraum Kebeck. W'ere goin'? Ah +donno. Prob'ly Ah'll stop dis place, eef yo' lak' dat feedle so moch, +hein?" + +His hand passed caressingly over the smooth brown wood of the violin. He +drew it up close to his face again, as if he would have kissed it, while +his eyes wandered timidly around the circle of listeners, and rested at +last, with a question in them, on the face of the hotel-keeper. Moody +was fairly warmed, for once, out of his customary temper of mistrust and +indecision. He spoke up promptly. + +"You kin stop here jess long's you like. We don' care where you come +from, an' you need n't to go no fu'ther, less you wanter. But we ain't +got no use for French names round here. Guess we 'll call him Fiddlin' +Jack, hey, Sereny? He kin do the chores in the day-time, an' play the +fiddle at night." + +This was the way in which Bytown came to have a lover of music among its +permanent inhabitants. + + + + +II + + +Jacques dropped into his place and filled it as if it had been made for +him. There was something in his disposition that seemed to fit him for +just the role that was vacant in the social drama of the settlement. It +was not a serious, important, responsible part, like that of a farmer, +or a store-keeper, or a professional hunter. It was rather an addition +to the regular programme of existence, something unannounced and +voluntary, and therefore not weighted with too heavy responsibilities. +There was a touch of the transient and uncertain about it. He seemed +like a perpetual visitor; and yet he stayed on as steadily as a native, +never showing, from the first, the slightest wish or intention to leave +the woodland village. + +I do not mean that he was an idler. Bytown had not yet arrived at that +stage of civilization in which an ornamental element is supported at the +public expense. + +He worked for his living, and earned it. He was full of a quick, +cheerful industry; and there was nothing that needed to be done about +Moody's establishment, from the wood-pile to the ice-house, at which he +did not bear a hand willingly and well. + +"He kin work like a beaver," said Bill Moody, talking the stranger over +down at the post-office one day; "but I don't b'lieve he's got much +ambition. Jess does his work and takes his wages, and then gits his +fiddle out and plays." + +"Tell ye what," said Hose Ransom, who set up for the village +philosopher, "he ain't got no 'magination. That's what makes men +slack. He don't know what it means to rise in the world; don't care fer +anythin' ez much ez he does fer his music. He's jess like a bird; let +him have 'nough to eat and a chance to sing, and he's all right. What's +he 'magine about a house of his own, and a barn, and sich things?" + +Hosea's illustration was suggested by his own experience. He had just +put the profits of his last summer's guiding into a new barn, and his +imagination was already at work planning an addition to his house in the +shape of a kitchen L. + +But in spite of his tone of contempt, he had a kindly feeling for the +unambitious fiddler. Indeed, this was the attitude of pretty much every +one in the community. A few men of the rougher sort had made fun of him +at first, and there had been one or two attempts at rude handling. But +Jacques was determined to take no offence; and he was so good-humoured, +so obliging, so pleasant in his way of whistling and singing about his +work, that all unfriendliness soon died out. + +He had literally played his way into the affections of the village. The +winter seemed to pass more swiftly and merrily than it had done before +the violin was there. He was always ready to bring it out, and draw all +kinds of music from its strings, as long as any one wanted to listen or +to dance. + +It made no difference whether there was a roomful of listeners, or only +a couple, Fiddlin' Jack was just as glad to play. With a little, quiet +audience, he loved to try the quaint, plaintive airs of the old French +songs--"A la Claire Fontaine," "Un Canadien Errant," and "Isabeau +s'y Promene"--and bits of simple melody from the great composers, and +familiar Scotch and English ballads--things that he had picked up heaven +knows where, and into which he put a world of meaning, sad and sweet. + +He was at his best in this vein when he was alone with Serena in the +kitchen--she with a piece of sewing in her lap, sitting beside the lamp; +he in the corner by the stove, with the brown violin tucked under his +chin, wandering on from one air to another, and perfectly content if +she looked up now and then from her work and told him that she liked the +tune. + +Serena was a pretty girl, with smooth, silky hair, end eyes of the +colour of the nodding harebells that blossom on the edge of the woods. +She was slight and delicate. The neighbours called her sickly; and a +great doctor from Philadelphia who had spent a summer at Bytown had +put his ear to her chest, and looked grave, and said that she ought +to winter in a mild climate. That was before people had discovered the +Adirondacks as a sanitarium for consumptives. + +But the inhabitants of Bytown were not in the way of paying much +attention to the theories of physicians in regard to climate. They held +that if you were rugged, it was a great advantage, almost a virtue; but +if you were sickly, you just had to make the best of it, and get along +with the weather as well as you could. + +So Serena stayed at home and adapted herself very cheerfully to the +situation. She kept indoors in winter more than the other girls, and had +a quieter way about her; but you would never have called her an invalid. +There was only a clearer blue in her eyes, and a smoother lustre on +her brown hair, and a brighter spot of red on her cheek. She was +particularly fond of reading and of music. It was this that made her +so glad of the arrival of the violin. The violin's master knew it, and +turned to her as a sympathetic soul. I think he liked her eyes too, +and the soft tones of her voice. He was a sentimentalist, this little +Canadian, for all he was so merry; and love--but that comes later. + +"Where'd you get your fiddle, Jack? said Serena, one night as they sat +together in the kitchen. + +"Ah'll get heem in Kebeck," answered Jacques, passing his hand lightly +over the instrument, as he always did when any one spoke of it. "Vair' +nice VIOLON, hein? W'at you t'ink? Ma h'ole teacher, to de College, he +was gif' me dat VIOLON, w'en Ah was gone away to de woods." + +"I want to know! Were you in the College? What'd you go off to the woods +for?" + +"Ah'll get tire' fraum dat teachin'--read, read, read, h'all taim'. +Ah'll not lak' dat so moch. Rader be out-door--run aroun'--paddle de +CANOE--go wid de boys in de woods--mek' dem dance at ma MUSIQUE. A-a-ah! +Dat was fon! P'raps you t'ink dat not good, hem? You t'ink Jacques one +beeg fool, Ah suppose?" + +"I dunno," said Serena, declining to commit herself, but pressing on +gently, as women do, to the point she had in view when she began the +talk. "Dunno's you're any more foolish than a man that keeps on doin' +what he don't like. But what made you come away from the boys in the +woods and travel down this way?" + +A shade passed over the face of Jacques. He turned away from the lamp +and bent over the violin on his knees, fingering the strings nervously. +Then he spoke, in a changed, shaken voice. + +"Ah'l tole you somet'ing, Ma'amselle Serene. You ma frien'. Don' you +h'ask me dat reason of it no more. Dat's somet'ing vair' bad, bad, bad. +Ah can't nevair tole dat--nevair." + +There was something in the way he said it that gave a check to her +gentle curiosity and turned it into pity. A man with a secret in his +life? It was a new element in her experience; like a chapter in a book. +She was lady enough at heart to respect his silence. She kept away from +the forbidden ground. But the knowledge that it was there gave a new +interest to Jacques and his music. She embroidered some strange romances +around that secret while she sat in the kitchen sewing. + +Other people at Bytown were less forbearing. They tried their best +to find out something about Fiddlin' Jack's past, but he was not +communicative. He talked about Canada. All Canadians do. But about +himself? No. + +If the questions became too pressing, he would try to play himself away +from his inquisitors with new tunes. If that did not succeed, he would +take the violin under his arm and slip quickly out of the room. And if +you had followed him at such a time, you would have heard him drawing +strange, melancholy music from the instrument, sitting alone in the +barn, or in the darkness of his own room in the garret. + +Once, and only once, he seemed to come near betraying himself. This was +how it happened. + +There was a party at Moody's one night, and Bull Corey had come down +from the Upper Lake and filled himself up with whiskey. + +Bull was an ugly-tempered fellow. The more he drank, up to a certain +point, the steadier he got on his legs, and the more necessary it seemed +for him to fight somebody. The tide of his pugnacity that night took a +straight set toward Fiddlin' Jack. + +Bull began with musical criticisms. The fiddling did not suit him at +all. It was too quick, or else it was too slow. He failed to perceive +how any one could tolerate such music even in the infernal regions, and +he expressed himself in plain words to that effect. In fact, he damned +the performance without even the faintest praise. + +But the majority of the audience gave him no support. On the contrary, +they told him to shut up. And Jack fiddled along cheerfully. + +Then Bull returned to the attack, after having fortified himself in +the bar-room. And now he took national grounds. The French were, in +his opinion, a most despicable race. They were not a patch on the noble +American race. They talked too much, and their language was ridiculous. +They had a condemned, fool habit of taking off their hats when they +spoke to a lady. They ate frogs. + +Having delivered himself of these sentiments in a loud voice, much to +the interruption of the music, he marched over to the table on which +Fiddlin' Jack was sitting, and grabbed the violin from his hands. + +"Gimme that dam' fiddle," he cried, "till I see if there's a frog in +it." + +Jacques leaped from the table, transported with rage. His face was +convulsed. His eyes blazed. He snatched a carving-knife from the dresser +behind him, and sprang at Corey. + +"TORT DIEU!" he shrieked, "MON VIOLON! Ah'll keel you, beast!" + +But he could not reach the enemy. Bill Moody's long arms were flung +around the struggling fiddler, and a pair of brawny guides had Corey +pinned by the elbows, hustling him backward. Half a dozen men thrust +themselves between the would-be combatants. There was a dead silence, +a scuffling of feet on the bare floor; then the danger was past, and a +tumult of talk burst forth. + +But a strange alteration had passed over Jacques. He trembled. He turned +white. Tears poured down his cheeks. As Moody let him go, he dropped on +his knees, hid his face in his hands, and prayed in his own tongue. + +"My God, it is here again! Was it not enough that I must be tempted once +before? Must I have the madness yet another time? My God, show the mercy +toward me, for the Blessed Virgin's sake. I am a sinner, but not the +second time; for the love of Jesus, not the second time! Ave Maria, +gratia plena, ora pro me!" + +The others did not understand what he was saying. Indeed, they paid +little attention to him. They saw he was frightened, and thought it was +with fear. They were already discussing what ought to be done about the +fracas. + +It was plain that Bull Corey, whose liquor had now taken effect +suddenly, and made him as limp as a strip of cedar bark, must be thrown +out of the door, and left to cool off on the beach. But what to do with +Fiddlin' Jack for his attempt at knifing--a detested crime? He might +have gone at Bull with a gun, or with a club, or with a chair, or with +any recognized weapon. But with a carving-knife! That was a serious +offence. Arrest him, and send him to jail at the Forks? Take him out, +and duck him in the lake? Lick him, and drive him out of the town? + +There was a multitude of counsellors, but it was Hose Ransom who settled +the case. He was a well-known fighting-man, and a respected philosopher. +He swung his broad frame in front of the fiddler. + +"Tell ye what we'll do. Jess nothin'! Ain't Bull Corey the blowin'est +and the mos' trouble-us cuss 'round these hull woods? And would n't it +be a fust-rate thing ef some o' the wind was let out 'n him?" + +General assent greeted this pointed inquiry. + +"And wa'n't Fiddlin' Jack peacerble 'nough 's long 's he was let alone? +What's the matter with lettin' him alone now?" + +The argument seemed to carry weight. Hose saw his advantage, and +clinched it. + +"Ain't he given us a lot o' fun here this winter in a innercent kind o' +way, with his old fiddle? I guess there ain't nothin' on airth he loves +better 'n that holler piece o' wood, and the toons that's inside o' it. +It's jess like a wife or a child to him. Where's that fiddle, anyhow?" + +Some one had picked it deftly out of Corey's hand during the scuffle, +and now passed it up to Hose. + +"Here, Frenchy, take yer long-necked, pot-bellied music-gourd. And I +want you boys to understand, ef any one teches that fiddle ag'in, I'll +knock hell out 'n him." + +So the recording angel dropped another tear upon the record of Hosea +Ransom, and the books were closed for the night. + + + + +III + + +For some weeks after the incident of the violin and the carving-knife, +it looked as if a permanent cloud had settled upon the spirits of +Fiddlin' Jack. He was sad and nervous; if any one touched him, or +even spoke to him suddenly, he would jump like a deer. He kept out of +everybody's way as much as possible, sat out in the wood-shed when he +was not at work, and could not be persuaded to bring down his fiddle. He +seemed in a fair way to be transformed into "the melancholy Jaques." + +It was Serena who broke the spell; and she did it in a woman's way, the +simplest way in the world--by taking no notice of it. + +"Ain't you goin' to play for me to-night?" she asked one evening, +as Jacques passed through the kitchen. Whereupon the evil spirit was +exorcised, and the violin came back again to its place in the life of +the house. + +But there was less time for music now than there had been in the winter. +As the snow vanished from the woods, and the frost leaked out of the +ground, and the ice on the lake was honeycombed, breaking away from the +shore, and finally going to pieces altogether in a warm southeast storm, +the Sportsmen's Retreat began to prepare for business. There was a +garden to be planted, and there were boats to be painted. The rotten old +wharf in front of the house stood badly in need of repairs. The fiddler +proved himself a Jack-of-all-trades and master of more than one. + +In the middle of May the anglers began to arrive at the Retreat--a +quiet, sociable, friendly set of men, most of whom were old-time +acquaintances, and familiar lovers of the woods. They belonged to the +"early Adirondack period," these disciples of Walton. They were not very +rich, and they did not put on much style, but they understood how to +have a good time; and what they did not know about fishing was not worth +knowing. + +Jacques fitted into their scheme of life as a well-made reel fits the +butt of a good rod. He was a steady oarsman, a lucky fisherman, with a +real genius for the use of the landing-net, and a cheerful companion, +who did not insist upon giving his views about artificial flies and +advice about casting, on every occasion. By the end of June he found +himself in steady employment as a guide. + +He liked best to go with the anglers who were not too energetic, but +were satisfied to fish for a few hours in the morning and again at +sunset, after a long rest in the middle of the afternoon. This was just +the time for the violin; and if Jacques had his way, he would take it +with him, carefully tucked away in its case in the bow of the boat; and +when the pipes were lit after lunch, on the shore of Round Island or +at the mouth of Cold Brook, he would discourse sweet music until the +declining sun drew near the tree-tops and the veery rang his silver +bell for vespers. Then it was time to fish again, and the flies danced +merrily over the water, and the great speckled trout leaped eagerly to +catch them. For trolling all day long for lake-trout Jacques had little +liking. + +"Dat is not de sport," he would say, "to hol' one r-r-ope in de 'and, +an' den pool heem in wid one feesh on t'ree hook, h'all tangle h'up +in hees mout'--dat is not de sport. Bisside, dat leef not taim' for la +musique." + +Midsummer brought a new set of guests to the Retreat, and filled the +ramshackle old house to overflowing. The fishing fell off, but there +were picnics and camping-parties in abundance, and Jacques was in +demand. The ladies liked him; his manners were so pleasant, and they +took a great interest in his music. Moody bought a piano for the parlour +that summer; and there were two or three good players in the house, +to whom Jacques would listen with delight, sitting on a pile of logs +outside the parlour windows in the warm August evenings. + +Some one asked him whether he did not prefer the piano to the violin. + +"NON," he answered, very decidedly; "dat piano, he vairee smart; he +got plentee word, lak' de leetle yellow bird in de cage--'ow you call +heem--de cannarie. He spik' moch. Bot dat violon, he spik' more deep, to +de heart, lak' de Rossignol. He mak' me feel more glad, more sorree--dat +fo' w'at Ah lak' heem de bes'!" + +Through all the occupations and pleasures of the summer Jacques kept as +near as he could to Serena. If he learned a new tune, by listening to +the piano--some simple, artful air of Mozart, some melancholy echo of +a nocturne of Chopin, some tender, passionate love-song of Schubert--it +was to her that he would play it first. If he could persuade her to a +boat-ride with him on the lake, Sunday evening, the week was complete. +He even learned to know the more shy and delicate forest-blossoms that +she preferred, and would come in from a day's guiding with a tiny bunch +of belated twin-flowers, or a few purple-fringed orchids, or a handful +of nodding stalks of the fragrant pyrola, for her. + +So the summer passed, and the autumn, with its longer hunting +expeditions into the depth of the wilderness; and by the time winter +came around again, Fiddlin' Jack was well settled at Moody's as +a regular Adirondack guide of the old-fashioned type, but with a +difference. He improved in his English. Something of that missing +quality which Moody called ambition, and to which Hose Ransom gave the +name of imagination, seemed to awaken within him. He saved his wages. He +went into business for himself in a modest way, and made a good turn in +the manufacture of deerskin mittens and snow-shoes. By the spring he had +nearly three hundred dollars laid by, and bought a piece of land from +Ransom on the bank of the river just above the village. + +The second summer of guiding brought him in enough to commence building +a little house. It was of logs, neatly squared at the corners; and there +was a door exactly in the middle of the facade, with a square window +at either side, and another at each end of the house, according to the +common style of architecture at Bytown. + +But it was in the roof that the touch of distinction appeared. For this, +Jacques had modelled after his memory of an old Canadian roof. There was +a delicate concave sweep in it, as it sloped downward from the peak, and +the eaves projected pleasantly over the front door, making a strip of +shade wherein it would be good to rest when the afternoon sun shone hot. + +He took great pride in this effort of the builder's art. One day at the +beginning of May, when the house was nearly finished, he asked old Moody +and Serena to stop on their way home from the village and see what he +had done. He showed them the kitchen, and the living-room, with the +bed-room partitioned off from it, and sharing half of its side window. +Here was a place where a door could be cut at the back, and a shed built +for a summer kitchen--for the coolness, you understand. And here were +two stoves--one for the cooking, and the other in the living-room for +the warming, both of the newest. + +"An' look dat roof. Dat's lak' we make dem in Canada. De rain ron off +easy, and de sun not shine too strong at de door. Ain't dat nice? You +lak' dat roof, Ma'amselle Serene, hein?" + +Thus the imagination of Jacques unfolded itself, and his ambition +appeared to be making plans for its accomplishment. I do not want any +one to suppose that there was a crisis in his affair of the heart. There +was none. Indeed, it is very doubtful whether anybody in the village, +even Serena herself, ever dreamed that there was such an affair. Up +to the point when the house was finished and furnished, it was to be a +secret between Jacques and his violin; and they found no difficulty in +keeping it. + +Bytown was a Yankee village. Jacques was, after all, nothing but a +Frenchman. The native tone of religion, what there was of it, was +strongly Methodist. Jacques never went to church, and if he was +anything, was probably a Roman Catholic. Serena was something of a +sentimentalist, and a great reader of novels; but the international +love-story had not yet been invented, and the idea of getting married +to a foreigner never entered her head. I do not say that she suspected +nothing in the wild flowers, and the Sunday evening boat-rides, and the +music. She was a woman. I have said already that she liked Jacques very +much, and his violin pleased her to the heart. But the new building by +the river? I am sure she never even thought of it once, in the way that +he did. + +Well, in the end of June, just after the furniture had come for the +house with the curved roof, Serena was married to Hose Ransom. He was a +young widower without children, and altogether the best fellow, as well +as the most prosperous, in the settlement. His house stood up on the +hill, across the road from the lot which Jacques had bought. It was +painted white, and it had a narrow front porch, with a scroll-saw fringe +around the edge of it; and there was a little garden fenced in with +white palings, in which Sweet Williams and pansies and blue lupines and +pink bleeding-hearts were planted. + +The wedding was at the Sportsmen's Retreat, and Jacques was there, of +course. There was nothing of the disconsolate lover about him. The noun +he might have confessed to, in a confidential moment of intercourse with +his violin; but the adjective was not in his line. + +The strongest impulse in his nature was to be a giver of entertaininent, +a source of joy in others, a recognized element of delight in the +little world where he moved. He had the artistic temperament in its +most primitive and naive form. Nothing pleased him so much as the act of +pleasing. Music was the means which Nature had given him to fulfil +this desire. He played, as you might say, out of a certain kind of +selfishness, because he enjoyed making other people happy. He was +selfish enough, in his way, to want the pleasure of making everybody +feel the same delight that he felt in the clear tones, the merry +cadences, the tender and caressing flow of his violin. That was +consolation. That was power. That was success. + +And especially was he selfish enough to want to feel his ability to give +Serena a pleasure at her wedding--a pleasure that nobody else could give +her. When she asked him to play, he consented gladly. Never had he drawn +the bow across the strings with a more magical touch. The wedding guests +danced as if they were enchanted. The big bridegroom came up and clapped +him on the back, with the nearest approach to a gesture of affection +that backwoods etiquette allows between men. + +"Jack, you're the boss fiddler o' this hull county. Have a drink now? I +guess you 're mighty dry." + +"MERCI, NON," said Jacques. "I drink only de museek dis night. Eef I +drink two t'ings, I get dronk." + +In between the dances, and while the supper was going on, he played +quieter tunes--ballads and songs that he knew Serena liked. After supper +came the final reel; and when that was wound up, with immense hilarity, +the company ran out to the side door of the tavern to shout a noisy +farewell to the bridal buggy, as it drove down the road toward the house +with the white palings. When they came back, the fiddler was gone. He +had slipped away to the little cabin with the curved roof. + +All night long he sat there playing in the dark. Every tune that he had +ever known came back to him--grave and merry, light and sad. He played +them over and over again, passing round and round among them as a leaf +on a stream follows the eddies, now backward, now forward, and returning +most frequently to an echo of a certain theme from Chopin--you remember +the NOCTURNE IN G MINOR, the second one? He did not know who Chopin +was. Perhaps he did not even know the name of the music. But the air had +fallen upon his ear somewhere, and had stayed in his memory; and now it +seemed to say something to him that had an especial meaning. + +At last he let the bow fall. He patted the brown wood of the violin +after his old fashion, loosened the strings a little, wrapped it in its +green baize cover, and hung it on the wall. + +"Hang thou there, thou little violin," he murmured. "It is now that I +shall take the good care of thee, as never before; for thou art the wife +of Jacques Tremblay. And the wife of 'Osee Ransom, she is a friend to +us, both of us; and we will make the music for her many years, I +tell thee, many years--for her, and for her good man, and for the +children--yes?" + +But Serena did not have many years to listen to the playing of +Jacques Tremblay: on the white porch, in the summer evenings, with +bleeding-hearts abloom in the garden; or by the winter fire, while the +pale blue moonlight lay on the snow without, and the yellow lamplight +filled the room with homely radiance. In the fourth year after her +marriage she died, and Jacques stood beside Hose at the funeral. + +There was a child--a little boy--delicate and blue-eyed, the living +image of his mother. Jacques appointed himself general attendant, nurse +in extraordinary, and court musician to this child. He gave up his work +as a guide. It took him too much away from home. He was tired of it. +Besides, what did he want of so much money? He had his house. He could +gain enough for all his needs by making snow-shoes and the deerskin +mittens at home. Then he could be near little Billy. It was pleasanter +so. + +When Hose was away on a long trip in the woods, Jacques would move up +to the white house and stay on guard. His fiddle learned how to sing the +prettiest slumber songs. Moreover, it could crow in the morning, just +like the cock; and it could make a noise like a mouse, and like the cat, +too; and there were more tunes inside of it than in any music-box in the +world. + +As the boy grew older, the little cabin with the curved roof became +his favourite playground. It was near the river, and Fiddlin' Jack was +always ready to make a boat for him, or help him catch minnows in the +mill-dam. The child had a taste for music, too, and learned some of the +old Canadian songs, which he sang in a curious broken patois, while his +delighted teacher accompanied him on the violin. But it was a great day +when he was eight years old, and Jacques brought out a small fiddle, for +which he had secretly sent to Albany, and presented it to the boy. + +"You see dat feedle, Billee? Dat's for you! You mek' your lesson on +dat. When you kin mek' de museek, den you play on de violon--lak' dis +one--listen!" + +Then he drew the bow across the strings and dashed into a medley of the +jolliest airs imaginable. + +The boy took to his instruction as kindly as could have been expected. +School interrupted it a good deal; and play with the other boys carried +him away often; but, after all, there was nothing that he liked much +better than to sit in the little cabin on a winter evening and pick out +a simple tune after his teacher. He must have had some talent for it, +too; for Jacques was very proud of his pupil, and prophesied great +things of him. + +"You know dat little Billee of 'Ose Ransom," the fiddler would say to a +circle of people at the hotel, where he still went to play for parties; +"you know dat small Ransom boy? Well, I 'm tichin' heem play de feedle; +an' I tell you, one day he play better dan hees ticher. Ah, dat 's +gr-r-reat t'ing, de museek, ain't it? Mek' you laugh, mek' you cry, mek' +you dance! Now, you dance. Tek' your pardnerre. EN AVANT! Kip' step to +de museek!" + + + + +IV + + +Thirty years brought many changes to Bytown. The wild woodland +flavour evaporated out of the place almost entirely; and instead of an +independent centre of rustic life, it became an annex to great cities. +It was exploited as a summer resort, and discovered as a winter resort. +Three or four big hotels were planted there, and in their shadow a score +of boarding-houses alternately languished and flourished. The summer +cottage also appeared and multiplied; and with it came many of the +peculiar features which man elaborates in his struggle toward the finest +civilization--afternoon teas, and amateur theatricals, and claw-hammer +coats, and a casino, and even a few servants in livery. + +The very name of Bytown was discarded as being too American and +commonplace. An Indian name was discovered, and considered much more +romantic and appropriate. You will look in vain for Bytown on the map +now. Nor will you find the old saw-mill there any longer, wasting a vast +water-power to turn its dripping wheel and cut up a few pine-logs into +fragrant boards. There is a big steam-mill a little farther up the +river, which rips out thousands of feet of lumber in a day; but there +are no more pine-logs, only sticks of spruce which the old lumbermen +would have thought hardly worth cutting. And down below the dam there is +a pulp-mill, to chew up the little trees and turn them into paper, and a +chair factory, and two or three industrial establishments, with quite a +little colony of French-Canadians employed in them as workmen. + +Hose Ransom sold his place on the hill to one of the hotel companies, +and a huge caravansary occupied the site of the house with the white +palings. There were no more bleeding-hearts in the garden. There were +beds of flaring red geraniums, which looked as if they were painted; and +across the circle of smooth lawn in front of the piazza the name of the +hotel was printed in alleged ornamental plants letters two feet long, +immensely ugly. Hose had been elevated to the office of postmaster, and +lived in a Queen Antic cottage on the main street. Little Billy Ransom +had grown up into a very interesting young man, with a decided musical +genius, and a tenor voice, which being discovered by an enterprising +patron of genius, from Boston, Billy was sent away to Paris to learn to +sing. Some day you will hear of his debut in grand opera, as Monsieur +Guillaume Rancon. + +But Fiddlin' Jack lived on in the little house with the curved roof, +beside the river, refusing all the good offers which were made to him +for his piece of land. + +"NON," he said; "what for shall I sell dis house? I lak' her, she +lak' me. All dese walls got full from museek, jus' lak' de wood of dis +violon. He play bettair dan de new feedle, becos' I play heem so long. +I lak' to lissen to dat rivaire in de night. She sing from long taim' +ago--jus' de same song w'en I firs come here. W'at for I go away? W'at I +get? W'at you can gif' me lak' dat?" + +He was still the favourite musician of the county-side, in great request +at parties and weddings; but he had extended the sphere of his influence +a little. He was not willing to go to church, though there were now +several to choose from; but a young minister of liberal views who had +come to take charge of the new Episcopal chapel had persuaded Jacques +into the Sunday-school, to lead the children's singing with his violin. +He did it so well that the school became the most popular in the +village. It was much pleasanter to sing than to listen to long +addresses. + +Jacques grew old gracefully, but he certainly grew old rapidly. His +beard was white; his shoulders were stooping; he suffered a good deal +in damp days from rheumatism--fortunately not in his hands, but in his +legs. One spring there was a long spell of abominable weather, just +between freezing and thawing. He caught a heavy cold and took to his +bed. Hose came over to look after him. + +For a few days the old fiddler kept up his courage, and would sit up in +the bed trying to play; then his strength and his spirit seemed to fail +together. He grew silent and indifferent. When Hose came in he would +find Jacques with his face turned to the wall, where there was a tiny +brass crucifix hanging below the violin, and his lips moving quietly. + +"Don't ye want the fiddle, Jack? I 'd like ter hear some o' them +old-time tunes ag'in." + +But the artifice failed. Jacques shook his head. His mind seemed to turn +back to the time of his first arrival in the village, and beyond it. +When he spoke at all, it was of something connected with this early +time. + +"Dat was bad taim' when I near keel Bull Corey, hein?" + +Hose nodded gravely. + +"Dat was beeg storm, dat night when I come to Bytown. You remember dat?" + +Yes, Hose remembered it very well. It was a real old-fashioned storm. + +"Ah, but befo dose taim', dere was wuss taim' dan dat--in Canada. Nobody +don' know 'bout dat. I lak to tell you, 'Ose, but I can't. No, it is not +possible to tell dat, nevair!" + +It came into Hose's mind that the case was serious. Jack was going to +die. He never went to church, but perhaps the Sunday-school might count +for something. He was only a Frenchman, after all, and Frenchmen had +their own ways of doing things. He certainly ought to see some kind of +a preacher before he went out of the wilderness. There was a Canadian +priest in town that week, who had come down to see about getting up a +church for the French people who worked in the mills. Perhaps Jack would +like to talk with him. + +His face lighted up at the proposal. He asked to have the room tidied +up, and a clean shirt put on him, and the violin laid open in its case +on a table beside the bed, and a few other preparations made for the +visit. Then the visitor came, a tall, friendly, quiet-looking man about +Jacques's age, with a smooth face and a long black cassock. The door was +shut, and they were left alone together. + +"I am comforted that you are come, mon pere," said the sick man, "for I +have the heavy heart. There is a secret that I have kept for many years. +Sometimes I had almost forgotten that it must be told at the last; but +now it is the time to speak. I have a sin to confess--a sin of the most +grievous, of the most unpardonable." + +The listener soothed him with gracious words; spoke of the mercy that +waits for all the penitent; urged him to open his heart without delay. + +"Well, then, mon pere, it is this that makes me fear to die. Long since, +in Canada, before I came to this place, I have killed a man. It was--" + +The voice stopped. The little round clock on the window-sill ticked very +distinctly and rapidly, as if it were in a hurry. + +"I will speak as short as I can. It was in the camp of 'Poleon Gautier, +on the river St. Maurice. The big Baptiste Lacombe, that crazy boy who +wants always to fight, he mocks me when I play, he snatches my violin, +he goes to break him on the stove. There is a knife in my belt. I +spring to Baptiste. I see no more what it is that I do. I cut him in +the neck--once, twice. The blood flies out. He falls down. He cries, 'I +die.' I grab my violin from the floor, quick; then I run to the woods. +No one can catch me. A blanket, the axe, some food, I get from a +hiding-place down the river. Then I travel, travel, travel through the +woods, how many days I know not, till I come here. No one knows me. I +give myself the name Tremblay. I make the music for them. With my violin +I live. I am happy. I forget. But it all returns to me--now--at the +last. I have murdered. Is there a forgiveness for me, mon pere?" + +The priest's face had changed very swiftly at the mention of the camp +on the St. Maurice. As the story went on, he grew strangely excited. +His lips twitched. His hands trembled. At the end he sank on his knees, +close by the bed, and looked into the countenance of the sick man, +searching it as a forester searches in the undergrowth for a lost trail. +Then his eyes lighted up as he found it. + +"My son," said he, clasping the old fiddler's hand in his own, "you are +Jacques Dellaire. And I--do you know me now?--I am Baptiste Lacombe. +See those two scars upon my neck. But it was not death. You have not +murdered. You have given the stroke that changed my heart. Your sin is +forgiven--AND MINE ALSO--by the mercy of God!" + +The round clock ticked louder and louder. A level ray from the setting +sun--red gold--came in through the dusty window, and lay across the +clasped hands on the bed. A white-throated sparrow, the first of the +season, on his way to the woods beyond the St. Lawrence, whistled so +clearly and tenderly that it seemed as if he were repeating to these two +gray-haired exiles the name of their homeland. "Sweet--sweet--Canada, +Canada, Canada!" But there was a sweeter sound than that in the quiet +room. + +It was the sound of the prayer which begins, in every language spoken by +men, with the name of that Unseen One who rules over life's chances, +and pities its discords, and tunes it back again into harmony. Yes, +this prayer of the little children who are only learning how to play +the first notes of life's music, turns to the great Master musician who +knows it all and who loves to bring a melody out of every instrument +that He has made; and it seems to lay the soul in His hands to play upon +as He will, while it calls Him, OUR FATHER! + + +Some day, perhaps, you will go to the busy place where Bytown used to +be; and if you do, you must take the street by the river to the white +wooden church of St. Jacques. It stands on the very spot where there was +once a cabin with a curved roof. There is a gilt cross on the top of +the church. The door is usually open, and the interior is quite gay with +vases of china and brass, and paper flowers of many colours; but if +you go through to the sacristy at the rear, you will see a brown violin +hanging on the wall. + +Pere Baptiste, if he is there, will take it down and show it to you. He +calls it a remarkable instrument--one of the best, of the most sweet. + +But he will not let any one play upon it. He says it is a relic. + + + + +II. THE REWARD OF VIRTUE + + + + +I + +When the good priest of St. Gerome christened Patrick Mullarkey, he lent +himself unconsciously to an innocent deception. To look at the name, you +would think, of course, it belonged to an Irishman; the very appearance +of it was equal to a certificate of membership in a Fenian society. + +But in effect, from the turned-up toes of his bottes sauvages to +the ends of his black mustache, the proprietor of this name was a +Frenchman--Canadian French, you understand, and therefore even more +proud and tenacious of his race than if he had been born in Normandy. +Somewhere in his family tree there must have been a graft from the +Green Isle. A wandering lumberman from County Kerry had drifted up the +Saguenay into the Lake St. John region, and married the daughter of a +habitant, and settled down to forget his own country and his father's +house. But every visible trace of this infusion of new blood had +vanished long ago, except the name; and the name itself was transformed +on the lips of the St. Geromians. If you had heard them speak it in +their pleasant droning accent,--"Patrique Moullarque,"--you would have +supposed that it was made in France. To have a guide with such a name as +that was as good as being abroad. + +Even when they cut it short and called him "Patte," as they usually did, +it had a very foreign sound. Everything about him was in harmony with +it; he spoke and laughed and sang and thought and felt in French--the +French of two hundred years ago, the language of Samuel de Champlain and +the Sieur de Monts, touched with a strong woodland flavour. In short, +my guide, philosopher, and friend, Pat, did not have a drop of Irish +in him, unless, perhaps, it was a certain--well, you shall judge for +yourself, when you have heard this story of his virtue, and the way it +was rewarded. + +It was on the shore of the Lac a la Belle Riviere, fifteen miles back +from St. Gerome, that I came into the story, and found myself, as +commonly happens in the real stories which life is always bringing out +in periodical form, somewhere about the middle of the plot. But Patrick +readily made me acquainted with what had gone before. Indeed, it is +one of life's greatest charms as a story-teller that there is never +any trouble about getting a brief resume of the argument, and even a +listener who arrives late is soon put into touch with the course of the +narrative. + +We had hauled our canoes and camp-stuff over the terrible road that +leads to the lake, with much creaking and groaning of wagons, and +complaining of men, who declared that the mud grew deeper and the hills +steeper every year, and vowed their customary vow never to come that way +again. At last our tents were pitched in a green copse of balsam trees, +close beside the water. The delightful sense of peace and freedom +descended upon our souls. Prosper and Ovide were cutting wood for the +camp-fire; Francois was getting ready a brace of partridges for supper; +Patrick and I were unpacking the provisions, arranging them conveniently +for present use and future transportation. + +"Here, Pat," said I, as my hand fell on a large square parcel--"here is +some superfine tobacco that I got in Quebec for you and the other men on +this trip. Not like the damp stuff you had last year--a little bad +smoke and too many bad words. This is tobacco to burn--something quite +particular, you understand. How does that please you?" + +He had been rolling up a piece of salt pork in a cloth as I spoke, and +courteously wiped his fingers on the outside of the bundle before he +stretched out his hand to take the package of tobacco. Then he answered, +with his unfailing politeness, but more solemnly than usual: + +"A thousand thanks to m'sieu'. But this year I shall not have need of +the good tobacco. It shall be for the others." + +The reply was so unexpected that it almost took my breath away. For Pat, +the steady smoker, whose pipes were as invariable as the precession of +the equinoxes, to refuse his regular rations of the soothing weed was a +thing unheard of. Could he be growing proud in his old age? Had he some +secret supply of cigars concealed in his kit, which made him scorn the +golden Virginia leaf? I demanded an explanation. + +"But no, m'sieu'," he replied; "it is not that, most assuredly. It +is something entirely different--something very serious. It is a +reformation that I commence. Does m'sieu' permit that I should inform +him of it?" + +Of course I permitted, or rather, warmly encouraged, the fullest +possible unfolding of the tale; and while we sat among the bags and +boxes, and the sun settled gently down behind the sharp-pointed firs +across the lake, and the evening sky and the waveless lake glowed with a +thousand tints of deepening rose and amber, Patrick put me in possession +of the facts which had led to a moral revolution in his life. + +"It was the Ma'm'selle Meelair, that young lady,--not very young, but +active like the youngest,--the one that I conducted down the Grande +Decharge to Chicoutimi last year, after you had gone away. She said that +she knew m'sieu' intimately. No doubt you have a good remembrance of +her?" + +I admitted an acquaintance with the lady. She was the president of +several societies for ethical agitation--a long woman, with short hair +and eyeglasses and a great thirst for tea; not very good in a canoe, but +always wanting to run the rapids and go into the dangerous places, and +talking all the time. Yes; that must have been the one. She was not a +bosom friend of mine, to speak accurately, but I remembered her well. + +"Well, then, m'sieu'," continued Patrick, "it was this demoiselle who +changed my mind about the smoking. But not in a moment, you understand; +it was a work of four days, and she spoke much. + +"The first day it was at the Island House; we were trolling for +ouananiche, and she was not pleased, for she lost many of the fish. I +was smoking at the stern of the canoe, and she said that the tobacco was +a filthy weed, that it grew in the devil's garden, and that it smelled +bad, terribly bad, and that it made the air sick, and that even the pig +would not eat it." + +I could imagine Patrick's dismay as he listened to this dissertation; +for in his way he was as sensitive as a woman, and he would rather have +been upset in his canoe than have exposed himself to the reproach of +offending any one of his patrons by unpleasant or unseemly conduct. + +"What did you do then, Pat?" I asked. + +"Certainly I put out the pipe--what could I do otherwise? But I thought +that what the demoiselle Meelair has said was very strange, and not +true--exactly; for I have often seen the tobacco grow, and it springs +up out of the ground like the wheat or the beans, and it has beautiful +leaves, broad and green, with sometimes a red flower at the top. Does +the good God cause the filthy weeds to grow like that? Are they not all +clean that He has made? The potato--it is not filthy. And the onion? +It has a strong smell; but the demoiselle Meelair she ate much of the +onion--when we were not at the Island House, but in the camp. + +"And the smell of the tobacco--this is an affair of the taste. For me, +I love it much; it is like a spice. When I come home at night to the +camp-fire, where the boys are smoking, the smell of the pipes runs far +out into the woods to salute me. It says, 'Here we are, Patrique; come +in near to the fire.' The smell of the tobacco is more sweet than the +smell of the fish. The pig loves it not, assuredly; but what then? I am +not a pig. To me it is good, good, good. Don't you find it like that, +m'sieu'?" + +I had to confess that in the affair of taste I sided with Patrick rather +than with the pig. "Continue," I said--"continue, my boy. Miss Miller +must have said more than that to reform you." + +"Truly," replied Pat. "On the second day we were making the lunch at +midday on the island below the first rapids. I smoked the pipe on a +rock apart, after the collation. Mees Meelair comes to me, and says: +'Patrique, my man, do you comprehend that the tobacco is a poison? +You are committing the murder of yourself.' Then she tells me many +things--about the nicoline, I think she calls him; how he goes into the +blood and into the bones and into the hair, and how quickly he will kill +the cat. And she says, very strong, 'The men who smoke the tobacco shall +die!'" + +"That must have frightened you well, Pat. I suppose you threw away your +pipe at once." + +"But no, m'sieu'; this time I continue to smoke, for now it is Mees +Meelair who comes near the pipe voluntarily, and it is not my offence. +And I remember, while she is talking, the old bonhomme Michaud St. +Gerome. He is a capable man; when he was young he could carry a barrel +of flour a mile without rest, and now that he has seventy-three years he +yet keeps his force. And he smokes--it is astonishing how that old man +smokes! All the day, except when he sleeps. If the tobacco is a poison, +it is a poison of the slowest--like the tea or the coffee. For the cat +it is quick--yes; but for the man it is long; and I am still young--only +thirty-one. + +"But the third day, m'sieu'--the third day was the worst. It was a day +of sadness, a day of the bad chance. The demoiselle Meelair was not +content but that we should leap the Rapide des Cedres in canoe. It was +rough, rough--all feather-white, and the big rock at the corner boiling +like a kettle. But it is the ignorant who have the most of boldness. The +demoiselle Meelair she was not solid in the canoe. She made a jump and a +loud scream. I did my possible, but the sea was too high. We took in of +the water about five buckets. We were very wet. After that we make the +camp; and while I sit by the fire to dry my clothes I smoke for comfort. + +"Mees Meelair she comes to me once more. 'Patrique,' she says with a sad +voice, 'I am sorry that a nice man, so good, so brave, is married to a +thing so bad, so sinful!' At first I am mad when I hear this, because +I think she means Angelique, my wife; but immediately she goes on: +'You are married to the smoking. That is sinful; it is a wicked thing. +Christians do not smoke. There is none of the tobacco in heaven. The men +who use it cannot go there. Ah, Patrique, do you wish to go to the hell +with your pipe?'" + +"That was a close question," I commented; "your Miss Miller is a plain +speaker. But what did you say when she asked you that?" + +"I said, m'sieu'," replied Patrick, lifting his hand to his forehead, +"that I must go where the good God pleased to send me, and that I would +have much joy to go to the same place with our cure, the Pere Morel, who +is a great smoker. I am sure that the pipe of comfort is no sin to that +holy man when he returns, some cold night, from the visiting of the +sick--it is not sin, not more than the soft chair and the warm fire. It +harms no one, and it makes quietness of mind. For me, when I see m'sieu' +the cure sitting at the door of the presbytere, in the evening coolness, +smoking the tobacco, very peaceful, and when he says to me, 'Good day, +Patrique; will you have a pipeful?' I cannot think that is wicked--no!" + +There was a warmth of sincerity in the honest fellow's utterance that +spoke well for the character of the cure of St. Gerome. The good word +of a plain fisherman or hunter is worth more than a degree of doctor of +divinity from a learned university. + +I too had grateful memories of good men, faithful, charitable, wise, +devout,--men before whose virtues my heart stood uncovered and reverent, +men whose lives were sweet with self-sacrifice, and whose words were +like stars of guidance to many souls,--and I had often seen these men +solacing their toils and inviting pleasant, kindly thoughts with the +pipe of peace. I wondered whether Miss Miller ever had the good fortune +to meet any of these men. They were not members of the societies for +ethical agitation, but they were profitable men to know. Their very +presence was medicinal. It breathed patience and fidelity to duty, and a +large, quiet friendliness. + +"Well, then," I asked, "what did she say finally to turn you? What was +her last argument? Come, Pat, you must make it a little shorter than she +did." + +"In five words, m'sieu', it was this: 'The tobacco causes the poverty.' +The fourth day--you remind yourself of the long dead-water below the +Rapide Gervais? It was there. All the day she spoke to me of the money +that goes to the smoke. Two piastres the month. Twenty-four the year. +Three hundred--yes, with the interest, more than three hundred in ten +years! Two thousand piastres in the life of the man! But she comprehends +well the arithmetic, that demoiselle Meelair; it was enormous! The big +farmer Tremblay has not more money at the bank than that. Then she asks +me if I have been at Quebec? No. If I would love to go? Of course, +yes. For two years of the smoking we could go, the goodwife and me, to +Quebec, and see the grand city, and the shops, and the many people, and +the cathedral, and perhaps the theatre. And at the asylum of the orphans +we could seek one of the little found children to bring home with us, to +be our own; for m'sieu knows it is the sadness of our house that we have +no child. But it was not Mees Meelair who said that--no, she would not +understand that thought." + +Patrick paused for a moment, and rubbed his chin reflectively. Then he +continued: + +"And perhaps it seems strange to you also, m'sieu', that a poor man +should be so hungry for children. It is not so everywhere: not in +America, I hear. But it is so with us in Canada. I know not a man so +poor that he would not feel richer for a child. I know not a man so +happy that he would not feel happier with a child in the house. It is +the best thing that the good God gives to us; something to work for; +something to play with. It makes a man more gentle and more strong. And +a woman,--her heart is like an empty nest, if she has not a child. It +was the darkest day that ever came to Angelique and me when our little +baby flew away, four years ago. But perhaps if we have not one of our +own, there is another somewhere, a little child of nobody, that belongs +to us, for the sake of the love of children. Jean Boucher, my wife's +cousin, at St. Joseph d'Alma, has taken two from the asylum. Two, +m'sieu', I assure you for as soon as one was twelve years old, he said +he wanted a baby, and so he went back again and got another. That is +what I should like to do." + +"But, Pat," said I, "it is an expensive business, this raising of +children. You should think twice about it." + +"Pardon, m'sieu'," answered Patrick; "I think a hundred times and always +the same way. It costs little more for three, or four, or five, in the +house than for two. The only thing is the money for the journey to the +city, the choice, the arrangement with the nuns. For that one must save. +And so I have thrown away the pipe. I smoke no more. The money of the +tobacco is for Quebec and for the little found child. I have already +eighteen piastres and twenty sous in the old box of cigars on the +chimney-piece at the house. This year will bring more. The winter after +the next, if we have the good chance, we go to the city, the goodwife +and me, and we come home with the little boy--or maybe the little girl. +Does m'sieu' approve?" + +"You are a man of virtue, Pat," said I; "and since you will not take +your share of the tobacco on this trip, it shall go to the other men; +but you shall have the money instead, to put into your box on the +mantel-piece." + +After supper that evening I watched him with some curiosity to see what +he would do without his pipe. He seemed restless and uneasy. The other +men sat around the fire, smoking; but Patrick was down at the landing, +fussing over one of the canoes, which had been somewhat roughly handled +on the road coming in. Then he began to tighten the tent-ropes, and +hauled at them so vigorously that he loosened two of the stakes. Then +he whittled the blade of his paddle for a while, and cut it an inch too +short. Then he went into the men's tent, and in a few minutes the sound +of snoring told that he had sought refuge in sleep at eight o'clock, +without telling a single caribou story, or making any plans for the next +day's sport. + + + + +II + +For several days we lingered on the Lake of the Beautiful River, trying +the fishing. We explored all the favourite meeting-places of the trout, +at the mouths of the streams and in the cool spring-holes, but we did +not have remarkable success. I am bound to say that Patrick was not +at his best that year as a fisherman. He was as ready to work, as +interested, as eager, as ever; but he lacked steadiness, persistence, +patience. Some tranquillizing influence seemed to have departed from +him. That placid confidence in the ultimate certainty of catching fish, +which is one of the chief elements of good luck, was wanting. He did not +appear to be able to sit still in the canoe. The mosquitoes troubled +him terribly. He was just as anxious as a man could be to have me take +plenty of the largest trout, but he was too much in a hurry. He even +went so far as to say that he did not think I cast the fly as well as I +did formerly, and that I was too slow in striking when the fish rose. He +was distinctly a weaker man without his pipe, but his virtuous resolve +held firm. + +There was one place in particular that required very cautious angling. +It was a spring-hole at the mouth of the Riviere du Milieu--an open +space, about a hundred feet long and fifteen feet wide, in the midst +of the lily-pads, and surrounded on every side by clear, shallow water. +Here the great trout assembled at certain hours of the day; but it was +not easy to get them. You must come up delicately in the canoe, and make +fast to a stake at the side of the pool, and wait a long time for the +place to get quiet and the fish to recover from their fright and come +out from under the lily-pads. It had been our custom to calm and soothe +this expectant interval with incense of the Indian weed, friendly to +meditation and a foe of "Raw haste, half-sister to delay." But this year +Patrick could not endure the waiting. After five minutes he would say: + +"BUT the fishing is bad this season! There are none of the big ones here +at all. Let us try another place. It will go better at the Riviere du +Cheval, perhaps." + +There was only one thing that would really keep him quiet, and that +was a conversation about Quebec. The glories of that wonderful city +entranced his thoughts. He was already floating, in imagination, with +the vast throngs of people that filled its splendid streets, looking up +at the stately houses and churches with their glittering roofs of tin, +and staring his fill at the magnificent shop-windows, where all the +luxuries of the world were displayed. He had heard that there were more +than a hundred shops--separate shops for all kinds of separate things: +some for groceries, and some for shoes, and some for clothes, and some +for knives and axes, and some for guns, and many shops where they sold +only jewels--gold rings, and diamonds, and forks of pure silver. Was it +not so? + +He pictured himself, side by side with his goodwife, in the salle a +manger of the Hotel Richelieu, ordering their dinner from a printed +bill of fare. Side by side they were walking on the Dufferin Terrace, +listening to the music of the military band. Side by side they were +watching the wonders of the play at the Theatre de l'Etoile du Nord. +Side by side they were kneeling before the gorgeous altar in the +cathedral. And then they were standing silent, side by side, in the +asylum of the orphans, looking at brown eyes and blue, at black hair and +yellow curls, at fat legs and rosy cheeks and laughing mouths, while the +Mother Superior showed off the little boys and girls for them to choose. +This affair of the choice was always a delightful difficulty, and here +his fancy loved to hang in suspense, vibrating between rival joys. + +Once, at the Riviere du Milieu, after considerable discourse upon +Quebec, there was an interval of silence, during which I succeeded in +hooking and playing a larger trout than usual. As the fish came up to +the side of the canoe, Patrick netted him deftly, exclaiming with an +abstracted air, "It is a boy, after all. I like that best." + +Our camp was shifted, the second week, to the Grand Lac des Cedres; and +there we had extraordinary fortune with the trout: partly, I conjecture, +because there was only one place to fish, and so Patrick's uneasy zeal +could find no excuse for keeping me in constant motion all around the +lake. But in the matter of weather we were not so happy. There is always +a conflict in the angler's mind about the weather--a struggle between +his desires as a man and his desires as a fisherman. This time our +prayers for a good fishing season were granted at the expense of our +suffering human nature. There was a conjunction in the zodiac of the +signs of Aquarius and Pisces. It rained as easily, as suddenly, as +penetratingly, as Miss Miller talked; but in between the showers the +trout were very hungry. + +One day, when we were paddling home to our tents among the birch trees, +one of these unexpected storms came up; and Patrick, thoughtful of +my comfort as ever, insisted on giving me his coat to put around my +dripping shoulders. The paddling would serve instead of a coat for him, +he said; it would keep him warm to his bones. As I slipped the garment +over my back, something hard fell from one of the pockets into the +bottom of the canoe. It was a brier-wood pipe. + +"Aha! Pat," I cried; "what is this? You said you had thrown all your +pipes away. How does this come in your pocket?" + +"But, m'sieu'," he answered, "this is different. This is not the pipe +pure and simple. It is a souvenir. It is the one you gave me two years +ago on the Metabetchouan, when we got the big caribou. I could not +reject this. I keep it always for the remembrance." + +At this moment my hand fell upon a small, square object in the other +pocket of the coat. I pulled it out. It was a cake of Virginia leaf. +Without a word, I held it up, and looked at Patrick. He began to explain +eagerly: + +"Yes, certainly, it is the tobacco, m'sieu'; but it is not for the +smoke, as you suppose. It is for the virtue, for the self-victory. I +call this my little piece of temptation. See; the edges are not cut. I +smell it only; and when I think how it is good, then I speak to myself, +'But the little found child will be better!' It will last a long time, +this little piece of temptation; perhaps until we have the boy at our +house--or maybe the girl." + +The conflict between the cake of Virginia leaf and Patrick's virtue must +have been severe during the last ten days of our expedition; for we +went down the Riviere des Ecorces, and that is a tough trip, and full +of occasions when consolation is needed. After a long, hard day's work +cutting out an abandoned portage through the woods, or tramping miles +over the incredibly shaggy hills to some outlying pond for a caribou, +and lugging the saddle and hind quarters back to the camp, the evening +pipe, after supper, seemed to comfort the men unspeakably. If their +tempers had grown a little short under stress of fatigue and hunger, now +they became cheerful and good-natured again. They sat on logs before +the camp-fire, their stockinged feet stretched out to the blaze, and the +puffs of smoke rose from their lips like tiny salutes to the comfortable +flame, or like incense burned upon the altar of gratitude and +contentment. + +Patrick, I noticed about this time, liked to get on the leeward side of +as many pipes as possible, and as near as he could to the smokers. He +said that this kept away the mosquitoes. There he would sit, with the +smoke drifting full in his face, both hands in his pockets, talking +about Quebec, and debating the comparative merits of a boy or a girl as +an addition to his household. + +But the great trial of his virtue was yet to come. The main object +of our trip down the River of Barks--the terminus ad quem of the +expedition, so to speak--was a bear. Now the bear as an object of the +chase, at least in Canada, is one of the most illusory of phantoms. The +manner of hunting is simple. It consists in walking about through the +woods, or paddling along a stream, until you meet a bear; then you try +to shoot him. This would seem to be, as the Rev. Mr. Leslie called his +book against the deists of the eighteenth century, "A Short and Easie +Method." But in point of fact there are two principal difficulties. The +first is that you never find the bear when and where you are looking for +him. The second is that the bear sometimes finds you when--but you shall +see how it happened to us. + +We had hunted the whole length of the River of Barks with the utmost +pains and caution, never going out, even to pick blueberries, without +having the rifle at hand, loaded for the expected encounter. Not one +bear had we met. It seemed as if the whole ursine tribe must have +emigrated to Labrador. + +At last we came to the mouth of the river, where it empties into Lake +Kenogami, in a comparatively civilized country, with several farm-houses +in full view on the opposite bank. It was not a promising place for the +chase; but the river ran down with a little fall and a lively, cheerful +rapid into the lake, and it was a capital spot for fishing. So we left +the rifle in the case, and took a canoe and a rod, and went down, on the +last afternoon, to stand on the point of rocks at the foot of the rapid, +and cast the fly. + +We caught half a dozen good trout; but the sun was still hot, and we +concluded to wait awhile for the evening fishing. So we turned the canoe +bottom up among the bushes on the shore, stored the trout away in the +shade beneath it, and sat down in a convenient place among the stones +to have another chat about Quebec. We had just passed the jewelry shops, +and were preparing to go to the asylum of the orphans, when Patrick +put his hand on my shoulder with a convulsive grip, and pointed up the +stream. + +There was a huge bear, like a very big, wicked, black sheep with a +pointed nose, making his way down the shore. He shambled along lazily +and unconcernedly, as if his bones were loosely tied together in a bag +of fur. It was the most indifferent and disconnected gait that I ever +saw. Nearer and nearer he sauntered, while we sat as still as if we had +been paralyzed. And the gun was in its case at the tent! + +How the bear knew this I cannot tell; but know it he certainly did, +for he kept on until he reached the canoe, sniffed at it suspiciously, +thrust his sharp nose under it, and turned it over with a crash that +knocked two holes in the bottom, ate the fish, licked his chops, stared +at us for a few moments without the slightest appearance of gratitude, +made up his mind that he did not like our personal appearance, and then +loped leisurely up the mountain-side. We could hear him cracking the +underbrush long after he was lost to sight. + +Patrick looked at me and sighed. I said nothing. The French language, as +far as I knew it, seemed trifling and inadequate. It was a moment when +nothing could do any good except the consolations of philosophy, or a +pipe. Patrick pulled the brier-wood from his pocket; then he took out +the cake of Virginia leaf, looked at it, smelled it, shook his head, and +put it back again. His face was as long as his arm. He stuck the cold +pipe into his mouth, and pulled away at it for a while in silence. +Then his countenance began to clear, his mouth relaxed, he broke into a +laugh. + +"Sacred bear!" he cried, slapping his knee; "sacred beast of the world! +What a day of the good chance for her, HE! But she was glad, I suppose. +Perhaps she has some cubs, HE? BAJETTE!" + + + + +III + +This was the end of our hunting and fishing for that year. We spent the +next two days in voyaging through a half-dozen small lakes and streams, +in a farming country, on our way home. I observed that Patrick kept his +souvenir pipe between his lips a good deal of the time, and puffed at +vacancy. It seemed to soothe him. In his conversation he dwelt with +peculiar satisfaction on the thought of the money in the cigar-box +on the mantel-piece at St. Gerome. Eighteen piastres and twenty sous +already! And with the addition to be made from the tobacco not smoked +during the past month, it would amount to more than twenty-three +piastres; and all as safe in the cigar-box as if it were in the bank +at Chicoutimi! That reflection seemed to fill the empty pipe with +fragrance. It was a Barmecide smoke; but the fumes of it were potent, +and their invisible wreaths framed the most enchanting visions of tall +towers, gray walls, glittering windows, crowds of people, regiments +of soldiers, and the laughing eyes of a little boy--or was it a little +girl? + +When we came out of the mouth of La Belle Riviere, the broad blue +expanse of Lake St. John spread before us, calm and bright in the +radiance of the sinking sun. In a curve on the left, eight miles away, +sparkled the slender steeple of the church of St. Gerome. A thick column +of smoke rose from somewhere in its neighbourhood. "It is on the beach," +said the men; "the boys of the village accustom themselves to burn the +rubbish there for a bonfire." But as our canoes danced lightly forward +over the waves and came nearer to the place, it was evident that the +smoke came from the village itself. It was a conflagration, but not a +general one; the houses were too scattered and the day too still for a +fire to spread. What could it be? Perhaps the blacksmith shop, perhaps +the bakery, perhaps the old tumble-down barn of the little Tremblay? It +was not a large fire, that was certain. But where was it precisely? + +The question, becoming more and more anxious, was answered when we +arrived at the beach. A handful of boys, eager to be the bearers of +news, had spied us far off, and ran down to the shore to meet us. + +"Patrique! Patrique!" they shouted in English, to make their importance +as great as possible in my eyes. "Come 'ome kveek; yo' 'ouse ees hall +burn'!" + +"W'at!" cried Patrick. "MONJEE!" And he drove the canoe ashore, leaped +out, and ran up the bank toward the village as if he were mad. The other +men followed him, leaving me with the boys to unload the canoes and pull +them up on the sand, where the waves would not chafe them. + +This took some time, and the boys helped me willingly. "Eet ees not need +to 'urry, m'sieu'," they assured me; "dat 'ouse to Patrique Moullarque +ees hall burn' seence t'ree hour. Not'ing lef' bot de hash." + +As soon as possible, however, I piled up the stuff, covered it with one +of the tents, and leaving it in charge of the steadiest of the boys, +took the road to the village and the site of the Maison Mullarkey. + +It had vanished completely: the walls of squared logs were gone; the +low, curved roof had fallen; the door-step with the morning-glory vines +climbing up beside it had sunken out of sight; nothing remained but +the dome of the clay oven at the back of the house, and a heap of +smouldering embers. + +Patrick sat beside his wife on a flat stone that had formerly supported +the corner of the porch. His shoulder was close to Angelique's--so close +that it looked almost as if he must have had his arm around her a moment +before I came up. His passion and grief had calmed themselves down now, +and he was quite tranquil. In his left hand he held the cake of Virginia +leaf, in his right a knife. He was cutting off delicate slivers of the +tobacco, which he rolled together with a circular motion between his +palms. Then he pulled his pipe from his pocket and filled the bowl with +great deliberation. + +"What a misfortune!" I cried. "The pretty house is gone. I am so sorry, +Patrick. And the box of money on the mantel-piece, that is gone, too, I +fear--all your savings. What a terrible misfortune! How did it happen?" + +"I cannot tell," he answered rather slowly. "It is the good God. And he +has left me my Angelique. Also, m'sieu', you see"--here he went over to +the pile of ashes, and pulled out a fragment of charred wood with a +live coal at the end--"you see"--puff, puff--"he has given me"--puff, +puff--"a light for my pipe again"--puff, puff, puff! + +The fragrant, friendly smoke was pouring out now in full volume. It +enwreathed his head like drifts of cloud around the rugged top of a +mountain at sunrise. I could see that his face was spreading into a +smile of ineffable contentment. + +"My faith!" said I, "how can you be so cheerful? Your house is in ashes; +your money is burned up; the voyage to Quebec, the visit to the asylum, +the little orphan--how can you give it all up so easily?" + +"Well," he replied, taking the pipe from his mouth, with fingers +curling around the bowl, as if they loved to feel that it was warm once +more--"well, then, it would be more hard, I suppose, to give it up not +easily. And then, for the house, we shall build a new one this fall; the +neighbours will help. And for the voyage to Quebec--without that we +may be happy. And as regards the little orphan, I will tell you +frankly"--here he went back to his seat upon the flat stone, and settled +himself with an air of great comfort beside his partner--"I tell you, in +confidence, Angelique demands that I prepare a particular furniture at +the new house. Yes, it is a cradle; but it is not for an orphan." + + + + +IV + +It was late in the following summer when I came back again to St. +Gerome. The golden-rods and the asters were all in bloom along the +village street; and as I walked down it the broad golden sunlight of +the short afternoon seemed to glorify the open road and the plain square +houses with a careless, homely rapture of peace. The air was softly +fragrant with the odour of balm of Gilead. A yellow warbler sang from +a little clump of elder-bushes, tinkling out his contented song like a +chime of tiny bells, "Sweet--sweet--sweet--sweeter--sweeter--sweetest!" + +There was the new house, a little farther back from the road than the +old one; and in the place where the heap of ashes had lain, a primitive +garden, with marigolds and lupines and zinnias all abloom. And there was +Patrick, sitting on the door-step, smoking his pipe in the cool of the +day. Yes; and there, on a many-coloured counterpane spread beside him, +an infant joy of the house of Mullarkey was sucking her thumb, while her +father was humming the words of an old slumber-song: + + + Sainte Marguerite, + Veillez ma petite! + Endormez ma p'tite enfant + Jusqu'a l'age de quinze ans! + Quand elle aura quinze ans passe + Il faudra la marier + Avec un p'tit bonhomme + Que viendra de Rome. + + +"Hola! Patrick," I cried; "good luck to you! Is it a girl or a boy?" + +"SALUT! m'sieu'," he answered, jumping up and waving his pipe. "It is a +girl AND a boy!" + +Sure enough, as I entered the door, I beheld Angelique rocking the other +half of the reward of virtue in the new cradle. + + + + +III. A BRAVE HEART + +"That was truly his name, m'sieu'--Raoul Vaillantcoeur--a name of the +fine sound, is it not? You like that word,--a valiant heart,--it pleases +you, eh! The man who calls himself by such a name as that ought to be a +brave fellow, a veritable hero? Well, perhaps. But I know an Indian +who is called Le Blanc; that means white. And a white man who is called +Lenoir; that means black. It is very droll, this affair of the names. It +is like the lottery." + +Silence for a few moments, broken only by the ripple of water under the +bow of the canoe, the persistent patter of the rain all around us, +and the SLISH, SLISH of the paddle with which Ferdinand, my Canadian +voyageur, was pushing the birch-bark down the lonely length of Lac +Moise. I knew that there was one of his stories on the way. But I must +keep still to get it. A single ill-advised comment, a word that would +raise a question of morals or social philosophy, might switch the +narrative off the track into a swamp of abstract discourse in which +Ferdinand would lose himself. Presently the voice behind me began again. + +"But that word VAILLANT, m'sieu'; with us in Canada it does not mean +always the same as with you. Sometimes we use it for something that +sounds big, but does little; a gun that goes off with a terrible crack, +but shoots not straight nor far. When a man is like that he is FANFARON, +he shows off well, but--well, you shall judge for yourself, when you +hear what happened between this man Vaillantcoeur and his friend Prosper +Leclere at the building of the stone tower of the church at Abbeville. +You remind yourself of that grand church with the tall tower--yes? With +permission I am going to tell you what passed when that was made. And +you shall decide whether there was truly a brave heart in the story, or +not; and if it went with the name." + +Thus the tale began, in the vast solitude of the northern forest, among +the granite peaks of the ancient Laurentian Mountains, on a lake that +knew no human habitation save the Indian's wigwam or the fisherman's +tent. + +How it rained that day! The dark clouds had collapsed upon the hills in +shapeless folds. The waves of the lake were beaten flat by the lashing +strokes of the storm. Quivering sheets of watery gray were driven before +the wind; and broad curves of silver bullets danced before them as they +swept over the surface. All around the homeless shores the evergreen +trees seemed to hunch their backs and crowd closer together in +patient misery. Not a bird had the heart to sing; only the +loon--storm-lover--laughed his crazy challenge to the elements, and +mocked us with his long-drawn maniac scream. + +It seemed as if we were a thousand miles from everywhere and everybody. +Cities, factories, libraries, colleges, law-courts, theatres, +palaces,--what had we dreamed of these things? They were far off, in +another world. We had slipped back into a primitive life. Ferdinand was +telling me the naked story of human love and human hate, even as it has +been told from the beginning. + +I cannot tell it just as he did. There was a charm in his speech too +quick for the pen: a woodland savour not to be found in any ink for sale +in the shops. I must tell it in my way, as he told it in his. + +But at all events, nothing that makes any difference shall go into the +translation unless it was in the original. This is Ferdinand's story. If +you care for the real thing, here it is. + + + + +I + +There were two young men in Abbeville who were easily the cocks of the +woodland walk. Their standing rested on the fact that they were the +strongest men in the parish. Strength is the thing that counts, when +people live on the edge of the wilderness. These two were well known all +through the country between Lake St. John and Chicoutimi as men of great +capacity. Either of them could shoulder a barrel of flour and walk off +with it as lightly as a common man would carry a side of bacon. There +was not a half-pound of difference between them in ability. But there +was a great difference in their looks and in their way of doing things. + +Raoul Vaillantcoeur was the biggest and the handsomest man in the +village; nearly six feet tall, straight as a fir tree, and black as +a bull-moose in December. He had natural force enough and to spare. +Whatever he did was done by sheer power of back and arm. He could send +a canoe up against the heaviest water, provided he did not get mad and +break his paddle--which he often did. He had more muscle than he knew +how to use. + +Prosper Leclere did not have so much, but he knew better how to handle +it. He never broke his paddle--unless it happened to be a bad one, and +then he generally had another all ready in the canoe. He was at least +four inches shorter than Vaillantcoeur; broad shoulders, long arms, +light hair, gray eyes; not a handsome fellow, but pleasant-looking and +very quiet. What he did was done more than half with his head. + +He was the kind of a man that never needs more than one match to light a +fire. + +But Vaillantcoeur--well, if the wood was wet he might use a dozen, and +when the blaze was kindled, as like as not he would throw in the rest of +the box. + +Now, these two men had been friends and were changed into rivals. At +least that was the way that one of them looked at it. And most of the +people in the parish seemed to think that was the right view. It was a +strange thing, and not altogether satisfactory to the public mind, +to have two strongest men in the village. The question of comparative +standing in the community ought to be raised and settled in the usual +way. Raoul was perfectly willing, and at times (commonly on Saturday +nights) very eager. But Prosper was not. + +"No," he said, one March night, when he was boiling maple-sap in the +sugar-bush with little Ovide Rossignol (who had a lyric passion for +holding the coat while another man was fighting)--"no, for what shall I +fight with Raoul? As boys we have played together. Once, in the rapids +of the Belle Riviere, when I have fallen in the water, I think he has +saved my life. He was stronger, then, than me. I am always a friend to +him. If I beat him now, am I stronger? No, but weaker. And if he beats +me, what is the sense of that? Certainly I shall not like it. What is to +gain?" + +Down in the store of old Girard, that night, Vaillantcoeur was holding +forth after a different fashion. He stood among the cracker-boxes and +flour-barrels, with a background of shelves laden with bright-coloured +calicoes, and a line of tin pails hanging overhead, and stated his view +of the case with vigour. He even pulled off his coat and rolled up his +shirt-sleeve to show the knotty arguments with which he proposed to +clinch his opinion. + +"That Leclere," said he, "that little Prosper Leclere! He thinks himself +one of the strongest--a fine fellow! But I tell you he is a coward. +If he is clever? Yes. But he is a poltroon. He knows well that I can +flatten him out like a crepe in the frying-pan. But he is afraid. He has +not as much courage as the musk-rat. You stamp on the bank. He dives. He +swims away. Bah!" + +"How about that time he cut loose the jam of logs in the Rapide des +Cedres?" said old Girard from his corner. + +Vaillantcoeur's black eyes sparkled and he twirled his mustache +fiercely. "SAPRIE!" he cried, "that was nothing! Any man with an axe can +cut a log. But to fight--that is another affair. That demands the brave +heart. The strong man who will not fight is a coward. Some day I will +put him through the mill--you shall see what that small Leclere is made +of. SACREDAM!" + +Of course, affairs had not come to this pass all at once. It was a long +history, beginning with the time when the two boys had played together, +and Raoul was twice as strong as the other, and was very proud of it. +Prosper did not care; it was all right so long as they had a good time. +But then Prosper began to do things better and better. Raoul did not +understand it; he was jealous. Why should he not always be the leader? +He had more force. Why should Prosper get ahead? Why should he have +better luck at the fishing and the hunting and the farming? It was by +some trick. There was no justice in it. + +Raoul was not afraid of anything but death; and whatever he wanted, he +thought he had a right to have. But he did not know very well how to get +it. He would start to chop a log just at the spot where there was a big +knot. + +He was the kind of a man that sets hare-snares on a caribou-trail, and +then curses his luck because he catches nothing. + +Besides, whatever he did, he was always thinking most about beating +somebody else. But Prosper eared most for doing the thing as well as +he could. If any one else could beat him--well, what difference did it +make? He would do better the next time. + +If he had a log to chop, he looked it all over for a clear place before +he began. What he wanted was, not to make the chips fly, but to get the +wood split. + +You are not to suppose that the one man was a saint and a hero, and +the other a fool and a ruffian. No; that sort of thing happens only in +books. People in Abbeville were not made on that plan. They were both +plain men. But there was a difference in their hearts; and out of that +difference grew all the trouble. + +It was hard on Vaillantcoeur, of course, to see Leclere going ahead, +getting rich, clearing off the mortgage on his farm, laying up money +with the notary Bergeron, who acted as banker for the parish--it was +hard to look on at this, while he himself stood still, or even slipped +back a little, got into debt, had to sell a bit of the land that his +father left him. There must be some cheating about it. + +But this was not the hardest morsel to swallow. The great thing that +stuck in his crop was the idea that the little Prosper, whom he could +have whipped so easily, and whom he had protected so loftily, when they +were boys, now stood just as high as he did as a capable man--perhaps +even higher. Why was it that when the Price Brothers, down at +Chicoutimi, had a good lumber-job up in the woods on the Belle Riviere, +they made Leclere the boss, instead of Vaillantcoeur? Why did the cure +Villeneuve choose Prosper, and not Raoul, to steady the strain of the +biggest pole when they were setting up the derrick for the building of +the new church? + +It was rough, rough! The more Raoul thought of it, the rougher it +seemed. The fact that it was a man who had once been his protege, and +still insisted on being his best friend, did not make it any smoother. +Would you have liked it any better on that account? I am not telling +you how it ought to have been, I am telling you how it was. This isn't +Vaillantcoeur's account-book; it's his story. You must strike your +balances as you go along. + +And all the time, you see, he felt sure that he was a stronger man and a +braver man than Prosper. He was hungry to prove it in the only way that +he could understand. The sense of rivalry grew into a passion of hatred, +and the hatred shaped itself into a blind, headstrong desire to fight. +Everything that Prosper did well, seemed like a challenge; every success +that he had was as hard to bear as an insult. All the more, because +Prosper seemed unconscious of it. He refused to take offence, went about +his work quietly and cheerfully, turned off hard words with a joke, went +out of his way to show himself friendly and good-natured. In reality, of +course, he knew well enough how matters stood. But he was resolved not +to show that he knew, if he could help it; and in any event, not to be +one of the two that are needed to make a quarrel. + +He felt very strangely about it. There was a presentiment in his heart +that he did not dare to shake off. It seemed as if this conflict were +one that would threaten the happiness of his whole life. He still kept +his old feeling of attraction to Raoul, the memory of the many happy +days they had spent together; and though the friendship, of course, +could never again be what it had been, there was something of it left, +at least on Prosper's side. To struggle with this man, strike at his +face, try to maim and disfigure him, roll over and over on the ground +with him, like two dogs tearing each other,--the thought was hateful. +His gorge rose at it. He would never do it, unless to save his life. +Then? Well, then, God must be his judge. + +So it was that these two men stood against each other in Abbeville. Just +as strongly as Raoul was set to get into a fight, just so strongly was +Prosper set to keep out of one. It was a trial of strength between two +passions,--the passion of friendship and the passion of fighting. + +Two or three things happened to put an edge on Raoul's hunger for an +out-and-out fight. + +The first was the affair at the shanty on Lac des Caps. The +wood-choppers, like sailors, have a way of putting a new man through a +few tricks to initiate him into the camp. Leclere was bossing the job, +with a gang of ten men from St. Raymond under him. Vaillantcoeur had +just driven a team in over the snow with a load of provisions, and +was lounging around the camp as if it belonged to him. It was Sunday +afternoon, the regular time for fun, but no one dared to take hold of +him. He looked too big. He expressed his opinion of the camp. + +"No fun in this shanty, HE? I suppose that little Leclere he makes +you others work, and say your prayers, and then, for the rest, you can +sleep. HE! Well, I am going to make a little fun for you, my boys. Come, +Prosper, get your hat, if you are able to climb a tree." + +He snatched the hat from the table by the stove and ran out into the +snow. In front of the shanty a good-sized birch, tall, smooth, very +straight, was still standing. He went up the trunk like a bear. + +But there was a dead balsam that had fallen against the birch and lodged +on the lower branches. It was barely strong enough to bear the weight +of a light man. Up this slanting ladder Prosper ran quickly in his +moccasined feet, snatched the hat from Raoul's teeth as he swarmed up +the trunk, and ran down again. As he neared the ground, the balsam, +shaken from its lodgement, cracked and fell. Raoul was left up the tree, +perched among the branches, out of breath. Luck had set the scene for +the lumberman's favourite trick. + +"Chop him down! chop him down" was the cry; and a trio of axes were +twanging against the birch tree, while the other men shouted and laughed +and pelted the tree with ice to keep the prisoner from climbing down. + +Prosper neither shouted nor chopped, but he grinned a little as he +watched the tree quiver and shake, and heard the rain of "SACRES!" and +"MAUDITS!" that came out of the swaying top. He grinned--until he saw +that a half-dozen more blows would fell the birch right on the roof of +the shanty. + +"Are you crazy?" he cried, as he picked up an axe; "you know nothing how +to chop. You kill a man. You smash the cabane. Let go!" He shoved one of +the boys away and sent a few mighty cuts into the side of the birch that +was farthest from the cabin; then two short cuts on the other side; the +tree shivered, staggered, cracked, and swept in a great arc toward the +deep snow-drift by the brook. As the top swung earthward, Raoul jumped +clear of the crashing branches and landed safely in the feather-bed of +snow, buried up to his neck. Nothing was to be seen of him but his head, +like some new kind of fire-work--sputtering bad words. + +Well, this was the first thing that put an edge on Vaillantcoeur's +hunger to fight. No man likes to be chopped down by his friend, even +if the friend does it for the sake of saving him from being killed by a +fall on the shanty-roof. It is easy to forget that part of it. What you +remember is the grin. + +The second thing that made it worse was the bad chance that both of +these men had to fall in love with the same girl. Of course there were +other girls in the village beside Marie Antoinette Girard--plenty of +them, and good girls, too. But somehow or other, when they were beside +her, neither Raoul nor Prosper cared to look at any of them, but only +at 'Toinette. Her eyes were so much darker and her cheeks so much more +red--bright as the berries of the mountain-ash in September. Her hair +hung down to her waist on Sunday in two long braids, brown and shiny +like a ripe hazelnut; and her voice when she laughed made the sound of +water tumbling over little stones. + +No one knew which of the two lovers she liked best. At school it was +certainly Raoul, because he was bigger and bolder. When she came back +from her year in the convent at Roberval it was certainly Prosper, +because he could talk better and had read more books. He had a volume of +songs full of love and romance, and knew most of them by heart. But +this did not last forever. 'Toinette's manners had been polished at the +convent, but her ideas were still those of her own people. She never +thought that knowledge of books could take the place of strength, in +the real battle of life. She was a brave girl, and she felt sure in her +heart that the man of the most courage must be the best man after all. + +For a while she appeared to persuade herself that it was Prosper, beyond +a doubt, and always took his part when the other girls laughed at him. +But this was not altogether a good sign. When a girl really loves, +she does not talk, she acts. The current of opinion and gossip in +the village was too strong for her. By the time of the affair of the +"chopping-down" at Lac des Caps, her heart was swinging to and fro like +a pendulum. One week she would walk home from mass with Raoul. The next +week she would loiter in the front yard on a Saturday evening and talk +over the gate with Prosper, until her father called her into the shop to +wait on customers. + +It was in one of these talks that the pendulum seemed to make its last +swing and settle down to its resting-place. Prosper was telling her of +the good crops of sugar that he had made from his maple grove. + +"The profit will be large--more than sixty piastres--and with that I +shall buy at Chicoutimi a new four-wheeler, of the finest, a veritable +wedding carriage--if you--if I--'Toinette? Shall we ride together?" + +His left hand clasped hers as it lay on the gate. His right arm stole +over the low picket fence and went around the shoulder that leaned +against the gate-post. The road was quite empty, the night already dark. +He could feel her warm breath on his neck as she laughed. + +"If you! If I! If what? Why so many ifs in this fine speech? Of whom +is the wedding for which this new carriage is to be bought? Do you know +what Raoul Vaillantcoeur has said? 'No more wedding in this parish till +I have thrown the little Prosper over my shoulder!'" + +As she said this, laughing, she turned closer to the fence and looked +up, so that a curl on her forehead brushed against his cheek. + +"BATECHE! Who told you he said that?" + +"I heard him, myself." + +"Where?" + +"In the store, two nights ago. But it was not for the first time. He +said it when we came from the church together, it will be four weeks +to-morrow." + +"What did you say to him?" + +"I told him perhaps he was mistaken. The next wedding might be after the +little Prosper had measured the road with the back of the longest man in +Abbeville." + +The laugh had gone out of her voice now. She was speaking eagerly, and +her bosom rose and fell with quick breaths. But Prosper's right arm +had dropped from her shoulder, and his hand gripped the fence as he +straightened up. + +"'Toinette!" he cried, "that was bravely said. And I could do it. Yes, I +know I could do it. But, MON DIEU, what shall I say? Three years now, he +has pushed me, every one has pushed me, to fight. And you--but I cannot. +I am not capable of it." + +The girl's hand lay in his as cold and still as a stone. She was silent +for a moment, and then asked, coldly, "Why not?" + +"Why not? Because of the old friendship. Because he pulled me out of the +river long ago. Because I am still his friend. Because now he hates +me too much. Because it would be a black fight. Because shame and evil +would come of it, whoever won. That is what I fear, 'Toinette!" + +Her hand slipped suddenly away from his. She stepped back from the gate. + +"TIENS! You have fear, Monsieur Leclere! Truly I had not thought of +that. It is strange. For so strong a man it is a little stupid to be +afraid. Good-night. I hear my father calling me. Perhaps some one in the +store who wants to be served. You must tell me again what you are going +to do with the new carriage. Good-night!" + +She was laughing again. But it was a different laughter. Prosper, at +the gate, did not think it sounded like the running of a brook over +the stones. No, it was more the noise of the dry branches that knock +together in the wind. He did not hear the sigh that came as she shut +the door of the house, nor see how slowly she walked through the passage +into the store. + + + + +II + +There seemed to be a great many rainy Saturdays that spring; and in the +early summer the trade in Girard's store was so brisk that it appeared +to need all the force of the establishment to attend to it. The gate of +the front yard had no more strain put upon its hinges. It fell into +a stiff propriety of opening and shutting, at the touch of people who +understood that a gate was made merely to pass through, not to lean +upon. + +That summer Vaillantcoeur had a new hat--a black and shiny beaver--and a +new red-silk cravat. They looked fine on Corpus Christi day, when he and +'Toinette walked together as fiancee's. + +You would have thought he would have been content with that. Proud, +he certainly was. He stepped like the cure's big rooster with the +topknot--almost as far up in the air as he did along the ground; and he +held his chin high, as if he liked to look at things over his nose. + +But he was not satisfied all the way through. He thought more of beating +Prosper than of getting 'Toinette. And he was not quite sure that he had +beaten him yet. + +Perhaps the girl still liked Prosper a little. Perhaps she still thought +of his romances, and his chansons, and his fine, smooth words, and +missed them. Perhaps she was too silent and dull sometimes, when she +walked with Raoul; and sometimes she laughed too loud when he talked, +more at him than with him. Perhaps those St. Raymond fellows still +remembered the way his head stuck out of that cursed snow-drift, and +joked about it, and said how clever and quick the little Prosper was. +Perhaps--ah, MAUDIT! a thousand times perhaps! And only one way to +settle them, the old way, the sure way, and all the better now because +'Toinette must be on his side. She must understand for sure that the +bravest man in the parish had chosen her. + +That was the summer of the building of the grand stone tower of the +church. The men of Abbeville did it themselves, with their own hands, +for the glory of God. They were keen about that, and the cure was the +keenest of them all. No sharing of that glory with workmen from Quebec, +if you please! Abbeville was only forty years old, but they already +understood the glory of God quite as well there as at Quebec, without +doubt. They could build their own tower, perfectly, and they would. +Besides, it would cost less. + +Vaillantcoeur was the chief carpenter. He attended to the affair of +beams and timbers. Leclere was the chief mason. He directed the affair +of dressing the stones and laying them. That required a very careful +head, you understand, for the tower must be straight. In the floor +a little crookedness did not matter; but in the wall--that might be +serious. People have been killed by a falling tower. Of course, if +they were going into church, they would be sure of heaven. But then +think--what a disgrace for Abbeville! + +Every one was glad that Leclere bossed the raising of the tower. They +admitted that he might not be brave, but he was assuredly careful. +Vaillantcoeur alone grumbled, and said the work went too slowly, and +even swore that the sockets for the beams were too shallow, or else too +deep, it made no difference which. That BETE Prosper made trouble always +by his poor work. But the friction never came to a blaze; for the cure +was pottering about the tower every day and all day long, and a few +words from him would make a quarrel go off in smoke. + +"Softly, my boys!" he would say; "work smooth and you work fast. The +logs in the river run well when they run all the same way. But when two +logs cross each other, on the same rock--psst! a jam! The whole drive is +hung up! Do not run crossways, my children." + +The walls rose steadily, straight as a steamboat pipe--ten, twenty, +thirty, forty feet; it was time to put in the two cross-girders, lay +the floor of the belfry, finish off the stonework, and begin the pointed +wooden spire. The cure had gone to Quebec that very day to buy the +shining plates of tin for the roof, and a beautiful cross of gilt for +the pinnacle. + +Leclere was in front of the tower putting on his overalls. Vaillantcoeur +came up, swearing mad. Three or four other workmen were standing about. + +"Look here, you Leclere," said he, "I tried one of the cross-girders +yesterday afternoon and it wouldn't go. The templet on the north is +crooked--crooked as your teeth. We had to let the girder down again. I +suppose we must trim it off some way, to get a level bearing, and make +the tower weak, just to match your sacre bad work, eh?" + +"Well," said Prosper, pleasant and quiet enough, "I'm sorry for that, +Raoul. Perhaps I could put that templet straight, or perhaps the girder +might be a little warped and twisted, eh? What? Suppose we measure it." + +Sure enough, they found the long timber was not half seasoned and had +corkscrewed itself out of shape at least three inches. Vaillantcoeur sat +on the sill of the doorway and did not even look at them while they were +measuring. When they called out to him what they had found, he strode +over to them. + +"It's a dam' lie," he said, sullenly. "Prosper Leclere, you slipped the +string. None of your sacre cheating! I have enough of it already. Will +you fight, you cursed sneak?" + +Prosper's face went gray, like the mortar in the trough. His fists +clenched and the cords on his neck stood out as if they were ropes. He +breathed hard. But he only said three words: + +"No! Not here." + +"Not here? Why not? There is room. The cure is away. Why not here?" + +"It is the house of LE BON DIEU. Can we build it in hate?" + +"POLISSON! You make an excuse. Then come to Girard's, and fight there." + +Again Prosper held in for a moment, and spoke three words: + +"No! Not now." + +"Not now? But when, you heart of a hare? Will you sneak out of it until +you turn gray and die? When will you fight, little musk-rat?" + +"When I have forgotten. When I am no more your friend." + +Prosper picked up his trowel and went into the tower. Raoul bad-worded +him and every stone of his building from foundation to cornice, and then +went down the road to get a bottle of cognac. + +An hour later he came back breathing out threatenings and slaughter, +strongly flavoured with raw spirits. Prosper was working quietly on the +top of the tower, at the side away from the road. He saw nothing until +Raoul, climbing up by the ladders on the inside, leaped on the platform +and rushed at him like a crazy lynx. + +"Now!" he cried, "no hole to hide in here, rat! I'll squeeze the lies +out of you." + +He gripped Prosper by the head, thrusting one thumb into his eye, and +pushing him backward on the scaffolding. + +Blinded, half maddened by the pain, Prosper thought of nothing but +to get free. He swung his long arm upward and landed a heavy blow on +Raoul's face that dislocated the jaw; then twisting himself downward and +sideways, he fell in toward the wall. Raoul plunged forward, stumbled, +let go his hold, and pitched out from the tower, arms spread, clutching +the air. + +Forty feet straight down! A moment--or was it an eternity?--of horrible +silence. Then the body struck the rough stones at the foot of the tower +with a thick, soft dunt, and lay crumpled up among them, without a +groan, without a movement. + +When the other men, who had hurried up the ladders in terror, found +Leclere, he was peering over the edge of the scaffold, wiping the blood +from his eyes, trying to see down. + +"I have killed him," he muttered, "my friend! He is smashed to death. I +am a murderer. Let me go. I must throw myself down!" + +They had hard work to hold him back. As they forced him down the ladders +he trembled like a poplar. + +But Vaillantcoeur was not dead. No; it was incredible--to fall forty +feet and not be killed--they talk of it yet all through the valley of +the Lake St. John--it was a miracle! But Vaillantcoeur had broken only +a nose, a collar-bone, and two ribs--for one like him that was but a +bagatelle. A good doctor from Chicoutimi, a few months of nursing, and +he would be on his feet again, almost as good a man as he had ever been. + +It was Leclere who put himself in charge of this. + +"It is my affair," he said--"my fault! It was not a fair place to fight. +Why did I strike? I must attend to this bad work." + +"MAIS, SACRE BLEU!" they answered, "how could you help it? He forced +you. You did not want to be killed. That would be a little too much." + +"No," he persisted, "this is my affair. Girard, you know my money is +with the notary. There is plenty. Raoul has not enough, perhaps not any. +But he shall want nothing--you understand--nothing! It is my affair, all +that he needs--but you shall not tell him--no! That is all." + +Prosper had his way. But he did not see Vaillantcoeur after he was +carried home and put to bed in his cabin. Even if he had tried to do so, +it would have been impossible. He could not see anybody. One of his eyes +was entirely destroyed. The inflammation spread to the other, and all +through the autumn he lay in his house, drifting along the edge of +blindness, while Raoul lay in his house slowly getting well. + +The cure went from one house to the other, but he did not carry any +messages between them. If any were sent one way they were not received. +And the other way, none were sent. Raoul did not speak of Prosper; and +if one mentioned his name, Raoul shut his mouth and made no answer. + +To the cure, of course, it was a distress and a misery. To have a hatred +like this unhealed, was a blot on the parish; it was a shame, as well +as a sin. At last--it was already winter, the day before Christmas--the +cure made up his mind that he would put forth one more great effort. + +"Look you, my son," he said to Prosper, "I am going this afternoon to +Raoul Vaillantcoeur to make the reconciliation. You shall give me a word +to carry to him. He shall hear it this time, I promise you. Shall I tell +him what you have done for him, how you have cared for him?" + +"No, never," said Prosper; "you shall not take that word from me. It is +nothing. It will make worse trouble. I will never send it." + +"What then?" said the priest. "Shall I tell him that you forgive him?" + +"No, not that," answered Prosper, "that would be a foolish word. What +would that mean? It is not I who can forgive. I was the one who struck +hardest. It was he that fell from the tower." + +"Well, then, choose the word for yourself. What shall it be? Come, I +promise you that he shall hear it. I will take with me the notary, and +the good man Girard, and the little Marie Antoinette. You shall hear an +answer. What message?" + +"Mon pere," said Prosper, slowly, "you shall tell him just this. I, +Prosper Leclere, ask Raoul Vaillantcoeur that he will forgive me for not +fighting with him on the ground when he demanded it." + +Yes, the message was given in precisely those words. Marie Antoinette +stood within the door, Bergeron and Girard at the foot of the bed, and +the cure spoke very clearly and firmly. Vaillantcoeur rolled on his +pillow and turned his face away. Then he sat up in bed, grunting a +little with the pain in his shoulder, which was badly set. His black +eyes snapped like the eyes of a wolverine in a corner. + +"Forgive?" he said, "no, never. He is a coward. I will never forgive!" + + +A little later in the afternoon, when the rose of sunset lay on the +snowy hills, some one knocked at the door of Leclere's house. + +"ENTREZ!" he cried. "Who is there? I see not very well by this light. +Who is it?" + +"It is me," said 'Toinette, her cheeks rosier than the snow outside, +"nobody but me. I have come to ask you to tell me the rest about that +new carriage--do you remember?" + + + + +III + +The voice in the canoe behind me ceased. The rain let up. The SLISH, +SLISH of the paddle stopped. The canoe swung sideways to the breeze. I +heard the RAP, RAP, RAP of a pipe on the gunwale, and the quick scratch +of a match on the under side of the thwart. + +"What are you doing, Ferdinand?" + +"I go to light the pipe, m'sieu'." + +"Is the story finished?" + +"But yes--but no--I know not, m'sieu'. As you will." + +"But what did old Girard say when his daughter broke her engagement and +married a man whose eyes were spoiled?" + +"He said that Leclere could see well enough to work with him in the +store." + +"And what did Vaillantcoeur say when he lost his girl?" + +"He said it was a cursed shame that one could not fight a blind man." + +"And what did 'Toinette say?" + +"She said she had chosen the bravest heart in Abbeville." + +"And Prosper--what did he say?" + +"M'sieu', I know not. He said it only to 'Toinette." + + + + +IV. THE GENTLE LIFE + +Do you remember that fair little wood of silver birches on the West +Branch of the Neversink, somewhat below the place where the Biscuit +Brook runs in? There is a mossy terrace raised a couple of feet +above the water of a long, still pool; and a very pleasant spot for a +friendship-fire on the shingly beach below you; and a plenty of painted +trilliums and yellow violets and white foam-flowers to adorn your +woodland banquet, if it be spread in the month of May, when Mistress +Nature is given over to embroidery. + +It was there, at Contentment Corner, that Ned Mason had promised to +meet me on a certain day for the noontide lunch and smoke and talk, he +fishing down Biscuit Brook, and I down the West Branch, until we came +together at the rendezvous. But he was late that day--good old Ned! He +was occasionally behind time on a trout stream. For he went about his +fishing very seriously; and if it was fine, the sport was a natural +occasion of delay. But if it was poor, he made it an occasion to sit +down to meditate upon the cause of his failure, and tried to overcome it +with many subtly reasoned changes of the fly--which is a vain thing to +do, but well adapted to make one forgetful of the flight of time. + +So I waited for him near an hour, and then ate my half of the sandwiches +and boiled eggs, smoked a solitary pipe, and fell into a light sleep at +the foot of the biggest birch tree, an old and trusty friend of mine. +It seemed like a very slight sound that roused me: the snapping of a dry +twig in the thicket, or a gentle splash in the water, differing in some +indefinable way from the steady murmur of the stream; something it was, +I knew not what, that made me aware of some one coming down the brook. +I raised myself quietly on one elbow and looked up through the trees to +the head of the pool. "Ned will think that I have gone down long ago," +I said to myself; "I will just lie here and watch him fish through this +pool, and see how he manages to spend so much time about it." + +But it was not Ned's rod that I saw poking out through the bushes at the +bend in the brook. It was such an affair as I had never seen before upon +a trout stream: a majestic weapon at least sixteen feet long, made in +two pieces, neatly spliced together in the middle, and all painted a +smooth, glistening, hopeful green. The line that hung from the tip of it +was also green, but of a paler, more transparent colour, quite thick and +stiff where it left the rod, but tapering down towards the end, as if it +were twisted of strands of horse-hair, reduced in number, until, at +the hook, there were but two hairs. And the hook--there was no disguise +about that--it was an unabashed bait-hook, and well baited, too. Gently +the line swayed to and fro above the foaming water at the head of the +pool; quietly the bait settled down in the foam and ran with the current +around the edge of the deep eddy under the opposite bank; suddenly the +line straightened and tautened; sharply the tip of the long green rod +sprang upward, and the fisherman stepped out from the bushes to play his +fish. + +Where had I seen such a figure before? The dress was strange and +quaint--broad, low shoes, gray woollen stockings, short brown breeches +tied at the knee with ribbons, a loose brown coat belted at the waist +like a Norfolk jacket; a wide, rolling collar with a bit of lace at the +edge, and a soft felt hat with a shady brim. It was a costume that, +with all its oddity, seemed wonderfully fit and familiar. And the +face? Certainly it was the face of an old friend. Never had I seen a +countenance of more quietness and kindliness and twinkling good humour. + +"Well met, sir, and a pleasant day to you," cried the angler, as his +eyes lighted on me. "Look you, I have hold of a good fish; I pray you +put that net under him, and touch not my line, for if you do, then we +break all. Well done, sir; I thank you. Now we have him safely landed. +Truly this is a lovely one; the best that I have taken in these waters. +See how the belly shines, here as yellow as a marsh-marigold, and there +as white as a foam-flower. Is not the hand of Divine Wisdom as skilful +in the colouring of a fish as in the painting of the manifold blossoms +that sweeten these wild forests?" + +"Indeed it is," said I, "and this is the biggest trout that I have seen +caught in the upper waters of the Neversink. It is certainly eighteen +inches long, and should weigh close upon two pounds and a half." + +"More than that," he answered, "if I mistake not. But I observe that you +call it a trout. To my mind, it seems more like a char, as do all the +fish that I have caught in your stream. Look here upon these curious +water-markings that run through the dark green of the back, and these +enamellings of blue and gold upon the side. Note, moreover, how bright +and how many are the red spots, and how each one of them is encircled +with a ring of purple. Truly it is a fish of rare beauty, and of high +esteem with persons of note. I would gladly know if it he as good to the +taste as I have heard it reputed." + +"It is even better," I replied; "as you shall find, if you will but try +it." + +Then a curious impulse came to me, to which I yielded with as little +hesitation or misgiving, at the time, as if it were the most natural +thing in the world. + +"You seem a stranger in this part of the country, sir," said I; "but +unless I am mistaken you are no stranger to me. Did you not use to go +a-fishing in the New River, with honest Nat. and R. Roe, many years ago? +And did they not call you Izaak Walton?" + +His eyes smiled pleasantly at me and a little curve of merriment played +around his lips. "It is a secret which I thought not to have been +discovered here," he said; "but since you have lit upon it, I will not +deny it." + +Now how it came to pass that I was not astonished nor dismayed at this, +I cannot explain. But so it was; and the only feeling of which I +was conscious was a strong desire to detain this visitor as long +as possible, and have some talk with him. So I grasped at the only +expedient that flashed into my mind. + +"Well, then, sir," I said, "you are most heartily welcome, and I trust +you will not despise the only hospitality I have to offer. If you will +sit down here among these birch trees in Contentment Corner, I will give +you half of a fisherman's luncheon, and will cook your char for you on +a board before an open wood-fire, if you are not in a hurry. Though I +belong to a nation which is reported to be curious, I will promise to +trouble you with no inquisitive questions; and if you will but talk to +me at your will, you shall find me a ready listener." + +So we made ourselves comfortable on the shady bank, and while I busied +myself in splitting the fish and pinning it open on a bit of board that +I had found in a pile of driftwood, and setting it up before the fire to +broil, my new companion entertained me with the sweetest and friendliest +talk that I had ever heard. + +"To speak without offence, sir," he began, "there was a word in your +discourse a moment ago that seemed strange to me. You spoke of being 'in +a hurry'; and that is an expression which is unfamiliar to my ears; but +if it mean the same as being in haste, then I must tell you that this +is a thing which, in my judgment, honest anglers should learn to forget, +and have no dealings with it. To be in haste is to be in anxiety and +distress of mind; it is to mistrust Providence, and to doubt that the +issue of all events is in wiser hands than ours; it is to disturb the +course of nature, and put overmuch confidence in the importance of our +own endeavours. + +"For how much of the evil that is in the world cometh from this plaguy +habit of being in haste! The haste to get riches, the haste to +climb upon some pinnacle of worldly renown, the haste to resolve +mysteries--from these various kinds of haste are begotten no small +part of the miseries and afflictions whereby the children of men are +tormented: such as quarrels and strifes among those who would over-reach +one another in business; envyings and jealousies among those who +would outshine one another in rich apparel and costly equipage; bloody +rebellions and cruel wars among those who would obtain power over their +fellow-men; cloudy disputations and bitter controversies among those who +would fain leave no room for modest ignorance and lowly faith among the +secrets of religion; and by all these miseries of haste the heart grows +weary, and is made weak and dull, or else hard and angry, while it +dwelleth in the midst of them. + +"But let me tell you that an angler's occupation is a good cure for +these evils, if for no other reason, because it gently dissuadeth us +from haste and leadeth us away from feverish anxieties into those ways +which are pleasantness and those paths which are peace. For an angler +cannot force his fortune by eagerness, nor better it by discontent. He +must wait upon the weather, and the height of the water, and the hunger +of the fish, and many other accidents of which he has no control. If +he would angle well, he must not be in haste. And if he be in haste, +he will do well to unlearn it by angling, for I think there is no surer +method. + +"This fair tree that shadows us from the sun hath grown many years +in its place without more unhappiness than the loss of its leaves in +winter, which the succeeding season doth generously repair; and shall we +be less contented in the place where God hath planted us? or shall there +go less time to the making of a man than to the growth of a tree? This +stream floweth wimpling and laughing down to the great sea which it +knoweth not; yet it doth not fret because the future is hidden; +and doubtless it were wise in us to accept the mysteries of life as +cheerfully and go forward with a merry heart, considering that we know +enough to make us happy and keep us honest for to-day. A man should be +well content if he can see so far ahead of him as the next bend in the +stream. What lies beyond, let him trust in the hand of God. + +"But as concerning riches, wherein should you and I be happier, this +pleasant afternoon of May, had we all the gold in Croesus his coffers? +Would the sun shine for us more bravely, or the flowers give forth a +sweeter breath, or yonder warbling vireo, hidden in her leafy choir, +send down more pure and musical descants, sweetly attuned by natural +magic to woo and win our thoughts from vanity and hot desires into a +harmony with the tranquil thoughts of God? And as for fame and power, +trust me, sir, I have seen too many men in my time that lived very +unhappily though their names were upon all lips, and died very sadly +though their power was felt in many lands; too many of these great +ones have I seen that spent their days in disquietude and ended them in +sorrow, to make me envy their conditions or hasten to rival them. Nor do +I think that, by all their perturbations and fightings and runnings to +and fro, the world hath been much bettered, or even greatly changed. The +colour and complexion of mortal life, in all things that are essential, +remain the same under Cromwell or under Charles. The goodness and mercy +of God are still over all His works, whether Presbytery or Episcopacy +be set up as His interpreter. Very quietly and peacefully have I lived +under several polities, civil and ecclesiastical, and under all there +was room enough to do my duty and love my friends and go a-fishing. +And let me tell you, sir, that in the state wherein I now find myself, +though there are many things of which I may not speak to you, yet one +thing is clear: if I had made haste in my mortal concerns, I should not +have saved time, but lost it; for all our affairs are under one sure +dominion which moveth them forward to their concordant end: wherefore +'HE THAT BELIEVETH SHALL NOT MAKE HASTE,' and, above all, not when he +goeth a-angling. + +"But tell me, I pray you, is not this char cooked yet? Methinks the time +is somewhat overlong for the roasting. The fragrant smell of the cookery +gives me an eagerness to taste this new dish. Not that I am in haste, +but-- + +"Well, it is done; and well done, too! Marry, the flesh of this fish is +as red as rose-leaves, and as sweet as if he had fed on nothing else. +The flavour of smoke from the fire is but slight, and it takes nothing +from the perfection of the dish, but rather adds to it, being clean and +delicate. I like not these French cooks who make all dishes in disguise, +and set them forth with strange foreign savours, like a masquerade. Give +me my food in its native dress, even though it be a little dry. If we +had but a cup of sack, now, or a glass of good ale, and a pipeful of +tobacco? + +"What! you have an abundance of the fragrant weed in your pouch? Sir, I +thank you very heartily! You entertain me like a prince. Not like King +James, be it understood, who despised tobacco and called it a 'lively +image and pattern of hell'; nor like the Czar of Russia who commanded +that all who used it should have their noses cut off; but like good +Queen Bess of glorious memory, who disdained not the incense of the +pipe, and some say she used one herself; though for my part I think the +custom of smoking one that is more fitting for men, whose frailty and +need of comfort are well known, than for that fairer sex whose innocent +and virgin spirits stand less in want of creature consolations. + +"But come, let us not trouble our enjoyment with careful discrimination +of others' scruples. Your tobacco is rarely good; I'll warrant it comes +from that province of Virginia which was named for the Virgin Queen; and +while we smoke together, let me call you, for this hour, my Scholar; +and so I will give you four choice rules for the attainment of that +unhastened quietude of mind whereof we did lately discourse. + +"First: you shall learn to desire nothing in the world so much but that +you can be happy without it. + +"Second: you shall seek that which you desire only by such means as are +fair and lawful, and this will leave you without bitterness towards men +or shame before God. + +"Third: you shall take pleasure in the time while you are seeking, even +though you obtain not immediately that which you seek; for the purpose +of a journey is not only to arrive at the goal, but also to find +enjoyment by the way. + +"Fourth: when you attain that which you have desired, you shall think +more of the kindness of your fortune than of the greatness of your +skill. This will make you grateful, and ready to share with others +that which Providence hath bestowed upon you; and truly this is both +reasonable and profitable, for it is but little that any of us would +catch in this world were not our luck better than our deserts. + +"And to these Four Rules I will add yet another--Fifth: when you smoke +your pipe with a good conscience, trouble not yourself because there are +men in the world who will find fault with you for so doing. If you wait +for a pleasure at which no sour-complexioned soul hath ever girded, you +will wait long, and go through life with a sad and anxious mind. But +I think that God is best pleased with us when we give little heed to +scoffers, and enjoy His gifts with thankfulness and an easy heart. + +"Well, Scholar, I have almost tired myself, and, I fear, more than +almost tired you. But this pipe is nearly burned out, and the few short +whiffs that are left in it shall put a period to my too long discourse. +Let me tell you, then, that there be some men in the world who hold not +with these my opinions. They profess that a life of contention and +noise and public turmoil, is far higher than a life of quiet work and +meditation. And so far as they follow their own choice honestly and with +a pure mind, I doubt not that it is as good for them as mine is for me, +and I am well pleased that every man do enjoy his own opinion. But so +far as they have spoken ill of me and my opinions, I do hold it a thing +of little consequence, except that I am sorry that they have thereby +embittered their own hearts. + +"For this is the punishment of men who malign and revile those that +differ from them in religion, or prefer another way of living; their +revilings, by so much as they spend their wit and labour to make them +shrewd and bitter, do draw all the sweet and wholesome sap out of their +lives and turn it into poison; and so they become vessels of mockery and +wrath, remembered chiefly for the evil things that they have said with +cleverness. + +"For be sure of this, Scholar, the more a man giveth himself to hatred +in this world, the more will he find to hate. But let us rather give +ourselves to charity, and if we have enemies (and what honest man hath +them not?) let them be ours, since they must, but let us not be theirs, +since we know better. + +"There was one Franck, a trooper of Cromwell's, who wrote ill of me, +saying that I neither understood the subjects whereof I discoursed nor +believed the things that I said, being both silly and pretentious. It +would have been a pity if it had been true. There was also one Leigh +Hunt, a maker of many books, who used one day a bottle of ink whereof +the gall was transfused into his blood, so that he wrote many hard words +of me, setting forth selfishness and cruelty and hypocrisy as if they +were qualities of my disposition. God knew, even then, whether these +things were true of me; and if they were not true, it would have been a +pity to have answered them; but it would have been still more a pity to +be angered by them. But since that time Master Hunt and I have met each +other; yes, and Master Franck, too; and we have come very happily to a +better understanding. + +"Trust me, Scholar, it is the part of wisdom to spend little of your +time upon the things that vex and anger you, and much of your time upon +the things that bring you quietness and confidence and good cheer. A +friend made is better than an enemy punished. There is more of God in +the peaceable beauty of this little wood-violet than in all the angry +disputations of the sects. We are nearer heaven when we listen to the +birds than when we quarrel with our fellow-men. I am sure that none can +enter into the spirit of Christ, his evangel, save those who willingly +follow his invitation when he says, 'COME YE YOURSELVES APART INTO A +LONELY PLACE, AND REST A WHILE.' For since his blessed kingdom was first +established in the green fields, by the lakeside, with humble fishermen +for its subjects, the easiest way into it hath ever been through the +wicket-gate of a lowly and grateful fellowship with nature. He that +feels not the beauty and blessedness and peace of the woods and meadows +that God hath bedecked with flowers for him even while he is yet a +sinner, how shall he learn to enjoy the unfading bloom of the celestial +country if he ever become a saint? + +"No, no, sir, he that departeth out of this world without perceiving +that it is fair and full of innocent sweetness hath done little honour +to the every-day miracles of divine beneficence; and though by mercy he +may obtain an entrance to heaven, it will be a strange place to him; and +though he have studied all that is written in men's books of divinity, +yet because he hath left the book of Nature unturned, he will have +much to learn and much to forget. Do you think that to be blind to the +beauties of earth prepareth the heart to behold the glories of heaven? +Nay, Scholar, I know that you are not of that opinion. But I can tell +you another thing which perhaps you knew not. The heart that is blest +with the glories of heaven ceaseth not to remember and to love the +beauties of this world. And of this love I am certain, because I feel +it, and glad because it is a great blessing. + +"There are two sorts of seeds sown in our remembrance by what we call +the hand of fortune, the fruits of which do not wither, but grow sweeter +forever and ever. The first is the seed of innocent pleasures, received +in gratitude and enjoyed with good companions, of which pleasures we +never grow weary of thinking, because they have enriched our hearts. The +second is the seed of pure and gentle sorrows, borne in submission +and with faithful love, and these also we never forget, but we come to +cherish them with gladness instead of grief, because we see them changed +into everlasting joys. And how this may be I cannot tell you now, for +you would not understand me. But that it is so, believe me: for if you +believe, you shall one day see it yourself. + +"But come, now, our friendly pipes are long since burned out. Hark, how +sweetly the tawny thrush in yonder thicket touches her silver harp for +the evening hymn! I will follow the stream downward, but do you tarry +here until the friend comes for whom you were waiting. I think we shall +all three meet one another, somewhere, after sunset." + +I watched the gray hat and the old brown coat and long green rod +disappear among the trees around the curve of the stream. Then Ned's +voice sounded in my ears, and I saw him standing above me laughing. + +"Hallo, old man," he said, "you're a sound sleeper! I hope you've had +good luck, and pleasant dreams." + + + + +V. A FRIEND OF JUSTICE + + + + +I + +It was the black patch over his left eye that made all the trouble. In +reality he was of a disposition most peaceful and propitiating, a friend +of justice and fair dealing, strongly inclined to a domestic life, and +capable of extreme devotion. He had a vivid sense of righteousness, it +is true, and any violation of it was apt to heat his indignation to the +boiling-point. When this occurred he was strong in the back, stiff +in the neck, and fearless of consequences. But he was always open to +friendly overtures and ready to make peace with honour. + +Singularly responsive to every touch of kindness, desirous of affection, +secretly hungry for caresses, he had a heart framed for love and +tranquillity. But nature saw fit to put a black patch over his left eye; +wherefore his days were passed in the midst of conflict and he lived the +strenuous life. + +How this sinister mark came to him, he never knew. Indeed it is not +likely that he had any idea of the part that it played in his career. +The attitude that the world took toward him from the beginning, an +attitude of aggressive mistrust,--the role that he was expected and +practically forced to assume in the drama of existence, the role of +a hero of interminable strife,--must have seemed to him altogether +mysterious and somewhat absurd. But his part was fixed by the black +patch. It gave him an aspect so truculent and forbidding that all +the elements of warfare gathered around him as hornets around a sugar +barrel, and his appearance in public was like the raising of a flag for +battle. + +"You see that Pichou," said MacIntosh, the Hudson's Bay agent at Mingan, +"you see yon big black-eye deevil? The savages call him Pichou because +he's ugly as a lynx--'LAID COMME UN PICHOU.' Best sledge-dog and the +gurliest tyke on the North Shore. Only two years old and he can lead +a team already. But, man, he's just daft for the fighting. Fought his +mother when he was a pup and lamed her for life. Fought two of his +brothers and nigh killed 'em both. Every dog in the place has a grudge +at him, and hell's loose as oft as he takes a walk. I'm loath to part +with him, but I'll be selling him gladly for fifty dollars to any man +that wants a good sledge-dog, eh?--and a bit collie-shangie every week." + +Pichou had heard his name, and came trotting up to the corner of the +store where MacIntosh was talking with old Grant the chief factor, who +was on a tour of inspection along the North Shore, and Dan Scott, +the agent from Seven Islands, who had brought the chief down in his +chaloupe. Pichou did not understand what his master had been saying +about him: but he thought he was called, and he had a sense of duty; +and besides, he was wishful to show proper courtesy to well-dressed and +respectable strangers. He was a great dog, thirty inches high at the +shoulder; broad-chested, with straight, sinewy legs; and covered with +thick, wavy, cream-coloured hair from the tips of his short ears to the +end of his bushy tail--all except the left side of his face. That +was black from ear to nose--coal-black; and in the centre of this +storm-cloud his eye gleamed like fire. + +What did Pichou know about that ominous sign? No one had ever told +him. He had no looking-glass. He ran up to the porch where the men +were sitting, as innocent as a Sunday-school scholar coming to the +superintendent's desk to receive a prize. But when old Grant, who had +grown pursy and nervous from long living on the fat of the land at +Ottawa, saw the black patch and the gleaming eye, he anticipated evil; +so he hitched one foot up on the porch, crying "Get out!" and with the +other foot he planted a kick on the side of the dog's head. + +Pichou's nerve-centres had not been shaken by high living. They acted +with absolute precision and without a tremor. His sense of justice +was automatic, and his teeth were fixed through the leg of the chief +factor's boot, just below the calf. + +For two minutes there was a small chaos in the post of the Honourable +Hudson's Bay Company at Mingan. Grant howled bloody murder; MacIntosh +swore in three languages and yelled for his dog-whip; three Indians and +two French-Canadians wielded sticks and fence-pickets. But order did not +arrive until Dan Scott knocked the burning embers from his big pipe on +the end of the dog's nose. Pichou gasped, let go his grip, shook +his head, and loped back to his quarters behind the barn, bruised, +blistered, and intolerably perplexed by the mystery of life. + +As he lay on the sand, licking his wounds, he remembered many strange +things. First of all, there was the trouble with his mother. + +She was a Labrador Husky, dirty yellowish gray, with bristling neck, +sharp fangs, and green eyes, like a wolf. Her name was Babette. She had +a fiendish temper, but no courage. His father was supposed to be a huge +black and white Newfoundland that came over in a schooner from Miquelon. +Perhaps it was from him that the black patch was inherited. And perhaps +there were other things in the inheritance, too, which came from this +nobler strain of blood Pichon's unwillingness to howl with the other +dogs when they made night hideous; his silent, dignified ways; his sense +of fair play; his love of the water; his longing for human society and +friendship. + +But all this was beyond Pichou's horizon, though it was within his +nature. He remembered only that Babette had taken a hate for him, almost +from the first, and had always treated him worse than his all-yellow +brothers. She would have starved him if she could. Once when he was half +grown, she fell upon him for some small offence and tried to throttle +him. The rest of the pack looked on snarling and slavering. He caught +Babette by the fore-leg and broke the bone. She hobbled away, shrieking. +What else could he do? Must a dog let himself be killed by his mother? + +As for his brothers--was it fair that two of them should fall foul of +him about the rabbit which he had tracked and caught and killed? He +would have shared it with them, if they had asked him, for they ran +behind him on the trail. But when they both set their teeth in his +neck, there was nothing to do but to lay them both out: which he did. +Afterward he was willing enough to make friends, but they bristled and +cursed whenever he came near them. + +It was the same with everybody. If he went out for a walk on the beach, +Vigneau's dogs or Simard's dogs regarded it as an insult, and there +was a fight. Men picked up sticks, or showed him the butt-end of their +dog-whips, when he made friendly approaches. With the children it was +different; they seemed to like him a little; but never did he follow one +of them that a mother did not call from the house-door: "Pierre! Marie! +come away quick! That bad dog will bite you!" Once when he ran down to +the shore to watch the boat coming in from the mail-steamer, the +purser had refused to let the boat go to land, and called out, "M'sieu' +MacIntosh, you git no malle dis trip, eef you not call avay dat dam' +dog." + +True, the Minganites seemed to take a certain kind of pride in his +reputation. They had brought Chouart's big brown dog, Gripette, down +from the Sheldrake to meet him; and after the meeting was over and +Gripette had been revived with a bucket of water, everybody, except +Chouart, appeared to be in good humour. The purser of the steamer had +gone to the trouble of introducing a famous BOULE-DOGGE from Quebec, +on the trip after that on which he had given such a hostile opinion of +Pichon. The bulldog's intentions were unmistakable; he expressed them +the moment he touched the beach; and when they carried him back to the +boat on a fish-barrow many flattering words were spoken about Pichou. He +was not insensible to them. But these tributes to his prowess were not +what he really wanted. His secret desire was for tokens of affection. +His position was honourable, but it was intolerably lonely and full of +trouble. He sought peace and he found fights. + +While he meditated dimly on these things, patiently trying to get the +ashes of Dan Scott's pipe out of his nose, his heart was cast down +and his spirit was disquieted within him. Was ever a decent dog so +mishandled before? Kicked for nothing by a fat stranger, and then beaten +by his own master! + +In the dining-room of the Post, Grant was slowly and reluctantly +allowing himself to be convinced that his injuries were not fatal. +During this process considerable Scotch whiskey was consumed and there +was much conversation about the viciousness of dogs. Grant insisted that +Pichou was mad and had a devil. MacIntosh admitted the devil, but firmly +denied the madness. The question was, whether the dog should be killed +or not; and over this point there was like to be more bloodshed, until +Dan Scott made his contribution to the argument: "If you shoot him, how +can you tell whether he is mad or not? I'll give thirty dollars for him +and take him home." + +"If you do," said Grant, "you'll sail alone, and I'll wait for the +steamer. Never a step will I go in the boat with the crazy brute that +bit me." + +"Suit yourself," said Dan Scott. "You kicked before he bit." + +At daybreak he whistled the dog down to the chaloupe, hoisted sail, and +bore away for Seven Islands. There was a secret bond of sympathy between +the two companions on that hundred-mile voyage in an open boat. Neither +of them realized what it was, but still it was there. + +Dan Scott knew what it meant to stand alone, to face a small hostile +world, to have a surfeit of fighting. The station of Seven Islands +was the hardest in all the district of the ancient POSTES DU ROI. +The Indians were surly and crafty. They knew all the tricks of the +fur-trade. They killed out of season, and understood how to make a +rusty pelt look black. The former agent had accommodated himself to his +customers. He had no objection to shutting one of his eyes, so long as +the other could see a chance of doing a stroke of business for himself. +He also had a convenient weakness in the sense of smell, when there was +an old stock of pork to work off on the savages. But all of Dan Scott's +senses were strong, especially his sense of justice, and he came into +the Post resolved to play a straight game with both hands, toward the +Indians and toward the Honourable H. B. Company. The immediate results +were reproofs from Ottawa and revilings from Seven Islands. Furthermore +the free traders were against him because he objected to their selling +rum to the savages. + +It must be confessed that Dan Scott had a way with him that looked +pugnacious. He was quick in his motions and carried his shoulders well +thrown back. His voice was heavy. He used short words and few of them. +His eyebrow's were thick and they met over his nose. Then there was +a broad white scar at one corner of his mouth. His appearance was +not prepossessing, but at heart he was a philanthropist and a +sentimentalist. He thirsted for gratitude and affection on a just basis. +He had studied for eighteen months in the medical school at Montreal, +and his chief delight was to practise gratuitously among the sick and +wounded of the neighbourhood. His ambition for Seven Islands was to +make it a northern suburb of Paradise, and for himself to become a +full-fledged physician. Up to this time it seemed as if he would have to +break more bones than he could set; and the closest connection of Seven +Islands appeared to be with Purgatory. + +First, there had been a question of suzerainty between Dan Scott and the +local representative of the Astor family, a big half-breed descendant +of a fur-trader, who was the virtual chief of the Indians hunting on +the Ste. Marguerite: settled by knock-down arguments. Then there was a +controversy with Napoleon Bouchard about the right to put a fish-house +on a certain part of the beach: settled with a stick, after Napoleon had +drawn a knife. Then there was a running warfare with Virgile and Ovide +Boulianne, the free traders, who were his rivals in dealing with the +Indians for their peltry: still unsettled. After this fashion the record +of his relations with his fellow-citizens at Seven Islands was made +up. He had their respect, but not their affection. He was the only +Protestant, the only English-speaker, the most intelligent man, as well +as the hardest hitter in the place, and he was very lonely. Perhaps it +was this that made him take a fancy to Pichou. Their positions in the +world were not unlike. He was not the first man who has wanted sympathy +and found it in a dog. + +Alone together, in the same boat, they made friends with each other +easily. At first the remembrance of the hot pipe left a little suspicion +in Pichou's mind; but this was removed by a handsome apology in the +shape of a chunk of bread and a slice of meat from Dan Scott's lunch. +After this they got on together finely. It was the first time in his +life that Pichou had ever spent twenty-four hours away from other dogs; +it was also the first time he had ever been treated like a gentleman. +All that was best in him responded to the treatment. He could not have +been more quiet and steady in the boat if he had been brought up to a +seafaring life. When Dan Scott called him and patted him on the head, +the dog looked up in the man's face as if he had found his God. And +the man, looking down into the eye that was not disfigured by the black +patch, saw something that he had been seeking for a long time. + +All day the wind was fair and strong from the southeast. The chaloupe +ran swiftly along the coast past the broad mouth of the River +Saint-Jean, with its cluster of white cottages past the hill-encircled +bay of the River Magpie, with its big fish-houses past the fire-swept +cliffs of Riviere-au-Tonnerre, and the turbulent, rocky shores of the +Sheldrake: past the silver cascade of the Riviere-aux-Graines, and the +mist of the hidden fall of the Riviere Manitou: past the long, desolate +ridges of Cap Cormorant, where, at sunset, the wind began to droop away, +and the tide was contrary So the chaloupe felt its way cautiously toward +the corner of the coast where the little Riviere-a-la-Truite comes +tumbling in among the brown rocks, and found a haven for the night in +the mouth of the river. + +There was only one human dwelling-place in sight As far as the eye +could sweep, range after range of uninhabitable hills covered with the +skeletons of dead forests; ledge after ledge of ice-worn granite thrust +out like fangs into the foaming waves of the gulf. Nature, with her +teeth bare and her lips scarred: this was the landscape. And in the +midst of it, on a low hill above the murmuring river, surrounded by the +blanched trunks of fallen trees, and the blackened debris of wood and +moss, a small, square, weather-beaten palisade of rough-hewn spruce, and +a patch of the bright green leaves and white flowers of the dwarf cornel +lavishing their beauty on a lonely grave. This was the only habitation +in sight--the last home of the Englishman, Jack Chisholm, whose story +has yet to be told. + +In the shelter of this hill Dan Scott cooked his supper and shared it +with Pichou. When night was dark he rolled himself in his blanket, +and slept in the stern of the boat, with the dog at his side. Their +friendship was sealed. + +The next morning the weather was squally and full of sudden anger. They +crept out with difficulty through the long rollers that barred the tiny +harbour, and beat their way along the coast. At Moisie they must run far +out into the gulf to avoid the treacherous shoals, and to pass beyond +the furious race of white-capped billows that poured from the great +river for miles into the sea. Then they turned and made for the group of +half-submerged mountains and scattered rocks that Nature, in some freak +of fury, had thrown into the throat of Seven Islands Bay. That was a +difficult passage. The black shores were swept by headlong tides. Tusks +of granite tore the waves. Baffled and perplexed, the wind flapped and +whirled among the cliffs. Through all this the little boat buffeted +bravely on till she reached the point of the Gran Boule. Then a strange +thing happened. + +The water was lumpy; the evening was growing thick; a swirl of the +tide and a shift of the wind caught the chaloupe and swung her suddenly +around. The mainsail jibed, and before he knew how it happened Dan Scott +was overboard. He could swim but clumsily. The water blinded him, choked +him, dragged him down. Then he felt Pichou gripping him by the shoulder, +buoying him up, swimming mightily toward the chaloupe which hung +trembling in the wind a few yards away. At last they reached it and the +man climbed over the stern and pulled the dog after him. Dan Scott lay +in the bottom of the boat, shivering, dazed, until he felt the dog's +cold nose and warm breath against his cheek. He flung his arm around +Pichon's neck. + +"They said you were mad! God, if more men were mad like you!" + + + + +II + + +Pichou's work at Seven Islands was cut out for him on a generous scale. +It is true that at first he had no regular canine labour to perform, +for it was summer. Seven months of the year, on the North Shore, a +sledge-dog's occupation is gone. He is the idlest creature in the +universe. + +But Pichou, being a new-comer, had to win his footing in the community; +and that was no light task. With the humans it was comparatively easy. +At the outset they mistrusted him on account of his looks. Virgile +Boulianne asked: "Why did you buy such an ugly dog?" Ovide, who was +the wit of the family, said: "I suppose M'sieu' Scott got a present for +taking him." + +"It's a good dog," said Dan Scott. "Treat him well and he'll treat you +well. Kick him and I kick you." + +Then he told what had happened off the point of Gran' Boule. The +village decided to accept Pichou at his master's valuation. Moderate +friendliness, with precautions, was shown toward him by everybody, +except Napoleon Bouchard, whose distrust was permanent and took the +form of a stick. He was a fat, fussy man; fat people seemed to have no +affinity for Pichou. + +But while the relations with the humans of Seven Islands were soon +established on a fair footing, with the canines Pichou had a very +different affair. They were not willing to accept any recommendations +as to character. They judged for themselves; and they judged by +appearances; and their judgment was utterly hostile to Pichou. + +They decided that he was a proud dog, a fierce dog, a bad dog, a +fighter. He must do one of two things: stay at home in the yard of the +Honourable H. B. Company, which is a thing that no self-respecting dog +would do in the summer-time, when cod-fish heads are strewn along the +beach; or fight his way from one end of the village to the other, which +Pichou promptly did, leaving enemies behind every fence. Huskies never +forget a grudge. They are malignant to the core. Hatred is the wine of +cowardly hearts. This is as true of dogs as it is of men. + +Then Pichou, having settled his foreign relations, turned his attention +to matters at home. There were four other dogs in Dan Scott's team. They +did not want Pichou for a leader, and he knew it. They were bitter +with jealousy. The black patch was loathsome to them. They treated +him disrespectfully, insultingly, grossly. Affairs came to a head +when Pecan, a rusty gray dog who had great ambitions and little sense, +disputed Pichou's tenure of a certain ham-bone. Dan Scott looked on +placidly while the dispute was terminated. Then he washed the blood and +sand from the gashes on Pecan's shoulder, and patted Pichou on the head. + +"Good dog," he said. "You're the boss." + +There was no further question about Pichou's leadership of the team. But +the obedience of his followers was unwilling and sullen. There was no +love in it. Imagine an English captain, with a Boer company, campaigning +in the Ashantee country, and you will have a fair idea of Pichou's +position at Seven Islands. + +He did not shrink from its responsibilities. There were certain reforms +in the community which seemed to him of vital importance, and he put +them through. + +First of all, he made up his mind that there ought to be peace and order +on the village street. In the yards of the houses that were strung along +it there should be home rule, and every dog should deal with trespassers +as he saw fit. Also on the beach, and around the fish-shanties, and +under the racks where the cod were drying, the right of the strong jaw +should prevail, and differences of opinion should be adjusted in +the old-fashioned way. But on the sandy road, bordered with a broken +board-walk, which ran between the houses and the beach, courtesy and +propriety must be observed. Visitors walked there. Children played +there. It was the general promenade. It must be kept peaceful and +decent. This was the First Law of the Dogs of Seven Islands. If two dogs +quarrel on the street they must go elsewhere to settle it. It was highly +unpopular, but Pichou enforced it with his teeth. + +The Second Law was equally unpopular: No stealing from the Honourable H. +B. Company. If a man bought bacon or corned-beef or any other delicacy, +and stored it an insecure place, or if he left fish on the beach over +night, his dogs might act according to their inclination. Though Pichou +did not understand how honest dogs could steal from their own master, +he was willing to admit that this was their affair. His affair was +that nobody should steal anything from the Post. It cost him many night +watches, and some large battles to carry it out, but he did it. In the +course of time it came to pass that the other dogs kept away from the +Post altogether, to avoid temptations; and his own team spent most of +their free time wandering about to escape discipline. + +The Third Law was this. Strange dogs must be decently treated as long +as they behave decently. This was contrary to all tradition, but +Pichou insisted upon it. If a strange dog wanted to fight he should be +accommodated with an antagonist of his own size. If he did not want to +fight he should be politely smelled and allowed to pass through. + +This Law originated on a day when a miserable, long-legged, black cur, +a cross between a greyhound and a water-spaniel, strayed into Seven +Islands from heaven knows where--weary, desolate, and bedraggled. All +the dogs in the place attacked the homeless beggar. There was a howling +fracas on the beach; and when Pichou arrived, the trembling cur was +standing up to the neck in the water, facing a semicircle of snarling, +snapping bullies who dared not venture out any farther. Pichou had no +fear of the water. He swam out to the stranger, paid the smelling +salute as well as possible under the circumstances, encouraged the poor +creature to come ashore, warned off the other dogs, and trotted by the +wanderer's side for miles down the beach until they disappeared around +the point. What reward Pichou got for this polite escort, I do not know. +But I saw him do the gallant deed; and I suppose this was the origin +of the well-known and much-resisted Law of Strangers' Rights in Seven +Islands. + +The most recalcitrant subjects with whom Pichou had to deal in all these +matters were the team of Ovide Boulianne. There were five of them, and +up to this time they had been the best team in the village. They had one +virtue: under the whip they could whirl a sledge over the snow farther +and faster than a horse could trot in a day. But they had innumerable +vices. Their leader, Carcajou, had a fleece like a merino ram. But under +this coat of innocence he carried a heart so black that he would bite +while he was wagging his tail. This smooth devil, and his four followers +like unto himself, had sworn relentless hatred to Pichou, and they made +his life difficult. + +But his great and sufficient consolation for all toils and troubles was +the friendship with his master. In the long summer evenings, when Dan +Scott was making up his accounts in the store, or studying his pocket +cyclopaedia of medicine in the living-room of the Post, with its +low beams and mysterious green-painted cupboards, Pichou would lie +contentedly at his feet. In the frosty autumnal mornings, when the brant +were flocking in the marshes at the head of the bay, they would go out +hunting together in a skiff. And who could lie so still as Pichou when +the game was approaching? Or who could spring so quickly and joyously to +retrieve a wounded bird? But best of all were the long walks on Sunday +afternoons, on the yellow beach that stretched away toward the Moisie, +or through the fir-forest behind the Pointe des Chasseurs. Then master +and dog had fellowship together in silence. To the dumb companion it was +like walking with his God in the garden in the cool of the day. + +When winter came, and snow fell, and waters froze, Pichou's serious +duties began. The long, slim COMETIQUE, with its curving prow, and its +runners of whalebone, was put in order. The harness of caribou-hide +was repaired and strengthened. The dogs, even the most vicious of them, +rejoiced at the prospect of doing the one thing that they could do best. +Each one strained at his trace as if he would drag the sledge alone. +Then the long tandem was straightened out, Dan Scott took his place +on the low seat, cracked his whip, shouted "POUITTE! POUITTE!" and the +equipage darted along the snowy track like a fifty-foot arrow. + +Pichou was in the lead, and he showed his metal from the start. No need +of the terrible FOUET to lash him forward or to guide his course. A +word was enough. "Hoc! Hoc! Hoc!" and he swung to the right, avoiding an +air-hole. "Re-re! Re-re!" and he veered to the left, dodging a heap of +broken ice. Past the mouth of the Ste. Marguerite, twelve miles; +past Les Jambons, twelve miles more; past the River of Rocks and La +Pentecote, fifteen miles more; into the little hamlet of Dead Men's +Point, behind the Isle of the Wise Virgin, whither the amateur doctor +had been summoned by telegraph to attend a patient with a broken +arm--forty-three miles for the first day's run! Not bad. Then the dogs +got their food for the day, one dried fish apiece; and at noon the next +day, reckless of bleeding feet, they flew back over the same track, and +broke their fast at Seven Islands before eight o'clock. The ration was +the same, a single fish; always the same, except when it was varied by +a cube of ancient, evil-smelling, potent whale's flesh, which a dog can +swallow at a single gulp. Yet the dogs of the North Shore are never +so full of vigour, courage, and joy of life as when the sledges are +running. It is in summer, when food is plenty and work slack, that they +sicken and die. + +Pichou's leadership of his team became famous. Under his discipline +the other dogs developed speed and steadiness. One day they made the +distance to the Godbout in a single journey, a wonderful run of over +eighty miles. But they loved their leader no better, though they +followed him faster. And as for the other teams, especially Carcajou's, +they were still firm in their deadly hatred for the dog with the black +patch. + + + + +III + +It was in the second winter after Pichou's coming to Seven Islands +that the great trial of his courage arrived. Late in February an Indian +runner on snowshoes staggered into the village. He brought news from the +hunting-parties that were wintering far up on the Ste. Marguerite--good +news and bad. First, they had already made a good hunting: for the +pelletrie, that is to say. They had killed many otter, some fisher and +beaver, and four silver foxes--a marvel of fortune. But then, for the +food, the chase was bad, very bad--no caribou, no hare, no ptarmigan, +nothing for many days. Provisions were very low. There were six families +together. Then la grippe had taken hold of them. They were sick, +starving. They would probably die, at least most of the women and +children. It was a bad job. + +Dan Scott had peculiar ideas of his duty toward the savages. He was +not romantic, but he liked to do the square thing. Besides, he had been +reading up on la grippe, and he had some new medicine for it, capsules +from Montreal, very powerful--quinine, phenacetine, and morphine. He was +as eager to try this new medicine as a boy is to fire off a new gun. +He loaded the Cometique with provisions and the medicine-chest with +capsules, harnessed his team, and started up the river. Thermometer +thirty degrees below zero; air like crystal; snow six feet deep on the +level. + +The first day's journey was slow, for the going was soft, and the track, +at places, had to be broken out with snow-shoes. Camp was made at the +foot of the big fall--a hole in snow, a bed of boughs, a hot fire and a +blanket stretched on a couple of sticks to reflect the heat, the dogs on +the other side of the fire, and Pichou close to his master. + +In the morning there was the steep hill beside the fall to climb, +alternately soft and slippery, now a slope of glass and now a +treacherous drift of yielding feathers; it was a road set on end. But +Pichou flattened his back and strained his loins and dug his toes into +the snow and would not give back an inch. When the rest of the team +balked the long whip slashed across their backs and recalled them +to their duty. At last their leader topped the ridge, and the others +struggled after him. Before them stretched the great dead-water of the +river, a straight white path to No-man's-land. The snow was smooth and +level, and the crust was hard enough to bear. Pichou settled down to his +work at a glorious pace. He seemed to know that he must do his best, +and that something important depended on the quickness of his legs. On +through the glittering solitude, on through the death-like silence, sped +the COMETIQUE, between the interminable walls of the forest, past the +mouths of nameless rivers, under the shadow of grim mountains. At noon +Dan Scott boiled the kettle, and ate his bread and bacon. But there was +nothing for the dogs, not even for Pichou; for discipline is discipline, +and the best of sledge-dogs will not run well after he has been fed. + +Then forward again, along the lifeless road, slowly over rapids, where +the ice was rough and broken, swiftly over still waters, where the way +was level, until they came to the foot of the last lake, and camped for +the night. The Indians were but a few miles away, at the head of the +lake, and it would be easy to reach them in the morning. + +But there was another camp on the Ste. Marguerite that night, and it was +nearer to Dan Scott than the Indians were. Ovide Boulianne had followed +him up the river, close on his track, which made the going easier. + +"Does that sacre bourgeois suppose that I allow him all that pelletrie +to himself and the Compagnie? Four silver fox, besides otter and beaver? +NON, MERCI! I take some provision, and some whiskey. I go to make trade +also." Thus spoke the shrewd Ovide, proving that commerce is no less +daring, no less resolute, than philanthropy. The only difference is +in the motive, and that is not always visible. Ovide camped the second +night at a bend of the river, a mile below the foot of the lake. Between +him and Dan Scott there was a hill covered with a dense thicket of +spruce. + +By what magic did Carcajou know that Pichou, his old enemy, was so near +him in that vast wilderness of white death? By what mysterious language +did he communicate his knowledge to his companions and stir the sleeping +hatred in their hearts and mature the conspiracy of revenge? + +Pichou, sleeping by the fire, was awakened by the fall of a lump of snow +from the branch of a shaken evergreen. That was nothing. But there were +other sounds in the forest, faint, stealthy, inaudible to an ear less +keen than his. He crept out of the shelter and looked into the wood. +He could see shadowy forms, stealing among the trees, gliding down the +hill. Five of them. Wolves, doubtless! He must guard the provisions. By +this time the rest of his team were awake. Their eyes glittered. They +stirred uneasily. But they did not move from the dying fire. It was no +concern of theirs what their leader chose to do out of hours. In the +traces they would follow him, but there was no loyalty in their hearts. +Pichou stood alone by the sledge, waiting for the wolves. + +But these were no wolves. They were assassins. Like a company of +soldiers, they lined up together and rushed silently down the slope. +Like lightning they leaped upon the solitary dog and struck him down. In +an instant, before Dan Scott could throw off his blanket and seize the +loaded butt of his whip, Pichou's throat and breast were torn to rags, +his life-blood poured upon the snow, and his murderers were slinking +away, slavering and muttering through the forest. + +Dan Scott knelt beside his best friend. At a glance he saw that the +injury was fatal. "Well done, Pichou!" he murmured, "you fought a good +fight." + +And the dog, by a brave effort, lifted the head with the black patch on +it, for the last time, licked his master', hand, and then dropped back +upon the snow--contented, happy, dead. + +There is but one drawback to a dog's friendship. It does not last long +enough. + + +End of the story? Well, if you care for the other people in it, you +shall hear what became of them. Dan Scott went on to the head of the +lake and found the Indians, and fed them and gave them his medicine, and +all of them got well except two, and they continued to hunt along +the Ste. Marguerite every winter and trade with the Honourable H. B. +Company. Not with Dan Scott, however, for before that year was ended +he resigned his post, and went to Montreal to finish his course in +medicine; and now he is a respected physician in Ontario. Married; three +children; useful; prosperous. But before he left Seven Islands he went +up the Ste. Marguerite in the summer, by canoe, and made a grave for +Pichou's bones, under a blossoming ash tree, among the ferns and wild +flowers. He put a cross over it. + +"Being French," said he, "I suppose he was a Catholic. But I'll swear he +was a Christian." + + + + +VI. THE WHITE BLOT + + + + +I + +The real location of a city house depends upon the pictures which hang +upon its walls. They are its neighbourhood and its outlook. They confer +upon it that touch of life and character, that power to beget love and +bind friendship, which a country house receives from its surrounding +landscape, the garden that embraces it, the stream that runs near it, +and the shaded paths that lead to and from its door. + +By this magic of pictures my narrow, upright slice of living-space in +one of the brown-stone strata on the eastward slope of Manhattan Island +is transferred to an open and agreeable site. It has windows that look +toward the woods and the sunset, watergates by which a little boat is +always waiting, and secret passageways leading into fair places that +are frequented by persons of distinction and charm. No darkness of night +obscures these outlets; no neighbour's house shuts off the view; no +drifted snow of winter makes them impassable. They are always free, and +through them I go out and in upon my adventures. + +One of these picture-wanderings has always appeared to me so singular +that I would like, if it were possible, to put it into words. + +It was Pierrepont who first introduced me to the picture--Pierrepont the +good-natured: of whom one of his friends said that he was like Mahomet's +Bridge of Paradise, because he was so hard to cross: to which another +added that there was also a resemblance in the fact that he led to a +region of beautiful illusions which he never entered. He is one of +those enthusiastic souls who are always discovering a new writer, a new +painter, a new view from some old wharf by the river, a new place to +obtain picturesque dinners at a grotesque price. He swung out of his +office, with his long-legged, easy stride, and nearly ran me down, as I +was plodding up-town through the languor of a late spring afternoon, +on one of those duty-walks which conscience offers as a sacrifice to +digestion. + +"Why, what is the matter with you?" he cried as he linked his arm +through mine, "you look outdone, tired all the way through to your +backbone. Have you been reading the 'Anatomy of Melancholy,' or +something by one of the new British female novelists? You will have la +grippe in your mind if you don't look out. But I know what you need. +Come with me, and I will do you good." + +So saying, he drew me out of clanging Broadway into one of the side +streets that run toward the placid region of Washington Square. "No, +no," I answered, feeling, even in the act of resistance, the pleasure of +his cheerful guidance, "you are altogether wrong. I don't need a dinner +at your new-found Bulgarian table-d'hote--seven courses for seventy-five +cents, and the wine thrown out; nor some of those wonderful Mexican +cheroots warranted to eradicate the tobacco-habit; nor a draught of your +South American melon sherbet that cures all pains, except these which it +causes. None of these things will help me. The doctor suggests that +they do not suit my temperament. Let us go home together and have a +shower-bath and a dinner of herbs, with just a reminiscence of the +stalled ox--and a bout at backgammon to wind up the evening. That will +be the most comfortable prescription." + +"But you mistake me," said he; "I am not thinking of any creature +comforts for you. I am prescribing for your mind. There is a picture +that I want you to see; not a coloured photograph, nor an exercise in +anatomical drawing; but a real picture that will rest the eyes of your +heart. Come away with me to Morgenstern's gallery, and be healed." + +As we turned into the lower end of Fifth Avenue, it seemed as if I +were being gently floated along between the modest apartment-houses and +old-fashioned dwellings, and prim, respectable churches, on the smooth +current of Pierrepont's talk about his new-found picture. How often a +man has cause to return thanks for the enthusiasms of his friends! They +are the little fountains that run down from the hills to refresh the +mental desert of the despondent. + +"You remember Falconer," continued Pierrepont, "Temple Falconer, that +modest, quiet, proud fellow who came out of the South a couple of years +ago and carried off the landscape prize at the Academy last year, and +then disappeared? He had no intimate friends here, and no one knew what +had become of him. But now this picture appears, to show what he has +been doing. It is an evening scene, a revelation of the beauty of +sadness, an idea expressed in colours--or rather, a real impression of +Nature that awakens an ideal feeling in the heart. It does not define +everything and say nothing, like so many paintings. It tells no story, +but I know it fits into one. There is not a figure in it, and yet it +is alive with sentiment; it suggests thoughts which cannot be put +into words. Don't you love the pictures that have that power of +suggestion--quiet and strong, like Homer Martin's 'Light-house' up at +the Century, with its sheltered bay heaving softly under the pallid +greenish sky of evening, and the calm, steadfast glow of the lantern +brightening into readiness for all the perils of night and coming storm? +How much more powerful that is than all the conventional pictures of +light-houses on inaccessible cliffs, with white foam streaming from them +like the ends of a schoolboy's comforter in a gale of wind! I tell you +the real painters are the fellows who love pure nature because it is +so human. They don't need to exaggerate, and they don't dare to be +affected. They are not afraid of the reality, and they are not ashamed +of the sentiment. They don't paint everything that they see, but they +see everything that they paint. And this picture makes me sure that +Falconer is one of them." + +By this time we had arrived at the door of the house where Morgenstern +lives and moves and makes his profits, and were admitted to the shrine +of the Commercial Apollo and the Muses in Trade. + +It has often seemed to me as if that little house were a silent epitome +of modern art criticism, an automatic indicator, or perhaps regulator, +of the aesthetic taste of New York. On the first floor, surrounded by +all the newest fashions in antiquities and BRIC-A-BRAC, you will see the +art of to-day--the works of painters who are precisely in the focus of +advertisement, and whose names call out an instant round of applause in +the auction-room. On the floors above, in degrees of obscurity deepening +toward the attic, you will find the art of yesterday--the pictures which +have passed out of the glare of popularity without yet arriving at +the mellow radiance of old masters. In the basement, concealed in huge +packing-cases, and marked "PARIS--FRAGILE,"--you will find the art of +to-morrow; the paintings of the men in regard to whose names, styles, +and personal traits, the foreign correspondents and prophetic critics +in the newspapers, are now diffusing in the public mind that twilight of +familiarity and ignorance which precedes the sunrise of marketable fame. + +The affable and sagacious Morgenstern was already well acquainted with +the waywardness of Pierrepont's admiration, and with my own persistent +disregard of current quotations in the valuation of works of art. He +regarded us, I suppose, very much as Robin Hood would have looked upon +a pair of plain yeomen who had strayed into his lair. The knights of +capital, and coal barons, and rich merchants were his natural prey, but +toward this poor but honest couple it would be worthy only of a Gentile +robber to show anything but courteous and fair dealing. + +He expressed no surprise when he heard what we wanted to see, but smiled +tolerantly and led the way, not into the well-defined realm of the past, +the present, or the future, but into a region of uncertain fortunes, a +limbo of acknowledged but unrewarded merits, a large back room devoted +to the works of American painters. Here we found Falconer's picture; +and the dealer, with that instinctive tact which is the best part of his +business capital, left us alone to look at it. + +It showed the mouth of a little river: a secluded lagoon, where the +shallow tides rose and fell with vague lassitude, following the impulse +of prevailing winds more than the strong attraction of the moon. But now +the unsailed harbour was quite still, in the pause of the evening; +and the smooth undulations were caressed by a hundred opalescent hues, +growing deeper toward the west, where the river came in. Converging +lines of trees stood dark against the sky; a cleft in the woods marked +the course of the stream, above which the reluctant splendours of an +autumnal day were dying in ashes of roses, while three tiny clouds, +poised high in air, burned red with the last glimpse of the departed +sun. + +On the right was a reedy point running out into the bay, and behind it, +on a slight rise of ground, an antique house with tall white pillars. It +was but dimly outlined in the gathering shadows; yet one could +imagine its stately, formal aspect, its precise garden with beds of +old-fashioned flowers and straight paths bordered with box, and a +little arbour overgrown with honeysuckle. I know not by what subtlety of +delicate and indescribable touches--a slight inclination in one of the +pillars, a broken line which might indicate an unhinged gate, a drooping +resignation in the foliage of the yellowing trees, a tone of sadness +in the blending of subdued colours--the painter had suggested that the +place was deserted. But the truth was unmistakable. An air of loneliness +and pensive sorrow breathed from the picture; a sigh of longing and +regret. It was haunted by sad, sweet memories of some untold story of +human life. + +In the corner Falconer had put his signature, T. F., "LARMONE," 189-, +and on the border of the picture he had faintly traced some words, which +we made out at last-- + + "A spirit haunts the year's last hours." + +Pierrepont took up the quotation and completed it-- + + "A spirit haunts the year's last hours, + Dwelling amid these yellowing bowers: + To himself he talks; + For at eventide, listening earnestly, + At his work you may hear him sob and sigh, + In the walks; + Earthward he boweth the heavy stalks + Of the mouldering flowers: + Heavily hangs the broad sunflower + Over its grave i' the earth so chilly; + Heavily hangs the hollyhock, + Heavily hangs the tiger-lily." + +"That is very pretty poetry, gentlemen," said Morgenstern, who had come +in behind us, "but is it not a little vague? You like it, but you cannot +tell exactly what it means. I find the same fault in the picture from +my point of view. There is nothing in it to make a paragraph about, no +anecdote, no experiment in technique. It is impossible to persuade the +public to admire a picture unless you can tell them precisely the points +on which they must fix their admiration. And that is why, although the +painting is a good one, I should be willing to sell it at a low price." + +He named a sum of money in three figures, so small that Pierrepont, who +often buys pictures by proxy, could not conceal his surprise. + +"Certainly I should consider that a good bargain, simply for +investment," said he. "Falconer's name alone ought to be worth more than +that, ten years from now. He is a rising man." + +"No, Mr. Pierrepont," replied the dealer, "the picture is worth what +I ask for it, for I would not commit the impertinence of offering a +present to you or your friend; but it is worth no more. Falconer's name +will not increase in value. The catalogue of his works is too short for +fame to take much notice of it; and this is the last. Did you not hear +of his death last fall? I do not wonder, for it happened at some place +down on Long Island--a name that I never saw before, and have forgotten +now. There was not even an obituary in the newspapers." + +"And besides," he continued, after a pause, "I must not conceal from +you that the painting has a blemish. It is not always visible, since you +have failed to detect it; but it is more noticeable in some lights than +in others; and, do what I will, I cannot remove it. This alone would +prevent the painting from being a good investment. Its market value will +never rise." + +He turned the canvas sideways to the light, and the defect became +apparent. + +It was a dim, oblong, white blot in the middle distance; a nebulous +blur in the painting, as if there had been some chemical impurity in the +pigment causing it to fade, or rather as if a long drop of some acid, or +perhaps a splash of salt water, had fallen upon the canvas while it was +wet, and bleached it. I knew little of the possible causes of such a +blot, but enough to see that it could not be erased without painting +over it, perhaps not even then. And yet it seemed rather to enhance than +to weaken the attraction which the picture had for me. + +"Your candour does you credit, Mr. Morgenstern," said I, "but you know +me well enough to be sure that what you have said will hardly discourage +me. For I have never been an admirer of 'cabinet finish' in works of +art. Nor have I been in the habit of buying them, as a Circassian father +trains his daughters, with an eye to the market. They come into my house +for my own pleasure, and when the time arrives that I can see them +no longer, it will not matter much to me what price they bring in the +auction-room. This landscape pleases me so thoroughly that, if you will +let us take it with us this evening, I will send you a check for the +amount in the morning." + +So we carried off the painting in a cab; and all the way home I was in +the pleasant excitement of a man who is about to make an addition to his +house; while Pierrepont was conscious of the glow of virtue which comes +of having done a favour to a friend and justified your own critical +judgment at one stroke. + +After dinner we hung the painting over the chimney-piece in the room +called the study (because it was consecrated to idleness), and sat there +far into the night, talking of the few times we had met Falconer at the +club, and of his reticent manner, which was broken by curious flashes of +impersonal confidence when he spoke not of himself but of his art. From +this we drifted into memories of good comrades who had walked beside us +but a few days in the path of life, and then disappeared, yet left us +feeling as if we cared more for them than for the men whom we see every +day; and of young geniuses who had never reached the goal; and of many +other glimpses of "the light that failed," until the lamp was low and it +was time to say good-night. + + + + +II + +For several months I continued to advance in intimacy with my picture. +It grew more familiar, more suggestive; the truth and beauty of it +came home to me constantly. Yet there was something in it not quite +apprehended; a sense of strangeness; a reserve which I had not yet +penetrated. + +One night in August I found myself practically alone, so far as human +intercourse was concerned, in the populous, weary city. A couple of +hours of writing had produced nothing that would bear the test of +sunlight, so I anticipated judgment by tearing up the spoiled sheets of +paper, and threw myself upon the couch before the empty fireplace. It +was a dense, sultry night, with electricity thickening the air, and a +trouble of distant thunder rolling far away on the rim of the cloudy +sky--one of those nights of restless dulness, when you wait and long for +something to happen, and yet feel despondently that nothing ever will +happen again. I passed through a region of aimless thoughts into one +of migratory and unfinished dreams, and dropped from that into an empty +gulf of sleep. + +How late it was when I drifted back toward the shore of consciousness, +I cannot tell. But the student-lamp on the table had burned out, and +the light of the gibbous moon was creeping in through the open windows. +Slowly the pale illumination crept up the eastern wall, like a tide +rising as the moon declined. Now it reached the mantel-shelf and +overflowed the bronze heads of Homer and the Indian Bacchus and the +Egyptian image of Isis with the infant Horus. Now it touched the frame +of the picture and lapped over the edge. Now it rose to the shadowy +house and the dim garden, in the midst of which I saw the white blot +more distinctly than ever before. + +It seemed now to have taken a new shape, like the slender form of a +woman, robed in flowing white. And as I watched it through half-closed +eyes, the figure appeared to move and tremble and wave to and fro, as if +it were a ghost. + +A haunted picture! Why should it not be so? A haunted ruin, a haunted +forest, a haunted ship,--all these have been seen, or imagined, and +reported, and there are learned societies for investigating such things. +Why should not a picture have a ghost in it? + +My mind, in that curiously vivid state which lies between waking and +sleeping, went through the form of careful reasoning over the question. +If there may be some subtle connection between a house and the spirits +of the people who have once lived in it,--and wise men have believed +this,--why should there be any impassable gulf between a picture and +the vanished lives out of which it has grown? All the human thought +and feeling which have passed into it through the patient toil of art, +remain forever embodied there. A picture is the most living and personal +thing that a man can leave behind him. When we look at it we see what he +saw, hour after hour, day after day, and we see it through his mood +and impression, coloured by his emotion, tinged with his personality. +Surely, if the spirits of the dead are not extinguished, but only veiled +and hidden, and if it were possible by any means that their presence +could flash for a moment through the veil, it would be most natural that +they should come back again to hover around the work into which their +experience and passion had been woven. Here, if anywhere, they would +"Revisit the pale glimpses of the moon." Here, if anywhere, we might +catch fleeting sight, as in a glass darkly, of the visions that passed +before them while they worked. + +This much of my train of reasoning along the edge of the dark, I +remember sharply. But after this, all was confused and misty. The shore +of consciousness receded. I floated out again on the ocean of forgotten +dreams. When I woke, it was with a quick start, as if my ship had been +made fast, silently and suddenly, at the wharf of reality, and the bell +rang for me to step ashore. + +But the vision of the white blot remained clear and distinct. And the +question that it had brought to me, the chain of thoughts that had +linked themselves to it, lingered through the morning, and made me feel +sure that there was an untold secret in Falconer's life and that the +clew to it must be sought in the history of his last picture. + +But how to trace the connection? Every one who had known Falconer, +however slightly, was out of town. There was no clew to follow. Even the +name "Larmone" gave me no help; for I could not find it on any map +of Long Island. It was probably the fanciful title of some old +country-place, familiar only to the people who had lived there. + +But the very remoteness of the problem, its lack of contact with the +practical world, fascinated me. It was like something that had drifted +away in the fog, on a sea of unknown and fluctuating currents. The only +possible way to find it was to commit yourself to the same wandering +tides and drift after it, trusting to a propitious fortune that you +might be carried in the same direction; and after a long, blind, +unhurrying chase, one day you might feel a faint touch, a jar, a thrill +along the side of your boat, and, peering through the fog, lay your hand +at last, without surprise, upon the very object of your quest. + + + + +III + +As it happened, the means for such a quest were at my disposal. I +was part owner of a boat which had been built for hunting and fishing +cruises on the shallow waters of the Great South Bay. It was a +deliberate, but not inconvenient, craft, well named the Patience; and my +turn for using it had come. Black Zekiel, the captain, crew, and cook, +was the very man that I would have chosen for such an expedition. He +combined the indolent good-humour of the negro with the taciturnity of +the Indian, and knew every shoal and channel of the tortuous waters. He +asked nothing better than to set out on a voyage without a port; sailing +aimlessly eastward day after day, through the long chain of landlocked +bays, with the sea plunging behind the sand-dunes on our right, and the +shores of Long Island sleeping on our left; anchoring every evening in +some little cove or estuary, where Zekiel could sit on the cabin roof, +smoking his corn-cob pipe, and meditating on the vanity and comfort of +life, while I pushed off through the mellow dusk to explore every creek +and bend of the shore, in my light canoe. + +There was nothing to hasten our voyage. The three weeks' vacation was +all but gone, when the Patience groped her way through a narrow, crooked +channel in a wide salt-meadow, and entered the last of the series +of bays. A few houses straggled down a point of land; the village of +Quantock lay a little farther back. Beyond that was a belt of woods +reaching to the water; and from these the south-country road emerged to +cross the upper end of the bay on a low causeway with a narrow bridge +of planks at the central point. Here was our Ultima Thule. Not even +the Patience could thread the eye of this needle, or float through the +shallow marsh-canal farther to the east. + +We anchored just in front of the bridge, and as I pushed the canoe +beneath it, after supper, I felt the indefinable sensation of having +passed that way before. I knew beforehand what the little boat would +drift into. The broad saffron light of evening fading over a still +lagoon; two converging lines of pine trees running back into the sunset; +a grassy point upon the right; and behind that a neglected garden, a +tangled bower of honeysuckle, a straight path bordered with box, leading +to a deserted house with a high, white-pillared porch--yes, it was +Larmone. + +In the morning I went up to the village to see if I could find trace of +my artist's visit to the place. There was no difficulty in the search, +for he had been there often. The people had plenty of recollections of +him, but no real memory, for it seemed as if none of them had really +known him. + +"Queer kinder fellow," said a wrinkled old bayman with whom I walked +up the sandy road, "I seen him a good deal round here, but 'twan't like +havin' any 'quaintance with him. He allus kep' himself to himself, +pooty much. Used ter stay round 'Squire Ladoo's place most o' the +time--keepin' comp'ny with the gal I guess. Larmone? Yaas, that's what +THEY called it, but we don't go much on fancy names down here. No, the +painter didn' 'zactly live there, but it 'mounted to the same thing. +Las' summer they was all away, house shet up, painter hangin' round all +the time, 's if he looked fur 'em to come back any minnit. Purfessed to +be paintin', but I don' see's he did much. Lived up to Mort Halsey's; +died there too; year ago this fall. Guess Mis' Halsey can tell ye most +of any one 'bout him." + +At the boarding-house (with wide, low verandas, now forsaken by the +summer boarders), which did duty for a village inn, I found Mrs. +Halsey; a notable housewife, with a strong taste for ancestry, and an +uncultivated world of romance still brightening her soft brown eyes. She +knew all the threads in the story that I was following; and the interest +with which she spoke made it evident that she had often woven them +together in the winter evenings on patterns of her own. + +Judge Ledoux had come to Quantock from the South during the war, and +built a house there like the one he used to live in. There were three +things he hated: slavery and war and society. But he always loved the +South more than the North, and lived like a foreigner, polite enough, +but very retired. His wife died after a few years, and left him alone +with a little girl. Claire grew up as pretty as a picture, but very shy +and delicate. About two years ago Mr. Falconer had come down from +the city; he stayed at Larmone first, and then he came to the +boarding-house, but he was over at the Ledoux' house almost all the +time. He was a Southerner too, and a relative of the family; a real +gentleman, and very proud though he was poor. It seemed strange that +he should not live with them, but perhaps he felt more free over here. +Every one thought he must be engaged to Claire, but he was not the kind +of a man that you could ask questions about himself. A year ago last +winter he had gone up to the city and taken all his things with him. He +had never stayed away so long before. In the spring the Ledoux had gone +to Europe; Claire seemed to be falling into a decline; her sight seemed +to be failing, and her father said she must see a famous doctor and have +a change of air. + +"Mr. Falconer came back in May," continued the good lady, "as if he +expected to find them. But the house was shut up and nobody knew just +where they were. He seemed to be all taken aback; it was queer if +he didn't know about it, intimate as he had been; but he never said +anything, and made no inquiries; just seemed to be waiting, as if there +was nothing else for him to do. We would have told him in a minute, if +we had anything to tell. But all we could do was to guess there must +have been some kind of a quarrel between him and the Judge, and if there +was, he must know best about it himself. + +"All summer long he kept going over to the house and wandering around +in the garden. In the fall he began to paint a picture, but it was very +slow painting; he would go over in the afternoon and come back long +after dark, damp with the dew and fog. He kept growing paler and weaker +and more silent. Some days he did not speak more than a dozen words, +but always kind and pleasant. He was just dwindling away; and when the +picture was almost done a fever took hold of him. The doctor said it was +malaria, but it seemed to me more like a trouble in the throat, a kind +of dumb misery. And one night, in the third quarter of the moon, just +after the tide turned to run out, he raised up in the bed and tried to +speak, but he was gone. + +"We tried to find out his relations, but there didn't seem to be any, +except the Ledoux, and they were out of reach. So we sent the picture +up to our cousin in Brooklyn, and it sold for about enough to pay Mr. +Falconer's summer's board and the cost of his funeral. There was nothing +else that he left of any value, except a few books; perhaps you would +like to look at them, if you were his friend? + +"I never saw any one that I seemed to know so little and like so well. +It was a disappointment in love, of course, and they all said that he +died of a broken heart; but I think it was because his heart was too +full, and wouldn't break. + +"And oh!--I forgot to tell you; a week after he was gone there was a +notice in the paper that Claire Ledoux had died suddenly, on the last +of August, at some place in Switzerland. Her father is still away +travelling. And so the whole story is broken off and will never be +finished. Will you look at the books?" + +Nothing is more pathetic, to my mind, than to take up the books of one +who is dead. Here is his name, with perhaps a note of the place where +the volume was bought or read, and the marks on the pages that he liked +best. Here are the passages that gave him pleasure, and the thoughts +that entered into his life and formed it; they became part of him, but +where has he carried them now? + +Falconer's little library was an unstudied choice, and gave a hint +of his character. There was a New Testament in French, with his name +written in a slender, woman's hand; three or four volumes of stories, +Cable's "Old Creole Days," Allen's "Kentucky Cardinal," Page's "In +Old Virginia," and the like; "Henry Esmond" and Amiel's "Journal" and +Lamartine's "Raphael"; and a few volumes of poetry, among them one of +Sidney Lanier's, and one of Tennyson's earlier poems. + +There was also a little morocco-bound book of manuscript notes. This I +begged permission to carry away with me, hoping to find in it something +which would throw light upon my picture, perhaps even some message to +be carried, some hint or suggestion of something which the writer would +fain have had done for him, and which I promised myself faithfully +to perform, as a test of an imagined friendship--imagined not in the +future, but in the impossible past. + +I read the book in this spirit, searching its pages carefully, through +the long afternoon, in the solitary cabin of my boat. There was nothing +at first but an ordinary diary; a record of the work and self-denials of +a poor student of art. Then came the date of his first visit to Larmone, +and an expression of the pleasure of being with his own people again +after a lonely life, and some chronicle of his occupations there, +studies for pictures, and idle days that were summed up in a phrase: "On +the bay," or "In the woods." + +After this the regular succession of dates was broken, and there +followed a few scraps of verse, irregular and unfinished, bound together +by the thread of a name--"Claire among her Roses," "A Ride through +the Pines with Claire," "An Old Song of Claire's" "The Blue Flower in +Claire's Eyes." It was not poetry, but such an unconscious tribute to +the power and beauty of poetry as unfolds itself almost inevitably from +youthful love, as naturally as the blossoms unfold from the apple trees +in May. If you pick them they are worthless. They charm only in their +own time and place. + +A date told of his change from Larmone to the village, and this was +written below it: "Too heavy a sense of obligation destroys freedom, and +only a free man can dare to love." + +Then came a number of fragments indicating trouble of mind +and hesitation; the sensitiveness of the artist, the delicate, +self-tormenting scruples of the lonely idealist, the morbid pride of the +young poor man, contending with an impetuous passion and forcing it to +surrender, or at least to compromise. + +"What right has a man to demand everything and offer nothing in return +except an ambition and a hope? Love must come as a giver, not as a +beggar." + +"A knight should not ask to wear his lady's colours until he has won his +spurs." + +"King Cophetua and the beggar-maid--very fine! but the other +way--humiliating!" + +"A woman may take everything from a man, wealth and fame and +position. But there is only one thing that a man may accept from a +woman--something that she alone can give--happiness." + +"Self-respect is less than love, but it is the trellis that holds love +up from the ground; break it down, and all the flowers are in the dust, +the fruit is spoiled." + +"And yet"--so the man's thought shone through everywhere--"I think she +must know that I love her, and why I cannot speak." + +One entry was written in a clearer, stronger hand: "An end of +hesitation. The longest way is the shortest. I am going to the city to +work for the Academy prize, to think of nothing else until I win it, and +then come back with it to Claire, to tell her that I have a future, +and that it is hers. If I spoke of it now it would be like claiming the +reward before I had done the work. I have told her only that I am +going to prove myself an artist, AND TO LIVE FOR WHAT I LOVE BEST. She +understood, I am sure, for she would not lift her eyes to me, but her +hand trembled as she gave me the blue flower from her belt." + +The date of his return to Larmone was marked, but the page was blank, as +the day had been. + +Some pages of dull self-reproach and questioning and bewildered regret +followed. + +"Is it possible that she has gone away, without a word, without a sign, +after what has passed between us? It is not fair. Surely I had some +claim." + +"But what claim, after all? I asked for nothing. And was it not pride +that kept me silent, taking it for granted that if I asked, she would +give?" + +"It was a mistake; she did not understand, nor care." + +"It was my fault; I might at least have told her that I loved her, +though she could not have answered me." + +"It is too late now. To-night, while I was finishing the picture, I saw +her in the garden. Her spirit, all in white, with a blue flower in her +belt. I knew she was dead across the sea. I tried to call to her, but my +voice made no sound. She seemed not to see me. She moved like one in a +dream, straight on, and vanished. Is there no one who can tell her? Must +she never know that I loved her?" + +The last thing in the book was a printed scrap of paper that lay between +the leaves: + + + IRREVOCABLE + + "Would the gods might give + Another field for human strife; + Man must live one life + Ere he learns to live. + Ah, friend, in thy deep grave, + What now can change; what now can save?" + + +So there was a message after all, but it could never be carried; a task +for a friend, but it was impossible. What better thing could I do +with the poor little book than bury it in the garden in the shadow of +Larmone? The story of a silent fault, hidden in silence. How many of +life's deepest tragedies are only that: no great transgression, no shock +of conflict, no sudden catastrophe with its answering thrill of courage +and resistance: only a mistake made in the darkness, and under the +guidance of what seemed a true and noble motive; a failure to see the +right path at the right moment, and a long wandering beyond it; a word +left unspoken until the ears that should have heard it are sealed, and +the tongue that should have spoken it is dumb. + +The soft sea-fog clothed the night with clinging darkness; the faded +leaves hung slack and motionless from the trees, waiting for their fall; +the tense notes of the surf beyond the sand-dunes vibrated through the +damp air like chords from some mighty VIOLONO; large, warm drops wept +from the arbour while I sat in the garden, holding the poor little book, +and thinking of the white blot in the record of a life that was too +proud to bend to the happiness that was meant for it. + +There are men like that: not many perhaps, but a few; and they are the +ones who suffer most keenly in this world of half-understanding and +clouded knowledge. There is a pride, honourable and sensitive, that +imperils the realization of love, puts it under a spell of silence and +reserve, makes it sterile of blossoms and impotent of fruits. For what +is it, after all, but a subtle, spiritual worship of self? And what was +Falconer's resolve not to tell this girl that he loved her until he +had won fame and position, but a secret, unconscious setting of himself +above her? For surely, if love is supreme, it does not need to wait for +anything else to lend it worth and dignity. The very sweetness and power +of it lie in the confession of one life as dependent upon another for +its fulfilment. It is made strong in its very weakness. It is the only +thing, after all, that can break the prison bars and set the heart free +from itself. The pride that hinders it, enslaves it. Love's first duty +is to be true to itself, in word and deed. Then, having spoken truth and +acted verity, it may call on honour to keep it pure and steadfast. + +If Falconer had trusted Claire, and showed her his heart without +reserve, would she not have understood him and helped him? It was the +pride of independence, the passion of self-reliance that drew him +away from her and divided his heart from hers in a dumb isolation. But +Claire,--was not she also in fault? Might she not have known, should not +she have taken for granted, the truth which must have been so easy to +read in Falconer's face, though he never put it into words? And yet +with her there was something very different from the pride that kept him +silent. The virgin reserve of a young girl's heart is more sacred than +any pride of self. It is the maiden instinct which makes the woman +always the shrine, and never the pilgrim. She is not the seeker, but the +one sought. She dares not take anything for granted. She has the right +to wait for the voice, the word, the avowal. Then, and not till then, if +the pilgrim be the chosen one, the shrine may open to receive him. + +Not all women believe this; but those who do are the ones best worth +seeking and winning. And Claire was one of them. It seemed to me, as I +mused, half dreaming, on the unfinished story of these two lives that +had missed each other in the darkness, that I could see her figure +moving through the garden, beyond where the pallid bloom of the tall +cosmos-flower bent to the fitful breeze. Her robe was like the waving of +the mist. Her face was fair, and very fair, for all its sadness: a blue +flower, faint as a shadow on the snow, trembled at her waist, as she +paced to and fro along the path. + +I murmured to myself, "Yet he loved her: and she loved him. Can pride be +stronger than love?" + +Perhaps, after all, the lingering and belated confession which Falconer +had written in his diary might in some way come to her. Perhaps if it +were left here in the bower of honeysuckles where they had so often sat +together, it might be a sign and omen of the meeting of these two souls +that had lost each other in the dark of the world. Perhaps,--ah, who +can tell that it is not so?--for those who truly love, with all their +errors, with all their faults, there is no "irrevocable"--there is +"another field." + +As I turned from the garden, the tense note of the surf vibrated through +the night. The pattering drops of dew rustled as they fell from the +leaves of the honeysuckle. But underneath these sounds it seemed as if +I heard a deep voice saying "Claire!" and a woman's lips whispering +"Temple!" + + + + +VII. A YEAR OF NOBILITY + + + + +I + +ENTER THE MARQUIS + +The Marquis sat by the camp-fire peeling potatoes. + +To look at him, you never would have taken him for a marquis. His +costume was a pair of corduroy trousers; a blue flannel shirt, patched +at elbows with gray; lumberman's boots, flat-footed, shapeless, with +loose leather legs strapped just below the knee, and wrinkled like the +hide of an ancient rhinoceros; and a soft brown hat with several holes +in the crown, as if it had done duty, at some time in its history, as an +impromptu target in a shooting-match. A red woollen scarf twisted about +his loins gave a touch of colour and picturesqueness. + +It was not exactly a court dress, but it sat well on the powerful sinewy +figure of the man. He never gave a thought to his looks, but peeled his +potatoes with a dexterity which betrayed a past-master of the humble +art, and threw the skins into the fire. + +"Look you, m'sieu'," he said to young Winthrop Alden, who sat on a +fallen tree near him, mending the fly-rod which he had broken in the +morning's fishing, "look you, it is an affair of the most strange, yet +of the most certain. We have known always that ours was a good family. +The name tells it. The Lamottes are of la haute classe in France. But +here, in Canada, we are poor. Yet the good blood dies not with the +poverty. It is buried, hidden, but it remains the same. It is like these +pataques. You plant good ones for seed: you get a good crop. You plant +bad ones: you get a bad crop. But we did not know about the title in our +family. No. We thought ours was a side-branch, an off-shoot. It was a +great surprise to us. But it is certain,--beyond a doubt." + +Jean Lamotte's deep voice was quiet and steady. It had the tone of +assured conviction. His bright blue eyes above his ruddy mustache and +bronzed cheeks, were clear and tranquil as those of a child. + +Alden was immensely interested and amused. He was a member of the Boston +branch of the Society for Ancestral Culture, and he recognized the +favourite tenet of his sect,--the doctrine that "blood will tell." He +was also a Harvard man, knowing almost everything and believing hardly +anything. Heredity was one of the few unquestioned articles of his +creed. But the form in which this familiar confession of faith came to +him, on the banks of the Grande Decharge, from the lips of a somewhat +ragged and distinctly illiterate Canadian guide, was grotesque enough +to satisfy the most modern taste for new sensations. He listened with an +air of gravity, and a delighted sense of the humour of the situation. + +"How did you find it out?" he asked. + +"Well, then," continued Jean, "I will tell you how the news came to me. +It was at St. Gedeon, one Sunday last March. The snow was good and hard, +and I drove in, ten miles on the lake, from our house opposite Grosse +Ile. After mass, a man, evidently of the city, comes to me in the stable +while I feed the horse, and salutes me. + +"'Is this Jean Lamotte?' + +"'At your service, m'sieu'.' + +"'Son of Francois Louis Lamotte?' + +"'Of no other. But he is dead, God give him repose.' + +"'I been looking for you all through Charlevoix and Chicoutimi.' + +"'Here you find me then, and good-day to you,' says I, a little short, +for I was beginning to be shy of him. + +"'Chut, chut,' says he, very friendly. 'I suppose you have time to talk +a bit. How would you like to be a marquis and have a castle in France +with a hundred thousand dollars?' + +"For a moment I think I will lick him; then I laugh. 'Very well indeed,' +says I, 'and also a handful of stars for buckshot, and the new moon for +a canoe.' + +"'But no,' answers the man. 'I am earnest, Monsieur Lamotte. I want to +talk a long talk with you. Do you permit that I accompany you to your +residence?' + +"Residence! You know that little farm-house of logs where my mother +lives,--you saw it last summer. But of course it is a pretty good house. +It is clean. It is warm. So I bring the man home in the sleigh. All that +evening he tells the story. How our name Lamotte is really De la Motte +de la Luciere. How there belongs to that name an estate and a title +in France, now thirty years with no one to claim it. How he, being an +AVOCAT, has remarked the likeness of the names. How he has tracked the +family through Montmorency and Quebec, in all the parish books. How he +finds my great-grandfather's great-grandfather, Etienne de La Motte who +came to Canada two hundred years ago, a younger son of the Marquis de la +Luciere. How he has the papers, many of them, with red seals on them. I +saw them. 'Of course,' says he, 'there are others of the family +here to share the property. It must be divided. But it is +large--enormous--millions of francs. And the largest share is yours, +and the title, and a castle--a castle larger than Price's saw-mill at +Chicoutimi; with carpets, and electric lights, and coloured pictures on +the wall, like the hotel at Roberval.' + +"When my mother heard about that she was pleased. But me--when I heard +that I was a marquis, I knew it was true." + +Jean's blue eyes were wide open now, and sparkling brightly. He had +put down the pan of potatoes. He was holding his head up and talking +eagerly. + +Alden turned away his face to light his pipe, and hide a smile. "Did he +get--any money--out of you?"--came slowly between the puffs of smoke. + +"Money!" answered Jean, "of course there must be money to carry on an +affair of this kind. There was seventy dollars that I had cleaned up on +the lumber-job last winter, and the mother had forty dollars from the +cow she sold in the fall. A hundred and ten dollars,--we gave him that. +He has gone to France to make the claim for us. Next spring he comes +back, and I give him a hundred dollars more; when I get my property five +thousand dollars more. It is little enough. A marquis must not be mean." + +Alden swore softly in English, under his breath. A rustic comedy, a joke +on human nature, always pleased him; but beneath his cynical varnish +he had a very honest heart, and he hated cruelty and injustice. He knew +what a little money meant in the backwoods; what hard and bitter toil it +cost to rake it together; what sacrifices and privations must follow +its loss. If the smooth prospector of unclaimed estates in France had +arrived at the camp on the Grande Decharge at that moment, Alden would +have introduced him to the most unhappy hour of his life. + +But with Jean Lamotte it was by no means so easy to deal. Alden +perceived at once that ridicule would be worse than useless. The man was +far too much in earnest. A jest about a marquis with holes in his hat! +Yes, Jean would laugh at that very merrily; for he was a true VOYAGEUR. +But a jest about the reality of the marquis! That struck him as almost +profane. It was a fixed idea with him. Argument could not shake it. +He had seen the papers. He knew it was true. All the strength of his +vigorous and healthy manhood seemed to have gone into it suddenly, as if +this was the news for which he had been waiting, unconsciously, since he +was born. + +It was not in the least morbid, visionary, abstract. It was concrete, +actual, and so far as Alden could see, wholesome. It did not make Jean +despise his present life. On the contrary, it appeared to lend a zest +to it, as an interesting episode in the career of a nobleman. He was not +restless; he was not discontented. His whole nature was at once elated +and calmed. He was not at all feverish to get away from his familiar +existence, from the woods and the waters he knew so well, from the large +liberty of the unpeopled forest, the joyous rush of the great river, the +splendid breadth of the open sky. Unconsciously these things had gone +into his blood. Dimly he felt the premonitions of homesickness for them +all. But he was lifted up to remember that the blood into which these +things had entered was blue blood, and that though he lived in the +wilderness he really belonged to la haute classe. A breath of romance, +a spirit of chivalry from the days when the high-spirited courtiers of +Louis XIV sought their fortune in the New World, seemed to pass into +him. He spoke of it all with a kind of proud simplicity. + +"It appears curious to m'sieu', no doubt, but it has been so in Canada +from the beginning. There were many nobles here in the old time. +Frontenac,--he was a duke or a prince. Denonville,--he was a grand +seigneur. La Salle, Vaudreuil,--these are all noble, counts or barons. I +know not the difference, but the cure has told me the names. And the old +Jacques Cartier, the father of all, when he went home to France, I have +heard that the King made him a lord and gave him a castle. Why not? He +was a capable man, a brave man; he could sail a big ship, he could run +the rapids of the great river in his canoe. He could hunt the bear, the +lynx, the carcajou. I suppose all these men,--marquises and counts and +barons,--I suppose they all lived hard, and slept on the ground, and +used the axe and the paddle when they came to the woods. It is not the +fine coat that makes the noble. It is the good blood, the adventure, the +brave heart." + +"Magnificent!" thought Alden. "It is the real thing, a bit of the +seventeenth century lost in the forest for two hundred years. It is like +finding an old rapier beside an Indian trail. I suppose the fellow +may be the descendant of some gay young lieutenant of the regiment +Carignan-Salieres, who came out with De Tracy, or Courcelles. An amour +with the daughter of a habitant,--a name taken at random,--who can +unravel the skein? But here's the old thread of chivalry running through +all the tangles, tarnished but unbroken." + +This was what he said to himself. What he said to Jean was, "Well, +Jean, you and I have been together in the woods for two summers now, and +marquis or no marquis, I hope this is not going to make any difference +between us." + +"But certainly NOT!" answered Jean. "I am well content with m'sieu', as +I hope m'sieu' is content with me. While I am AU BOIS, I ask no better +than to be your guide. Besides, I must earn those other hundred dollars, +for the payment in the spring." + +Alden tried to make him promise to give nothing more to the lawyer +until he had something sure to show for his money. But Jean was +politely non-committal on that point. It was evident that he felt the +impossibility of meanness in a marquis. Why should he be sparing or +cautious? That was for the merchant, not for the noble. A hundred, two +hundred, three hundred dollars: What was that to an estate and a title? +Nothing risk, nothing gain! He must live up to his role. Meantime he was +ready to prove that he was the best guide on the Grande Decharge. + +And so he was. There was not a man in all the Lake St. John country who +knew the woods and waters as well as he did. Far up the great rivers +Peribonca and Misstassini he had pushed his birch canoe, exploring the +network of lakes and streams along the desolate Height of Land. He knew +the Grand Brule, where the bears roam in September on the fire-scarred +hills among the wide, unharvested fields of blueberries. He knew the +hidden ponds and slow-creeping little rivers where the beavers build +their dams, and raise their silent water-cities, like Venice lost in the +woods. He knew the vast barrens, covered with stiff silvery moss, where +the caribou fed in the winter. On the Decharge itself,--that tumultuous +flood, never failing, never freezing, by which the great lake pours all +its gathered waters in foam and fury down to the deep, still gorge of +the Saguenay,--there Jean was at home. There was not a curl or eddy +in the wild course of the river that he did not understand. The quiet +little channels by which one could drop down behind the islands while +the main stream made an impassable fall; the precise height of the water +at which it was safe to run the Rapide Gervais; the point of rock on the +brink of the Grande Chute where the canoe must whirl swiftly in to the +shore if you did not wish to go over the cataract; the exact force of +the tourniquet that sucked downward at one edge of the rapid, and of the +bouillon that boiled upward at the other edge, as if the bottom of the +river were heaving, and the narrow line of the FILET D'EAU along which +the birch-bark might shoot in safety; the treachery of the smooth, oily +curves where the brown water swept past the edge of the cliff, silent, +gloomy, menacing; the hidden pathway through the foam where the canoe +could run out securely and reach a favourite haunt of the ouananiche, +the fish that loves the wildest water,--all these secrets were known to +Jean. He read the river like a book. He loved it. He also respected it. +He knew it too well to take liberties with it. + +The camp, that June, was beside the Rapide des Cedres. A great ledge +stretched across the river; the water came down in three leaps, brown +above, golden at the edge, white where it fell. Below, on the left bank, +there was a little cove behind a high point of rocks, a curving beach +of white sand, a gentle slope of ground, a tent half hidden among the +birches and balsams. Down the river, the main channel narrowed and +deepened. High banks hemmed it in on the left, iron-coasted islands on +the right. It was a sullen, powerful, dangerous stream. Beyond that, in +mid-river, the Ile Maligne reared its wicked head, scarred, bristling +with skeletons of dead trees. On either side of it, the river broke away +into a long fury of rapids and falls in which no boat could live. + +It was there, on the point of the island, that the most famous fishing +in the river was found; and there Alden was determined to cast his fly +before he went home. Ten days they had waited at the Cedars for the +water to fall enough to make the passage to the island safe. At last +Alden grew impatient. It was a superb morning,--sky like an immense blue +gentian, air full of fragrance from a million bells of pink Linnaea, +sunshine flattering the great river,--a morning when danger and death +seemed incredible. + +"To-day we are going to the island, Jean; the water must be low enough +now." + +"Not yet, m'sieu', I am sorry, but it is not yet." + +Alden laughed rather unpleasantly. "I believe you are afraid. I thought +you were a good canoeman--" + +"I am that," said Jean, quietly, "and therefore,--well, it is the bad +canoeman who is never afraid." + +"But last September you took your monsieur to the island and gave him +fine fishing. Why won't you do it for me? I believe you want to keep me +away from this place and save it for him." + +Jean's face flushed. "M'sieu' has no reason to say that of me. I beg +that he will not repeat it." + +Alden laughed again. He was somewhat irritated at Jean for taking the +thing so seriously, for being so obstinate. On such a morning it was +absurd. At least it would do no harm to make an effort to reach the +island. If it proved impossible they could give it up. "All right, +Jean," he said, "I'll take it back. You are only timid, that's all. +Francois here will go down with me. We can manage the canoe together. +Jean can stay at home and keep the camp. Eh, Francois?" + +Francois, the second guide, was a mush of vanity and good nature, with +just sense enough to obey Jean's orders, and just jealousy enough to +make him jump at a chance to show his independence. He would like very +well to be first man for a day,--perhaps for the next trip, if he had +good luck. He grinned and nodded his head--"All ready, m'sieu'; I guess +we can do it." + +But while he was holding the canoe steady for Alden to step out to his +place in the bow, Jean came down and pushed him aside. "Go to bed, dam' +fool," he muttered, shoved the canoe out into the river, and jumped +lightly to his own place in the stern. + +Alden smiled to himself and said nothing for a while. When they were a +mile or two down the river he remarked, "So I see you changed your mind, +Jean. Do you think better of the river now?" + +"No, m'sieu', I think the same." + +"Well then?" + +"Because I must share the luck with you whether it is good or bad. It is +no shame to have fear. The shame is not to face it. But one thing I ask +of you--" + +"And that is?" + +"Kneel as low in the canoe as you can, paddle steady, and do not dodge +when a wave comes." + +Alden was half inclined to turn back, and give it up. But pride made it +difficult to say the word. Besides the fishing was sure to be superb; +not a line had been wet there since last year. It was worth a little +risk. The danger could not be so very great after all. How fair the +river ran,--a current of living topaz between banks of emerald! What but +good luck could come on such a day? + +The canoe was gliding down the last smooth stretch. Alden lifted his +head, as they turned the corner, and for the first time saw the passage +close before him. His face went white, and he set his teeth. + +The left-hand branch of the river, cleft by the rocky point of the +island, dropped at once into a tumult of yellow foam and raved downward +along the northern shore. The right-hand branch swerved away to the +east, running with swift, silent fury. On the lower edge of this +desperate race of brown billows, a huge whirlpool formed and dissolved +every two or three minutes, now eddying round in a wide backwater into a +rocky bay on the end of the island, now swept away by the rush of waves +into the white rage of the rapids below. + +There was the secret pathway. The trick was, to dart across the +right-hand current at the proper moment, catch the rim of the whirlpool +as it swung backward, and let it sweep you around to the end of the +island. It was easy enough at low water. But now? + +The smooth waves went crowding and shouldering down the slope as if they +were running to a fight. The river rose and swelled with quick, uneven +passion. The whirlpool was in its place one minute; the next, it was +blotted out; everything rushed madly downward--and below was hell. + +Jean checked the boat for a moment, quivering in the strong +current, waiting for the TOURNIQUET to form again. Five seconds--ten +seconds--"Now!" he cried. + +The canoe shot obliquely into the stream, driven by strong, quick +strokes of the paddles. It seemed almost to leap from wave to wave. All +was going well. The edge of the whirlpool was near. Then came the crest +of a larger wave,--slap--into the boat. Alden shrank involuntarily from +the cold water, and missed his stroke. An eddy caught the bow and shoved +it out. The whirlpool receded, dissolved. The whole river rushed down +upon the canoe and carried it away like a leaf. + +Who says that thought is swift and clear in a moment like that? Who +talks about the whole of a man's life passing before him in a flash of +light? A flash of darkness! Thought is paralyzed, dumb. "What a fool!" +"Good-bye!" "If--" That is about all it can say. And if the moment +is prolonged, it says the same thing over again, stunned, bewildered, +impotent. Then?--The rocking waves; the sinking boat; the roar of the +fall; the swift overturn; the icy, blinding, strangling water--God! + +Jean was flung shoreward. Instinctively he struck out, with the current +and half across it, toward a point of rock. His foot touched bottom. +He drew himself up and looked back. The canoe was sweeping past, bottom +upward, Alden underneath it. + +Jean thrust himself out into the stream again, still going with the +current, but now away from shore. He gripped the canoe, flinging his +arm over the stern. Then he got hold of the thwart and tried to turn it +over. Too heavy! Groping underneath he caught Alden by the shoulder and +pulled him out. They would have gone down together but for the boat. + +"Hold on tight," gasped Jean, "put your arm over the canoe--the other +side!" + +Alden, half dazed, obeyed him. The torrent carried the dancing, slippery +bark past another point. Just below it, there was a little eddy. + +"Now," cried Jean; "the back-water--strike for the land!" + +They touched the black, gliddery rocks. They staggered out of the +water; waist-deep, knee-deep, ankle-deep; falling and rising again. They +crawled up on the warm moss.... + +The first thing that Alden noticed was the line of bright red spots on +the wing of a cedar-bird fluttering silently through the branches of the +tree above him. He lay still and watched it, wondering that he had never +before observed those brilliant sparks of colour on the little brown +bird. Then he wondered what made his legs ache so. Then he saw Jean, +dripping wet, sitting on a stone and looking down the river. + +He got up painfully and went over to him. He put his hand on the man's +shoulder. + +"Jean, you saved my life--I thank you, Marquis!" + +"M'sieu'," said Jean, springing up, "I beg you not to mention it. It was +nothing. A narrow shave,--but LA BONNE CHANCE! And after all, you were +right,--we got to the island! But now how to get off?" + + + + +II + +AN ALLIANCE OF RIVALS + +Yes, of course they got off--the next day. At the foot of the island, +two miles below, there is a place where the water runs quieter, and a +BATEAU can cross from the main shore. Francois was frightened when the +others did not come back in the evening. He made his way around to St. +Joseph d'Alma, and got a boat to come up and look for their bodies. He +found them on the shore, alive and very hungry. But all that has nothing +to do with the story. + +Nor does it make any difference how Alden spent the rest of his summer +in the woods, what kind of fishing he had, or what moved him to leave +five hundred dollars with Jean when he went away. That is all padding: +leave it out. The first point of interest is what Jean did with the +money. A suit of clothes, a new stove, and a set of kitchen utensils for +the log house opposite Grosse Ile, a trip to Quebec, a little game of +"Blof Americain" in the back room of the Hotel du Nord,--that was the +end of the money. + +This is not a Sunday-school story. Jean was no saint. Even as a hero he +had his weak points. But after his own fashion he was a pretty good +kind of a marquis. He took his headache the next morning as a matter of +course, and his empty pocket as a trick of fortune. With the nobility, +he knew very well, such things often happen; but the nobility do not +complain about it. They go ahead, as if it was a bagatelle. + +Before the week was out Jean was on his way to a lumber-shanty on the +St. Maurice River, to cook for a crew of thirty men all winter. + +The cook's position in camp is curious,--half menial, half superior. It +is no place for a feeble man. But a cook who is strong in the back and +quick with his fists can make his office much respected. Wages, forty +dollars a month; duties, to keep the pea-soup kettle always hot and the +bread-pan always full, to stand the jokes of the camp up to a +certain point, and after that to whip two or three of the most active +humourists. + +Jean performed all his duties to perfect satisfaction. Naturally most of +the jokes turned upon his great expectations. With two of the +principal jokers he had exchanged the usual and conclusive form of +repartee,--flattened them out literally. The ordinary BADINAGE he did +not mind in the least; it rather pleased him. + +But about the first of January a new hand came into the camp,--a big, +black-haired fellow from Three Rivers, Pierre Lamotte DIT Theophile. +With him it was different. There seemed to be something serious in his +jests about "the marquis." It was not fun; it was mockery; always on the +edge of anger. He acted as if he would be glad to make Jean ridiculous +in any way. + +Finally the matter came to a head. Something happened to the soup one +Sunday morning--tobacco probably. Certainly it was very bad, only fit +to throw away; and the whole camp was mad. It was not really Pierre +who played the trick; but it was he who sneered that the camp would be +better off if the cook knew less about castles and more about cooking. +Jean answered that what the camp needed was to get rid of a badreux who +thought it was a joke to poison the soup. Pierre took this as a personal +allusion and requested him to discuss the question outside. But before +the discussion began he made some general remarks about the character +and pretensions of Jean. + +"A marquis!" said he. "This bagoulard gives himself out for a marquis! +He is nothing of the kind,--a rank humbug. There is a title in the +family, an estate in France, it is true. But it is mine. I have seen +the papers. I have paid money to the lawyer. I am waiting now for him +to arrange the matter. This man knows nothing about it. He is a fraud. I +will fight him now and settle the matter." + +If a bucket of ice-water had been thrown over Jean he could not have +cooled off more suddenly. He was dazed. Another marquis? This was +a complication he had never dreamed of. It overwhelmed him like an +avalanche. He must have time to dig himself out of this difficulty. + +"But stop," he cried; "you go too fast. This is more serious than a +pot of soup. I must hear about this. Let us talk first, Pierre, and +afterwards--" + +The camp was delighted. It was a fine comedy,--two fools instead of one. +The men pricked up their ears and clamoured for a full explanation, a +debate in open court. + +But that was not Jean's way. He had made no secret of his expectations, +but he did not care to confide all the details of his family history to +a crowd of fellows who would probably not understand and would certainly +laugh. Pierre was wrong of course, but at least he was in earnest. That +was something. + +"This affair is between Pierre and me," said Jean. "We shall speak of it +by ourselves." + +In the snow-muffled forest, that afternoon, where the great tree-trunks +rose like pillars of black granite from a marble floor, and the branches +of spruce and fir wove a dark green roof above their heads, these two +stray shoots of a noble stock tried to untangle their family history. +It was little that they knew about it. They could get back to their +grandfathers, but beyond that the trail was rather blind. Where they +crossed neither Jean nor Pierre could tell. In fact, both of their minds +had been empty vessels for the plausible lawyer to fill, and he had +filled them with various and windy stuff. There were discrepancies and +contradictions, denials and disputes, flashes of anger and clouds of +suspicion. + +But through all the voluble talk, somehow or other, the two men were +drawing closer together. Pierre felt Jean's force of character, his air +of natural leadership, his bonhommie. He thought, "It was a shame for +that lawyer to trick such a fine fellow with the story that he was +the heir of the family." Jean, for his part, was impressed by Pierre's +simplicity and firmness of conviction. He thought, "What a mean thing +for that lawyer to fool such an innocent as this into supposing himself +the inheritor of the title." What never occurred to either of them was +the idea that the lawyer had deceived them both. That was not to be +dreamed of. To admit such a thought would have seemed to them like +throwing away something of great value which they had just found. The +family name, the papers, the links of the genealogy which had been +so convincingly set forth,--all this had made an impression on their +imagination, stronger than any logical argument. But which was the +marquis? That was the question. + +"Look here," said Jean at last, "of what value is it that we fight? We +are cousins. You think I am wrong. I think you are wrong. But one of us +must be right. Who can tell? There will certainly be something for both +of us. Blood is stronger than currant juice. Let us work together and +help each other. You come home with me when this job is done. The +lawyer returns to St. Gedeon in the spring. He will know. We can see +him together. If he has fooled you, you can do what you like to him. +When--PARDON, I mean if--I get the title, I will do the fair thing by +you. You shall do the same by me. Is it a bargain?" + +On this basis the compact was made. The camp was much amazed, not to say +disgusted, because there was no fight. Well-meaning efforts were made at +intervals through the winter to bring on a crisis. But nothing came of +it. The rival claimants had pooled their stock. They acknowledged the +tie of blood, and ignored the clash of interests. Together they +faced the fire of jokes and stood off the crowd; Pierre frowning and +belligerent, Jean smiling and scornful. Practically, they bossed the +camp. They were the only men who always shaved on Sunday morning. This +was regarded as foppish. + +The popular disappointment deepened into a general sense of injury. In +March, when the cut of timber was finished and the logs were all hauled +to the edge of the river, to lie there until the ice should break and +the "drive" begin, the time arrived for the camp to close. The last +night, under the inspiration drawn from sundry bottles which had been +smuggled in to celebrate the occasion, a plan was concocted in the +stables to humble "the nobility" with a grand display of humour. Jean +was to be crowned as marquis with a bridle and blinders: + +Pierre was to be anointed as count, with a dipperful of harness-oil; +after that the fun would be impromptu. + +The impromptu part of the programme began earlier than it was +advertised. Some whisper of the plan had leaked through the chinks +of the wall between the shanty and the stable. When the crowd came +shambling into the cabin, snickering and nudging one another, Jean and +Pierre were standing by the stove at the upper end of the long table. + +"Down with the canaille!" shouted Jean. + +"Clean out the gang!" responded Pierre. + +Brandishing long-handled frying-pans, they charged down the sides of the +table. The mob wavered, turned, and were lost! Helter-skelter they +fled, tumbling over one another in their haste to escape. The lamp +was smashed. The benches were upset. In the smoky hall a furious din +arose,--as if Sir Galahad and Sir Percivale were once more hewing their +way through the castle of Carteloise. Fear fell upon the multitude, and +they cried aloud grievously in their dismay. The blows of the weapons +echoed mightily in the darkness, and the two knights laid about them +grimly and with great joy. The door was too narrow for the flight. Some +of the men crept under the lowest berths; others hid beneath the table. +Two, endeavouring to escape by the windows, stuck fast, exposing a +broad and undefended mark to the pursuers. Here the last strokes of the +conflict were delivered. + +"One for the marquis!" cried Jean, bringing down his weapon with a +sounding whack. + +"Two for the count!" cried Pierre, making his pan crack like the blow of +a beaver's tail when he dives. + +Then they went out into the snowy night, and sat down together on the +sill of the stable-door, and laughed until the tears ran down their +cheeks. + +"My faith!" said Jean. "That was like the ancient time. It is from the +good wood that strong paddles are made,--eh, cousin?" And after that +there was a friendship between the two men that could not have been cut +with the sharpest axe in Quebec. + + + + +III + +A HAPPY ENDING WHICH IS ALSO A BEGINNING + +The plan of going back to St. Gedeon, to wait for the return of the +lawyer, was not carried out. Several of the little gods that use their +own indiscretion in arranging the pieces on the puzzle-map of life, +interfered with it. + +The first to meddle was that highly irresponsible deity with the bow +and arrows, who has no respect for rank or age, but reserves all his +attention for sex. + +When the camp on the St. Maurice dissolved, Jean went down with Pierre +to Three Rivers for a short visit. There was a snug house on a high bank +above the river, a couple of miles from the town. A wife and an armful +of children gave assurance that the race of La Motte de la Luciere +should not die out on this side of the ocean. + +There was also a little sister-in-law, Alma Grenou. If you had seen her +you would not have wondered at what happened. Eyes like a deer, face +like a mayflower, voice like the "D" string in a 'cello,--she was the +picture of Drummond's girl in "The Habitant": + + + "She's nicer girl on whole Comte, an' jus' got eighteen year-- + Black eye, black hair, and cheek rosee dat's lak wan Fameuse + on de fall; + But don't spik much,--not of dat kin',--I can't say she love + me at all." + + +With her Jean plunged into love. It was not a gradual approach, like +gliding down a smooth stream. It was not a swift descent, like running a +lively rapid. It was a veritable plunge, like going over a chute. He did +not know precisely what had happened to him at first; but he knew very +soon what to do about it. + +The return to Lake St. John was postponed till a more convenient season: +after the snow had melted and the ice had broken up--probably the lawyer +would not make his visit before that. If he arrived sooner, he would +come back again; he wanted his money, that was certain. Besides, what +was more likely than that he should come also to see Pierre? He had +promised to do so. At all events, they would wait at Three Rivers for a +while. + +The first week Jean told Alma that she was the prettiest girl he had +ever seen. She tossed her head and expressed a conviction that he was +joking. She suggested that he was in the habit of saying the same thing +to every girl. + +The second week he made a long stride in his wooing. He took her out +sleighing on the last remnant of the snow,--very thin and bumpy,--and +utilized the occasion to put his arm around her waist. She cried +"Laisse-moi tranquille, Jean!" boxed his ears, and said she thought he +must be out of his mind. + +The following Saturday afternoon he craftily came behind her in the +stable as she was milking the cow, and bent her head back and kissed +her on the face. She began to cry, and said he had taken an unfair +advantage, while her hands were busy. She hated him. + +"Well, then," said he, still holding her warm shoulders, "if you hate +me, I am going home tomorrow." + +The sobs calmed down quickly. She bent herself forward so that he could +see the rosy nape of her neck with the curling tendrils of brown hair +around it. + +"But," she said, "but, Jean,--do you love me for sure?" + +After that the path was level, easy, and very quickly travelled. On +Sunday afternoon the priest was notified that his services would be +needed for a wedding, the first week in May. Pierre's consent was +genial and hilarious. The marriage suited him exactly. It was a family +alliance. It made everything move smooth and certain. The property would +be kept together. + +But the other little interfering gods had not yet been heard from. One +of them, who had special charge of what remained of the soul of the +dealer in unclaimed estates, put it into his head to go to Three Rivers +first, instead of to St. Gedeon. + +He had a good many clients in different parts of the country,--temporary +clients, of course,--and it occurred to him that he might as well +extract another fifty dollars from Pierre Lamotte DIT Theophile, before +going on a longer journey. On his way down from Montreal he stopped in +several small towns and slept in beds of various quality. + +Another of the little deities (the one that presides over unclean +villages; decidedly a false god, but sufficiently powerful) arranged a +surprise for the travelling lawyer. It came out at Three Rivers. + +He arrived about nightfall, and slept at the hotel, feeling curiously +depressed. The next morning he was worse; but he was a resolute and +industrious dog, after his own fashion. So he hired a buggy and drove +out through the mud to Pierre's place. They heard the wagon stop at the +gate, and went out to see who it was. + +The man was hardly recognizable: face pale, lips blue, eyes dull, teeth +chattering. + +"Get me out of this," he muttered. "I am dying. God's sake, be quick!" + +They helped him to the house, and he immediately went into a convulsion. +From this he passed into a raging fever. Pierre took the buggy and drove +posthaste to town for a doctor. + +The doctor's opinion was evidently serious, but his remarks were +non-committal. + +"Keep him in this room. Give him ten drops of this in water every hour. +One of these powders if he becomes violent. One of you must stay with +him all the time. Only one, you understand. The rest keep away. I will +come back in the morning." + +In the morning the doctor's face was yet more grave. He examined the +patient carefully. Then he turned to Jean, who had acted as nurse. + +"I thought so," said he; "you must all be vaccinated immediately. There +is still time, I hope. But what to do with this gentleman, God knows. We +can't send him back to the town. He has the small-pox." + +That was a pretty prelude to a wedding festival. They were all at their +wit's end. While the doctor scratched their arms, they discussed the +situation, excitedly and with desperation. Jean was the first to stop +chattering and begin to think. + +"There is that old cabane of Poulin's up the road. It is empty these +three years. But there is a good spring of water. One could patch the +roof at one end and put up a stove." + +"Good!" said the doctor. "But some one to take care of him? It will be a +long job, and a bad one." + +"I am going to do that," said Jean; "it is my place. This gentleman +cannot be left to die in the road. Le bon Dieu did not send him here for +that. The head of the family"--here he stopped a moment and looked at +Pierre, who was silent--"must take the heavy end of the job, and I am +ready for it." + +"Good!" said the doctor again. But Alma was crying in the corner of the +room. + +Four weeks, five weeks, six weeks the vigil in the cabane lasted. The +last patches of snow disappeared from the fields one night, as if winter +had picked up its rags and vanished. The willows along the brook turned +yellow; the grass greened around the spring. Scarlet buds flamed on the +swamp maples. A tender mist of foliage spread over the woodlands. The +chokecherries burst into a glory of white blossoms. The bluebirds came +back, fluting love-songs; and the robins, carolling ballads of joy; and +the blackbirds, creaking merrily. + +The priest came once and saw the sick man, but everything was going +well. It was not necessary to run any extra risks. Every week after that +he came and leaned on the fence, talking with Jean in the doorway. When +he went away he always lifted three fingers--so--you know the sign? It +is a very pleasant one, and it did Jean's heart good. + +Pierre kept the cabane well supplied with provisions, leaving them just +inside of the gate. But with the milk it was necessary to be a little +careful; so the can was kept in a place by itself, under the out-of-door +oven, in the shade. And beside this can Jean would find, every day, +something particular,--a blossom of the red geranium that bloomed in the +farmhouse window, a piece of cake with plums in it, a bunch of trailing +arbutus,--once it was a little bit of blue ribbon, tied in a certain +square knot--so--perhaps you know that sign too? That did Jean's heart +good also. + +But what kind of conversation was there in the cabane when the sick +man's delirium had passed and he knew what had happened to him? Not much +at first, for the man was too weak. After he began to get stronger, he +was thinking a great deal, fighting with himself. In the end he came out +pretty well--for a lawyer of his kind. Perhaps he was desirous to leave +the man whom he had deceived, and who had nursed him back from death, +some fragment, as much as possible, of the dream that brightened his +life. Perhaps he was only anxious to save as much as he could of his own +reputation. At all events, this is what he did. + +He told Jean a long story, part truth, part lie, about his +investigations. The estate and the title were in the family; that was +certain. Jean was the probable heir, if there was any heir; that was +almost sure. The part about Pierre had been a--well, a mistake. But +the trouble with the whole affair was this. A law made in the days of +Napoleon limited the time for which an estate could remain unclaimed. A +certain number of years, and then the government took everything. That +number of years had just passed. By the old law Jean was probably a +marquis with a castle. By the new law?--Frankly, he could not advise +a client to incur any more expense. In fact, he intended to return the +amount already paid. A hundred and ten dollars, was it not? Yes, and +fifty dollars for the six weeks of nursing. VOILA, a draft on Montreal, +a hundred and sixty dollars,--as good as gold! And beside that, there +was the incalculable debt for this great kindness to a sick man, for +which he would always be M. de la Motte's grateful debtor! + +The lawyer's pock-marked face--the scars still red and angry--lit +up with a curious mixed light of shrewdness and gratitude. Jean was +somewhat moved. His castle was in ruins. But he remained noble--by the +old law; that was something! + +A few days later the doctor pronounced it safe to move the patient. He +came with a carriage to fetch him. Jean, well fumigated and dressed in a +new suit of clothes, walked down the road beside them to the farm-house +gate. There Alma met him with both hands. His eyes embraced her. The +air of June was radiant about them. The fragrance of the woods breathed +itself over the broad valley. A song sparrow poured his heart out from +a blossoming lilac. The world was large, and free, and very good. And +between the lovers there was nothing but a little gate. + +"I understand," said the doctor, smiling, as he tightened up the reins, +"I understand that there is a title in your family, M. de la Motte, in +effect that you are a marquis?" + +"It is true," said Jean, turning his head, "at least so I think." + +"So do I," said the doctor "But you had better go in, MONSIEUR LE +MARQUIS--you keep MADAME LA MARQUISE waiting." + + + + +VIII. THE KEEPER OF THE LIGHT + +At long distance, looking over the blue waters of the Gulf of St. +Lawrence in clear weather, you might think that you saw a lonely +sea-gull, snow-white, perching motionless on a cobble of gray rock. +Then, as your boat drifted in, following the languid tide and the soft +southern breeze, you would perceive that the cobble of rock was a rugged +hill with a few bushes and stunted trees growing in the crevices, +and that the gleaming speck near the summit must be some kind of a +building--if you were on the coast of Italy or Spain you would say a +villa or a farm-house. Then, as you floated still farther north and +drew nearer to the coast, the desolate hill would detach itself from +the mainland and become a little mountain-isle, with a flock of smaller +islets clustering around it as a brood of wild ducks keep close to their +mother, and with deep water, nearly two miles wide, flowing between it +and the shore; while the shining speck on the seaward side stood out +clearly as a low, whitewashed dwelling with a sturdy round tower at one +end, crowned with a big eight-sided lantern--a solitary lighthouse. + +That is the Isle of the Wise Virgin. Behind it the long blue Laurentian +Mountains, clothed with unbroken forest, rise in sombre ranges toward +the Height of Land. In front of it the waters of the gulf heave and +sparkle far away to where the dim peaks of St. Anne des Monts are traced +along the southern horizon. Sheltered a little, but not completely, by +the island breakwater of granite, lies the rocky beach of Dead Men's +Point, where an English navy was wrecked in a night of storm a hundred +years ago. + +There are a score of wooden houses, a tiny, weather-beaten chapel, a +Hudson Bay Company's store, a row of platforms for drying fish, and a +varied assortment of boats and nets, strung along the beach now. Dead +Men's Point has developed into a centre of industry, with a life, a +tradition, a social character of its own. And in one of those houses, as +you sit at the door in the lingering June twilight, looking out across +the deep channel to where the lantern of the tower is just beginning +to glow with orange radiance above the shadow of the island--in that +far-away place, in that mystical hour, you should hear the story of the +light and its keeper. + + + + +I + +When the lighthouse was built, many years ago, the island had another +name. It was called the Isle of Birds. Thousands of sea-fowl nested +there. The handful of people who lived on the shore robbed the nests +and slaughtered the birds, with considerable profit. It was perceived in +advance that the building of the lighthouse would interfere with +this, and with other things. Hence it was not altogether a popular +improvement. Marcel Thibault, the oldest inhabitant, was the leader of +the opposition. + +"That lighthouse!" said he, "what good will it be for us? We know the +way in and out when it makes clear weather, by day or by night. But when +the sky gets swampy, when it makes fog, then we stay with ourselves at +home, or we run into La Trinite, or Pentecote. We know the way. What? +The stranger boats? B'EN! the stranger boats need not to come here, +if they know not the way. The more fish, the more seals, the more +everything will there be left for us. Just because of the stranger +boats, to build something that makes all the birds wild and spoils the +hunting--that is a fool's work. The good God made no stupid light on the +Isle of Birds. He saw no necessity of it." + +"Besides," continued Thibault, puffing slowly at his pipe, +"besides--those stranger boats, sometimes they are lost, they come +ashore. It is sad! But who gets the things that are saved, all sorts +of things, good to put into our houses, good to eat, good to sell, +sometimes a boat that can be patched up almost like new--who gets these +things, eh? Doubtless those for whom the good God intended them. But who +shall get them when this sacre lighthouse is built, eh? Tell me that, +you Baptiste Fortin." + +Fortin represented the party of progress in the little parliament of the +beach. He had come down from Quebec some years ago bringing with him a +wife and two little daughters, and a good many new notions about life. +He had good luck at the cod-fishing, and built a house with windows at +the side as well as in front. When his third girl, Nataline, was born, +he went so far as to paint the house red, and put on a kitchen, and +enclose a bit of ground for a yard. This marked him as a radical, an +innovator. It was expected that he would defend the building of the +lighthouse. And he did. + +"Monsieur Thibault," he said, "you talk well, but you talk too late. It +is of a past age, your talk. A new time comes to the Cote Nord. We +begin to civilize ourselves. To hold back against the light would be +our shame. Tell me this, Marcel Thibault, what men are they that love +darkness?" + +"TORRIEUX!" growled Thibault, "that is a little strong. You say my deeds +are evil?" + +"No, no," answered Fortin; "I say not that, my friend, but I say this +lighthouse means good: good for us, and good for all who come to this +coast. It will bring more trade to us. It will bring a boat with the +mail, with newspapers, perhaps once, perhaps twice a month, all through +the summer. It will bring us into the great world. To lose that for the +sake of a few birds--CA SERA B'EN DE VALEUR! Besides, it is impossible. +The lighthouse is coming, certain." + +Fortin was right, of course. But Thibault's position was not altogether +unnatural, nor unfamiliar. All over the world, for the past hundred +years, people have been kicking against the sharpness of the pricks that +drove them forward out of the old life, the wild life, the free life, +grown dear to them because it was so easy. There has been a terrible +interference with bird-nesting and other things. All over the world the +great Something that bridges rivers, and tunnels mountains, and fells +forests, and populates deserts, and opens up the hidden corners of the +earth, has been pushing steadily on; and the people who like things +to remain as they are have had to give up a great deal. There was no +exception made in favour of Dead Men's Point. The Isle of Birds lay in +the line of progress. The lighthouse arrived. + +It was a very good house for that day. The keeper's dwelling had three +rooms and was solidly built. The tower was thirty feet high. The lantern +held a revolving light, with a four-wick Fresnel lamp, burning sperm +oil. There was one of Stevenson's new cages of dioptric prisms around +the flame, and once every minute it was turned by clockwork, flashing a +broad belt of radiance fifteen miles across the sea. All night long that +big bright eye was opening and shutting. "BAGUETTE!" said Thibault, "it +winks like a one-eyed Windigo." + +The Department of Marine and Fisheries sent down an expert from Quebec +to keep the light in order and run it for the first summer. He +took Fortin as his assistant. By the end of August he reported to +headquarters that the light was all right, and that Fortin was qualified +to be appointed keeper. Before October was out the certificate of +appointment came back, and the expert packed his bag to go up the river. + +"Now look here, Fortin," said he, "this is no fishing trip. Do you think +you are up to this job?" + +"I suppose," said Fortin. + +"Well now, do you remember all this business about the machinery that +turns the lenses? That 's the main thing. The bearings must be kept well +oiled, and the weight must never get out of order. The clock-face will +tell you when it is running right. If anything gets hitched up here's +the crank to keep it going until you can straighten the machine again. +It's easy enough to turn it. But you must never let it stop between dark +and daylight. The regular turn once a minute--that's the mark of this +light. If it shines steady it might as well be out. Yes, better! Any +vessel coming along here in a dirty night and seeing a fixed light would +take it for the Cap Loup-Marin and run ashore. This particular light has +got to revolve once a minute every night from April first to December +tenth, certain. Can you do it?" + +"Certain," said Fortin. + +"That's the way I like to hear a man talk! Now, you've got oil enough to +last you through till the tenth of December, when you close the light, +and to run on for a month in the spring after you open again. The ice +may be late in going out and perhaps the supply-boat can't get down +before the middle of April, or thereabouts. But she'll bring plenty of +oil when she comes, so you'll be all right." + +"All right," said Fortin. + +"Well, I've said it all, I guess. You understand what you've got to do? +Good-by and good luck. You're the keeper of the light now." + +"Good luck," said Fortin, "I am going to keep it." The same day he shut +up the red house on the beach and moved to the white house on the island +with Marie-Anne, his wife, and the three girls, Alma, aged seventeen, +Azilda, aged fifteen, and Nataline, aged thirteen. He was the captain, +and Marie-Anne was the mate, and the three girls were the crew. They +were all as full of happy pride as if they had come into possession of a +great fortune. + +It was the thirty-first day of October. A snow-shower had silvered the +island. The afternoon was clear and beautiful. As the sun sloped toward +the rose-coloured hills of the mainland the whole family stood out in +front of the lighthouse looking up at the tower. + +"Regard him well, my children," said Baptiste; "God has given him to us +to keep, and to keep us. Thibault says he is a Windigo. B'EN! We shall +see that he is a friendly Windigo. Every minute all the night he +shall wink, just for kindness and good luck to all the world, till the +daylight." + + + + +II + +On the ninth of November, at three o'clock in the afternoon, Baptiste +went into the tower to see that the clockwork was in order for the +night. He set the dial on the machine, put a few drops of oil on the +bearings of the cylinder, and started to wind up the weight. + +It rose a few inches, gave a dull click, and then stopped dead. He +tugged a little harder, but it would not move. Then he tried to let it +down. He pushed at the lever that set the clockwork in motion. + +He might as well have tried to make the island turn around by pushing at +one of the little spruce trees that clung to the rock. + +Then it dawned fearfully upon him that something must be wrong. +Trembling with anxiety, he climbed up and peered in among the wheels. + +The escapement wheel was cracked clean through, as if some one had +struck it with the head of an axe, and one of the pallets of the spindle +was stuck fast in the crack. He could knock it out easily enough, but +when the crack came around again, the pallet would catch and the clock +would stop once more. It was a fatal injury. + +Baptiste turned white, then red, gripped his head in his hands, and ran +down the steps, out of the door, straight toward his canoe, which was +pulled up on the western side of the island. + +"DAME!" he cried, "who has done this? Let me catch him! If that old +Thibault--" + +As he leaped down the rocky slope the setting sun gleamed straight in +his eyes. It was poised like a ball of fire on the very edge of the +mountains. Five minutes more and it would be gone. Fifteen minutes more +and darkness would close in. Then the giant's eye must begin to glow, +and to wink precisely once a minute all night long. If not, what became +of the keeper's word, his faith, his honour? + +No matter how the injury to the clockwork was done. No matter who was +to be blamed or punished for it. That could wait. The question now was +whether the light would fail or not. And it must be answered within a +quarter of an hour. + +That red ray of the vanishing sun was like a blow in the face to +Baptiste. It stopped him short, dazed and bewildered. Then he came to +himself, wheeled, and ran up the rocks faster than he had come down. + +"Marie-Anne! Alma!" he shouted, as he dashed past the door of the house, +"all of you! To me, in the tower!" + +He was up in the lantern when they came running in, full of curiosity, +excited, asking twenty questions at once. Nataline climbed up the ladder +and put her head through the trap-door. + +"What is it?" she panted. "What has hap--" + +"Go down," answered her father, "go down all at once. Wait for me. I am +coming. I will explain." + +The explanation was not altogether lucid and scientific. There were some +bad words mixed up with it. + +Baptiste was still hot with anger and the unsatisfied desire to whip +somebody, he did not know whom, for something, he did not know what. +But angry as he was, he was still sane enough to hold his mind hard and +close to the main point. The crank must be adjusted; the machine must be +ready to turn before dark. While he worked he hastily made the situation +clear to his listeners. + +That crank must be turned by hand, round and round all night, not too +slow, not too fast. The dial on the machine must mark time with +the clock on the wall. The light must flash once every minute until +daybreak. He would do as much of the labour as he could, but the wife +and the two older girls must help him. Nataline could go to bed. + +At this Nataline's short upper lip trembled. She rubbed her eyes with +the sleeve of her dress, and began to weep silently. + +"What is the matter with you?" said her mother, "bad child, have you +fear to sleep alone? A big girl like you!" + +"No," she sobbed, "I have no fear, but I want some of the fun." + +"Fun!" growled her father. "What fun? NOM D'UN CHIEN! She calls this +fun!" He looked at her for a moment, as she stood there, half defiant, +half despondent, with her red mouth quivering and her big brown eyes +sparkling fire; then he burst into a hearty laugh. + +"Come here, my little wild-cat," he said, drawing her to him and kissing +her; "you are a good girl after all. I suppose you think this light is +part yours, eh?" + +The girl nodded. + +"B'EN! You shall have your share, fun and all. You shall make the tea +for us and bring us something to eat. Perhaps when Alma and 'Zilda +fatigue themselves they will permit a few turns of the crank to you. Are +you content? Run now and boil the kettle." + +It was a very long night. No matter how easily a handle turns, after +a certain number of revolutions there is a stiffness about it. The +stiffness is not in the handle, but in the hand that pushes it. + +Round and round, evenly, steadily, minute after minute, hour after hour, +shoving out, drawing in, circle after circle, no swerving, no stopping, +no varying the motion, turn after turn--fifty-five, fifty-six, +fifty-seven--what's the use of counting? Watch the dial; go to +sleep--no! for God's sake, no sleep! But how hard it is to keep awake! +How heavy the arm grows, how stiffly the muscles move, how the will +creaks and groans. BATISCAN! It is not easy for a human being to become +part of a machine. + +Fortin himself took the longest spell at the crank, of course. He went +at his work with a rigid courage. His red-hot anger had cooled down into +a shape that was like a bar of forged steel. He meant to make that light +revolve if it killed him to do it. He was the captain of a company that +had run into an ambuscade. He was going to fight his way through if he +had to fight alone. + +The wife and the two older girls followed him blindly and bravely, in +the habit of sheer obedience. They did not quite understand the meaning +of the task, the honour of victory, the shame of defeat. But Fortin said +it must be done, and he knew best. So they took their places in turn, as +he grew weary, and kept the light flashing. + +And Nataline--well, there is no way of describing what Nataline did, +except to say that she played the fife. + +She felt the contest just as her father did, not as deeply, perhaps, but +in the same spirit. She went into the fight with darkness like a little +soldier. And she played the fife. + +When she came up from the kitchen with the smoking pail of tea, she +rapped on the door and called out to know whether the Windigo was at +home to-night. + +She ran in and out of the place like a squirrel. She looked up at the +light and laughed. Then she ran in and reported. "He winks," she said, +"old one-eye winks beautifully. Keep him going. My turn now!" + +She refused to be put off with a shorter spell than the other girls. +"No," she cried, "I can do it as well as you. You think you are so much +older. Well, what of that? The light is part mine; father said so. Let +me turn, va-t-en." + +When the first glimmer of the little day came shivering along the +eastern horizon, Nataline was at the crank. The mother and the two older +girls were half asleep. Baptiste stepped out to look at the sky. "Come," +he cried, returning. "We can stop now, it is growing gray in the east, +almost morning." + +"But not yet," said Nataline; "we must wait for the first red. A few +more turns. Let's finish it up with a song." + +She shook her head and piped up the refrain of the old Canadian chanson: + + + "En roulant ma boule-le roulant + En roulant ma bou-le." + + +And to that cheerful music the first night's battle was carried through +to victory. + +The next day Fortin spent two hours in trying to repair the clockwork. +It was of no use. The broken part was indispensable and could not be +replaced. + +At noon he went over to the mainland to tell of the disaster, and +perhaps to find out if any hostile hand was responsible for it. He found +out nothing. Every one denied all knowledge of the accident. Perhaps +there was a flaw in the wheel; perhaps it had broken itself. That was +possible. Fortin could not deny it; but the thing that hurt him most was +that he got so little sympathy. Nobody seemed to care whether the light +was kept burning or not. When he told them how the machine had been +turned all night by hand, they were astonished. "CRE-IE!" they cried, +"you must have had a great misery to do that." But that he proposed to +go on doing it for a month longer, until December tenth, and to begin +again on April first, and go on turning the light by hand for three +or four weeks more until the supply-boat came down and brought the +necessary tools to repair the machine--such an idea as this went beyond +their horizon. + +"But you are crazy, Baptiste," they said, "you can never do it; you are +not capable." + +"I would be crazy," he answered, "if I did not see what I must do. That +light is my charge. In all the world there is nothing else so great as +that for me and for my family--you understand? For us it is the chief +thing. It is my Ten Commandments. I shall keep it or be damned." + +There was a silence after this remark. They were not very particular +about the use of language at Dead Men's Point, but this shocked them +a little. They thought that Fortin was swearing a shade too hard. In +reality he was never more reverent, never more soberly in earnest. + +After a while he continued, "I want some one to help me with the work +on the island. We must be up all the nights now. By day we must get some +sleep. I want another man or a strong boy. Is there any who will come? +The Government will pay. Or if not, I will pay, moi-meme." + +There was no response. All the men hung back. The lighthouse was still +unpopular, or at least it was on trial. Fortin's pluck and resolution +had undoubtedly impressed them a little. But they still hesitated to +commit themselves to his side. + +"B'en," he said, "there is no one. Then we shall manage the affair en +famille. Bon soir, messieurs!" + +He walked down to the beach with his head in the air, without looking +back. But before he had his canoe in the water he heard some one running +down behind him. It was Thibault's youngest son, Marcel, a well-grown +boy of sixteen, very much out of breath with running and shyness. + +"Monsieur Fortin," he stammered, "will you--do you think--am I big +enough?" + +Baptiste looked him in the face for a moment. Then his eyes twinkled. + +"Certain," he answered, "you are bigger than your father. But what will +he say to this?" + +"He says," blurted out Marcel--"well, he says that he will say nothing +if I do not ask him." + +So the little Marcel was enlisted in the crew on the island. For thirty +nights those six people--a man, and a boy, and four women (Nataline was +not going to submit to any distinctions on the score of age, you may be +sure)--for a full month they turned their flashing lantern by hand from +dusk to day-break. + +The fog, the frost, the hail, the snow beleaguered their tower. Hunger +and cold, sleeplessness and weariness, pain and discouragement, held +rendezvous in that dismal, cramped little room. Many a night Nataline's +fife of fun played a feeble, wheezy note. But it played. And the crank +went round. And every bit of glass in the lantern was as clear as +polished crystal. And the big lamp was full of oil. And the great eye +of the friendly giant winked without ceasing, through fierce storm and +placid moonlight. + +When the tenth of December came, the light went to sleep for the winter, +and the keepers took their way across the ice to the mainland. They had +won the battle, not only on the island, fighting against the elements, +but also at Dead Men's Point, against public opinion. The inhabitants +began to understand that the lighthouse meant something--a law, an +order, a principle. + +Men cannot help feeling respect for a thing when they see others willing +to fight or to suffer for it. + +When the time arrived to kindle the light again in the spring, Fortin +could have had any one that he wanted to help him. But no; he chose the +little Marcel again; the boy wanted to go, and he had earned the right. +Besides, he and Nataline had struck up a close friendship on the island, +cemented during the winter by various hunting excursions after hares and +ptarmigan. Marcel was a skilful setter of snares. But Nataline was not +content until she had won consent to borrow her father's CARABINE. They +hunted in partnership. One day they had shot a fox. That is, Nataline +had shot it, though Marcel had seen it first and tracked it. Now they +wanted to try for a seal on the point of the island when the ice went +out. It was quite essential that Marcel should go. + +"Besides," said Baptiste to his wife, confidentially, "a boy costs less +than a man. Why should we waste money? Marcel is best." + +A peasant-hero is seldom averse to economy in small things, like money. + +But there was not much play in the spring session with the light on the +island. It was a bitter job. December had been lamb-like compared with +April. First, the southeast wind kept the ice driving in along the +shore. Then the northwest wind came hurtling down from the Arctic +wilderness like a pack of wolves. There was a snow-storm of four days +and nights that made the whole world--earth and sky and sea--look like a +crazy white chaos. And through it all, that weary, dogged crank must be +kept turning--turning from dark to daylight. + +It seemed as if the supply-boat would never come. At last they saw it, +one fair afternoon, April the twenty-ninth, creeping slowly down the +coast. They were just getting ready for another night's work. + +Fortin ran out of the tower, took off his hat, and began to say his +prayers. The wife and the two elder girls stood in the kitchen door, +crossing themselves, with tears in their eyes. Marcel and Nataline were +coming up from the point of the island, where they had been watching for +their seal. She was singing + + + "Mon pere n'avait fille que moi, + Encore sur la mer il m'envoi-e-eh!" + + +When she saw the boat she stopped short for a minute. + +"Well," she said, "they find us awake, n'est-c'pas? And if they don't +come faster than that we'll have another chance to show them how we make +the light wink, eh?" + +Then she went on with her song-- + + "Sautez, mignonne, Cecilia. + Ah, ah, ah, ah, Cecilia!" + + + + +III + +You did not suppose that was the end of the story, did you? + +No, an out-of-doors story does not end like that, broken off in the +middle, with a bit of a song. It goes on to something definite, like a +wedding or a funeral. + +You have not heard, yet, how near the light came to failing, and how the +keeper saved it and something else too. Nataline's story is not told; it +is only begun. This first part is only the introduction, just to let you +see what kind of a girl she was, and how her life was made. If you want +to hear the conclusion, we must hurry along a little faster or we shall +never get to it. + +Nataline grew up like a young birch tree--stately and strong, good to +look at. She was beautiful in her place; she fitted it exactly. Her +bronzed face with an under-tinge of red; her low, black eyebrows; her +clear eyes like the brown waters of a woodland stream; her dark, curly +hair with little tendrils always blowing loose around the pillar of her +neck; her broad breast and sloping shoulders; her firm, fearless step; +her voice, rich and vibrant; her straight, steady looks--but there, +who can describe a thing like that? I tell you she was a girl to love +out-of-doors. + +There was nothing that she could not do. She could cook; she could swing +an axe; she could paddle a canoe; she could fish; she could shoot; and, +best of all, she could run the lighthouse. Her father's devotion to it +had gone into her blood. It was the centre of her life, her law of God. +There was nothing about it that she did not understand and love. From +the first of April to the tenth of December the flashing of that light +was like the beating of her heart--steady, even, unfaltering. She kept +time to it as unconsciously as the tides follow the moon. She lived by +it and for it. + +There were no more accidents to the clockwork after the first one was +repaired. It ran on regularly, year after year. + +Alma and Azilda were married and went away to live, one on the South +Shore, the other at Quebec. Nataline was her father's right-hand man. As +the rheumatism took hold of him and lamed his shoulders and wrists, more +and more of the work fell upon her. She was proud of it. + +At last it came to pass, one day in January, that Baptiste died. He was +not gathered to his fathers, for they were buried far away beside the +Montmorenci, and on the rocky coast of Brittany. But the men dug through +the snow behind the tiny chapel at Dead Men's Point, and made a grave +for Baptiste Fortin, and the young priest of the mission read the +funeral service over it. + +It went without saying that Nataline was to be the keeper of the light, +at least until the supply-boat came down again in the spring and orders +arrived from the Government in Quebec. Why not? She was a woman, it is +true. But if a woman can do a thing as well as a man, why should she not +do it? Besides, Nataline could do this particular thing much better +than any man on the Point. Everybody approved of her as the heir of her +father, especially young Marcel Thibault. + +What? + +Yes, of course. You could not help guessing it. He was Nataline's lover. +They were to be married the next summer. They sat together in the best +room, while the old mother was rocking to and fro and knitting beside +the kitchen stove, and talked of what they were going to do. Once in a +while, when Nataline grieved for her father, she would let Marcel put +his arm around her and comfort her in the way that lovers know. But +their talk was mainly of the future, because they were young, and of the +light, because Nataline's life belonged to it. + +Perhaps the Government would remember that year when it was kept going +by hand for two months, and give it to her to keep as long as she lived. +That would be only fair. Certainly, it was hers for the present. No one +had as good a right to it. She took possession without a doubt. At all +events, while she was the keeper the light should not fail. + +But that winter was a bad one on the North Shore, and particularly at +Dead Men's Point. It was terribly bad. The summer before, the fishing +had been almost a dead failure. In June a wild storm had smashed all +the salmon nets and swept most of them away. In July they could find no +caplin for bait for the cod-fishing, and in August and September +they could find no cod. The few bushels of potatoes that some of the +inhabitants had planted, rotted in the ground. The people at the Point +went into the winter short of money and very short of food. + +There were some supplies at the store, pork and flour and molasses, +and they could run through the year on credit and pay their debts the +following summer if the fish came back. But this resource also failed +them. In the last week of January the store caught fire and burned up. +Nothing was saved. The only hope now was the seal-hunting in February +and March and April. That at least would bring them meat and oil enough +to keep them from starvation. + +But this hope failed, too. The winds blew strong from the north and +west, driving the ice far out into the gulf. The chase was long and +perilous. The seals were few and wild. Less than a dozen were killed in +all. By the last week in March Dead Men's Point stood face to face with +famine. + +Then it was that old Thibault had an idea. + +"There is sperm oil on the Island of Birds," said he, "in the +lighthouse, plenty of it, gallons of it. It is not very good to taste, +perhaps, but what of that? It will keep life in the body. The Esquimaux +drink it in the north, often. We must take the oil of the lighthouse to +keep us from starving until the supply-boat comes down." + +"But how shall we get it?" asked the others. "It is locked up. Nataline +Fortin has the key. Will she give it?" + +"Give it?" growled Thibault. "Name of a name! of course she will give +it. She must. Is not a life, the life of all of us, more than a light?" + +A self-appointed committee of three, with Thibault at the head, waited +upon Nataline without delay, told her their plan, and asked for the +key. She thought it over silently for a few minutes, and then refused +point-blank. + +"No," she said, "I will not give the key. That oil is for the lamp. If +you take it, the lamp will not be lighted on the first of April; it will +not be burning when the supply-boat comes. For me, that would be shame, +disgrace, worse than death. I am the keeper of the light. You shall not +have the oil." + +They argued with her, pleaded with her, tried to browbeat her. She was +a rock. Her round under-jaw was set like a steel trap. Her lips +straightened into a white line. Her eyebrows drew together, and her eyes +grew black. + +"No," she cried, "I tell you no, no, a thousand times no. All in this +house I will share with you. But not one drop of what belongs to the +light! Never." + +Later in the afternoon the priest came to see her; a thin, pale young +man, bent with the hardships of his life, and with sad dreams in his +sunken eyes. He talked with her very gently and kindly. + +"Think well, my daughter; think seriously what you do. Is it not our +first duty to save human life? Surely that must be according to the will +of God. Will you refuse to obey it?" + +Nataline was trembling a little now. Her brows were unlocked. The tears +stood in her eyes and ran down her cheeks. She was twisting her hands +together. + +"My father," she answered, "I desire to do the will of God. But how +shall I know it? Is it not His first command that we should love and +serve Him faithfully in the duty which He has given us? He gave me this +light to keep. My father kept it. He is dead. If I am unfaithful what +will he say to me? Besides, the supply-boat is coming soon--I have +thought of this--when it comes it will bring food. But if the light is +out, the boat may be lost. That would be the punishment for my sin. No, +MON PERE, we must trust God. He will keep the people. I will keep the +light."' + +The priest looked at her long and steadily. A glow came into his face. +He put his hand on her shoulder. "You shall follow your conscience," he +said quietly. "Peace be with you, Nataline." + +That evening just at dark Marcel came. She let him take her in his arms +and kiss her. She felt like a little child, tired and weak. + +"Well," he whispered, "you have done bravely, sweetheart. You were right +not to give the key. That would have been a shame to you. But it is all +settled now. They will have the oil without your fault. To-night they +are going out to the lighthouse to break in and take what they want. You +need not know. There will be no blame--" + +She straightened in his arms as if an electric shock had passed through +her. She sprang back, blazing with anger. + +"What?" she cried, "me a thief by round-about,--with my hand behind my +back and my eyes shut? Never. Do you think I care only for the blame? I +tell you that is nothing. My light shall not be robbed, never, never!" + +She came close to him and took him by the shoulders. Their eyes were on +a level. He was a strong man, but she was the stronger then. + +"Marcel Thibault," she said, "do you love me?" + +"My faith," he gasped, "I do. You know I do." + +"Then listen," she continued; "this is what you are going to do. You are +going down to the shore at once to make ready the big canoe. I am going +to get food enough to last us for the month. It will be a hard pinch, +but it will do. Then we are going out to the island to-night, in less +than an hour. Day after to-morrow is the first of April. Then we shall +light the lantern, and it shall burn every night until the boat comes +down. You hear? Now go: and be quick and bring your gun." + + + + +IV + +They pushed off in the black darkness, among the fragments of ice that +lay along the shore. They crossed the strait in silence, and hid their +canoe among the rocks on the island. They carried their stuff up to the +house and locked it in the kitchen. Then they unlocked the tower, and +went in, Marcel with his shot-gun, and Nataline with her father's old +carabine. They fastened the door again, and bolted it, and sat down in +the dark to wait. + +Presently they heard the grating of the prow of the barge on the stones +below, the steps of men stumbling up the steep path, and voices mingled +in confused talk. The glimmer of a couple of lanterns went bobbing in +and out among the rocks and bushes. There was a little crowd of eight or +ten men, and they came on carelessly, chattering and laughing. Three of +them carried axes, and three others a heavy log of wood which they had +picked up on their way. + +"The log is better than the axes," said one; "take it in your hands this +way, two of you on one side, another on the opposite side in the middle. +Then swing it back and forwards and let it go. The door will come down, +I tell you, like a sheet of paper. But wait till I give the word, then +swing hard. One--two--" + +"Stop!" cried Nataline, throwing open the little window. "If you dare to +touch that door, I shoot." + +She thrust out the barrel of the rifle, and Marcel's shot-gun appeared +beside it. The old rifle was not loaded, but who knew that? Besides, +both barrels of the shot-gun were full. + +There was amazement in the crowd outside the tower, and consternation, +and then anger. + +"Marcel," they shouted, "you there? MAUDIT POLISSON! Come out of that. +Let us in. You told us--" + +"I know," answered Marcel, "but I was mistaken, that is all. I stand by +Mademoiselle Fortin. What she says is right. If any man tries to break +in here, we kill him. No more talk!" + +The gang muttered; cursed; threatened; looked at the guns; and went off +to their boat. + +"It is murder that you will do," one of them called out, "you are a +murderess, you Mademoiselle Fortin! you cause the people to die of +hunger!" + +"Not I," she answered; "that is as the good God pleases. No matter. The +light shall burn." + +They heard the babble of the men as they stumbled down the hill; the +grinding of the boat on the rocks as they shoved off; the rattle of the +oars in the rowlocks. After that the island was as still as a graveyard. + +Then Nataline sat down on the floor in the dark, and put her face in +her hands, and cried. Marcel tried to comfort her. She took his hand and +pushed it gently away from her waist. + +"No, Marcel," she said, "not now! Not that, please, Marcel! Come into +the house. I want to talk with you." + +They went into the cold, dark kitchen, lit a candle and kindled a fire +in the stove. Nataline busied herself with a score of things. She put +away the poor little store of provisions, sent Marcel for a pail of +water, made some tea, spread the table, and sat down opposite to him. +For a time she kept her eyes turned away from him, while she talked +about all sorts of things. Then she fell silent for a little, still not +looking at him. She got up and moved about the room, arranged two or +three packages on the shelves, shut the damper of the stove, glancing at +Marcel's back out of the corners of her eyes. Then she came back to her +chair, pushed her cup aside, rested both elbows on the table and her +chin in her hands, and looked Marcel square in the face with her clear +brown eyes. + +"My friend," she said, "are you an honest man, un brave garcon?" + +For an instant he could say nothing. He was so puzzled. "Why yes, +Nataline," he answered, "yes, surely--I hope." + +"Then let me speak to you without fear," she continued. "You do not +suppose that I am ignorant of what I have done this night. I am not a +baby. You are a man. I am a girl. We are shut up alone in this house for +two weeks, a month, God knows how long. You know what that means, what +people will say. I have risked all that a girl has most precious. I have +put my good name in your hands." + +Marcel tried to speak, but she stopped him. + +"Let me finish. It is not easy to say. I know you are honourable. +I trust you waking and sleeping. But I am a woman. There must be no +love-making. We have other work to do. The light must not fail. You will +not touch me, you will not embrace me--not once--till after the boat has +come. Then"--she smiled at him like a sunburned angel--"well, is it a +bargain?" + +She put out one hand across the table. Marcel took it in both of his +own. He did not kiss it. He lifted it up in front of his face. + +"I swear to you, Nataline, you shall be to me as the Blessed Virgin +herself." + +The next day they put the light in order, and the following night they +kindled it. They still feared another attack from the mainland, and +thought it needful that one of them should be on guard all the time, +though the machine itself was working beautifully and needed little +watching. Nataline took the night duty; it was her own choice; she loved +the charge of the lamp. Marcel was on duty through the day. They were +together for three or four hours in the morning and in the evening. + +It was not a desperate vigil like that affair with the broken clockwork +eight years before. There was no weary turning of the crank. There was +just enough work to do about the house and the tower to keep them busy. +The weather was fair. The worst thing was the short supply of food. +But though they were hungry, they were not starving. And Nataline still +played the fife. She jested, she sang, she told long fairy stories while +they sat in the kitchen. Marcel admitted that it was not at all a bad +arrangement. + +But his thoughts turned very often to the arrival of the supply-boat. +He hoped it would not be late. The ice was well broken up already and +driven far out into the gulf. The boat ought to be able to run down the +shore in good time. + +One evening as Nataline came down from her sleep she saw Marcel coming +up the rocks dragging a young seal behind him. + +"Hurra!" he shouted, "here is plenty of meat. I shot it out at the end +of the island, about an hour ago." + +But Nataline said that they did not need the seal. There was still food +enough in the larder. On shore there must be greater need. Marcel must +take the seal over to the mainland that night and leave it on the beach +near the priest's house. He grumbled a little, but he did it. + +That was on the twenty-third of April. The clear sky held for three +days longer, calm, bright, halcyon weather. On the afternoon of the +twenty-seventh the clouds came down from the north, not a long furious +tempest, but a brief, sharp storm, with considerable wind and a +whirling, blinding fall of April snow. It was a bad night for boats at +sea, confusing, bewildering, a night when the lighthouse had to do its +best. Nataline was in the tower all night, tending the lamp, watching +the clockwork. Once it seemed to her that the lantern was so covered +with snow that light could not shine through. She got her long brush +and scraped the snow away. It was cold work, but she gloried in it. The +bright eye of the tower, winking, winking steadily through the storm +seemed to be the sign of her power in the world. It was hers. She kept +it shining. + +When morning came the wind was still blowing fitfully off shore, but +the snow had almost ceased. Nataline stopped the clockwork, and was just +climbing up into the lantern to put out the lamp, when Marcel's voice +hailed her. + +"Come down, Nataline, come down quick. Make haste!" + +She turned and hurried out, not knowing what was to come; perhaps a +message of trouble from the mainland, perhaps a new assault on the +lighthouse. + +As she came out of the tower, her brown eyes heavy from the night-watch, +her dark face pale from the cold, she saw Marcel standing on the rocky +knoll beside the house and pointing shoreward. + +She ran up beside him and looked. There, in the deep water between the +island and the point, lay the supply-boat, rocking quietly on the waves. + +It flashed upon her in a moment what it meant--the end of her fight, +relief for the village, victory! And the light that had guided the +little ship safe through the stormy night into the harbour was hers. + +She turned and looked up at the lamp, still burning. + +"I kept you!" she cried. + +Then she turned to Marcel; the colour rose quickly in her cheeks, the +light sparkled in her eyes; she smiled, and held out both her hands, +whispering, "Now you shall keep me!" + +There was a fine wedding on the last day of April, and from that time +the island took its new name,--the Isle of the Wise Virgin. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Ruling Passion, by Henry van Dyke + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RULING PASSION *** + +***** This file should be named 1048.txt or 1048.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/4/1048/ + +Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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