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diff --git a/16716.txt b/16716.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..817a861 --- /dev/null +++ b/16716.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1178 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Going of the White Swan, by Gilbert Parker + +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 Going of the White Swan + +Author: Gilbert Parker + +Release Date: September 18, 2005 [EBook #16716] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GOING OF THE WHITE SWAN *** + + + + +Produced by Janet Keller, Janet Blenkinship and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + +THE GOING OF THE WHITE SWAN + +[Illustration] + +[Illustration] + +[Illustration: "'No, no--this!' the priest said." (p 56)] + + + + + THE GOING OF THE WHITE SWAN + + BY + + GILBERT PARKER + + [Illustration] + + NEW YORK + D. APPLETON AND COMPANY + MCMXII + + [Illustration] + + Copyright, 1912, by + + GILBERT PARKER + + Copyright, 1895, by Charles Scribner's Sons + Copyright, 1895, by Stone and Kimball + Copyright, 1898, by The Macmillan Company + + [Illustration] + + + + +THE GOING OF THE WHITE SWAN + + + + +[Illustration] + +I + + +"Why don't she come back, father?" + +The man shook his head, his hand fumbled with the wolfskin robe covering +the child, and he made no reply. + +"She'd come if she knew I was hurted, wouldn't she?" + +The father nodded, and then turned restlessly toward the door, as though +expecting some one. The look was troubled, and the pipe he held was not +alight, though he made a pretense of smoking. + +"Suppose the wildcat had got me, she'd be sorry when she comes, wouldn't +she?" + +There was no reply yet, save by gesture, the language of primitive man; +but the big body shivered a little, and the uncouth hand felt for a +place in the bed where the lad's knee made a lump under the robe. He +felt the little heap tenderly, but the child winced. + +"S-sh, but that hurts! This wolfskin's most too much on me, isn't it, +father?" + +The man softly, yet awkwardly, lifted the robe, folded it back, and +slowly uncovered the knee. The leg was worn away almost to skin and +bone, but the knee itself was swollen with inflammation. He bathed it +with some water, mixed with vinegar and herbs, then drew down the +deer-skin shirt, and did the same with the child's shoulder. Both +shoulder and knee bore the marks of teeth,--where a huge wildcat had +made havoc--and the body had long red scratches. + +Presently the man shook his head sorrowfully, and covered up the small +disfigured frame again, but this time with a tanned skin of the caribou. +The flames of the huge wood-fire dashed the walls and floor with a +velvety red and black, and the large iron kettle, bought of the Company +at Fort Sacrament, puffed out geysers of steam. + +The place was a low hut with parchment windows and rough mud-mortar +lumped between the logs. Skins hung along two sides, with bullet-holes +and knife-holes showing: of the great gray wolf, the red puma, the +bronze hill-lion, the beaver, the bear, and the sable; and in one corner +was a huge pile of them. Bare of the usual comforts as the room was, it +had a sort of refinement also, joined to an inexpressible loneliness, +you could scarce have told how or why. + +"Father," said the boy, his face pinched with pain for a moment, "it +hurts so, all over, every once in a while." + +His fingers caressed the leg just below the knee. + +"Father," he suddenly added, "what does it mean when you hear a bird +sing in the middle of the night?" + +The woodsman looked down anxiously into the boy's face. "It hasn't no +meaning, Dominique. There ain't such a thing on the Labrador Heights as +a bird singin' in the night. That's only in warm countries where there's +nightingales. So--_bien sur!_" + +The boy had a wise, dreamy, speculative look. + +"Well, I guess it was a nightingale--it didn't sing like any I ever +heard." + +The look of nervousness deepened in the woodman's face. "What did it +sing like, Dominique?" + +"So it made you shiver. You wanted it to go on, and yet you didn't want +it. It was pretty, but you felt as if something was going to snap inside +of you." + +"When did you hear it, my son?" + +"Twice last night--and--and I guess it was Sunday the other time. I +don't know, for there hasn't been no Sunday up here since mother went +away--has there?" + +"Mebbe not." + +The veins were beating like live cords in the man's throat and at his +temples. + +"'Twas just the same as Father Corraine bein' here, when mother had +Sunday, wasn't it?" + +The man made no reply; but a gloom drew down his forehead, and his lips +doubled in as though he endured physical pain. He got to his feet and +paced the floor. For weeks he had listened to the same kind of talk from +this wounded, and, as he thought, dying son, and he was getting less and +less able to bear it. The boy at nine years of age was, in manner of +speech, the merest child, but his thoughts were sometimes large and +wise. The only white child within a compass of a hundred miles or so; +the lonely life of the hills and plains, so austere in winter, so melted +to a sober joy in summer; listening to the talk of his elders at +camp-fires and on the hunting-trail, when, even as an infant almost, he +was swung in a blanket from a tree or was packed in the torch-crane of a +canoe; and more than all, the care of a good, loving--if +passionate--little mother: all these had made him far wiser than his +years. He had been hours upon hours each day alone with the birds, and +squirrels, and wild animals, and something of the keen scent and +instinct of the animal world had entered into his body and brain, so +that he felt what he could not understand. + +He saw that he had worried his father, and it troubled him. He thought +of something. + +"Daddy," he said, "let me have it." + +A smile struggled for life in the hunter's face, as he turned to the +wall and took down the skin of a silver fox. He held it on his palm for +a moment, looking at it in an interested, satisfied way, then he brought +it over and put it into the child's hands; and the smile now shaped +itself, as he saw an eager pale face buried in the soft fur. + +"Good! good!" he said involuntarily. + +"_Bon! bon!_" said the boy's voice from the fur, in the language of his +mother, who added a strain of Indian blood to her French ancestry. + +The two sat there, the man half-kneeling on the low bed, and stroking +the fur very gently. It could scarcely be thought that such pride should +be spent on a little pelt, by a mere backwoodsman and his nine-year-old +son. One has seen a woman fingering a splendid necklace, her eyes +fascinated by the bunch of warm, deep jewels--a light not of mere +vanity, or hunger, or avarice in her face--only the love of the +beautiful thing. But this was an animal's skin. Did they feel the +animal underneath it yet, giving it beauty, life, glory? + +The silver-fox skin is the prize of the north, and this one was of the +boy's own harvesting. While his father was away he saw the fox creeping +by the hut. The joy of the hunter seized him, and guided his eye over +the sights of his father's rifle as he rested the barrel on the +windowsill, and the animal was his! Now his finger ran into the hole +made by the bullet, and he gave a little laugh of modest triumph. +Minutes passed as they studied, felt, and admired the skin, the hunter +proud of his son, the son alive with a primitive passion, which inflicts +suffering to get the beautiful thing. Perhaps the tenderness as well as +the wild passion of the animal gets into the hunter's blood, and tips +his fingers at times with an exquisite kindness--as one has noted in a +lion fondling her young, or in tigers as they sport upon the sands of +the desert. This boy had seen his father shoot a splendid moose, and, as +it lay dying, drop down and kiss it in the neck for sheer love of its +handsomeness. Death is no insult. It is the law of the primitive +world--war, and love in war. + + + + +[Illustration] + +II + + +They sat there for a long time, not speaking, each busy in his own way: +the boy full of imaginings, strange, half-heathen, half-angelic +feelings; the man roaming in that savage, romantic, superstitious +atmosphere which belongs to the north, and to the north alone. At last +the boy lay back on his pillow, his finger still in the bullet-hole of +the pelt. His eyes closed, and he seemed about to fall asleep, but +presently looked up and whispered: "I haven't said my prayers, have I?" + +The father shook his head in a sort of rude confusion. + +"I can pray out loud if I want to, can't I?" + +"Of course, Dominique." The man shrank a little. + +"I forget a good many times, but I know one all right, for I said it +when the bird was singing. It isn't one out of the book Father Corraine +sent mother by Pretty Pierre; it's one she taught me out of her own +head. P'r'aps I'd better say it." + +"P'r'aps, if you want to." The voice was husky. + +The boy began: + +"O Bon Jesu, who died to save us from our sins, and to lead us to Thy +country, where there is no cold, nor hunger, nor thirst, and where no +one is afraid, listen to Thy child.... When the great winds and rains +come down from the hills, do not let the floods drown us, nor the woods +cover us, nor the snow-slide bury us, and do not let the prairie-fires +burn us. Keep wild beasts from killing us in our sleep, and give us good +hearts that we may not kill them in anger." + +His finger twisted involuntarily into the bullet-hole in the pelt, and +he paused a moment. + +"Keep us from getting lost, O Bon Jesu." + +Again there was a pause, his eyes opened wide, and he said: + +"Do you think mother's lost, father?" + +A heavy broken breath came from the father, and he replied haltingly: +"Mebbe--mebbe so." + +Dominique's eyes closed again. "I'll make up some," he said slowly: "And +if mother's lost, O Bon Jesu, bring her back again to us, for +everything's going wrong." + +Again he paused, then went on with the prayer as it had been taught him. + +"Teach us to hear Thee whenever Thou callest, and to see Thee when Thou +visitest us, and let the blessed Mary and all the saints speak often to +Thee for us. O Christ, hear us. Lord have mercy upon us. Christ, have +mercy upon us. Amen." + +Making the sign of the cross, he lay back, and said: "I'll go to sleep +now, I guess." + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + +III + + +The man sat for a long time looking at the pale, shining face, at the +blue veins showing painfully dark on the temples and forehead, at the +firm little white hand, which was as brown as a butternut a few weeks +before. The longer he sat, the deeper did his misery sink into his soul. +His wife had gone he knew not where, his child was wasting to death, and +he had for his sorrows no inner consolation. He had ever had that touch +of mystical imagination inseparable from the far north, yet he had none +of that religious belief which swallowed up natural awe and turned it to +the refining of life, and to the advantage of a man's soul. Now it was +forced in upon him that his child was wiser than himself; wiser and +safer. His life had been spent in the wastes, with rough deeds and +rugged habits, and a youth of hardship, danger, and almost savage +endurance had given him a half-barbarian temperament, which could strike +an angry blow at one moment and fondle to death at the next. + +When he married sweet Lucette Barbond his religion reached little +farther than a belief in the Scarlet Hunter of the Kimash Hills and +those voices that could be heard calling in the night, till their time +of sleep be past and they should rise and reconquer the north. + +Not even Father Corraine, whose ways were like those of his Master, +could ever bring him to a more definite faith. His wife had at first +striven with him, mourning yet loving. Sometimes the savage in him had +broken out over the little creature, merely because barbaric tyranny was +in him--torture followed by the passionate kiss. But how was she +philosopher enough to understand the cause! + +When she fled from their hut one bitter day, as he roared some wild +words at her, it was because her nerves had all been shaken from +threatened death by wild beasts, (of this he did not know) and his +violence drove her mad. She had run out of the house, and on, and on, +and on--and she had never come back. That was weeks ago, and there had +been no word nor sign of her since. The man was now busy with it all, in +a slow, cumbrous way. A nature more to be touched by things seen than by +things told, his mind was being awakened in a massive kind of fashion. +He was viewing this crisis of his life as one sees a human face in the +wide searching light of a great fire. He was restless, but he held +himself still by a strong effort, not wishing to disturb the little +sleeper. His eyes seemed to retreat farther and farther back under his +shaggy brows. + +The great logs in the chimney burned brilliantly, and a brass crucifix +over the child's head now and again reflected soft little flashes of +light. This caught the hunter's eye. Presently there grew up in him a +vague kind of hope that, somehow, this symbol would bring him luck--that +was the way he put it to himself. He had felt this--and something +more--when Dominique prayed. Somehow, Dominique's prayer was the only +one he had ever heard that had gone home to him, had opened up the big +sluices of his nature, and let the light of God flood in. No, there was +another: the one Lucette made on the day that they were married, when a +wonderful timid reverence played through his hungry love for her. + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + +IV + + +Hours passed. All at once, without any other motion or gesture, the +boy's eyes opened wide with a strange, intense look. + +"Father," he said slowly, and in a kind of dream, "when you hear a sweet +horn blow at night, is it the Scarlet Hunter calling?" + +"P'r'aps. Why, Dominique?" He made up his mind to humor the boy, though +it gave him strange aching forebodings. He had seen grown men and women +with these fancies--and they had died. + +"I heard one blowing just now, and the sounds seemed to wave over my +head. P'r'aps he's calling some one that's lost." + +"Mebbe." + +"And I heard a voice singing--it wasn't a bird to-night." + +"There was no voice, Dominique." + +"Yes, yes." There was something fine in the grave, courteous certainty +of the lad. "I waked, and you were sitting there thinking, and I shut my +eyes again, and I heard the voice. I remember the tune and the words." + +"What were the words?" In spite of himself the hunter felt awed. + +"I've heard mother sing them, or something most like them: + + "'Why does the fire no longer burn? + (I am so lonely.) + Why does the tent-door swing outward? + (I have no home.) + Oh, let me breathe hard in your face! + (I am so lonely.) + Oh, why do you shut your eyes to me? + (I have no home.)'" + +The boy paused. + +"Was that all, Dominique?" + +"No, not all." + + "'Let us make friends with the stars; + (I am so lonely.) + Give me your hand, I will hold it. + (I have no home.) + Let us go hunting together. + (I am so lonely.) + We will sleep at God's camp to-night. + (I have no home.)'" + +Dominique did not sing, but recited the words with a sort of chanting +inflection. + +"What does it mean when you hear a voice like that, father?" + +"I don't know. Who told--your mother--the song?" + +"Oh, I don't know. I suppose she just made them up--she and God.... +There! There it is again? Don't you hear it--don't you hear it, daddy?" + +"No, Dominique, it's only the kettle singing." + +"A kettle isn't a voice. Daddy--" He paused a little, then went on, +hesitatingly: "I saw a white swan fly through the door over your +shoulder when you came in to-night." + +"No, no, Dominique, it was a flurry of snow blowing over my shoulder." + +"But it looked at me with two shining eyes." + +"That was two stars shining through the door, my son." + +"How could there be snow flying and stars shining, too, father?" + +"It was just drift-snow on a light wind, but the stars were shining +above, Dominique." + +The man's voice was anxious and unconvincing, his eyes had a hungry, +haunted look. The legend of the White Swan had to do with the passing of +a human soul. The Swan had come in--would it go out alone? He touched +the boy's hand--it was hot with fever; he felt the pulse--it ran high; +he watched the face--it had a glowing light. Something stirred within +him, and passed like a wave to the farthest course of his being. Through +his misery he had touched the garment of the Master of Souls. As though +a voice said to him there, "_Some one hath touched me_," he got to his +feet, and, with a sudden blind humility, lit two candles, and placed +them on a shelf in a corner before a porcelain figure of the Virgin, as +he had seen his wife do. Then he picked a small handful of fresh spruce +twigs from a branch over the chimney, and laid them beside the candles. +After a short pause he came slowly to the head of the boy's bed. Very +solemnly he touched the foot of the Christ on the cross with the tips of +his fingers, and brought them to his lips with an indescribable +reverence. After a moment, standing with eyes fixed on the face of the +crucified figure, he said, in a shaking voice: + +"_Pardon, bon Jesu! Sauves mon enfant! Ne me laissez pas seul!_" + +The boy looked up with eyes again grown unnaturally heavy, and said: + +"Amen!... _Bon Jesu!... Encore! Encore, mon pere!_" + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + +V + + +The boy slept. The father stood still by the bed for a time, but at last +slowly turned and went toward the fire. + +Outside, two figures were approaching the hut--a man and a woman; yet at +first glance the man might easily have been taken for a woman, because +of his clean-shaven face, of the long black robe which he wore, and +because his hair fell loose on his shoulders. + +"Have patience, my daughter," said the man. "Do not enter till I call +you. But stand close to the door, if you will, and hear all." + +So saying he raised his hand as in a kind of benediction, passed to the +door, and, after tapping very softly, opened it, entered, and closed it +behind him--not so quickly, however, but that the woman caught a glimpse +of the father and the boy. In her eyes there was the divine look of +motherhood. + +"Peace be to this house!" said the man gently, as he stepped forward +from the door. + +The father, startled, turned shrinkingly on him, as though he had seen a +spirit. + +"_M'sieu' le cure!_" he said in French, with an accent much poorer than +that of the priest, or even of his own son. He had learned French from +his wife; he himself was English. + +The priest's quick eye had taken in the lighted candles at the little +shrine, even as he saw the painfully changed aspect of the man. + +"The wife and child, Bagot?" he asked, looking round. "Ah, the boy!" he +added, and going toward the bed, continued, presently, in a low voice: +"Dominique is ill?" + +Bagot nodded, and then answered: "A wildcat and then fever, Father +Corraine." + +The priest felt the boy's pulse softly, then with a close personal look +he spoke hardly above his breath, yet distinctly, too: + +"Your wife, Bagot?" + +"She is not here, m'sieu'." The voice was low and gloomy. + +"Where is she, Bagot?" + +"I do not know, m'sieu'." + +"When did you see her last?" + +"Four weeks ago, m'sieu'." + +"That was September, this is October--winter. On the ranches they let +their cattle loose upon the plains in winter, knowing not where they go, +yet looking for them to return in the spring. But a woman--a woman and a +wife--is different.... Bagot, you have been a rough, hard man, and you +have been a stranger to your God, but I thought you loved your wife and +child!" + +The hunter's hands clenched, and a wicked light flashed up into his +eyes; but the calm, benignant gaze of the other cooled the tempest in +his veins. The priest sat down on the couch where the child lay, and +took the fevered hand in his own. + +"Stay where you are, Bagot, just there where you are, and tell me what +your trouble is, and why your wife is not here.... Say all honestly--by +the name of the Christ!" he added, lifting up an iron crucifix that hung +on his breast. + +Bagot sat down on a bench near the fireplace, the light playing on his +bronzed, powerful face, his eyes shining beneath his heavy brows like +two coals. After a moment he began: + +"I don't know how it started. I'd lost a lot of pelts--stolen they were, +down on the Child o' Sin River. Well, she was hasty and nervous, like as +not--she always was brisker and more sudden than I am. I--I laid my +powder-horn and whiskey-flash--up there!" + +He pointed to the little shrine of the Virgin, where now his candles +were burning. The priest's grave eyes did not change expression at all, +but looked out wisely, as though he understood everything before it was +told. + +Bagot continued: "I didn't notice it, but she had put some flowers +there. She said something with an edge, her face all snapping angry, +threw the things down, and called me a heathen and a wicked heretic--and +I don't say now but she'd a right to do it. But I let out then, for them +stolen pelts was rasping me on the raw. I said something pretty rough, +and made as if I was goin' to break her in two--just fetched up my +hands, and went like this!--" + +With a singular simplicity he made a wild gesture with his hands, and an +animal-like snarl came from his throat. Then he looked at the priest +with the honest intensity of a boy. + +"Yes, that was what you _did_--what was it you _said_ which was 'pretty +rough'?" + +There was a slight hesitation, then came the reply: + +"I said there was enough powder spilt on the floor to kill all the +priests in heaven." + +A fire suddenly shot up into Father Corraine's face, and his lips +tightened for an instant, but presently he was as before, and he said: + +"How that will face you one day, Bagot! Go on. What else?" + +Sweat began to break out on Bagot's face, and he spoke as though he were +carrying a heavy weight on his shoulders, low and brokenly. + +"Then I said, 'And if virgins has it so fine, why didn't you stay +one?'" + +"Blasphemer!" said the priest in a stern, reproachful voice, his face +turning a little pale, and he brought the crucifix to his lips. "To the +mother of your child--shame! What more?" + +"She threw up her hands to her ears with a wild cry, ran out of the +house, down the hills, and away. I went to the door and watched her as +long as I could see her, and waited for her to come back--but she never +did. I've hunted and hunted, but I can't find her." Then, with a sudden +thought, "Do you know anything of her, m'sieu'?" + +The priest appeared not to hear the question. Turning for a moment +toward the boy, who now was in a deep sleep, he looked at him intently. +Presently he spoke. + +"Ever since I married you and Lucette Barbond you have stood in the way +of her duty, Bagot. How well I remember that first day when you knelt +before me! Was ever so sweet and good a girl--with her golden eyes and +the look of summer in her face, and her heart all pure! Nothing had +spoiled her--you cannot spoil such women--God is in their hearts. But +you, what have you cared? One day you would fondle her, and the next you +were a savage--and she, so gentle, so gentle all the time. Then, for her +religion and the faith of her child--she has fought for it, prayed for +it, suffered for it. You thought you had no need of religion, for you +had so much happiness, which you did not deserve--that was it. But +she--with all a woman suffers, how can she bear life--and man--without +God? No, it is not possible. And you thought you and your few +superstitions were enough for her.--Ah, poor fool! She should worship +you! So selfish, so small, for a man who knows in his heart how great +God is. You did not love her." + +"By the Heaven above, yes!" said Bagot, half starting to his feet. + +"Ah, 'by the Heaven above,' no! nor the child. For true love is +unselfish and patient, and where it is the stronger, it cares for the +weaker; but it was your wife who was unselfish, patient, and cared for +you. Every time she said an _ave_ she thought of you, and her every +thanks to God had you therein. They know you well in heaven, +Bagot--through your wife. Did you ever pray--ever since I married you to +her?" + +"Yes." + +"When?" + +"An hour or so ago." + +Once again the priest's eyes glanced towards the lighted candles. + + + + +[Illustration] + +VI + + +Presently he said: "You asked me if I had heard anything of your wife. +Listen, and be patient while you listen.... Three weeks ago I was +camping on the Sundust Plains, over against the Young Sky River. In the +morning, as I was lighting a fire outside my tent, my young Cree Indian +with me, I saw coming over the crest of a landwave, from the very lips +of the sunrise, as it were, a band of Indians. I could not quite make +them out. I hoisted my little flag on the tent, and they hurried on to +me. I did not know the tribe--they had come from near Hudson's Bay. They +spoke Chinook, and I could understand them. Well, as they came near, I +saw that they had a woman with them." + +Bagot leaned forward, his body strained, every muscle tense. "A woman!" +he said, as if breathing gave him sorrow--"my wife?" + +"Your wife." + +"Quick! Quick! Go on--oh, go on, m'sieu'--good father." + +"She fell at my feet, begging me to save her.... I waved her off." + +The sweat dropped from Bagot's forehead, a low growl broke from him, and +he made such a motion as a lion might make at its prey. + +"You wouldn't--wouldn't save her--you coward!" He ground the words out. + +The priest raised his palm against the other's violence. "Hush!... She +drew away, saying that God and man had deserted her.... We had +breakfast, the chief and I. Afterwards, when the chief had eaten much +and was in good humor, I asked him where he had got the woman. He said +that he had found her on the plains--she had lost her way. I told him +then that I wanted to buy her. He said to me. 'What does a priest want +of a woman?' I said that I wished to give her back to her husband. He +said that he had found her, and she was his, and that he would marry her +when they reached the great camp of the tribe. I was patient. It would +not do to make him angry. I wrote down on a piece of bark the things +that I would give him for her: an order on the Company at Fort o' Sin +for shot, blankets and beads. He said no." + +The priest paused. Bagot's face was all swimming with sweat, his body +was rigid, but the veins of his neck knotted and twisted. + +"For the love of God go on!" he said hoarsely. + +"Yes, for the love of God. I have no money, I am poor, but the Company +will always honor my orders, for I pay sometimes by the help of _le bon +Jesu_. Well, I added some things to the list: a saddle, a rifle, and +some flannel. But no, he would not. Once more I put many things down. It +was a big bill--it would keep me poor for five years. To save your wife, +John Bagot, you who drove her from your door, blaspheming and railing at +such as I.... I offered the things, and told him that was all I could +give. After a little he shook his head, and said that he must have the +woman for his wife. I did not know what to add. I said, 'She is white, +and the white people will never rest till they have killed you all, if +you do this thing. The Company will track you down.' Then he said, 'The +whites must catch me and fight me before they kill me.'... What was +there to do?" + +Bagot came near to the priest, bending over him savagely: + +"You let her stay with them--you, with hands like a man!" + +"Hush," was the calm, reproving answer. "I was one man, they were +twenty." + +"Where was your God to help you, then?" + +"Her God and mine was with me." + +Bagot's eyes blazed. "Why didn't you offer rum--rum? They'd have done it +for that--one--five--ten kegs of rum!" + +He swayed to and fro in his excitement, yet their voices hardly rose +above a hoarse whisper all the time. + +"You forget," answered the priest, "that it is against the law, and that +as a priest of my order I am vowed to give no rum to an Indian." + +"A vow! A vow! Son of God! what is a vow beside a woman--my wife?" + +His misery and his rage were pitiful to see. + +"Perjure my soul! Offer rum! Break my vow in the face of the enemies of +God's Church! What have you done for me that I should do this for you, +John Bagot?" + +"Coward!" was the man's despairing cry, with a sudden threatening +movement. "Christ himself would have broke a vow to save her." + +The grave, kind eyes of the priest met the other's fierce gaze, and +quieted the wild storm that was about to break. + +"Who am I that I should teach my Master?" he said, solemnly. "What would +you give Christ, Bagot, if He had saved her to you?" + +The man shook with grief, and tears rushed from his eyes, so suddenly +and fully had a new emotion passed through him. + +"Give--give!" he cried, "I would give twenty years of my life!" + +The figure of the priest stretched up with gentle grandeur. Holding out +the iron crucifix, he said: "On your knees and swear it, John Bagot!" + +There was something inspiring, commanding, in the voice and manner, and +Bagot, with a new hope rushing through his veins, knelt and repeated his +words. + +The priest turned to the door, and called, "Madame Lucette!" + +The boy, hearing, waked, and sat up in bed suddenly. + +"Mother! mother!" he cried, as the door flew open. + +The mother came to her husband's arms, laughing and weeping, and an +instant afterwards was pouring out her love and anxiety over her child. + +Father Corraine now faced the man, and with a soft exaltation of voice +and manner said: + +"John Bagot, in the name of Christ, I demand twenty years of your +life--of love and obedience of God. I broke my vow; I perjured my soul; +I bought your wife with ten kegs of rum." + +The tall hunter dropped again to his knees, and caught the priest's hand +to kiss it. + +"No, no--this!" the priest said, and laid his iron crucifix against the +other's lips. + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + +VII + + +Dominique's voice came clearly through the room: + +"Mother, I saw the white swan fly away through the door when you came +in." + +"My dear, my dear," she said, "there was no white swan." But she clasped +the boy to her breast protectingly, and whispered an _ave_. + +"Peace be to this house," said the voice of the priest. + +And there was peace--for the child lived, and the man has loved, and has +kept his vow, even unto this day. + +For the visions of the boy, who can know the divers ways in which God +speaks to the children of men! + +THE END + + + + NOVELS BY SIR GILBERT PARKER + + The Going of the White Swan + The Seats of the Mighty + The Trail of the Sword + The Trespasser + The Translation of a Savage + Mrs. Falchion + + D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Going of the White Swan, by Gilbert Parker + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GOING OF THE WHITE SWAN *** + +***** This file should be named 16716.txt or 16716.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/6/7/1/16716/ + +Produced by Janet Keller, Janet Blenkinship and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + +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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