Ex Libris 
 C. K. OGDEN
 
 Jonn a CCeevt 3ln Cnsig 
 
 tfie 
 
 of foot 
 
 3lf.c6a.rdL 3i3 cou&in 
 
 Jfontgomery 
 'jfie. Command- AUo a. 6 eeyneur 
 
 -Amity 
 
 '3Sominicput farmer/a tfie 
 crippled brolfitr 
 
 flzofca.. I Indians who 
 tfestenurnna's \ are- friends to 
 daughter \ $ Cfeeva. 
 ftuskingon I 
 
 '~r'atnerjaunoy\ Jesuit pries/sin 
 father Joly \ the neighbourhood 
 
 scene is faid daring fne period of tne fngfesA 
 ynvci<ston tn Canada (/7 tne year 176Q
 
 FOR: AMITY 
 
 A.T. UILLEFL COUCH 
 
 HODDER. fc. STOUGHTONS 
 SEVENPENNY LIBRARY 
 
 HODDER. AND STOUGHTON 
 LONDON NEWYORJC TORONTO
 
 College 
 Library 
 
 PR 
 
 TO HENRY NEWBOLT. 
 
 MY DEAR NEWBOLT. 
 
 | I 1 -v 
 
 Two schoolfellows, who had sat together in the 
 Sixth at Clifton, met at Paddington some twenty years 
 later, and travelled down to enter their two sons at 
 one school. On their way, while the boys shyly 
 became acquainted, the fathers discussed the project 
 of this story ; a small matter in comparison with the 
 real business of that day but that it happened so 
 gives me the opportunity of dedicating " Fort Amity " 
 to you, its editor in The Monthly Review, as a reminder 
 to outlast the short life granted in these days to 
 novels. 
 
 Yet if either of our sons shall turn its pages some 
 years hence, though but to remind himself of his first 
 journey to school, I hope he will not lay it down too 
 contemptuously. The tale has, for its own purposes, 
 so seriously confused the geography of Fort Amitie, 
 that he may search the map and end by doubting if 
 any such fortress ever existed and stood a siege ; but 
 I trust it will leave him in no doubt of what his elders 
 understood by honour and friendship. 
 
 Of these two themes, at any rate, I have composed 
 it, and dedicate it to a poet who has sung nobly of 
 both. " Like to the generations of leaves are those 
 of men " but while we last, let these deciduous pages 
 commemorate the day when we two went back to 
 school four strong. May also they contain nothing 
 unworthy to survive us in our two fellow-travellers ! 
 
 A. T. QUILLER-COUCH. 
 
 jf*iif<
 
 '8 FORT AMITY 
 
 becomingly gilt tassels and yellow silken folds and 
 stepped down to the lakeside where the batteaux 
 waited. 
 
 The scene is known to-day for one of the fairest in 
 the world. Populous cities lie near it, and pour their 
 holiday-makers upon it through the summer season. 
 Trains whistle along the shore under its forests ; 
 pleasure-steamers, with music on their decks, shoot 
 across bays churned of old by the paddles of war 
 canoes ; from wildernesses where Indians lurked in 
 ambush smile neat hotels, white-walled, with green 
 shutters and deep verandahs ; and lovers, wandering 
 among the hemlocks, happen on a clearing with a few 
 turfed mounds, and seat themselves on these last 
 ruins of an ancient fort, nor care to remember even 
 its name. Behind them behind the Adirondacks 
 and the Green Mountains and pushed but a little 
 way back in these hundred-and-fifty years, lies the 
 primeval forest, trodden no longer now by the wasting 
 redman, but untamed yet, almost unhandselled. 
 And still, as the holiday-makers leave it, winter closes 
 down on the lakeside and wraps it in silence, broken 
 by the loon's cry or the crash of a snow-laden tree 
 deep in the forest the same sounds, the same aching 
 silence, endured by French and English garrisons 
 watching each other and the winter through in Fort 
 Carillon or Fort William Henry. 
 
 " The world's great age begins anew." ... It 
 begins anew, and hourly, wherever hearts are high 
 and youth sets out with bright eyes to meet his fate. 
 It began anew for Ensign John a Cleeve on this 
 morning of July 5, 1758 ; it was sounded up by bugles, 
 shattering the forest silence ; it breathed m the wind 
 of the boat's speed, shaking the silken flag above him. 
 His was one of twelve hundred boats spreading like 
 brilliant water-fowl across the lake which stretched
 
 MALBROUCK S'EN VA T'EN GUERRE 9- 
 
 for thirty miles ahead, gay with British uniforms, 
 scarlet and gold, with Highland tartans, with the 
 blue jackets of the Provincials ; flash of oars, in- 
 numerable glints of steel, of epaulettes, of belt, 
 cross-belt and badge ; gilt knops and tassels and 
 sheen of flags. Yonder went Blakeney's 27th Regi- 
 ment, and yonder the Highlanders of the Black 
 Watch ; Abercromby's 44th, Howe's 55th with 
 their idolised young commander, the 6oth or Royal 
 Americans in two battalions ; Gage's Light Infantry, 
 Bradstreet's axemen and batteau-men, Starke's 
 rangers ; a few friendly Indians but the great 
 Johnson was hurrying up with more, maybe with 
 five hundred ; in all fifteen thousand men and over. 
 Never had America seen such an armament ; and 
 it went to take a fort from three thousand Frenchmen. 
 
 No need to cover so triumphant an advance in 
 silence ! Why should not the regimental bands 
 strike up ? For what else had we dragged them up 
 the Hudson from Albany and across the fourteen- 
 mile portage to the lake ? Weary work with a big 
 drum in so much brushwood ! And play they did,, 
 as the flotilla pushed forth and spread and left the 
 stockades far behind ; stockades planted on the scene 
 of last year's massacre. Though for weeks before 
 our arrival Bradstreet and his men had been clearing 
 and building, sights remained to nerve our arms and 
 set our blood boiling to the cry " Remember Fort 
 William Henry ! " Its shores fade, and somewhere 
 at the foot of the lake three thousand Frenchmen are 
 waiting for us (if, indeed, they dare to wait). Let 
 the bands play " Britons strike home ! " 
 
 Play they did : drums tunding and bagpipes skirling 
 as though Fort Carillon (or Ticonderoga, as the Indians 
 called it) would succumb like another Jericho to their 
 clamour. The Green Mountains tossed its echoes
 
 io FORT AMITY 
 
 to the Adirondacks, and the Adirondacks flung it 
 back ; and under it, down the blue waterway toward 
 the Narrows, went Ensign John a Cleeve, canopied 
 by the golden flag of the 46th. 
 
 The lake smiled at all his expectations and surpassed 
 them. He had imagined it a sepulchral sheet of 
 water, sunk between cavernous woods. And lo ! 
 it lay high in the light of day, broad-rimmed, with 
 the forests diminishing as they shelved down to its 
 waters. The mountains rimmed it, amethystine, 
 remote, delicate as carving, as vapours almost trans- 
 parent ; and within the rim it twinkled like a great 
 cup of champagne held high in a god's hand so high 
 that John a Cleeve, who had been climbing ever 
 since his regiment left Albany, seemed lifted with 
 all these flashing boats and uniforms upon a platform 
 where men were heroes, and all great deeds possible, 
 and the mere air laughed in the veins like wine. 
 
 Two heavy flat-boats ploughed alongside of his ; 
 deep in the bows and yawing their sterns ludicrously. 
 They carried a gun a-piece, and the artillerymen had 
 laded them too far forward. To the 46th they were a 
 sufficiently good joke to last for miles. " Look at 
 them up-tailed ducks a-searching for worms ! Guns ? 
 Who wants guns on this trip ? Take 'em home 
 before they sink and the General loses his temper." 
 The crews grinned back and sweated and tugged, at 
 every third drive drenching the bowmen with spray, 
 although not a breath of wind rippled the lake's sur- 
 face. 
 
 The boat ahead of John's carried Elliott the Senior 
 Ensign of the 46th, with the King's colours the 
 flag of Union, drooping in stripes of scarlet, white 
 and blue. On his right strained a boat's crew of the 
 New York Regiment, with the great patroon, Philip 
 Schuyler himself, erect in the stern sheets and steering,
 
 MALBROUCK S EN VA PEN GUERRE n 
 
 in blue uniform and three-cornered hat ; too grand a 
 gentleman to recognise our Ensign, although John 
 had danced the night through in the Schuyler's 
 famous white ballroom on the eve of marching from 
 Albany, and had flung packets of sweetmeats into the 
 nursery windows at dawn, and awakened three night- 
 gowned little girls to blow kisses after him as he took 
 his way down the hill from the Schuyler mansion. 
 That was a month ago. To John it seemed years 
 since he had left Albany and its straight sidewalks 
 dappled with maple shade : but the patroon's face 
 was the same, sedately cheerful now as then when 
 he had moved among his guests with a gracious word 
 for each and a brow unclouded by the morrow. 
 
 Men like Philip Schuyler do not suffer to-morrows 
 to perturb them, since t them every to-morrow dawns 
 big with duties, responsibilities, risks. John caught 
 himself wondering to what that calm face looked 
 forward, at the lake-end, where the forests slept upon 
 their shadows and the mountains descended and closed 
 like fairy gates. For John himself Fame waited 
 beyond those gates. Although in the last three or 
 iour weeks he had endured more actual hardships 
 than in all his life before, he had enjoyed them 
 thoroughly, and felt that they were hardening him 
 into a man. He understood now why the tales he 
 had read at school in his Homer and Ovid tales of 
 Ulysses, of Hercules and Perseus were never sorrow- 
 ful, however severe the heroes' labours. For were 
 they not undergone in just such a shining atmosphere 
 as this ? 
 
 His mind ran on these ancient tales, and so, memory 
 reverting to Douai and the seminary class-room in 
 which he had first construed them, he began uncon- 
 sciously to set the lines of an old repetition lesson to 
 the stroke of the oars.
 
 12 FORT AMITY 
 
 Angustam amice pauperiem pati 
 robustus acri militia puer 
 condiscat et Parthos feroces 
 vexet eques metuendus hasta : 
 
 Vitamque sub divo et trepidis agat 
 in rebus. . . . 
 
 and so on, with halts and breaks where memory 
 failed him. Parthos these would be the Indians 
 Abenakis, Algonquins, Hurons, whomsoever Montcalm 
 might have gathered yonder in the woods with him. 
 Dulce et decorum est yes, to be sure ; in a little while 
 he would be facing death for his country ; but he did 
 not feel in the least like dying. A sight of Philip 
 Schuyler's face sent him sliding into the next ode 
 Justumettenacem . . . nonvoltusinstantistyranni. . . . 
 John a Cleeve would have started had the future 
 opened for an instant and %evealed the face of the 
 tyrant Philip Schuyler was soon to defy : and Schuyler 
 would have started too. 
 
 Then John remembered his cousin's letter, and 
 pulled it from his pocket again. . . . 
 
 "And if Abercromby's your Ccesar which is as 
 much as III risk saying in a letter which may be opened 
 before it reaches you why, you have Howe to clip his 
 parade wig as he's already docked the men's coat-tails. 
 So here's five pounds on it, and let it be a match Wolfe 
 against Howe, and shall J. a C. or R. M. be first in 
 Quebec ? And another five pounds, if you will, on our 
 epaulettes ; for I repeat to you, this is Pitt's consulship, 
 and promotion henceforth comes to men as they deserve 
 it. Look at Wolfe, sir a man barely thirty-two and 
 the ball just set rolling ! Wherefore I too am resolved 
 to enter Quebec a Brigadier-General, who now go carry- 
 ing the colours of the ijth to Louisbourg. We but wait 
 (icnl. Amherst, who is expected daily, and then yeo- 
 heave-ho for the nor'ard! Farewell, dearest Jack!
 
 MALBROUCK S'EN VA T'EN GUERRE 13 
 
 Given in this camp at Halifax, the twelfth of May, 1758, 
 in the middle of a plaguy fog, by your affect, cousin 
 R. Montgomery." 
 
 John smiled as he folded up the letter, so charac- 
 teristic of Dick. Dick was always in perfect spirits, 
 always confident in himself. It was characteristic 
 of Dick, too, to call himself Romulus and his- friend 
 Remus, meaning no slight, simply because he always 
 took himself for granted as the leading spirit. It 
 had always been so even in the days when they had 
 gone birds' -nesting or rook-shooting together in the 
 woods around J ohn' s Devonshire home. Always J ohn 
 had yielded the lead to this freckled Irish cousin (the kin- 
 ship was, in fact, a remote one, and lay on their mother's 
 side through the Ranelagh family) ; and years had but 
 seemed to widen the three months' gap in their ages. 
 
 Dick's parents were Protestant ; and Dick had gone 
 to Trinity College, Dublin, passing thence to an 
 ensigncy in the lyth (Forbes') Regiment. The a 
 Cleeves, on the other hand, had always been Roman 
 Catholics, and by consequence had lived for genera- 
 tions somewhat isolated among the Devon gentry, 
 their neighbours. When John looked back on his 
 boyhood, his prevailing impressions were of a large 
 house set low in a valley, belted with sombre dripping 
 elms and haunted by Roman Catholic priests some 
 fat and rosy some lean and cadaverous but all soft- 
 footed ; of an insufficiency of light in the rooms ; 
 and of a sad lack of fellow-creatures willing to play 
 with him. His parents were old, and he had been born 
 late to them twelve years after Philip, his only 
 brother and the heir. From the first his mother had 
 destined him for the priesthood, and a succession of 
 
 priests had been his tutors : but What instinct 
 
 is there in the sacerdotal mind which warns it off 
 some cases as hopeless from the first ? Here was a
 
 i 4 FORT AMITY 
 
 child, docile, affectionate, moody at times, but eager 
 to please and glad to be rewarded by a smile ; bred 
 among priests and designed to be a priest ; yet amid 
 a thousand admonishments, chastisements, encourage- 
 ments, blandishments, the child with a child's sure 
 instinct for sincerity could not remember having 
 been spoken to sincerely, with heart open to heart. 
 Years later, when in the seminary at Douai, the little 
 worm of scepticism began to stir in his brain and grow,, 
 feeding on the books of M. Voltaire and other for- 
 bidden writings, he wondered if his many tutors had 
 been, one and all, unconsciously prescient. But he 
 was an honest lad. He threw up the seminary, re- 
 turned to Cleeve Court, and announced with tears- 
 to his mother (his father had died two years before) 
 that he could not be a priest. She told him, stonily, 
 that he had disappointed her dearest hopes and broken 
 her heart. His brother the Squire now, and a prig 
 from his cradle took him out for a long walk, argued 
 with him as with a fractious child, and, without attend- 
 ing to his answers, finally gave him up as a bad job. 
 So an ensigncy was procured, and John a Cleeve 
 shipped from Cork to Halifax, to fight the French in 
 America. At Cork he had met and renewed acquaint- 
 ance with his Irish cousin, Dick Montgomery. They 
 had met again in Halifax, which they reached in 
 separate transports, and had passed the winter there 
 in company. Dick clapped his cousin on the back and 
 laughed impartially at his doubts and the family dis- 
 tress. Dick had no doubts ; always saw clearly and 
 made up his mind at once ; was, moreover, very little 
 concerned with religion (beyond damning the Pope), 
 and a great deal concerned with soldiering. He fas- 
 cinated John, as the practical man usually fascinates 
 the speculative. So Remus listened to Romulus, 
 and began to be less contrite in his home-letters.
 
 MALBROUCK S'EN VA T'EN GUERRE 15 
 
 To the smallest love at home (of the kind that under- 
 stands, or tries to understand) he would have re- 
 sponded religiously ; but he had found such nowhere 
 save in Dick who, besides, was a gallant young 
 gentleman, and scrupulous on all points of honour. 
 He took fire from Dick ; almost worshipped him ; 
 and wished now, as the flotilla swept on and the 
 bands woke louder echoes from the narrowing shore, 
 that Dick were here to see how the last few weeks 
 had tanned and hardened him. 
 
 The troops came to land before nightfall at Sabbath 
 Day Point, twenty-five miles down the lake ; stretched 
 themselves to doze for a while in the dry undergrowth ; 
 re-embarked under the stars, and, rowing on through 
 the dawn, reached the lake-end at ten in the morning. 
 Here they found the first trace of the enemy a bridge 
 broken in two over the river which drains into Lake 
 Champlain. A small French rearguard loitered here ; 
 but two companies of riflemen were landed, and drove 
 it back into the woods, without loss. The boats 
 discharged the British unopposed, who now set for- 
 ward afoot through the forest to follow the left bank 
 of the stream, which, leaving the lake tranquilly 
 is broken presently by stony rapids, and grows smooth 
 again only as it nears its new reservoir. Smooth , 
 rapid, and smooth again, it sweeps round a long bend ; 
 and this bend the British prepared to follow, leaving 
 a force to guard the boats. 
 
 Howe led, feeling forward with his light infantry ; 
 and the army followed in much the same disposition 
 they had held down the lake ; regulars in the centre, 
 provincials on either flank ; a long scarlet body 
 creeping with broad blue wings or so it might have- 
 appeared to a bird with sight able to pierce the over- 
 lacing boughs. To John a Cleeve, warily testing the 
 thickets with the butt of his staff and pulling the
 
 16 FORT AMITS 
 
 thorns aside lest they should rip its precious silken 
 folds, the advance, after the first ten minutes, seemed 
 to keep no more order than a gang of children pressing 
 after blackberries. Somewhere on his right the rapids 
 murmured ; men struggled beside him now a dozen 
 redcoats, now a few knowing Provincials who had lost 
 their regiments, but were cocksure of the right path. 
 And always before, behind and all around him 
 sounded the calls of the parade-ground : Sub-divisions 
 left front mark time ! Left, half turn ! Three 
 files on the left left turn wheel ! files to the 
 front ! " Singular instructions for men grappling 
 with a virgin forest ! 
 
 If the standing trees were bad, the fallen ones 
 and there seemed to be a diabolical number of them 
 were ten times worse. John was straddling the 
 trunk of one and cursing vehemently when a sound 
 struck on his ears, more intelligible than any parade- 
 call. It came back to him from the front : the sharp 
 sound of musketry two volleys. 
 
 The parade-calls ceased suddenly all around him. 
 He listened, still sitting astride the trunk. One or two 
 redcoats leaped it, shouting as they leaped, and fol- 
 lowed the sound, which crackled now as though the 
 whole green forest were on fire. By-and-by, as he 
 listened, a moustachioed man in a short jacket one 
 of Gage's light infantry came bursting through the 
 undergrowth, capless, shouting for a surgeon. 
 
 " What's wrong in front ? " asked John, as the 
 man scarcely regarding him laid his hands on the 
 trunk to vault it. 
 
 " Faith, and I don't know, redcoat ; except that 
 they've killed him. Whereabouts is the General ? " 
 
 " Who's killed ? " 
 
 " The best man amongst us : Lord Howe ! " 
 
 A second runner, following, shouted the same news ;
 
 MALBROUCK S'EN VA T'EN GUERRE 17 
 
 and the two passed on together in search of the General. 
 But already the tidings had spread along the front of the 
 main body, as though wafted by a sudden wind through 
 the undergrowth. Already, as John sat astride his log 
 endeavouring to measure up the loss, to right and left 
 of him bugles were sounding the halt. It seemed that 
 as yet the mass of troops scarcely took in the meaning 
 of the rumour, but awoke under the shock, only to- 
 find themselves astray and without bearings. 
 
 John's first sense was of a day made dark at a stroke. 
 If this thing had happened, then the glory had gone 
 out of the campaign. The army would by-and-by 
 be marching on, and would march again to-morrow ; 
 the drill cries would begin again, the dull wrestle 
 through swamps and thickets ; and in due time the 
 men would dress down upon the French forts and take 
 them. But where would be the morning's cheerful- 
 ness, the spirit of youth which had carried the boats 
 down the lake amid laughter and challenges to race, 
 and at the landing-place set the men romping like 
 schoolboys ? The longer John considered, the more 
 he marvelled at the hopes he and all the army had 
 been building on this young soldier and not the army 
 only, but every colony. Messengers even now would 
 be heading up the lake as fast as paddles could drive 
 them, to take horse and gallop smoking to the Hudson, 
 to bear the tidings to Albany, and from Albany ride 
 south with it to New York, to Philadelphia, to Rich- 
 mond. " Lord Howe killed ! " From that long track 
 of dismay John called his thoughts back to himself 
 and the army. Howe dead ? He, that up to an 
 hour ago had been the pivot of so many activities, the 
 centre on which veterans rested their confidence, and 
 from which young soldiers drew their high spirits, the 
 one commander whom the Provincials trusted and 
 liked because he understood them ; for whom and foi
 
 38 FORT AMITY 
 
 their faith in him the regulars would march till their 
 legs failed them ! Wonderful how youth and looks 
 and gallantry and brains together will grip hold of 
 men and sway their imaginations ! But how rare the 
 alliance, and on how brittle a hazard resting ! An 
 unarmed bullet a stop in the heart's pulsation and 
 the star we followed has gone out, God knows whither. 
 The hope of fifteen thousand men lies broken and 
 sightless in a forest glade. They assure us that 
 nothing in this world perishes, nor in the firmament 
 above it : but we look up at the black space where a 
 star has been quenched, and know that something has 
 failed us which to-morrow will not bring again. 
 
 It was learnt afterwards that he had been killed by 
 the first shot in the campaign. Montcalm had thrown 
 out three hundred rangers overnight under Langy to 
 feel the British advance : but so dense was the tangle 
 that even those experienced woodmen went astray 
 during the night and, in hunting for tracks, blundered 
 upon Howe's light infantry at unawares. In the 
 moment of surprise each side let fly with a volley, and 
 Howe fell instantly, shot through the heart. 
 
 The British bivouacked in the woods that night. 
 Toward dawn John a Cleeve stretched himself, felt 
 for his arms, and lay for a while staring up at a 
 solitary star visible through the overhanging boughs. 
 He was wondering what had awakened him, when his 
 ears grew aware of a voice in the distance, singing- 
 cither deep in the forest or on some hillside to the 
 northward : a clear tenor voice shaken out on the 
 still air with a tremolo such as the Provensals love. 
 It sang to the army and to him : 
 
 Malbrouck s'en va t'en guerre : 
 Mironton, mironton, mirontaine I 
 
 Malbrouck s'en va t'en guerre : 
 Ne sais quand riviendra I
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 A BIVOUAC IN THE FOREST 
 
 THROUGH the night, meanwhile, Montcalm and his 
 men had been working like demons. 
 
 The stone fort of Ticonderoga stood far out on a 
 bluff at the head of Lake Champlain, its basedescending 
 on the one hand into the still lake- water, on the other 
 swept by the river which the British had been trying 
 to follow, and which here, its rapids passed, dis- 
 embogues in a smooth, strong flood. It stood high, 
 too, over these meeting waters ; but as a military 
 position was next to worthless, being dominated, across 
 the river on the south, by a loftier hill called Rattle- 
 snake Mountain. 
 
 Such was Ticonderoga ; and hither Montcalm had 
 hurried up the Richelieu River from the north to find 
 Bourlamaque, that good fighter, posted with the 
 regiments of La Reine, Beam, and Guienne, and a few 
 Canadian regulars and militia. He himself had 
 brought the battalions of La Sarre and De Berry a 
 picked force, if ever there was one, but scarcely above 
 three thousand strong. 
 
 A couple of miles above the fort, and just below 
 the rapids, a bridge spanned the river. A saw- mill 
 stood beside it : and here Montcalm had crossed and 
 taken up his quarters, pushing forward Bourlamaque 
 to guard the upper end of the rapids, and holding 
 
 19
 
 20 FORT AMITY 
 
 Langy ready with three hundred rangers to patrol the 
 woods on the outer side of the river's loop. 
 
 But when his scouts and Indians came in with the 
 news of the British embarking on the upper shore, and 
 with reports of their multitude, Montcalm perceived 
 that the river could not be held ; and, having recalled 
 Bourlamaque and broken down the bridges above and 
 below the rapids, withdrew his force again to Ticon- 
 deroga v leaving only Langy 's rangers in the further 
 woods to feel the enemy's approach. 
 
 Next he had to ask himself, could the fort be 
 defended ? All agreed that it could not, with Rattle- 
 snake Mountain overtopping it : and the most were 
 for evacuating it and retiring up Lake Champlain to- 
 the stronger French fort on Crown Point. But Mont- 
 calm was expecting Levis at any moment with rein- 
 forcements ; and, studying the ridge at the extreme 
 end of which the fort stood, he decided that the 
 position ought not to be abandoned. This ridge ran 
 inland, its slope narrowed on either side between the 
 river and the lake by swamps, and approachable only 
 from the landward over the col, where it broadened 
 and dipped to the foot hills. Here, at the entrance 
 to the ridge, and half a mile from his fort, he com- 
 manded his men to throw up an entrenchment and 
 cut down trees ; and while the sappers fell to work he 
 traced out the lines of a rude star-fort, with curtains 
 and jutting angles from which the curtains could be 
 enfiladed. Through the dawn, while the British slept 
 in the woods, the Frenchmen laboured, hacking and 
 felling. Scores of trees they left to lie and encumber 
 the ground : others they dragged, unlopped, to the 
 entrenchment, and piled them before it, trunks inward 
 and radiating from its angles ; lacing their boughs 
 together or roughly pointing them with a few strokes 
 of the axe.
 
 A BIVOUAC IN THE FOREST 2H 
 
 In the growing daylight the chevaux-de-frise began 
 to look formidable ; but Bourlamaque, watching it 
 with Montcalm, shook his head, hunched his shoulders, 
 and jerked a thumb toward a spur of Rattlesnake 
 Mountain, by which their defences were glaringly 
 commanded. 
 
 Montcalm said, " We will risk it. Those English 
 Generals are inconceivable." 
 
 " But a cannon or two " 
 
 " If he think of them ! Believe me, who have tried : 
 you never know what an English General will do 
 or what his soldiers won't. Pile the trees higher, my 
 braves more than breast-high mountain-high if 
 time serves ! But this Abercromby comes from a 
 land where the bees fly tail-foremost by rule." 
 
 " With all submission, I would still recommend 
 Crown Point." 
 
 " Should he, by chance, think of planting a gun 
 yonder, I feel sure that notion will exclude all others. 
 We shall open the door and retreat on Crown Point- 
 unmolested." 
 
 Bourlamaque drew in a long breath and emitted 
 it in a mighty pouf ! 
 
 " I am not conducting his campaign for him," said 
 his superior calmly. " God forbid ! I once imagined 
 myself in his predecessor's place, the Earl of Loudon's, 
 and within twenty minutes France had lost Canada. 
 I shudder at it still ! " 
 
 Bourlamaque laughed. Montcalm had said it with 
 a whimsical smile, and it passed him unheeded that 
 the smile ended in a contracting of the brows and a 
 bitter little sigh. The fighter judged war by its- 
 victories ; the strategist by their effects. Montcalm 
 could win victories ; even now, by putting himself 
 into what might pass for his adversary's mind, he 
 hoped to snatch a success against odds. But what
 
 22 FORT AMITY 
 
 .avails it to administer drubbings which but leave your 
 foe the more stubbornly aggressive ? British Generals 
 blundered, but always the British armies came on. 
 War had been declared three years ago ; actually it 
 liad lasted for four ; and the sum of its results was that 
 France, with her chain of forts planted for aggression 
 from the St. Lawrence to the Ohio, had turned to 
 defending them. His countrymen might throw up 
 their caps over splendid repulses of the foe, and hail 
 such for triumphs ; but Montcalm looked beneath the 
 laurels. 
 
 The British, having slept the night in the woods, 
 were mustered at dawn, and marched back to the 
 landing place. Their General, falling back upon com- 
 mon sense after the loss of a precious day, was now 
 resolved to try the short and beaten path by which 
 Montcalm had retreated. It formed a four-mile chord, 
 with the loop of the river for arc, and presented no 
 real difficulty except the broken bridge, which Brad- 
 street was sent forward to repair. 
 
 But though beaten and easy to follow, the road was 
 rough ; and Abercromby in a sweating hurry now 
 determined to leave his guns behind. John a Cleeve, 
 passing forward with his regiment, took note of them 
 as they lay unlimbered amid the brushwood by the 
 landing stage, and thought little of it. He had his 
 drill-book by heart, relied for orders on his senior 
 officers, and took pride in obeying them smartly. This 
 seemed to him the way for a young soldier to learn 
 his calling ; for the rest, war was a game of valour, 
 .and would give him his opportunity. Theoretically 
 lie knew the uses of artillery, but he was not an 
 artilleryman ; nor had he ever felt the temptation 
 to teach his grandmother to suck eggs. His cousin 
 Dick's free comments upon white-headed Generals of 
 division and brigade he let pass with a laugh. To
 
 A BIVOUAC IN THE FOREST 23 
 
 Dick, the Earl of Loudon was " a mournful thickhead," 
 Webb " a mighty handsome figure for a poltroon," 
 Sackville " a discreet footman for a ladies' drum," 
 and the ancestors of Abercromby had all been hanged 
 for fools. Dick, very much at his ease in Sion, would 
 have court-martialled and cashiered the lot out of 
 hand. But John's priestly tutors had schooled him 
 in diffidence, if in nothing else. 
 
 His men to-day were in no pleasant humour, and 
 a few of them veterans, too grumbled viciously 
 as they passed the guns. " Silence in the ranks ! " 
 shouted the captain of his company ; and the familiar 
 words soothed him, and he wondered what had pro- 
 voked the grumbling. A minute later he had for- 
 gotten it. The column crawled forward sulkily. The 
 shadow of Howe's loss lay heavy on it, and a sense 
 that his life had been flung away. They had been 
 inarched into a jungle and marched back again, with 
 nothing to show for it but twenty-four wasted hours. 
 On they crawled beneath the sweltering July heat ; 
 and, coming to the bridge, found more delays. 
 
 Bradstreet and his men had worked like heroes, 
 but the bridge would not be ready to carry troops 
 before the early morning. A wooden saw-mill stood 
 beside it, melancholy and deserted ;^. and here the 
 General took up his quarters, while the army cooked 
 its supper and disposed itself for the night in the 
 trampled clearing around the mill and in the forest 
 beyond. The 46th lay close alongside the river, and 
 the noise of Bradstreet' s hammers on the bridge kept 
 John for a long while awake, and staring up at the 
 high western ridges, black as ink against the radiance 
 of a climbing moon. In the intervals of hammering, 
 the swirl of the river kept tune in his ears with the 
 whir-r-r of a saw in the rear of the mill, slicing up the 
 last planks for the bridge. There was a mill in the
 
 24 FORT AMITY 
 
 valley at home, and he had heard it a hundred times 
 making just such music with the stream that ran down 
 from Dartmoor and past Cleeve Court t - His thoughts 
 went back to Devonshire, but not to linger there ; 
 only to wonder how much love his mother would put 
 into her prayers could she be reached by a vision of 
 him stretched here with his first battle waiting for 
 him on the morrow. He wondered, not bitterly, if 
 her chief reflection would be that he had brought the 
 unpleasant experience on himself when he might have 
 been safe in a priest's cassock. He laughed. How 
 little she understood him, or had ever under- 
 stood ! 
 
 His heart went out to salute the morrow and yet 
 soberly. Outside of his simple duties of routine he 
 was just an unshaped subaltern, with eyes sealed as 
 yet to war's practical teachings. To him, albeit he 
 would have been puzzled had any one told him so, 
 war existed as yet only as a spiritual conflict in which 
 men proved themselves heroes or cowards : and he 
 meant to be a hero. For him everything lay in the 
 will to dare or to endure. He recalled tales of old 
 knights keeping vigil by their arms in solitary chapels, 
 and he questioned the far hill-tops and the stars 
 What substitute for faith supported him ? Did he 
 believe in God ? Yes, after a fashion in some tre- 
 mendous and overruling Power, at any rate. A 
 Power that had made the mountains yonder ? Yes, 
 he supposed so. A loving Power an intimate coun- 
 sellor a Father attending all his steps ? Well, 
 perhaps ; and, if so, a Father to be answered with all 
 a man's love : but, before answering, he honestly 
 needed more assurance. As for another world and a 
 continuing Hfe there, should he happen to fall to- 
 morrow, John searched his heart and decided that 
 he asked for nothing of the sort. Such promises
 
 A BIVOUAC IN THE FOREST 25 
 
 struck him as unworthy bribes, belittling the sacri- 
 fice he came prepared to make. He despised men 
 who bargained with them. Here was he, young, 
 abounding in life, ready to risk extinction. Why ? 
 For a cause (some might say), and that his country's. 
 Maybe : he had never thought this out. To be sure 
 he was proud to carry the regimental colours, and had 
 rather belong to the 46th than to any other regiment. 
 The honour of the 46th was dear to him now as his 
 own. But why, again ? Pure accident had assigned 
 him to the 46th : as for love of his country, he could 
 not remember that it had played any conspicuous 
 part in sending him to join the army. The hammering 
 on the bridge had ceased without his noting it, and 
 also the whirr of the saw. Only the river sang to him 
 now : and to the swirl of it he dropped off into a 
 dreamless, healthy sleep.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 TICONDEROGA 
 
 AT the alarm-post next morning the men were in 
 high spirits again. Every one seemed to be posted 
 in the day's work ahead. The French had thrown up 
 an outwork on the landward end of the ridge ; an 
 engineer had climbed Rattlesnake Mountain at day- 
 break and conned it through his glass, and had brought 
 down his report two hours ago. The white-coats had 
 been working like niggers, helped by some reinforce- 
 ments which had come in overnight Levis with the 
 Royal Roussillon, the scouts said : but the thing was 
 a rough-and-ready affair of logs, and the troops ,were 
 to carry it with the bayonet. John asked in what 
 direction it lay, and thumbs were jerked towards the 
 screening forest across the river. The distance (some 
 said) was not two miles. Colonel Beaver, returning 
 from a visit to the saw-mill, confirmed the rumour. 
 The 46th would march in a couple of hours or less. 
 
 At breakfast Howe's death seemed to be forgotten, 
 and John found no time for solemn thoughts. Bets 
 were laid that the French would not wait for the 
 assault, but slip away to their boats ; even with 
 Levis they could scarcely be four thousand strong. 
 Bradstreet, having finished his bridge, had started 
 back for the landing-stage to haul a dozen of the 
 lighter batteaux across the portage and float them 
 
 26
 
 TICONDEROGA 27 
 
 down to Lake Champlain filled with riflemen. Brad- 
 street was a glutton for work but would he be in 
 time ? That old fox Montcalm would never let his 
 earths be stopped so easily, and to pile defences on 
 the ridge was simply to build himself into a trap. A 
 good half of the officers maintained that there would 
 be no fighting. 
 
 Well, fighting or no, some business was in hand. 
 Here was the battalion in motion ; and, to leave the 
 enemy in no doubt of our martial ardour, here were 
 the drums playing away like mad. The echo of 
 John's feet on the wooden bridge awoke him from 
 these vain shows and rattlings of war to its real 
 meaning, and his thoughts again kept him solemn 
 company as he breasted the slope beyond and began 
 the tedious climb to the right through the woods. 
 
 The scouts, coming in one by one, reported them 
 undefended : and the battalion, though perforce 
 moving slowly, kept good order. Towards the sum- 
 mit, indeed, the front ranks appeared to straggle and 
 extend themselves confusedly : but the disorder, no 
 more than apparent, came from the skirmishers re- 
 turning and falling back upon either flank as the 
 column scrambled up the last five hundred yards and 
 halted on the fringe of the clearing. Of the enemy 
 John could see nothing : only a broad belt of sunlight 
 beyond the last few tree-trunks and their green leaves. 
 The advance had been well timed, the separate 
 columns arriving and coming to the halt almost at 
 clockwork intervals ; nor did the halt give him much 
 leisure to look about him. To the right were drawn 
 up the Highlanders, their dark plaids blending with 
 the forest glooms. In the space between, Beaver 
 had stepped forward, and was chatting with their 
 colonel. By-and-by the dandified Gage joined them, 
 and after a few minutes' talk Beaver came striding.
 
 28 FORT AMITY 
 
 back, with his scabbard tucked under his arm-pit, 
 to be clear of the undergrowth. At once the order 
 was given to fix bayonets, and at a signal the columns 
 were put in motion and marched out upon the edge 
 -of the clearing. 
 
 There, as he stepped forth, the flash of the noonday 
 sun upon lines of steel held John's eyes dazzled. He 
 heard the word given to halt, and the command " Left 
 wheel into line ! " He heard the calls that followed 
 " Eyes front ! " " Steady," " Quick march," " Halt, 
 dress " and felt, rather than saw, the whole elaborate 
 manoeuvre ; the rear ranks locking up, the covering 
 sergeants jigging about like dancers in a minuet 
 pace to the rear, side step to the right the pivot men 
 with stiff arms extended, the companies wheeling up 
 and dressing ; all happening precisely as on parade. 
 
 What, after all, was the difference ? Well, to 
 begin with, the clearing ahead in no way resembled a 
 parade-ground, being strewn and criss-crossed with 
 fallen trees and inter-set with stumps, some cleanly 
 cut, others with jagged splinters from three to ten feet 
 high. And beyond, with the fierce sunlight quivering 
 above it, rose a mass of prostrate trees piled as if for 
 the base of a tremendous bonfire. Not a Frenchman 
 showed behind it. Was that what they had to 
 carry ? 
 
 " The battalion will advance ! " 
 
 Yes, there lay the barrier ; and their business was 
 simply to rush it ; to advance at the charge, holding 
 their fire until within the breastwork. 
 
 The French, too, held their fire. The distance 
 from the edge of the clearing to the abattis was, at 
 the most, a long musket-shot, and for two-thirds of it 
 the crescent-shaped line of British ran as in a paper- 
 -chase, John a Cleeve vaulting across tree-trunks, leap- 
 ing over stumps, and hurrahing with the rest.
 
 TICONDEROGA 29. 
 
 Then with a flame the breastwork opened before him, 
 and with a shock as though the whole ridge lifted 
 itself against the sky a shock which hurled him 
 backward, whirling away his shako. He saw the line 
 to right and left wither under it and shrink like parch- 
 ment held to a candle flame. For a moment the 
 ensign-staff shook in his hands, as if whipped by a 
 gale. He steadied it, and stood dazed, harkening to 
 the scream of the bullets, gulping at a lump in his 
 throat. Then he knew himself unhurt, and, seeing, 
 the men on either hand were picking themselves up 
 and running forward, he ducked his head and ran 
 forward too. 
 
 He had gained the abattis. He went into it with a 
 leap, a dozen men at his heels. A pointed bough met 
 him in the ribs, piercing his tunic and forcing him to 
 cry out with pain. He fell back from it and tugged 
 at the interlacing boughs between him and the log- 
 wall, fighting them with his left, pressing them aside,, 
 now attempting to leap them, now to burst through 
 them with his weight. The wall jetted flame through, 
 its crevices, and the boughs held him fast within 
 twenty yards of it. He could reach it easily (he told 
 himself) but for the staff he carried, against which each 
 separate twig hitched itself as though animated by- 
 special malice. 
 
 He swung himself round and forced his body back- 
 wards against the tangle ; and a score of men, rallying 
 to the colours, leapt in after him. As their weight 
 pressed him down supine and the flag sank in his grasp, 
 he saw' their faces Highlanders and redcoats mixed. 
 They had long since disregarded the order to hold 
 their fire, and were blazing away idly and reloading, 
 cursing the boughs that impeded their ramrods. A 
 corporal of the 46th had managed to reload, and was 
 lifting his piece when a bramble catching in the lock:
 
 30 FORT AMITY 
 
 the charge exploded in his face, and he fell, a 
 bloody weight, across John's legs. Half a dozen men, 
 leaping over him, hurled themselves into the lane 
 which John had opened. 
 
 Ten seconds later but in such a struggle who can 
 count seconds ? John had flung off the dead man and 
 was on his feet again with his face to the rampart. 
 The men who had hurried past him were there, all six 
 of them ; but stuck in strange attitudes and hung 
 across the withering boughs like vermin on a game- 
 keeper's tree corpses every one. The rest had van- 
 ished, and, turning, he found himself alone. Out in 
 the clearing, under the drifted smoke, the shattered 
 regiments were re-forming for a second charge. 
 Gripping the colours, he staggered out to join them, 
 and as he went a bullet sang past him and his left wrist 
 dropped nerveless at his side. He scarcely felt the 
 wound. The brutal jar of the repulse had stunned 
 every sense in him but that of thirst. The reek of 
 gunpowder caked his throat, and his tongue crackled 
 in his mouth like a withered leaf. 
 
 Some one was pointing back over the tree-tops 
 towards Rattlesnake Mountain ; and on the slopes 
 there, as the smoke cleared, sure enough, figures were 
 moving. Guns ? A couple of guns planted there 
 could have knocked this cursed rampart to flinders in 
 t went}- minutes, or plumpedroundshotat leisure among 
 the French huddled within. Where was the General ? 
 
 The General was down at the saw-mill in the valley, 
 seated at his table, penning a despatch. The men on 
 Rattlesnake Mountain were Johnson's Indians Mo- 
 hawks, Oneidas, and others of the Six Nations, who, 
 arriving late, had swarmed up by instinct to the key 
 of the position and seated themselves there with im- 
 passive faces, asking each other when the guns would 
 .arrive and this stupid folly cease. They had seen
 
 TICONDEROGA 31 
 
 artillery, perhaps, once in their lives ; and had learnt 
 the use of it. 
 
 Oh, it was cruel ! By this time there was not a 
 man in the army but could have taught the General 
 the madness of it. But the General was down at the 
 saw-mill, two miles away ; and the broken regiments 
 re-formed and faced the rampart again. The sun 
 beat down on the clearing, heating men to madness. 
 The wounded went down through the gloom of the 
 woods and were carried past the saw-mill, by scores 
 at first, then by hundreds. Within the saw-mill, in 
 his cool chamber, the General sat and wrote. Some 
 one (Gage it is likely) sent down, beseeching him to 
 bring the guns into play. He answered that the guns 
 Avere at the landing-stage, and could not be planted 
 Avithin six hours. A second messenger suggested that 
 the assault on the ridge had already caused inordinate 
 loss, and that by the simple process of marching around 
 Ticonderoga and occupying the narrows of Lake 
 Champlain Montcalm could be starved out in a week. 
 The General showed him the door. Upon the ridge 
 the fight went on. 
 
 John a Cleeve had by this time lost count of the 
 charges. Some had been feeble ; one or two superb ; 
 and once the Highlanders, with a gallantry only pos- 
 sible to men past caring for life, had actually heaved 
 themselves over the parapets on the French right. 
 They had gone into action a thousand strong ; they 
 were now six hundred. Charge after charge had flung 
 forward a few to leap the rampart and fall on the 
 French bayonets ; but now the best part of a company 
 poured over. For a moment sheer desperation carried 
 the day ; but the white-coats, springing back off their 
 platforms, poured in a volley and settled the question. 
 That night the Black Watch called its roll ; there 
 answered five hundred mefi less one.
 
 32 FORT AMITY 
 
 It was in the next charge after this half-heartedly 
 taken up by the exhausted troops on the right that 
 John a Cleeve found himself actually climbing the 
 log- wall towards which he had been straining all the 
 afternoon. What carried him there he afterwards 
 affirmed was the horrid vision of young Sagramore 
 of the 2yth impaled on a pointed branch and left to 
 struggle in death agony while the regiments rallied. 
 The body was quivering yet as they came on again ; 
 and John, as he ran by, shouted to a sergeant to drag 
 it off : for his own left hand hung powerless, and the 
 colours encumbered his right. In front of him re- 
 peated charges had broken a sort of pathway through 
 the abattis, swept by an enfilading fire from two angles 
 of the breastwork, slippery with blood and hampered 
 with corpses ; but the grape-shot which had accounted 
 for most of these no longer whistled along it, the 
 French having run off their guns to the right to meet 
 the capital attack of the Highlanders. Through it he 
 forced his way, the pressure of the men behind lifting 
 and bearing him forward whenever the ensign-staff 
 for a moment impeded him. He noted that the leaves 
 which at noon had been green and sappy, with only a 
 slight crumpling of their edges, were now grey and 
 curled into tight scrolls, crackling as he brushed them 
 aside. How long had the day lasted, then ? And 
 would it ever end ? The vision of young Sagramore 
 followed him. He had known Sagramore at Halifax, and 
 invited him to mess one night with the 46th as brain- 
 less and sweet-tempered a boy as ever muddled his drill. 
 
 John was at the foot of the rampart. While with his 
 injured hand he fumbled vainly to climb it, someone 
 stooped a shoulder and hoisted him. He flung a leg 
 over the parapet, and glanced down a moment at the 
 man's face. It was the sergeant to whom he had 
 shouted just now.
 
 TICONDEROGA 33 
 
 " Right, sir," the sergeant grunted ; " we're after 
 you ! " 
 
 John hoisted the colours high and hurrahed. 
 
 " Forward ! Forward, Forty-sixth ! " 
 
 Then, as a dozen men heaved themselves on to the 
 parapet, a fiery pang gripped him by the chest, and 
 the night so long held back came suddenly, swoop- 
 ing on him from all corners of the sky at once. The 
 grip of his knees relaxed. The sergeant, leaping, 
 caught the standard in the nick of time, as the limp 
 body slid and dropped within the rampart.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE VOYAGEURS. 
 
 Fringue, fringue sur la riviere ; 
 Fringue, fringue sur 1'aviron ! 
 
 THE man at the bow paddle set the chorus, which was 
 taken up by boat after boat. John, stretched at the 
 bottom of a canoe with two wounded Highlanders, won- 
 dered where he had heard the voice before. His wits 
 were not very clear yet. The canoe's gunwale hid all 
 the landscape but a mountain-ridge high over his 
 right, feathered with forest and so far away that, 
 swiftly as the strokes carried him forward, its serrated 
 pines and notches of naked rock crept by him inch by 
 inch. He stared at these and prayed for the moment 
 when the sun should drop behind them. For hours 
 it had been beating down on him. An Indian sat high 
 in the stern, steering ; paddling rhythmically and with 
 no sign of effort except that his face ran with sweat 
 beneath its grease and vermilion. But not a feature 
 of it twitched in the glare across which, hour after hour, 
 John had been watching him through scorched eye- 
 lashes. 
 
 Athwart the stern, and almost at the Indian's feet, 
 reclined a brawn of a man with his knees drawn high 
 a French sergeant in a spick-and-span white tunic 
 with the badge of the Bearnais regiment. A musket 
 lay across his thighs, so pointed that John looked 
 
 34
 
 THE VOYAGEURS 35 
 
 straight down its barrel. Doubtless it was loaded :. 
 but John had plenty to distract his thoughts from; 
 such a trifle in the heat, the glare, the torment of 
 his wounds, and, worst of all, the incessant coughing, 
 of the young Highlander beside him. The lad had. 
 been shot through the lungs, and the wound imper- 
 fectly bandaged. A horrible wind issued from it with 
 every cough. 
 
 How many men might be seated or lying in the fore 
 part of the canoe John could not tell, being unable to 
 turn his head. Once or twice a guttural voice there 
 growled a word of comfort to the dying lad, in Gaelic 
 or iri broken English. And always the bowman sang 
 high and clear, setting the chorus for the attendant 
 boats, and from the chorus passing without a break, 
 into the solo. " En roulant ma boule " followed 
 " Fringue sur 1'aviron " ; and from that the voice- 
 slid into a little love-chant, tender and delicate : 
 
 " A la claire fontaine 
 M'en allant promener, 
 J'ai trouve 1'eau si belle 
 Que je m'y suis baigne. 
 
 II y a longtemps que je t'aime, 
 
 Jamais je ne t'oublierai." 
 
 " II y a longtemps que je t'aime," broke in the chorus, 
 the wide lake modulating the music as water only can. 
 John remembered the abattis and all its slaughter, 
 and marvelled what manner of men they were who, 
 fresh from it, could put their hearts into such a song. 
 
 " Et patata, et patata ! " rapped in the big sergeant. 
 " For God's sake, Chameau, what kind of milk is this 
 to turn a man's stomach ? " 
 
 The chorus drowned his growls, and the bowman 
 continued : 
 
 " Sur la plus haute branche 
 Le rossignol, chantait.
 
 36 FORT AMITY 
 
 Chante, rossignol, chante, 
 Toi qui as le cceur gai . . . 
 Chante, rossignol, chante, 
 Toi qui as le cceur gai ; 
 Tu as le cceur a rire, 
 Moi je 1'ait a pleurer. . . ." 
 
 " Gr-r-r " As the song ended, the sergeant spat 
 
 contemptuously over the gunwale. " La -la -la, 
 rossignol ! et la-la-la, rosier ! " he mimicked. " We 
 are not rosieres, my friend." 
 
 " The song is true Canayan, m'sieur, and your 
 comrades appear to like it." 
 
 " Par exemple ! Listen, Monsieur Chameau, to 
 something more in their line." He inflated his huge 
 lungs and burst into a ditty of his own : 
 
 " C'est dans la ville de Bordeaux 
 Qu'est arrive trois beaux vaissaux 
 
 Qu'est arrive trois beaux vaissaux : 
 Les matelots qui sont dedans, 
 Vrai Dieu, sont de jolis galants." 
 
 The man had a rich baritone voice, not comparable, 
 indeed, with the bowman's tenor, yet not without 
 quality ; but he used it affectedly, and sang with 
 a simper on his face. His face, brick red in hue, was 
 handsome in its florid way ; but John, watching the 
 simper, found it detestable. 
 
 " C'est une dame de Bordeaux 
 Qu'est amoureuse d'un matelpt " 
 
 Here he paused, and a few soldiers took up the refrain 
 half-heartedly : 
 
 " Va, ma servante, va moi chercher 
 
 Un matelot pour m'amuser." 
 
 The song from this point became indecent, and set 
 the men in the nearer boats laughing. At its close a
 
 THE VOYAGEURS 37 
 
 few clapped their hands. But it was not a success, 
 and the brick red darkened on the singer's face ; 
 darkened almost to purple when a voice in the dis- 
 tance took up the air and returned it mockingly, 
 caricaturing a roulade to the life with the help of one 
 or two ridiculous grace-notes : at which the soldiers 
 laughed again. 
 
 " I think, m'sieur," suggested the bowman politely, 
 " they do not know it very well, or they would doubt- 
 less have been heartier." 
 
 But the sergeant had heaved himself up with a 
 curse and a lurch which sent the canoe rocking, and 
 was scanning the boats for the fellow who had dared 
 to insult him. 
 
 " How the devil can a man sing while that dog 
 keeps barking ! " he growled, and let out a kick at 
 the limp legs of the young highlander. 
 
 Another growl answered. It came from the 
 wounded prisoner behind John -the man who had 
 been muttering in Gaelic. 
 
 " It is a coward you are, big man. Go on singing 
 your sculduddery, and let the lad die quiet ! " 
 
 The sergeant scowled, not understanding. John, 
 whose blood was up, obligingly translated the reproof 
 into French. " He says and I also that \"ou are a 
 cowardly bully ; and we implore you to sing in tune, 
 another time. Par pitie, monsieur, ne scalpez-voifs 
 pas les demi-morts ! " 
 
 The shaft bit, as he had intended, and the man's 
 vanity positively foamed upon it. " Dog of a ros-bif, 
 congratulate yourself that you are half dead, or I 
 would whip you again as we whipped you yesterday, 
 and as my regiment is even now again whipping your 
 compatriots." He jerked a thumb towards the south, 
 where, far up the lake, a pale saffron glow spread 
 itself upon the twilight. 
 
 B
 
 38 FORT AMITY 
 
 " The English are burning your fort, maybe," John 
 suggested amiably. 
 
 " They are burning the mill, more like or their 
 boats. But after such a defeat, who cares ? " 
 
 " If our general had only used his artillery 
 
 " Eh, what is that you're singing ? Ouida, if your 
 general had only used his artillery ? My little friend, 
 that's a fine battle that battle of ' If.' It is always 
 won, too only it has the misfortune never to be 
 fought. So, so : and a grand battle it is too, for 
 reputations. ' // the guns had only arrived ' ; and 
 ' if the brigadier Chose had brought up the reserves 
 as ordered ' ; and ' if the right had extended itself, 
 and that devil of a left had not straggled ' why, 
 then we should all be heroes, we ros-bifs. Whereas 
 we came on four to one, and we were beaten ; and 
 we are being carried north to Montreal, and our general 
 is running south from an army one-third of his size 
 and burning fireworks on his way. And at Albany 
 the ladies will take your standards, and stitch ' // ' on 
 them in gold letters a foot long. Eh, but it was a 
 glorious fight faith of Sergeant Barboux ! " 
 
 And Sergeant Barboux, having set his vanity on 
 its legs again, pulled out his pipe and skin of tobacco. 
 
 " Hola, M. le Chameau ! " he called ; " the gentle- 
 man desires better music than mine. Sing for him 
 ' Malbrouck s'en va t'en guerre ! " 
 
 M. le Chameau lifted his voice obediently ; and 
 thereupon John recognised the note, and knew to 
 whose singing he had lain awake in the woods so far 
 behind and (it seemed) those ages ago. 
 
 He had been young then, and all possibilities of 
 glory lay beyond the horizons to which he was voyag- 
 ing. Darkness had closed down on them, but the 
 beat of the paddles drove him forward. He stared 
 up at the peering stars and tried to bethink him that
 
 THE VOYAGEURS 39 
 
 they looked down on the same world that he had 
 known on Albany Halifax perhaps even on Cleeve 
 Court in Devonshire. The bowman's voice, ahead 
 in the darkness, kept time with the paddles : 
 
 " II reviendra-z a Paques 
 
 Mironton, mironton, mirontaine ! 
 II reviendra-z a Paques, 
 Ou a la Trinite ! " 
 
 Yes, the question was of returning, now ; a day had 
 made that difference. Yet why should he wish to 
 return ? Of what worth would his return be ? For 
 weeks, for months, he had been living in a life ahead, 
 towards which these paddles were faithfully guiding 
 him ; and if the hope had died out of it, and all the 
 colour, what better lay behind that he should seek 
 back to it ? a mother, who had shown him little 
 love ; a brother, who coldly considered him a fool ; 
 nearer, but only a little nearer for already the 
 leagues between seemed endless a few friends, a 
 
 few messmates 
 
 His ribs hurt him intolerably ; and his wrist, too, 
 was painful. Yet his wounds troubled him with no 
 thought of death. On the contrary, he felt quite sure 
 of recovering and living on, and on, on, on in those 
 unknown regions ahead. . . . 
 
 " La Trinite se passe 
 
 Mironton, mironton, mirontaine ! 
 La Trinite se passe 
 
 Malbrouck ne revient pas." 
 
 What were they like, those regions ahead ? For he 
 was young less than twenty and a life almost as 
 long as an ordinary man's might lie before him yonder. 
 He remembered an old discussion with a seminary 
 priest at Douai, on Nicodemus's visit by night, and 
 his question, " How can a man be born when he is
 
 40 FORT AMITY 
 
 old ? " . . . and all his thoughts harked back to the 
 Church he had left that Church so Catholic, so far- 
 reaching, so secure of herself in all climes and amid 
 all nations of men. There were Jesuits, he knew, up 
 yonder, beyond the rivers, beyond the forests. He 
 would find that Church there, steadfast as these stars, 
 and, alone with them, bridging all this long gulf. In 
 his momentary weakness the repose she offered came 
 on him as a temptation. Had he but anchored him- 
 seM upon her, all these leagues had been as nothing. 
 But he had cut himself adrift ; and now the world, 
 too, had cut him off, and where was he with his 
 doubts ? . . . Or was she following now and whisper- 
 ing, " Poor fool, you thought yourself strong, and I 
 granted you a short license ; but I have followed, as I 
 can follow everywhere, unseen, knowing the hour 
 when you must repent and want me ; and lo ! my 
 lap is open. Come, let its folds wrap you, and at 
 once there is no more trouble ; for within them time 
 and distance are not, and all this voyage shall be as a 
 dream." 
 
 No ; he put the temptation from him. For it was 
 a sensual temptation after all, surprising him in 
 anguish and exhaustion, and bribing with promise 
 of repose. He craved after it, but set his teeth. 
 " Yes, you are right, so far. The future has gone 
 from me, and I have no hopes. But it seems 1 1 have 
 to live, and I am a man. My doubts are my doubts, 
 and this is no fair moment to abandon them. What 
 iVnust suffer I will try to suffer. ..." 
 
 The bowman had lit a lantern in the bows, and 
 passed back the resinous brand to an Indian seated 
 forward, who in turn handed it back over John's 
 head towards Sergeant Barboux, but, seeing that he 
 dozed, crawled aft over the wounded men and set it 
 to the wick of a second lantern rigged on a stick astern.
 
 THE VOYAGEURS 41 
 
 As the wick took fire, the Indian, who had been steer- 
 ing hitherto hour after hour, grunted out a syllable 
 or two, and handed^ his comrade the paddle. The 
 pair changed places, and the ex-steersman who 
 seemed the elder by many years crept cautiously 
 forward ; the lantern-light, as he passed it, falling 
 warm on his scarlet trousers and drawing fiery twinkles 
 from his belt and silver arm-ring. 
 
 With a guttural whisper he crouched over John, 
 so low that his body blotted out the lantern, the stars, 
 the whole dim arch of the heavens. Was this murder ? 
 John shut his teeth. If this were to be the end, let 
 it come now and be done with ; he would not cry out. 
 The Highland lad had ceased his coughing, and lay un- 
 conscious, panting out the last of his life more and 
 more feebly. The elder Highlander moaned from time 
 to time in his sleep, but had not stirred for some while. 
 Forward the bowman's paddle still beat time like a 
 clock, and away in the darkness other paddles 
 answered it. 
 
 A hand was groping with the bandages about 
 John's chest, and loosening them gently until his 
 wound felt the edge of the night wind. All his 
 muscles stiffened to meet the coming stroke. . . . 
 
 The Indian grunted, and withdrew his hand. A 
 moment, and John felt it laid on the wound again, 
 with a touch which charmed away pain and the wind's 
 chill together a touch of smooth ointment. 
 
 Do what he would, a sob shook the lad from head- 
 to foot. 
 
 " Thanks, brother ! " he whispered in French. 
 The Indian did not answer, but replaced and drew 
 close the bandage with rapid hands, and so with 
 another grunt crawled forward, moving like a shadow, 
 scarcely touching the wounded men as he went. 
 
 For a while John lay awake, gazing up into the
 
 42 FORT AMITY 
 
 stars. His pain had gone, and he felt infinitely rest- 
 ful. The vast heavens were a protection now, a 
 shield flung over his helplessness. He had found a 
 friend. 
 
 Why? 
 
 That he could not tell. But he had found a friend, 
 and could sleep. 
 
 In his dreams he heard a splash. The young 
 Highlander had died in the night, and Sergeant 
 Barboux and the Indian lifted and dropped the body 
 overboard. 
 
 But John a Cleeve slept on ; and still northward 
 through the night, down the long reaches of the lake, 
 the canoe held her way.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 CONTAINS THE APOLOGUE OF MANABOZHO's TOE 
 
 THEY had threaded their course through the many 
 islets at the foot of the lake, and were speeding down 
 the headwaters of the Richelieu. The forests had 
 closed in upon them, shutting out the mountains. 
 The convoy officered for the most part by Canadian 
 militiamen with but a sprinkling of regulars such as 
 Sergeant Barboux soon began to straggle. The 
 prisoners were to be delivered at Montreal. Montcalm 
 had despatched them thither, on short rations, for 
 the simple reason that Fort Carillon held scarcely 
 food enough to support his own army ; but he could 
 detach very few of his efficients for escort, and, for 
 the rest, it did not certainly appear who was in com- 
 mand. Barboux, for example, was frankly insubordin- 
 ate, and declared a dozen times a day that it did not 
 become gentlemen of the Beam and Royal Roussillon 
 to take their orders from any coureur de bois who 
 might choose to call himself Major. 
 
 Consequently the convoy soon straggled at will, 
 the boatmen labouring if the fancy took them, or 
 resting their paddles across their thighs and letting 
 their canoes drift on the current. Now and again 
 they met a train of batteaux labouring up with 
 reinforcements, that had heard of the victory from 
 the leading boats and hurrahed as they passed, or 
 
 43
 
 44 FORT AMITY 
 
 shouted questions which Barboux answered as a 
 conscious hero of the fight and with no false modesty. 
 But for hour after hour John lived alone with his own 
 boat's company and the interminable procession of 
 the woods. 
 
 They descended to the river, these woods, and 
 overhung it each bank a mute, monotonous screen 
 of foliage, unbroken by glade or clearing ; pine and 
 spruce and hemlock, maple and alder ; piled plumes 
 of green, motionless, brooding, through which no 
 sunrays broke, though here and there a silver birch 
 drew a shaft of light upon their sombre background. 
 Here were no English woodlands, no stretches of pale 
 green turf, no vistas opening beneath flattened boughs, 
 with blue distant hills, and perhaps a group of antlers 
 topping the bracken. The wild life of these forests 
 crawled among thickets or lurked in sinister shadows. 
 No bird poured out its heart in them ; no lark soared 
 out of them, breasting heaven. At rare intervals a 
 note fell on the ear the scream of hawk or eagle, 
 the bitter cackling laugh of blue jay or woodpecker, 
 the loon's ghostly cry solitary notes, and unhappy, 
 as though wrung by pain out of the choking silence ; 
 or away on the hillside a grouse began drumming, 
 or a duck went whirring down the long waterway 
 until the sound sank and was overtaken by the river's 
 slow murmur. 
 
 When night had hushed down these noises, the 
 forest would be silent for an hour or two, and then 
 awake more horribly with the howling of wolves. 
 John slept little of nights ; not on account of the 
 wolves, but because the mosquitos allowed him no 
 peace. (They were torture to a wounded man ; but he 
 declared afterwards that they cured his wounded arm 
 willy-nilly, for they forced him to keep it active under 
 pain of being eaten alive.) By day he dozed, lulled
 
 APOLOGUE OF MANABOZHO'S TOE 45 
 
 by the eternal woods, the eternal dazzle on the water, 
 the eternal mutter of the flood, the paddle-strokes, 
 M. le Chameau's singing. 
 
 They were now six in the canoe the sergeant, 
 le Chameau, the two Indians, John a Cleeve and the 
 elder Highlander, Corporal Hugh McQuarters. 
 
 By this time that is to say, having seen him 
 John understood the meaning of M. le Chameau's 
 queer name. He was a hunchback, but a gay little 
 man, nevertheless ; reputedly a genius in the art of 
 shooting rapids. He was also a demon to work, 
 when allowed ; but the sergeant would not allow him. 
 
 It suited the sergeant's humour to lag behind the 
 other boats by way of asserting his dignity, and 
 proving that he, Barboux, held himself at no trumpery 
 colonial's beck and call. Also he had begun to nurse 
 a scheme ; as will appear by-and-by. 
 
 At present it amused him to order the canoe to 
 shore for an hour or two in the heat of the day, lend 
 his bayonet to the Indians, and watch, smoking, 
 ^\hile they searched the banks and dug out mus- 
 quashes. These they cooked and ate ; which Barboux 
 asserted to be good economy, since provisions were 
 running short. It occurred to John that this might 
 be a still better reason for hurrying forward, but he 
 was grateful for the siesta under the boughs while 
 the Indians worked. They were Ojibways both, 
 the elder by name Menehwehna and the younger (a 
 handsome fellow with a wonderful gift of silence) 
 Muskingon. 
 
 Since that one stealthy act of kindness Meneh- 
 wehna had given no sign of cordiality. John had 
 tried a score of times to catch his eye, and had caught 
 it once or twice, but only to find the man inscrutable. 
 Yet he was by no means taciturn ; but seemed, as 
 his war-paint of soot and vermilion wore thinner, to
 
 46 FORT AMITY 
 
 thaw into what (for an Indian) might pass for geniality. 
 After a successful rat-hunt he wouW even grow 
 loquacious, seating himself on the bank and jabbering 
 while he skinned his spoils, using for the most part 
 a jargon of broken French (in which he was fluent) 
 and native words of which Barboux understood very 
 few and John none at all. When he fell back on 
 Ojibway pure and simple, it was to address Muskingon, 
 who answered in monosyllables, and was sparing of 
 these. Muskingon and McOuarters were the silent 
 men of the party the latter by force as well as 
 choice, since he knew no French and in English could 
 only converse with John. He and Muskingon had 
 this further in common they both detested the 
 sergeant. 
 
 John, for his part, had patched up a peace with the 
 man, after this fashion : On the second day Barboux 
 had called upon le Chameau for a song ; and, the little 
 hunchback having given " En roulant ma boule," 
 demanded another. 
 
 " But it is monsieur's turn, who has a charming 
 voice," suggested le Chameau politely. 
 
 " It has the misfortune to grate on the ears of our 
 English milord," Barboux answered, with an angry 
 flush, stealing a malevolent glance at John. " And I 
 do not sing to please myself." 
 
 John doubted this, but being by nature quick to 
 forgive and repent a quarrel, he answered with some 
 grace : " I was annoyed, Sergeant Barboux, and said 
 what I thought would hurt rather than what was just. 
 You possess, indeed, a charming voice, and I regret 
 to have insulted it." 
 
 " You mean it ? " asked Barboux, still red in the 
 face, but patently delighted. 
 
 " So entirely that I shall not pardon myself until 
 you have done us the favour to sing."
 
 APOLOGUE OF MANABOZHO'S TOE 47 
 
 The sergeant held out his hand. " And that's very 
 handsomely said ! Given or taken, an apology never 
 goes astray between brave fellows. And, after all," 
 he added, " I had, if I remember, something the better 
 of that argument ! You really wish me to sing 
 then ? " 
 
 " To be sure I do," Jack assured him, smiling. 
 
 Barboux cleared his throat, wagged his head once or 
 twice impassively, and trolled out : 
 
 " Belle meunidre en passant par ici, 
 Ne-suis je t'y pas eligne d' Italic. . . " 
 
 From this graceful opening the song declined into the 
 grossest filth ; and it was easy to see, watching his 
 face, why McQuarters, without understanding a word 
 of French, had accused him of singing " sculduddery." 
 John, though disgusted, could not help being amused 
 by a performance which set him in mind now of a 
 satyr and now of a mincing schoolgirl vert galant 
 avec tin sourire de cantatrice lasciviousness blowing 
 affected kisses in the intervals of licking its chops. 
 At the conclusion he complimented the singer, with a 
 grave face. 
 
 Barboux bowed. " It has, to say true, a little more 
 marrow in it than le Chameau's rossignols and rosiers. 
 Hola, Chameau ; the Englishman here agrees that you 
 sing well, but that your matter is watery stuff. You 
 must let me teach you one or two of my songlets 
 
 " Pardon, m'sieur, mais a sera un peu trop trop 
 vif ; c'est-a-dire pour moi," stammered the little 
 hunchback. 
 
 Barboux guffawed. The idea of le Chameau as a 
 ladies' man tickled him hugely, and he tormented the 
 patient fellow with allusions to it, and to his deformity, 
 twenty times a day. 
 
 And yet the sergeant was not ill-natured until you
 
 48 FORT AMITY 
 
 happened to cross him, when his temper became damn- 
 able but merely a big, vain, boisterous lout. John, 
 having taken his measure, found it easy to study him 
 philosophically, and even to be passably amused by 
 him. But he made himself, it must be owned, an 
 affliction ; and an affliction against which, since the 
 boats had parted company, there was no redress. He 
 was conceited, selfish, tyrannical, and inordinately 
 lazy. He never took a hand with the paddle, but 
 would compel the others to work, or to idle, as the 
 freak took him. He docked the crew's allowance, 
 but fed himself complacently on more than full rations, 
 proving this to be his due by discourse on the innate 
 superiority of Frenchmen over Canadians, Englishmen 
 or Indians. He would sit by the hour bragging of his 
 skill with the gun, his victories in love, his feats of 
 strength baring his chest, arms, legs, and inviting 
 the company to admire his muscles. He jested from 
 sunrise until sundown, and never made a jest that did 
 not hurt. Worst of all it was when he schooled le 
 Chameau to sing his obscenities after him, line for line. 
 
 " No, no, I beg you, monsieur," the little fellow 
 would protest, " c'est c'est sale ! " and would blush 
 like a girl. 
 
 " Sale, you dog ? I'll teach you " A blow 
 
 would follow. M. Barboux was getting liberal with 
 his blows. Once he struck Muskingon. Menehwehna 
 growled ominously, and the growl seemed to warn not 
 only Barboux but Muskingon, who for the moment 
 had looked murderous. 
 
 , John guessed that some tie, if not of blood-relation- 
 ship, at least of strong affection, bound the two 
 Indians together. 
 
 For himself, as soon as his wound allowed him to sit 
 upright, which it did on the second day the bullet 
 having glanced across his ribs and left but its ugly
 
 APOLOGUE OF MANABOZHO'S TOE 49 
 
 track in the thin flesh covering them the monotony 
 of the woods and the ceaseless glint of the water were 
 a drug which he could summon at will, and so with- 
 draw himself within a stupor untroubled by Barboux 
 or his boastings. He suffered the man, but saw no 
 necessity for heeding him. 
 
 He had observed two or three hanks of fishing-line 
 dangling from the thin strips of cedar which sheathed 
 the canoe within, a little below the gunwale. They 
 had hooks attached, and from the shape of these hooks 
 he judged them to belong to the Indians. He un- 
 hitched one of the lines, and more for the sake of killing 
 time than for any set purpose, began to construct a 
 gaudy salmon-fly with a few frayed threads of cloth 
 from his tunic. After a minute or two he was aware 
 of Muskingon watching him with interest, and by 
 signs begged for a feather from the young Indian's 
 topknot. Muskingon drew one forth, and, under 
 instructions, plucked off a piece of fluff from the root 
 of the feather, a small quill or two, and handed them 
 over. With a length of red silk drawn from his sash, 
 John within half an hour was bending a very pretty 
 fly on the hook. It did not in the least resemble any 
 winged creature upon earth ; but it had a meretrici- 
 ous air about it, and even a " killing " one when he 
 finished up by binding its body tight with an inch of 
 gilt from his collar. Meanwhile, his ambition growing 
 with success, he had cast his eyes about, to alight on 
 a long jointed cane which the canoe carried as part of 
 its appanage, to be lifted on cross-legs and serve as 
 the ridge of an awning on wet nights. It was cum- 
 brous, but flexible, in some small degree. Muskingon 
 dragged it within reach, and sat watching while John 
 whipped a loop to its end and ran the line through it. 
 
 He had begun in pure idleness, but now the produc- 
 tion of the rod had drawn everyone's eyes. Barboux
 
 50 FORT AMITY 
 
 was watching him superciliously, and Menehwehna 
 with grave attention, resting his paddle on his knees 
 while the canoe drifted. Fish had been leaping 
 throughout the afternoon salmon by the look of 
 them. John knew something of salmon ; he had 
 played and landed many a fish out of the Dart above 
 Totnes, and in his own river below Cleeve Court. The 
 sun had dropped behind the woods, the water was not 
 too clear, and, in short, it looked a likely hour for 
 feeding. He lifted his clumsy rod in his right hand, 
 steadied it with his injured left, and put all his skill 
 into the cast. 
 
 As he cast the weight of his rod almost overbalanced 
 him : a dart of pain came from his closing wound, and 
 he knew that he had been a fool and overtaxed his 
 strength. But to his amazement a fish rose at once 
 and gulped the fly down. He tossed the rod to Musk- 
 ingon, calling to him to draw it inboard and sit quite 
 still ; and catching the line, tautened it and slackened 
 it out slowly, feeling up to the loop in which (as was 
 to be expected) it had kinked and was sticking fast. 
 
 He had the line in both hands now, with Muskingon 
 paying out the slack behind him ; and if the hook 
 held the line had no gut he felt confident of his fish. 
 By the feel of him he was a salmon or a black bass. 
 John had heard of black bass and the sport they gave. 
 A beauty, at any rate ! 
 
 Yes, he was a salmon. Giving on the line but never 
 slackening it, though it cut his forefinger cruelly (his 
 left being all but useless to check the friction), John 
 worked him to the top of the water, and so, by little 
 and little, to the side of the canoe. But his own 
 strength was giving out, faster now than the salmon's. 
 His wound had parted ; and as he clenched his teeth 
 he felt the line fraying. The fish would have been 
 lost had not Muskingon, almost without shaking the
 
 APOLOGUE OF MANABOZHO'S TOE 51 
 
 canoe, dropped overboard, dived under, and clenched 
 both hands upon his struggles. 
 
 It was Menehwehna who dragged the salmon across 
 the gunwale ; for John had fainted. And when he 
 recovered Menehwehna was coolly gutting the monster 
 if a fish of eighteen pounds can be called a monster ; 
 as surely he can when taken in such fashion. 
 
 After this, John being out of action, Sergeant Bar- 
 boux must take a turn with the rod. He did not (he 
 protested) count on landing a fish ; but the hooking 
 of one had been so ridiculously prompt and easy that 
 it was hard to see how he could fail. 
 
 But he did. He flogged the water till nightfall, 
 confidently at first though clumsity, at length with the 
 air of a Xerxes casting chains into the flood ; but never 
 a bite rewarded him. He gave over the rod in a huff, 
 but began again at dawn, to lay it down after an hour 
 and swear viciously. As he retired Muskingon took 
 the pole ; he had watched John's one and only cast, 
 and began to imitate it patiently, while the sergeant 
 jeered and the canoe drifted. Towards noon he felt 
 a bite, struck, and missed ; but half an hour later 
 he struck again, and Menehwehna shouted and 
 pointed as John's fly was sucked under in a noble 
 swirl of water. Muskingon dragged back his rod and* 
 stretched out a hand for the line ; but Barboux had 
 already run forward and clutched it, at the same 
 moment roughly thrusting him down on his seat ^ 
 and then in a moment the mischief was done. The 
 line parted, and the sergeant floundered back 
 with a lurch that sent the canoe down to her gun- 
 wale. 
 
 McQuarters laughed aloud and grimly. Meneh- 
 wehna's dark eyes shone. Even John, though the 
 lurch obliged him to fling out both hands to balance 
 the boat, and the sudden movement sent a dart of
 
 52 FORT AMITY 
 
 pain through his wound, could not hold back a smile. 
 Barboux was furious. 
 
 " Eh ? So you are pleased to laugh at me, master 
 Englishman ! Wait then, and we'll see who laughs 
 last. And you, dog of an Indian, at what are you 
 rubbing your hands ? " 
 
 " Your exploit, O illustrious warrior," answered 
 Menehwehna with gravity, " set me in mind of Mana- 
 bozho ; and when one thinks upon Manabozho it is 
 permitted, and even customary, to rub the hands." 
 
 " Who the devil was Manabozho ? " 
 
 " He was a very Great One even another such 
 Great One as yourself. It was he who made the earth 
 once on a time, by accident. And another time he 
 went fishing." 
 
 " Have a care, Menehwehna. I bid you beware if 
 you are poking fun at me." 
 
 " I am telling of Manabozho. He went fishing in 
 the lake and let down a line. ' King Fish,' said he, 
 ' take hold of my bait,' and he kept saying this until 
 the King Fish felt annoyed, and said, ' This Mana- 
 bozho is a nuisance. Here, trout, take hold of his 
 line.' The trout obeyed, and Manabozho shouted, 
 ' Wa-i-he ! Wa-i-he ! I have him ! ' while the canoe 
 *rocked to and fro. But when he saw the trout he 
 called, ' Esa, esa ! Shame upon you, trout ; I fish for 
 your betters.' So the trout let go ; and again Mana- 
 bozho sank his line, saying, ' O King Fish, take hold of 
 my bait.' ' I shall lose my temper soon with this 
 fellow,' said the King Fish ; ' here, sunfish, take hold 
 of his line ' The sunfish did so, and Manabozho's 
 canoe spun round and round ; but when he saw what 
 lie had caught he cried out, ' Esa, esa ! Shame upon 
 you, sunfish ; I am come for your betters.' So the 
 sunfish let go, and again Manabozho 
 
 " Joli a'mphigouri ! " yawned the sergeant.
 
 APOLOGUE OF MANABOZHO'S TOE 53 
 
 " Pardon, M. Menehwehna, but this story of yours 
 seems likely to last." 
 
 " Not so, O chief ; for this time the King Fish took 
 the bait and swallowed Manabozho, canoe and all." 
 
 John laughed aloud ; but enough sense remained 
 in Barboux to cover his irritation. " Well, that was 
 the last of him, and the Lord be praised ! " 
 
 " There is much more of the story," said Meneh- 
 wehna, " and all full of instruction." 
 
 " We will postpone it, anyhow. Take up your 
 paddle, if you have not forgotten how to work." 
 
 So Menehwehna and the hunchback paddled anew, 
 while the great Barboux sat and sulked a sufficiently 
 childish figure. Night fell, the canoe was brought 
 to shore, and the Indians as usual lifted out the 
 wounded men and laid them on beds of moss strewn 
 with pine-boughs and cedar. While Menehwehna lit 
 the camp fire, Muskingon prepared John's salmon 
 for supper, and began to grill it deftly as soon as the 
 smoke died down on a pile of clear embers. 
 
 John sleepily watched these preparations, and was 
 fairly dozing when he heard Barboux announce with 
 an oath that for his impudence the dog of an English- 
 man should go without his share of the fish. The 
 announcement scarcely awoke him the revenge 
 was so petty. Barboux in certain moods could be 
 such a baby that John had ceased to regard him 
 except as an object of silent mirth. So he smiled 
 and answered sweetly that Sergeant Barboux was 
 entirely welcome ; for himself a scrap of biscuit would 
 suffice. And with that he closed his eyes again. 
 
 But it seemed that, for some reason, the two Indians 
 were angry, not to say outraged. By denying him 
 his share Barboux had no doubt ignorantly broken 
 some sacred law in the etiquette of hunting. Musk- 
 ingon growled ; the firelight showed his lips drawn
 
 54 FORT AMITY 
 
 back, like a dog's, from his white teeth. Menehwehna 
 remonstrated. Even le Chameau seemed to be 
 perturbed. 
 
 Barboux, however, did not understand ; and as 
 nobody would share in John's portion, ate it himself 
 with relish amid an angry silence, which at length 
 impressed him. 
 
 " Eh ? What the devil's wrong with you all ? " 
 he demanded, looking about him. 
 
 Menehwehna broke into a queer growl, and began 
 ico rub his hands. " Manabozho " he began. 
 
 " Fichtre ! It appears we have not heard the end 
 of him, then ? " 
 
 " It is usual," Menehwehna explained, " to rub one's 
 hands at the mention of Manabozho. In my tribe 
 it is even necessary." 
 
 " Farceur de Manabozho ! the habit has not ex- 
 tended to mine," growled Barboux. " Is this the 
 same story ? " 
 
 " O slayer of heads, it is an entirely different one." 
 The sergeant winced, and John cast himself back on 
 his leafy bed to smile up at the branches. Tueur de 
 tetes may be a high compliment from an Indian warrior, 
 but a vocalist may be excused for looking twice at it. 
 
 " This Manabozho," Menehwehna continued tran- 
 quilly, " was so big and strong that he began to think 
 himself everybody's master. One day he walked in 
 the forest, cuffing the ears of the pine trees for sport, 
 and knocking them flat if they took it ill ; and at 
 length he came on a clearing. In the clearing was 
 a lodge, and in the lodge was no one but a small child, 
 curled up asleep with its toe in its mouth. Mana- 
 bozhoo gazed at the child for a long while, and said 
 he, ' I have never seen any one before who could lie 
 with his toe in his mouth. But I can do it, to be sure.' 
 Whereupon he lay down in much the same posture
 
 APOLOGUE OF MANABOZHO'S TOE 55 
 
 as the child, and took his right foot in his hand. But 
 it would not reach by a long way. ' How stupid I 
 am,' cried Manabozho, ' when it was the left foot all 
 the time ! ' So he tried the left foot, but this also 
 would not reach. He rolled on his back, and twisted 
 and bent himself, and strained and struggled until 
 the tears ran down his face. Then he sat up in des- 
 pair; and behold ! he had awakened the child, and 
 the child was laughing at him. ' Oh, oh ! ' cried 
 Manabozho in a passion, ' am I then to be mocked 
 by a babe ! ' And with that he drew a great breath 
 and blew the child away over the mountains, and 
 afterwards walked across and across the lodge, tramp- 
 ling it down until not a trace of it remained. ' After 
 all/ said Manabozho, ' I can do something. And I 
 see nobody hereabouts to deny that I can put my toe 
 in my mouth ! ' ' 
 
 As Menehwehna concluded, John waited for an 
 explosion of wrath. None came. He raised his 
 head after a minute and looked about him. Barboux 
 sat smoking and staring into the camp fire. The Indian 
 had laid himself down to slumber, with his blanket 
 drawn up to his ears.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 BATEESE 
 
 NEXT morning Barboux and Menehwehna held a 
 long colloquy aft, but in tones so low that John could 
 not catch a word. By-and-by Muskingon was called 
 into council, and lastly le Chameau. 
 
 The two Indians were arguing against some pro- 
 posal of the sergeant's, which by the way they pointed 
 and traced imaginary maps with their fingers, spread- 
 ing their palms apart to indicate distances, plainly 
 turned on a point of geography. Le Chameau' s 
 opinion seemed to settle the dispute in the sergeant's 
 favour. Coming that afternoon to the mouth of a 
 tributary stream on the left bank, he headed the 
 canoe for it without a word, and at once the paddles 
 were busy, forcing her against the rapid current. 
 
 Then followed days during which, though reason 
 might prove that in the river he held an infallible 
 clue, John's senses lost themselves in the forest maze. 
 It overlapped and closed upon him, folding him deeper. 
 On the Richelieu he had played with thoughts of 
 escape, noting how the canoe lagged behind its con- 
 voy, and speculating on the Indians' goodwill faint 
 speculations, since (without reckoning his own raw 
 wound) McCjuarters was almost too weak to stir as 
 yet, and to abandon him would be a scurvy trick. 
 So he had put aside his unformed plans, which at the 
 
 56
 
 BATEESE 57 
 
 best little better than hopes ; and now the wilderness 
 oppressed and smothered and buried them out of 
 recollection. 
 
 The voyageurs made tedious progress ; almost at 
 once they came to a chain of rapids around which 
 the canoe had to be ported. The Indians toiled 
 steadily, and le Chameau, too, stripped to the waist 
 and sweating ; and by the end of the day each man 
 carried a dark red weal on one shoulder, sunk in the 
 flesh by the canoe's weight. John could w r alk, but 
 was powerless to help, and McQuarters had to be 
 lifted and carried with the baggage. Barboux con- 
 lined himself to swearing and jeering at le Chameau' s 
 naked back diable de torse, as he proclaimed it. The 
 man was getting past endurance. 
 
 On the second day he called a halt, left le Chameau 
 in charge of the camp and the prisoners, and went off 
 with the Indians in search of a moose, whose lowing 
 call had twice echoed through the woods during the 
 night and been answered by Menehwehna on his 
 birch-horn. The forest swallowed them, and a blessed 
 relief fell on the camp no more oaths and gibes for a 
 while, but rest and green shade and the murmur of 
 the rapids below. 
 
 After the noon-day meal, the hunchback stretched 
 himself luxuriously and began to converse. He was 
 explaining the situation with the help of three twigs, 
 which he laid in the form of a triangle two long sides 
 and a short base. 
 
 " Voyons, this long one will be the Richelieu and 
 that other the St. Lawrence ; and here" he put his 
 ringer near the base " here is Montreal. The ser- 
 geant knows what he is about. Those other boats, 
 
 look you, will go around so He traced their 
 
 course around the apex very slowly. " Whereas we 
 we ! " A quick stroke of the finger across the
 
 58 FORT AMITY 
 
 base filled up the sentence, and the little man smiled 
 triumphantly. 
 
 " I see," said John, picking up the short twig and 
 bending it into an arch, " we are now climbing up 
 this side of the slope, eh ? And on the other there 
 will likewise be a river ? " 
 
 The boatman nodded. " A hard way to find, 
 m'sieur. But have no fear. I have travelled it." 
 
 " Assuredly I have no fear with you, M. 
 
 " Guyon, m'sieur Jean Bateese Guyon. This M. 
 Barboux is a merry fellow il ne peut pas se passer de 
 ses enjouments. But I was not born like this." 
 And here he touched his shoulder very simply and 
 gravely. 
 
 " It was an accident then, M. Guyon ? " 
 
 " An accident oh, yes, be assured it was an acci- 
 dent." A flush showed on the little man's cheek, and 
 his speech on a sudden became very rapid. " But as 
 we were saying, I know the trail across yonder ; and 
 my brother Dominique he knows it even better. I 
 wish we may see Dominique, m'sieur ; there is no 
 such voyageur from Quebec up to Michilimackinac, 
 aye or beyond ! He has been down the Cascades by 
 night, himself only ; it was when I had my my acci- 
 dent, and he must go to fetch a surgeon. All along 
 the river it is talked of yet. But it is nothing to boast 
 of, for the hand of God must have been upon him. 
 And as good as he is brave ! " 
 
 " And where is your brother Dominique just 
 now ? " 
 
 " He will be at home, m'sieur. Soon they will be 
 carrying the harvest at Boisveyrac, and he is now the 
 seigneur's farmer. He will be worrying himself over 
 the harvest, for Dominique takes things to heart, 
 both of this world and the next ; whereas I am a 
 good Catholic, I hope but these things do not trouble
 
 BATEESE 59, 
 
 me. It seems there is no time to be troubled." 
 Bateese looked up shyly, with a blush like a girl's. 
 " M'sieur may be able to tell me or, maybe, he will 
 think it foolish. This love of women, now ? " 
 
 " Proceed, M. Guyon." 
 
 " Ah, you believe in it ! When the sergeant begins 
 his talk c'est bien sale, is it not ? But that is not 
 the sort I mean. Well, Dominique is in love, and it 
 brings him no happiness. He can never have what 
 he wants, nor would it be right, and he knows it ; but 
 nevertheless he goes on craving for it and takes no- 
 pleasure in life for the want of it. I look at him, 
 wondering. Then I say to myself, ' Bateese, when 
 le bon Dieu broke you in pieces He was not unkind. 
 Your heart is cracked and cannot hold love, like your 
 brother's ; but what of that, while God is pouring 
 love into it all day long and never ceases ? You are 
 ugly, and no maid will ever want you for a husband ; 
 therefore you are lucky who cannot store away desire 
 for this or that one, like poor Dominique, who goes 
 about aching and fit to burst. You go singing A la 
 claire fontaine, which is full of unhappiness and long- 
 ing, but all the while you are happy enough.' Indeed, 
 that is the truth, monsieur. I study this love of 
 Dominique's, which makes him miserable ; but I 
 cannot judge it. I see that it brings pain to men." 
 
 " But delight also, my friend." 
 
 " And delight also that is understood. M'sieur 
 is, perhaps, in love ? Or has been ? " 
 
 " No, Bateese ; not yet." 
 
 " But you will ; with that face it is certain. Now 
 shall I tell you ? to my guessing this love of women 
 is like an untried rapid. Something smiles ahead for 
 you, and you push for it and voyez I in a moment 
 down you go, fifteen miles an hour and the world 
 spinning ; and at the bottom of the fall, if the woman
 
 60 FORT AMITY 
 
 be good, sweet is the journey and you wonder, looking 
 back from the smooth water, down what shelves you 
 ivere swept to her. That, I say is, what I suppose 
 this love to be ; but for myself I shall never try it. 
 Since le bon Dieu broke the pitcher its pieces are 
 scattered all over me, within ; they hold nothing, but 
 there they lie shining in their useless fashion." 
 
 " Not useless,, perhaps, Bateese." 
 
 " In their useless fashion," he persisted. " They 
 will smile and be gay at the sight of a pretty girl, or at 
 the wild creatures in the woods yonder, or at the 
 thoughts in a song, or for no better reason than that 
 the day is bright and the air warm. But they can 
 store nothing. It is the same with religion, monsieur, 
 and with affairs of State ; neither troubles my head. 
 Dominique is devout, for example ; and Father 
 Launoy comes to talk with him, which makes him 
 gloomy. The reverend Father just hears my sins 
 and lets me go ; he knows well that Bateese does not 
 count. And then he and Dominique sit and talk 
 politics by the hour. The Father declares that all 
 the English are devils, and that any one who fights 
 for the Holy Church and is killed by them will rise 
 again the third day." 
 
 John laughed aloud this time. 
 
 " I, too, think the reverend Father must be making 
 some mistake," said Bateese gravely. " No doubt 
 he has been misinformed." 
 
 " No doubt. For suppose now that I were a 
 devil ? " 
 
 " Oh, m'sieur," Bateese expostulated. " Ca serait 
 bien dommage / But I hope, in any case, God would 
 pardon me for talking with you, seeing that to contain 
 anything, even hatred, is beyond me." 
 
 " Shall I tell you what I think, Bateese ? I think 
 we are all pitchers and perhaps made to be broken
 
 BATEESE 61 
 
 Ten days ago I was brimful of ambitions ; someone 
 le bon Dieu, or General Abercromby has toppled 
 me over and spilt them all ; and here I lie on my side, 
 not broken, but full of emptiness." 
 
 " Heh, heh ' full of emptiness ? ' " chuckled 
 Bateese, to whom the phrase was new. 
 
 " It may be that in time someone will set me up 
 again and pour into me wine of another sort. I hope 
 for this, because it is painful to lie upset and empty ; 
 and I do not wish to be broken, for that must be even 
 more painful at the time, eh ? " 
 
 Bateese glanced up, with a twitch of remembered 
 pain. 
 
 " Indeed, m'sieur, it hurt at the time." 
 
 " But afterwards when the pieces have no more 
 trouble, being released from pride the pride of being 
 a pitcher ! Is it useless they are as they lie upturned, 
 reflecting what ? My friend, if we only knew this 
 we might discover that now, when it can no longer 
 store up wine for itself, the pitcher is at last serving 
 an end it was made for." 
 
 The little hunchback glanced up again quickly. 
 " You are talking for my sake, monsieur, not for 
 yourself. At your age I, too, could be melancholy 
 for amusement. Ah, pardon," for John had blushed 
 hotly. " Do I not know why you said it ? Am I 
 not grateful ? " 
 
 He held out his hand. His eyes were shining.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE WATCHER IN THE PASS 
 
 THENCEFORWARD, as the forest folded them deeper, 
 John found a wonderful solace in Bateese's company, 
 although the two seldom exchanged a word unless 
 alone together, and after a day or two Barboux took 
 a whim to carry off the little boatman on his expedi- 
 tions and leave Muskingon in charge of the camp. 
 He pretended that John, as he mended of his wound, 
 needed a stalwart fellow for sentry ; but the real 
 reason was malice. For some reason he hated Mus- 
 kingon ; and knowing Muskingon' s delight in every 
 form of the chase, carefully thwarted it. On the 
 other hand, it was fun to drag off Bateese, who loved 
 to sit by his boat and hated the killing of animals. 
 
 " If I give him my parole," suggested John, " he 
 will have no excuse, and Muskingon can go in your 
 place." 
 
 But to this Bateese would not listen. So the 
 wounded were left, on hunting days, in Muskingon's 
 charge ; and with him, too, John contrived to make 
 friends. The young Indian had a marvellous gift of 
 silence, and would sit brooding for hours. Perhaps 
 he nursed his hatred of Barboux ; perhaps he dis- 
 trusted the journey for he and Menehwehna, Ojib- 
 ways both, were hundreds of miles from their own 
 country, which lay at the back of Lake Huron. Now 
 
 62
 
 THE WATCHER IN THE PASS 63 
 
 and again, however, he would unbend and teach John 
 a few words of the O jib way language ; or would allow 
 him, as a fellow-sportsman, to sit by the water's edge 
 and study the Indian tricks of fishing. 
 
 There was one in particular which fairly amazed 
 John. He had crawled after Muskingon on his belly 
 though not understanding the need of this caution 
 to the edge of a rock overhanging a deep pool. The 
 Indian peered over, unloosed his waist-belt, and drew 
 oil his scarlet breeches as if for a bathe. But no, he 
 did not intend this at least, not just yet. He wound 
 the breeches about his right arm and dipped it cau- 
 tiously, bending over the ledge until his whole body 
 from the waist overhung the water, and it was a 
 wonder how his thighs kept their grip. Then, in a 
 moment, up flew his heels and over he soused. John, 
 peering down as the swirl cleared, saw only a red- 
 brown back heaving below ; and as the seconds 
 dragged by, and the back appeared to heave more and 
 more faintly, was plucking off his own clothes to dive 
 and rescue Muskingon from the rocks, when a pair of 
 hands shot up, holding aloft an enormous, bleeding 
 cat-fish, and hitched him deftly on the gaff which 
 John hurried to lower. But the fish had scarcely a 
 kick left in him, Muskingon having smashed his head 
 against the crevices of the rock. 
 
 Indeed, ' Barboux had this excuse for leaving 
 Muskingon in camp by the river that there was 
 always a string of fish ready before nightfall when he 
 and Menehwehna returned. John, stupefied through 
 the daylight hours, always seemed to awake with the 
 lighting of the camp-fire. This, at any rate, was the 
 one scene he afterwards saw most clearly, in health 
 and in the delirium of fever the fire ; the ring of 
 faces ; beyond the faces a sapling strung with fish 
 like short broad-swords reflecting the flames' glint ;
 
 64 FORT AMITY 
 
 a stouter sapling laid across two forked boughs, and 
 from it a dead deer suspended, with white, filmed 
 eyes, and the firelight warm on its dun flank ; behind, 
 the black deep of the forest, sounded, if at all, by the cry 
 of a lonely wolf. These sights he recalled, with the scent 
 of greea fir burning and the smart of it on his lashes. 
 
 But by day he went with senses lulled, having for- 
 gotten all desire of escape or return. These five 
 companions were all his world. Was he a prisoner ? 
 Was Barboux his enemy ? The words had no mean- 
 ing. They were all in the same boat, and " France " 
 and " England " had become idle names. If he con- 
 sidered Barboux' s gun, it was as a provider of game, 
 .or a protector against any possible foe from the woods. 
 But the woods kept their sinister silence. 
 
 Once, indeed, at the head of a portage they came 
 upon a still reach of water with a strip of clearing on 
 its farther bank bois brule Bateese called it ; but 
 the fire, due to lightning no doubt, must have hap- 
 pened many years before, for spruces of fair growth 
 rose behind the alders on the swampy shore, and tall 
 wickup plants and tussocks of the blueberry choked 
 the interspaces. A cool breeze blew down the water- 
 way, as through a funnel, from the uplands ahead, 
 and the falls below sang deafeningly in the voyageurs' 
 ears as they launched their boat. 
 
 Suddenly Menehwehna touched Barboux by the 
 elbow. His ear had caught the crackling of a twig 
 amid the uproar. John, glancing up as the sergeant 
 lifted his piece, spied the antlers of a bull-moose 
 spreading above an alder-clump across the stream. 
 The tall brute had come down through the bois brule 
 to drink, or to browse on the young spruce-buds, 
 which there grew tenderer than in the thick forest ; 
 and for a moment moose and men gazed full at each 
 other in equal astonishment.
 
 THE WATCHER IN THE PASS 65 
 
 Barboux would have fired at once had not Meneh- 
 wehna checked him with a few rapid words. With a 
 snort of disgust the moose turned slowly, presenting 
 his flank, and crashed away through the undergrowth 
 as the shot rang after him. Bateese and Muskingon 
 had the canoe launched in a second, and the whole 
 party clambered in and paddled across. But before 
 they reached the bank the beast's hoofs could be heard 
 drumming away on the ridge beyond the swamp and 
 the branches snapping as he parted them. 
 
 Barboux cursed his luck. The two Indians main- 
 tained that the moose had been hit. At length Mus- 
 kingon, who had crossed the swamp, found a splash 
 of blood among the mosses, and again another on the 
 leaves of a wickup plant a rod or two farther on the 
 trail. The sergeant, hurrying to inspect these traces, 
 plunged into liquid mud up to his knees, and was 
 dragged out in the worst of tempers by John, who had 
 chosen to follow without leave. Bateese and Mc- 
 Ouarters remained with the canoe. 
 
 Each in his own fashion, then, the trackers crossed 
 the swamp, and soon were hunting among a network 
 of moose-trails, which criss-crossed one another 
 through the burnt wood. John, aware of his incom- 
 petence, contented himself with watching the Indians 
 as they picked up a new trail, followed it for a while, 
 then patiently harked back to the last spot of blood 
 and worked off on a new line. Barboux had theories 
 of his own, which they received with a galling silence. 
 It galled him at length to fury, and he was lashing 
 them with curses which made John wonder at their 
 forbearance, when a call from the river silenced him. 
 
 It came from Bateese. Bateese, who cared nothing 
 for sport, had paddled up stream to inspect the next 
 reach of the river, and there, at the first ford, had 
 found the moose lying dead and warm, with the ripple
 
 66 FORT AMITY 
 
 running over his flank and his gigantic horns high out 
 of the water like a snag. 
 
 From oaths Barboux now turned incontinently to 
 boasting. This was his first moose, but hehe, 
 Joachim Barboux, was a sportsman from his birth. 
 He still contended, but complacently and without 
 rancour, that had the Indians taken up the trail he 
 had advised from the first it would have led them 
 straight to the ford. They heard him and went on 
 skinning the moose, standing knee deep in the bloody 
 water, for the body was too heavy to be dragged 
 ashore without infinite labour. Menehwehna found 
 and handed him the bullet, which had glanced across 
 and under the shoulder-blade, and flattened itself 
 against one of the ribs on the other side. Barboux 
 pocketed it in high good humour ; and when their 
 work was done an ugly work, from which Bateese 
 kept his eyes averted a steak or two cut out, with the 
 tongue, and the carcase left behind to rot in the stream 
 he praised them for brave fellows. They listened 
 as indifferently as they had listened to his revilings. 
 
 This shot which slew the moose was the last fired 
 on the upward journey. They had followed the 
 stream up to the hill ridges, where rapid succeeded 
 rapid ; and two days of all but incessant portage 
 brought them out above the forest, close beneath the 
 naked ridges where but a few pines straggled. 
 
 Bateese pointed out a path by following which, as 
 he promised, they would find a river to carry them 
 down into the St. Lawrence. He unfolded a scheme. 
 There were trees beside that farther stream elm 
 trees, for example blown down and needing only 
 to be stripped ; his own eyes had seen them. Portage 
 up and over the ridge would be back-breaking work. 
 Let the canoe, therefore, be abandoned hidden some- 
 where by the head waters and let the Indians hurry
 
 THE WATCHER IN THE PASS 67 
 
 ahead and rig up a light craft to carry the party 
 down stream. They had axes to- strip the bark and 
 thongs to close it at bow and stern. What more was 
 needed ? As for the loss of his canoe, he understood 
 the sergeant's to be State business, requiring despatch ; 
 and if so, M. the Intendant at Montreal would recom- 
 pense him. Nay, he himself might be travelling back 
 this way before long, and then how handy to pick up 
 a canoe on this side of the hills ! 
 
 The sergeant bravo-ed and clapped the little man 
 on his back, drawing tears of pain. The canoe was 
 hauled up and stowed in a damp corner of the under- 
 growth under a mat of pine-branches, well screened 
 from the sun's rays, and the travellers began to trudge 
 on foot, in two divisions. The Indians led, with John 
 and Barboux, the latter being minded to survey the 
 country with them from the top of the ridge and 
 afterwards allow them to -push on alone. He took 
 John to keep him company after their departure, and 
 because the two prisoners could not well be left in 
 charge of Bateese, who besides had his hands full 
 with the baggage. So Bateese and McQuarters toiled 
 behind, the little man grunting and shifting his load 
 from time to time with a glance to assure himself 
 that McQuarters was holding out; now and then 
 slackening the pace, but still, as he plodded, measur- 
 ing the slopes ahead with his eye, comparing progress 
 with the sun's march, and timing himself to reach 
 the ridge at nightfall. Barboux had proposed to 
 camp there, on the summit. The Indians were to 
 push forward through the darkness. 
 
 Meanwhile John stepped ahead with Barboux and 
 the Indians. His spirits rose as he climbed above 
 the forest ; the shadow which had lain on them slipped 
 away and melted in the clear air. Here and there 
 he stumbled, his knees reminding him suddenly of
 
 68 FORT AMITY 
 
 his weakness ; but health was coming back to him, 
 and he drank in long, pure draughts of it It was 
 good, after all, to be alive and young. A sudden 
 throbbing in the air brought him to a halt ; it came 
 from a tiny humming-bird poising itself over a bush- 
 tufted rock on his right. As it sang on, careless of 
 his presence, John watched the music bubbling and 
 trembling within its flame-coloured throat. He, too, 
 felt ready to sing for no other reason than pure delight. 
 He understood the ancient gods and their laughter ; 
 he smiled down with them upon the fret of the world 
 and mortal fate. Father Jove, optimus maximus, 
 was a grand fellow, a good Catholic in spite of mis- 
 conception, and certainly immortal ; god and gentle- 
 man both, large, lusty, superlative, tolerant, debonair. 
 As for misconception, from this height Father Jove 
 could overlook centuries of it at ease the Middle 
 Ages, for instance. Every one had been more or less 
 cracked in the Middle Ages cracked as fiddles. 
 Likely enough Jove had made the Middle Ages, to 
 amuse himself. . . . 
 
 As the climb lulled his brain, John played with 
 these idle fancies. Barboux, being out of condition 
 and scant of breath, conversed very little. The 
 Indians kept silence as usual. 
 
 The sun was dropping behind the cleft of the pass 
 as they reached it, and the rocky walls opened in the 
 haze of its yellow beams. So once more John came 
 to the gate of a new world. 
 
 Menehwehna led, Barboux followed, with John close 
 behind, and Muskingon bringing up the rear. They 
 were treading the actual pass, and Menehwehna, 
 rounding an angle of the cliff, had been lost to sight 
 for a moment, when John heard a low, guttural cry 
 whether of surprise or warning he could not tell. 
 
 He ran forward at Barboux's heels. A dozen paces
 
 THE WATCHER IN THE PASS 69 
 
 ahead of the Indian, reclining against the rock-face 
 on a heap of scree, in the very issue of the pass, with 
 leagues of sunlight beyond him and the basin of the 
 plain at his feet, sat a man. 
 
 He did not move ; and at first this puzzled them, 
 for he lay dark against the sun, and its rays shone 
 in their eyes. 
 
 But Menehwehna stepped close up to him and 
 pointed. Then they saw, and understood. 
 
 The man was dead ; dead and scalped a horrible 
 sight.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE FARTHER SLOPE 
 
 BARBOUX'S complexion had turned to a sick yellow 
 beneath its mottles. He had been walking hard and 
 was out of condition ; no doubt, too, the sunset 
 light painted bis colour deeper. But the man fairly 
 twittered. 
 
 Menehwehna muttered an Indian name. 
 
 " Eh ? Speak low, for the love of God ! " The 
 sergeant swept the cliffs above and around with a 
 shuddering glance. 
 
 " Les Agniers, as you call them but Iroquois for 
 certain. The man, you see, is Canayen -" Meneh- 
 wehna began coolly to handle the corpse. " He has 
 been dead for hours, but not many hours." He lifted 
 an arm and let it fall, after trying the rigidity of the 
 muscles. " Not many hours," he repeated, and signed 
 to Muskingon, who began to crawl forward and, from 
 the gap of the pass, to reconnoitre the slope below. 
 
 " And in the interval they have been tracking MS, 
 belike ? " 
 
 " They may, indeed, have spied us coming from 
 the cliffs above," answered Menehwehna, unperturbed. 
 " If so, they are watching us at this moment, and 
 there is no escaping ; but this we shall learn within 
 twenty paces, since between the rocks here they have 
 us at their will. You, O illustrious, they might suffer 
 
 70
 
 THE FARTHER SLOPE 71 
 
 to promenade yourself for a while in the open, for the 
 sake of better sport ; with us, who are Ojibways, they 
 would deal while yet they could be sure." 
 
 He said it without any show of vanity, nor did he 
 trouble himself to glance around or above for signs 
 of the foe. " We had best make trial of this without 
 delay," he added ; "for if they fire the noise may 
 reach the other two and warn Bateese, who is clever, 
 and may yet save himself." 
 
 " What the devil care I for Bateese ? " snarled 
 Barboux. " If they have tracked us, they have tracked 
 all. I run no risks for a bossu and a useless prisoner." 
 
 " I did not say that they have tracked us. Him 
 they tracked beyond a doubt ; and at the end he 
 
 knew they were after him. See " Again he lifted 
 
 the arm of the corpse, and invited the sergeant to 
 feel its shirt along the ribs and under the armpits. 
 " See you how stiff it is ; that is where the sweat 
 has dried, and men sweat so when they are in a great 
 hurry. Perhaps he was the last of his company, and 
 they overtook him here. Now, see again I tell you 
 they have not been tracking us, and I will prove it. 
 In the first place I am no fool, and if one two 
 three men have tracked me close (it cannot be far) 
 a day long without my knowing it it will be the first 
 time in Menehwehna's life. But let that pass. See 
 these marks ; they overtook him here, and they did 
 with him so. But where is any mark on the path 
 behind us ? Look weU ; there is only one path and 
 no trail in it at all, else I had not cried out as I did. 
 No man has passed within less time than it takes the 
 moss to grow. Very good ; then whoever killed him 
 followed him up from yonder, and here stopped and 
 turned back I think, in a hurry. To place the body 
 so that is an Iroquois trick when few and in a hurry ; 
 otherwise they take him away and do worse."
 
 72 FORT AMITY 
 
 " Iroquois ? But que diable ! The Six Nations 
 are at peace with us ! Why on earth should the 
 Iroquois meddle with this man, by the dress of him 
 a coureur de bois ? " 
 
 " And unarmed, too ! " pursued Menehwehna, with 
 fine irony, " since they have taken away his gun. 
 Ask me riddles that I can read. The Six Nations 
 are never at peace ; there were five hundred of them 
 back at Ticonderoga, seated on a hill opposite and 
 only waiting. Yes, and in peace they have never 
 less reasons than fingers and toes for killing a man. 
 Your questions are for a child ; but 7 say that the 
 Iroquois have been here and killed this man, and in 
 a hurry. Now, answer me ; if, after killing him, they 
 wished to spy down upon our coming, and were in a 
 hurry, why did they not take the short way through 
 the pass ? " 
 
 ' That is simple. Any fresh track of men at the 
 entrance, or close within it, would warn us back ; 
 therefore they would say, ' Let us climb to the ridge 
 and watch, though it take longer.' " 
 
 " Good ; now you talk with a clear head, and I 
 have less fear for you. They may be aloft there, as 
 you say, having drawn us into their trap. Yet I do 
 not think it, for why should they be expecting us ? 
 It is now two days since you killed the moose. They 
 could not have been near in a body to hear that shot 
 fired, for it is hours since they overtook this man, 
 following him up from the other slope. But a scout 
 might have heard it and climbed across to warn 
 them ; yes, that is possible." 
 
 But here Muskingon came crawling back. He had 
 inspected the ground by the lip of the descent, and 
 in his belief the dead man's pursuers were three or 
 four at the most, and had hurried down the hill again 
 when their work was done.
 
 73 
 
 Menehwehna nodded gravely. " It is as I thought, 
 and for the moment we need not fear ; but we cannot 
 spend the night in this trap for trap it is, whether 
 watched or not. Do we go forward then, or back ? " 
 
 Barboux cursed. " How in the name of twenty 
 devils can I go back ! Back to the Richelieu ? it 
 would be wasting weeks ! " His hand went up to his 
 breast, then he seemed to recollect himself, and turned 
 upon John roughly. " Step back, you, and find if 
 the others are in sight. We, here, have private 
 matters to discuss." 
 
 John obeyed. The first turn of the cliff shut off 
 the warm westerly glow, and he went back through 
 the twilight. He knew now why Barboux had lagged 
 behind on the Richelieu, in scorn of discipline. The 
 man must be entrusted with some secret missive of 
 Montcalm's, and, being puffed up with it, had in a 
 luckless hour struck out a line of his own. To turn 
 back now would mean his ruin ; might end in his 
 standing up to be shot with his back to a wall. . . . 
 
 Between the narrow walls of the pass night was 
 closing down rapidly. John lifted his face towards 
 the strip of sky aloft, greenish-blue and tranquil. . . . 
 
 He fell back his heart, after one leap, freezing 
 slowly freezing to a standstill ; his hands spreading 
 themselves against the face of the rock. 
 
 What was that, screaming ? . . . one two three 
 horrible human screams, rending the twilight, beat- 
 ing down on his ears, echoing from wall to wall. . . . 
 
 The third and last scream died out in a low, bubbling 
 wail. Close upon it rose a sound which John could 
 not mistake the whoop of Indians. He plucked his 
 hands from the rock, and ran ; but, as he turned to 
 run, in the sudden silence a body thudded down upon 
 the path behind him. 
 
 In twenty strides he was back again at the issue
 
 74 FORT AMITY 
 
 of the pass. The two Indians had vanished. Bar- 
 boux's gross body alone blocked the pale daylight 
 there. Barboux lingered a moment, stooping over 
 the murdered man ; but he, too, ran at the sound 
 of John's footsteps, and the corpse, as John came 
 abreast of it, slid over in a silly heap, almost rolling 
 against his legs. 
 
 He leaped aside and cleared it, and in a moment 
 was pelting down the slope after the sergeant, who 
 flung back an agonised, doubtful glance, and recog- 
 nising his pursuer grunted with relief. At their feet, 
 and far below, spread a wide plain a sea of forest 
 rolling, wave upon wave, with a gleam of water 
 between. The river, then Bateese's river was near 
 at hand. 
 
 Fifty yards down the slope, which was bare of 
 cover, he saw the two Indians. Muskingon led by 
 a few strides, and the pair seemed to be moving noise- 
 lessly ; yet, by the play of their shoulders, both were 
 running for their lives. John raced past the lumber- 
 ing sergeant, and put forth all his strength to catch 
 up with Menehwehna. The descent jarred his knees 
 horribly, and still, as he plunged deeper into the 
 shadow of the plain, the stones and bushes beneath 
 his feet grew dimmer and the pitfalls harder to avoid. 
 His ears were straining for the Indian war-whoop 
 behind him ; he wondered more and more as the 
 seconds grew into minutes and yet brought no sounds 
 but the trickle and slide of stones dislodged by Bar- 
 boux thundering in the rear. 
 
 They were close upon the outskirts of the forest. 
 He had caught up with Menehwehna, and was running 
 at his heels, stride for stride. 
 
 In the first dark shadow of the trees Menehwehna 
 checked himself, came to a sudden halt and swung 
 round, panting. Somehow, although unable to see
 
 THE FARTHER SLOPE 75 
 
 his face, John knew him to be furiously angry with 
 the cold fury of an Indian. 
 
 " Englishman, you aVe a fool ! " 
 
 " But why ? " panted John innocently. " Is it the 
 noise I made ? I cannot run as you Indians can." 
 
 Menehwehna grunted. " What matters noise more 
 or less, when he is anywhere near ? " 
 
 " They have not seen us ! " gasped Barboux, 
 blundering up at this moment and almost into John's 
 arms. 
 
 " To be sure," answered Menehwehna sardonically, 
 " they have not seen us. It may even be that the 
 great Maniton has smitten them with deafness and 
 they have not heard you, O illustrious ! and with 
 blindness, that they cannot trace your footmarks ; 
 yes, and perchance with folly, too, so that, returning 
 to a dead man whom they left, they may wonder not 
 at all that he has tumbled himself about ! " 
 
 " Peste \ It was this Englishman's fault. He came 
 running behind and hurried me. But you Indians do 
 not know everything. I found But here 
 
 Barboux checked himself on the edge of a boast. 
 
 The Indian had sunk on one knee and laid his ear 
 to the ground. " It will be of great price," said he, 
 " if what you found will take us out of this. They 
 are not following as yet, and the water is near."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 MENEHWEHNA SETTLES ACCOUNTS 
 
 WEARY as they were, there could be no thought of 
 halting. The river and the plain lay far below them 
 yet, and they must push on through the darkness. 
 
 Hitherto the forest had awed John by its loneliness ; 
 its night- voices, falling at rare intervals on his ear and 
 awaking him from dreams beside the camp-fire, had 
 seemed to cry and challenge across immense distances 
 as though the very beasts were far astray. But now, 
 as he crouched behind Menehwehna, he felt it to be no 
 less awfully inhabited. A thousand creeping things 
 stirred or slunk away through the undergrowth ; 
 roosting birds edged towards one another in the' 
 branches, ever on the point of napping off in panic ; 
 the thickets were warm from the flanks of moose and 
 deer. And all this wild life, withdrawing, watched 
 the four fugitives with a thousand eyes. 
 
 These imaginary terrors did him one service. They 
 kept him awake. By-and-by his brain began to work 
 clearly, as it often will when the body has passed a 
 certain point of fatigue. " If these Indians on the 
 ridge are Iroquois, why should I run ? The Iroquois 
 are friends of England, and would recognise my red 
 coat. The man they killed was a Canadian, a coureur 
 de bois ; they will kill Barboux if they catch him, 
 and also these two O jib ways. But to me capture 
 will bring release." 
 
 76
 
 MENEHWEHNA SETTLES ACCOUNTS 77 
 
 He understood now why Menehwehna had called 
 him a fool. Nevertheless, as he went, the screams 
 on the cliff rang in his ears again, closing the argument. 
 
 Muskingon still led. He had struck a small moun- 
 tain stream, and was tracking it down towards the 
 r i ver keeping wide of it to avoid the swampy ground, 
 relying on his ears and the lie of the slope. Meneh- 
 wehna followed close, ready to give counsel if needed ; 
 but the young Indian held on in silence, never once 
 hesitating. 
 
 The debate in John's brain started afresh. " These 
 Iroquois mean me no harm. I am sure enough of 
 that, at any rate, to face the risk of it. Barboux is 
 my enemy my country's enemy and I dislike in 
 him the little I don't despise. As for Menehwehna 
 and Muskingon they, I suppose, are my enemies, and 
 the Iroquois my friends." Somehow John felt that 
 when civilised nations employed uncivilised allies, 
 the simplest questions of ethics may become compli- 
 cated. He remembered a hundred small acts of 
 kindness, of good-fellowship ; and he recalled, all too 
 vividly, the murdered man and his gory head. 
 
 But might he not escape back and show himself 
 without lessening his comrades' chances ? It was a 
 nuisance that he must always be thinking of them as 
 comrades. Was he not their prisoner ? Would their 
 comradeship help him at the end of the journey ? . . . 
 
 The moon had still risen over the hills when Musk- 
 ingon' s piloting brought them out once more under 
 open sky, at a point where the mountain stream met 
 and poured itself into a larger one hurrying down from 
 the north-east. A few yards below their confluence 
 the river bed narrowed, and the waters, gathering 
 speed, were swept down through a rocky chasm to- 
 wards a cataract, the noise of which had been sounding 
 in John's ears while he debated.
 
 78 FORT AMITY 
 
 Hitherto he had weighed the question as one between 
 himself and his three companions. For the moment 
 he saw no chance of giving them the slip ; and, if a 
 chance occurred, the odds must be terribly unequal. 
 Still, supposing that one occurred, ought he to take 
 it ? Putting aside the insane risk, ought he to 
 bring death and such a death down upon these 
 three men, two of whom he looked upon as friends ? 
 Did his country, indeed, require this of him ? He 
 wished he had his cousin Dick beside him for counseller, 
 or could borrow Dick's practical mind. Dick always 
 saw clearly. 
 
 And behold ! as he stepped out upon the river bank, 
 his wish was given him. He remembered suddenly 
 that this Barboux carried a message of what im- 
 portance he could not tell, nor was it for him to 
 consider. Important or not, it must be to England's 
 detriment, and as a soldier, he had no other duty than 
 to baulk it. Why had he not thought of this before ? 
 It ruled out all private questions, even that of escape 
 or of saving his own life. The report of a gun would 
 certainly be heard on the ridge above ; and if, by 
 forcing Barboux to shoot, he could draw down the 
 Iroquois, why then live or die the signal must be 
 given. 
 
 He scanned the chasm. It could not measure less 
 than twenty feet across, and the current whirled 
 through it far below thirty feet perhaps. He eyed 
 his companions. Barboux leaned on his gun a few 
 paces from the brink, where the two Indians stood 
 peering down at the dim waters. John dropped on 
 one knee, pretending to fasten a button of his gaiters, 
 and drew a long breath while he waited for his chance. 
 
 Presently Muskingon straightened himself up, and, 
 as if satisfied with his inspection, began to lead the 
 way again, slanting his course away from the bank
 
 MENEHWEHNA SETTLES ACCOUNTS 79 
 
 and back towards the selvage of the woods. Meneh- 
 wehna followed close, and Barboux shouldered his 
 musket and fell into third place, grunting to John to 
 hurry after. 
 
 ^ And so John did for a dozen paces back from the 
 river. Then, swinging quickly on -his heel, he dashed 
 for the brink, and leapt. 
 
 So sudden was the manoeuvre that not until his 
 feet left the rock it seemed, at that very instant- 
 did he hear the sergeant's oath of dismay. Even as 
 he flew across the whirling darkness his ear was 
 listening for the shot to follow. 
 
 The take-off a flat slab of rock was good, and 
 the leap well timed. But he had allowed too little, 
 perhaps, for his weariness and his recent wound ; and 
 in the darkness he had not seen that of the two brinks 
 the far one stood the higher by many inches. In 
 mid-air he saw it, and flung his arms forward as he 
 pitched against it little more than breast high. His 
 fingers clutched vainly for hold, while his toes scraped 
 the face of the rock, but found no crevice to support 
 them. 
 
 Had his body dropped a couple of inches lower 
 before striking the bank, or had the ledge shelved a 
 degree or two more steeply, or had it been smooth or 
 slippery with rain, he must have fallen backward into 
 the chasm. As it was, his weight rested so far forward 
 upon his arms that, pressing his elbows down upon 
 the rock, he heaved himself over on the right side of 
 the balance, fell on his face and chest, and so wriggled 
 forward until he could lift a knee. 
 
 The roar of the waters drowned all other noise. 
 Only that faint cry of Barboux had followed him 
 across. But now, as he scrambled to his feet, he 
 heard a sudden thud on the ledge behind him. A 
 hand clutched at his heel, out of the night. At once
 
 86 FORT AMITY 
 
 he knew that his stratagem had failed, that Barboux 
 would not fire, that Muskingon was upon him. He 
 turned to get at grips ; but, in the act of turning, 
 felt his brain open and close again with a flame and 
 a crash, stretched out both arms, and pitched forward 
 into darkness. 
 
 It seemed for he knew no break in his sensations 
 that the ground, as he touched it, became strangely 
 soft and elastic. For a while he wondered at this 
 idly, then opened his eyes but only to blink and 
 close them again, for they were met by broad daylight. 
 
 He was lying on the grass ; he was resting in 
 Muskingon' s arms amid a roaring of many waters ; 
 he was being carried between Muskingon and Meneh- 
 wehna beneath a dark roof of pines and yet their 
 boughs were transparent, and he looked straight 
 through them into blue sky. Was he dead ? Had 
 he passed into a world where time was not, that all 
 these things were happening together ? If so, how 
 came the two Indians here ? And Barboux ? He 
 could hear Barboux muttering : no, shouting aloud. 
 Why was the man making such a noise ? And who 
 was that firing ? . . . Oh, tell him to stop ! The 
 breastwork will never be carried in this way haven't 
 the troops charged it again and again ? Look at 
 Sagramore, there : pull him off somebody, and let 
 him die quiet ! For pity's sake fetch the General, 
 to make an end of this folly ! Forty-sixth ! Where 
 are the Forty-sixth ? . . . 
 
 He was lying in a boat now a canoe. But how 
 could this be, when the boat was left behind on the 
 other side of the mountain ? Yet here it was, plain 
 as daylight, and he was lying in it ; also he could 
 remember having been lifted and placed here by
 
 Muskingon not by Menehwehna. To be sure Meneh- 
 vvehna crouched here above him, musket in hand. 
 Between the shouting and firing he heard the noise of 
 water tumbling over rapids. The noise never ceased ; 
 it was all about him ; and yet the boat did not move. 
 It lay close under a low bank, with a patch of swamp 
 between it and the forest : and across this swamp 
 towards the forest Muskingon was running. John 
 saw him halt and lift his piece as Barboux came 
 bursting through the trees with an Indian in pursuit. 
 The two ran in line, the Indian lifting a tomahawk 
 and gaining at every stride ; and Muskingon had to 
 step aside and let them come abreast of him before 
 he fired at close quarters. The Indian fell in a heap ; 
 Barboux struggled through the swamp and leapt 
 into the canoe as Muskingon turned to follow. But 
 now three four five Indians were running out of 
 the woods upon him ; four with tomahawks only, but 
 the fifth carried a gun ; and, while the others pursued, 
 this man, having gained the open, dropped swiftly on 
 one knee and fired. At that instant Menehwehna' s 
 musket roared out close above John's head ; but as 
 the marksman rolled over, dead, on his smoking gun, 
 Muskingon gave one leap like a wounded stag's and 
 toppled prone on the edge of the bank close above 
 the canoe. 
 
 And with that, and even as Menehwehna sprang to 
 his feet to reach and rescue him, Barboux let fly an 
 oath, planted the butt of his musket against the bank, 
 and thrust the canoe off. It was done in a second. 
 In another, the canoe had lurched afloat, the edge of 
 the rapid whirled her bow round, and she went 
 spinning down-stream. 
 
 All this John saw distinctly, and afterwards recalled 
 it all in order, as it befell. But sometimes, as he 
 recalled it, he seemed to be watching the scene with
 
 82 FORT AMITY 
 
 an excruciating ache in his brain ; at others, in a 
 delicious languor of weakness. He remembered, too, 
 how the banks suddenly gathered speed and slid past, 
 while the boat plunged and was whirled off in the heart of 
 the rapid. Muskingon had uttered no cry : but back far 
 back on the shore sounded the whoops of the Iroquois. 
 
 Then almost at once the canoe was floating on 
 smooth water, and Menehwehna talking with Barboux. 
 
 " It had better be done so," Menehwehna was 
 saying. " You are younger than I, and stronger, and 
 it will give you a better chance." 
 
 " Don't be a fool," growled Barboux. " The man 
 was dead, I tell you. They are always dead when 
 they jump like that. Que diable ! I have seen 
 enough fighting to know." 
 
 But Menehwehna replied, " You need much sleep, 
 and you cannot watch against me. I have reloaded 
 my gun, and the lock of yours is wet. Indeed, there- 
 fore, it must be as I say." 
 
 After this Barboux said very little ; but the canoe 
 was paddled to shore, and the two men svalked aside 
 into the woods. The sun was setting, and they cast 
 long shadows upon the bank as they stepped out. 
 
 John lay still and dozed fitfully, waking up now and 
 then to brush away the mosquitoes that came with 
 the first falling shadows to plague him. 
 
 By-and-by in the twilight Menehwehna returned and 
 stood above the bank. He tossed a bundle into the 
 canoe, stepped after it, and pushed off without hurry. 
 
 John laughed as a child might laugh guessing some 
 foolish riddle. 
 
 " You have killed him ! " 
 
 " He did wickedly," answered Menehwehna. " He 
 was a fool and past bearing." 
 
 John laughed again ; and, being satisfied, dropped 
 asleep*
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 BOISVEYRAC 
 
 ALONG the river-front of Boisveyrac, on the slopes 
 between the stone walls of the Seigniory and the broad 
 St. Lawrence, Dominique Guy on, the Seigneur's 
 farmer, strode to and fro encouraging the harvesters. 
 
 " Work, my children ! Work ! " 
 
 He said it over and over again, using the words 
 his father had always used at this season. But the 
 harvesters old Damase Juneau and his wife La Mar- 
 mite, Jo Lagasse, the brothers Pierre and Teles- 
 phore Coarteau, with Telesphore's half-breed wife 
 Leelinau (Lelie, in French) all knew the difference 
 in tone. It had been worth while in former times 
 to hear old Bonhomme Guyon say the words, putting 
 his heart into them, while the Seigneur himself would 
 follow behind, echoing, " Yes, that is so. Work, 
 my children : work is the great cure ! " But Bori- 
 homme Guyon was dead these two months -rest 
 his soul ; and the Seigneur gone up the river to 
 command a fortress for the King of France ; and 
 no one left at Boisveyrac but themselves and half 
 a dozen militiamen and this young Dominique 
 Guyon, who would not smile and was a skinflint. 
 
 It was as if the caterpillars had eaten the mirth 
 as well as the profits out of this harvest which (if 
 folks said true) the Seigneur needed so badly. Even
 
 84 FORT AMITY 
 
 the children had ceased to find it amusing, and had 
 trooped after the priest, Father Launoy, up the hill 
 into the courtyard of the Chateau. 
 
 " Work, my friends ! " said Dominique. He knew 
 well that they detested him, and would have vastly 
 preferred his brother Bateese for overseer. For his 
 part, he took life seriously ; but no one was better 
 aware of the bar between him and others' love or 
 liking. 
 
 They respected him because he was the best canotier 
 on the river ; a better even than his malformed 
 brother Bateese now with the army. When he drew 
 near they put more spirit into their pitchforking. 
 
 " But all the same it breaks the back, this suspense," 
 declared La Marmite. " I never could work with 
 more than one thing in my mind. Tell us, Dominique 
 Guyon : the good Father will be coming out soon, 
 will he not ? that is, if he means to shoot the falls 
 before sunset." 
 
 " What can it matter to you, mother ? " 
 
 " Matter ? Why, if he doesn't come soon, I shall 
 burst myself with curiosity, that is all ! " 
 
 " But you know all that can be told. There has 
 been a great victory, for certain." 
 
 " Eh ? Eh ? You are clever enough, doubtless ; 
 but you don't think you can question and cross- 
 question a man the way that Father Launoy does it ? 
 Why, the last time I confessed to him he turned me 
 upside down and emptied me like a sack." 
 
 "There has been a great victory: that is all we 
 need to know. Work, my friends, work with a good 
 heart 1 " 
 
 But when his back was turned they drew together 
 and talked, glancing now towards the Seigniory above 
 the slope, now towards the river bank, where a couple 
 of tall Etcbemin Indians stood guard beside a canoe,
 
 BOISVEYRAC 85 
 
 and across the broad flood to the woods on the farther 
 shore stretching away southward in a haze of blue. 
 Down in the south there, far beyond the blue horizon, 
 a battle had been fought and a great victory won. 
 
 Jo Lagasse edged away towards Corporal Chretien, 
 who kept watch, musket in hand, on the western 
 fringe of the clearing. Harvests at Boisveyrac 
 had been gathered under arms since time out of 
 mind, with sentries posted far up the shore and in the 
 windmill behind the Seigniory, to give warning of the 
 Iroquois. To-day the corporal and his men were 
 specially alert, and at an alarm the workers would 
 have plenty of time to take shelter within the gate- 
 way of the Chateau. 
 
 " Well, it seems that we may all lift up our hearts. 
 The English are done for, and next season there is to 
 be a big stamping-out of the Iroquois." 
 
 " Who told you that, Jo Lagasse ? " 
 
 " Every one is saying it. Pierre Courteau has 
 even some tale that two thousand of them were 
 slaughtered after the battle yonder Onnontagues 
 and Agniers for the most part. At this rate you 
 idlers will soon be using your bayonets to turn the 
 corn with the rest of us." 
 
 " Yes ; that's right call us idlers ! And the 
 Iroquois known to be within a dozen miles ! You 
 would sing to another tune, my friend, if we idlers 
 offered to march off and leave you just now." The 
 corporal swung round on his thin legs and peered 
 into the belt of trees. 
 
 Jo Lagasse grinned. 
 
 " No, no, corporal ; I was jesting only. To think 
 of me undervaluing the military ! Why, often and 
 often, as a single man with no ties, I have fancied 
 myself enlisting. But now it will be too late." 
 
 " If M. de Montcalm has really swallowed the
 
 86 FORT AMITY 
 
 English," answered the other drily, "it will be too 
 late, as you say." 
 
 " But these English, now I have always had a 
 curiosity to see them. Is it true, corporal, that they 
 have faces like devils, and that he who has the mis- 
 fortune to be killed by one will assuredly rise the third 
 day. The priests say so." 
 
 Corporal Chretien had never actually confronted 
 his country's foes. " Much would depend," he 
 answered cautiously, " upon circumstances, and 
 upon what you mean by a devil." 
 
 While Jo Lagasse scratched his head over this, 
 the wicket opened in the great gate of the Seigniory, 
 and Father Launoy came forth with a troop of children 
 at his heels. The harvesters crowded about him at 
 once. 
 
 He lifted a hand. He was a tall priest and square- 
 shouldered, with the broad brow and set square 
 chin of a fighting man. 
 
 " My children," he announced in a voice clear as 
 a bell, " it is certain there has been a great battle at 
 Fort Carillon. The English came on, four to one, 
 gnashing their teeth like devils of the pit. But the 
 host of the faithful stood firm and overcame them, 
 and now they are flying southward whence they 
 came. Let thanks be given to God, who giveth us 
 the victory ! " 
 
 The men bared their heads. 
 
 " When I met 'Polyte Latulippe and young Damase 
 on my way down the river, I could scarcely believe 
 their tale. But the Ojibway puts it beyond doubt ; 
 and the few answers I could win from the wounded 
 sergeant all confirm the story." 
 
 " His name, Father ? " asked La Marmite. " We 
 can get nothing out of Dominique Guyon, who keeps 
 his tongue as close as his fist."
 
 BOISVEYRAC 87 
 
 " His name is a Clive, and he is of the regiment cf 
 Beam. He has come near to death's door, poor 
 fellow, and still lies too near it for talking. But I 
 think he is strong enough to bear carrying up to 
 Fort Amitie, where the Seigneur who, by the way, 
 sends greeting to you all " 
 
 " And our salutations go back to him. Would he 
 were here to-day to see the harvest carried !" 
 
 " The Seigneur, having heard what 'Polyte and 
 Damase have to tell, will desire to hear more of this 
 glorious fight. For myself, I must hasten down to 
 Montreal, where I have a message to deliver, and 
 perhaps I may reach there with these tidings also 
 before the boats, which are coming up by way of the 
 Richelieu. Therefore I am going to borrow Domin- 
 ique Guyon of you, to pilot me down through the 
 Roches Fendues. And, talking of Dominique," 
 here the Jesuit laid a hand on the shoulder of the 
 } ; oung man, who bent his eyes to the ground " you 
 complain that he is close, eh ? How often, my 
 children, must I ask you to judge a brother by his 
 virtues ? To which of you did it occur, when these 
 men came, to send 'Polyte and Damase up to Fort 
 Amitie with their news ? No one has told me : yet 
 I will wager it was Dominique Guyon. Who sat up, 
 the night through, with this wounded stranger ? Dom- 
 inique Guyon. Who has been about the field all day, 
 as though to have missed a night's sleep were no 
 excuse for shirking the daily task ? Dominique 
 Guyon. Again, to whom do I turn now to steer me 
 down the worst fall in the river ? To Dominique 
 Guyon. He will arrive back here to-night tired as a 
 dog, but once more at daybreak it will be Dominique 
 who sets forth to carry the wounded man up to Fort 
 Amitie. And why ? Because, when a thing needs 
 to be done well, he is to be trusted ; you would turn
 
 88 FORT AMITY 
 
 to him then and trust him rather than any of j^our- 
 selves, and you know it. Do you grumble, then, that 
 the Seigneur knows it ? I say to you that a man is 
 born thus, or thus; responsible or not responsible; 
 and a man that is born responsible, though he add 
 pound to pound and field to field, is a man to be thank- 
 ful for. Moreover, if he keep his own counsel, you may 
 go to him at a pinch with the more certainty that he 
 will keep yours." 
 
 " What did I tell you ? " whispered La Marmite 
 to Jo Lagasse, who had joined the little crowd. 
 " The Father's eye turns you inside out : he knows 
 how we have been grumbling all day. But all the 
 same," she added aloud, " he is young, and ought 
 to laugh." 
 
 " I have told you," said Father Launoy, " that 
 you should judge a man by his virtues : but where 
 that is hard, at least you should judge him by help 
 of your own pity. All this day Dominique has been 
 copying his dead father ; and the same remembrance 
 that has been to him a sorrowful incitement, has 
 been to you but food for uncharitable thoughts. If 
 I am not saying the truth, correct me." 
 
 They were silent. The priest had a great gift of per- 
 sonal talk, straight and simple ; and treated them as 
 brothers and sisters of a family, holding up the virtues 
 of this one, or the faults of that, to the common gaze. 
 They might not agree with this laudation of Domin- 
 ique : but no one cared to challenge it at the risk of 
 finding himself pilloried for public laughter. Father 
 Launoy knew all the peccadilloes of this small flock, 
 and had a tongue which stripped your clothes off 
 to use .-in expression of La Marmite's. 
 
 They followed him down to the shore, where the 
 Etchemins held the canoe ready. There they knelt, 
 and he blessed them before embarking. Dominique
 
 BOISVEYRAC 89 
 
 stepped on board after him, and the two Indians 
 took up their paddles. 
 
 Long after the boat had been pushed off and was 
 speeding down the broad waterway, the harvesters 
 stood and watched it The sunset followed it, gleam- 
 ing along its wake and on its polished quarter, flash- 
 ing as the paddles rose and dipped ; until it rounded 
 the corner by Bout de 1'Isle, where the rapids began. 
 
 The distant voice of these rapids filled the air with 
 its humming ; but their ears were accustomed to it, 
 and had ceased to heed. Nor did they mark the 
 evening croak of the frogs alongshore among the reed 
 beds, until Jo Lagasse imitated it to perfection. 
 
 " To work, my children ! " he croaked. " Work 
 is the only cure ! " 
 
 They burst out laughing, and hurried back to. 
 gather the last load before nightfall.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 FATHER LAUNOY HAS HIS DOUBTS 
 
 FOR a little while after leaving the shore the priest 
 kept silence. 
 
 " Dominique," said he at length, " there is some- 
 thing in your guests that puzzles me ; and something 
 too that puzzles me in the manner of their coming to 
 Boisveyrac. Tell me now precisely how you found 
 them." 
 
 " It was not I who found them, Father. Teles- 
 phore Courteau came running to me, a little before 
 sunset, with news that a man an Indian was 
 standing on the shore opposite and signalling with 
 his arms as if for help. Well, at first I thought it 
 might be some trick of the Iroquois not that I had 
 dreamed of any in the neighbourhood : and Chretien 
 got his men ready and under arms. But the glass 
 seemed to show that this was not an Iroquois : and 
 next I saw a bundle, which might be a wounded man, 
 lying on the bank beside him. So we launched a boat, 
 and pushed across very carefully until we came within 
 hail : and then we parleyed for some while, the soldiers 
 standing ready to fire, until the Indian's look and 
 speech convinced me for I have been as far west 
 as Michilimackinac, and know something of the 
 Ojibway talk. So when he called out his nation to 
 me, I called back to him to leave speaking in French 
 and use his own tongue." 
 
 90
 
 FATHER LAUNOY HAS HIS DOUBTS $r 
 
 " Yes, yes he is an Ojibway beyond doubt." 
 
 " Well, Father, while I was making sure of this, we 
 had pushed forward little by little, and I saw the 
 wounded man clearly. He was half-naked, but lay 
 with his tunic over him, as the Indian had wrapped 
 him against the chill. Indeed, he was half-dead too, 
 and past speaking, when at length we took him off." 
 
 " And they had lost their boat in the Cedars ? " 
 
 " So the Ojibway said. The wonder is that they 
 ever came to shore." 
 
 " The wonder to my thinking is rather that, coming 
 through the wilderness from the Richelieu River, 
 they should have possessed a canoe to launch on the 
 Great River here." 
 
 " Their tale is that they were four, and happened 
 on a small party of Iroquois by surprise : and that 
 two perished while this pair possessed themselves of 
 the Iroquois' canoe and so escaped." 
 
 " Yes," mused the priest, " so again the Ojibway 
 told me. A strange story : and when I began to 
 put questions he grew more and more stupid but I 
 know well enough by this time, I should hope, when 
 an Indian pretends to be duller than he is. The sick 
 man I could not well cross-examine. He told me 
 something of the fight at Fort Carillon, where he, it 
 appears, saw the main fighting upon the ridge, while 
 the Indians were spread as sharpshooters along the 
 swamps below. For the rest he refers me to his 
 comrade." Father Launoy fell to musing again. 
 " What puzzles me is that he carries no message, or 
 will not own to carrying one. But what, then, brings 
 him across the Wilderness ? The other boats with the 
 wounded and prisoners went down the Richelieu to 
 its mouth, and will be travelling up the Great River 
 to Montreal that is, if they have not already arrived. 
 Now why should this one boat have turned aside ?
 
 92 FORT AMITY 
 
 That I could understand, if the man were upon special 
 service : the way he came would be a short cut either 
 down the river to Montreal, or upstream to Fort 
 Amitie or Fort Frontenac. But as I say, this man 
 apparently carries no message. Also, he started 
 from Fort Carillon with two wounds ; and who would 
 entrust special service to a wounded man ? " 
 
 " Of a certainty, Father, he was wounded, as I 
 myself saw when we drew off his shirt. The hurt in 
 his ribs is scarcely skinned over, and he has a fresh 
 scar on his wrist. But the blow on the head, from 
 which he suffers, is later, and was given him (he says) 
 by an Indian.-" 
 
 " A bad blow and yet he escaped." 
 
 " A bad blow. Either from that or from the 
 drenching, towards morning his head wandered, and 
 he talked at full speed for an hour." 
 
 " Of what did he talk ? " asked the priest quickly. 
 
 " That I cannot tell, since he chattered in English." 
 
 " English ? How do you know that it was 
 English ? " 
 
 " Why, since it was not French, nor like any kind 
 of Indian ! Moreover, I have heard the English talk. 
 They were prisoners brought down from Oswego, 
 twelve batteaux in all, and I took them through the 
 falls. When they talked it was just as this man 
 chattered last night." 
 
 " Then you, too, Dominique, find your guest a 
 strange fellow ? " 
 
 " Oh, as for that ! He is a sergeant, and of the 
 regiment of Bearn. Your reverence saw his coat 
 hanging by the bed." 
 
 " Even in that there is something strange. For 
 Bcarn lies in the Midi, close to the Pyrenees ; and, 
 as I understand, the regiment of Bearn was recruited 
 and officered almost entirely from its own province.
 
 FATHER LAUXOY HAS HIS DOUBTS 93 
 
 But this Sergeant a Clive comes from the north ; 
 his speech has no taste of the south in it, and indeed 
 he owns to me that he is a northerner. He says 
 further that he comes from my own seminary of 
 Douai. And this again is correct ; for I cross- 
 questioned him on the seminary, and he knows it 
 as a hand knows its glove the customs of the place, 
 the lectures, the books in use there. He has told 
 me, moreover, why he left it. ... Dominique, you 
 do right in misliking your guest." 
 
 " I do not say, Father, that I mislike him. I fear 
 him a little I cannot tell why." 
 
 " You do right, then, to fear him ; and I will tell 
 you why. He is an atheist." 
 
 " An atheist ? O oh ! " 
 
 " He has been of the true Faith. But he rejected 
 me ; he would make no confession, but turned him- 
 self to the wall when I exhorted him. Voyons here 
 is a Frenchman who talks English in his delirium ; 
 a northerner serving in a regiment of the south ; an 
 infidel from Douai. Dominique, I do not like your 
 guest." 
 
 " Nor I, Father, since you tell me that he is an 
 atheist." 
 
 While they talked they had been lifting their 
 voices insensibly to the roar of the nearing rapids ; 
 and were now come to Bout de 1'Isle and the edge of 
 peril. Below Bout de 1'Isle the river divided, to 
 plunge through the Roches Fendues, where to choose 
 the wrong channel meant destruction. Yet a mile 
 below the Roches Fendues lay the Cascades, with a 
 long, straight plunge over smooth shelves of rock 
 and two miles of furious water beyond. Yet further 
 down came the terrible rapids of Lachine, not to be 
 attempted. There the voyageurs would leave the 
 canoe and reach Montreal on foot.
 
 94 FORT AMITY 
 
 Father Launoy was a brave man. Thrice before 
 he had let Dominique lead him through the awful 
 dance ahead, and always at the end of it he had felt his 
 soul purged of earthly terrors and left clean as a child's. 
 
 Dominique reached out a hand in silence and took 
 the paddle from the Etchemin, who crawled aft and 
 seated himself with an expressionless face. Then, 
 with a single glance astern to assure himself that 
 the other Indian was prepared, the young man knelt 
 and crouched, with his eyes on the V-shaped ripple 
 ahead, for the angle of which they were heading. 
 
 On this, too, the priest's eyes were bent. He 
 gripped the gunwale as the current lifted and swept 
 the canoe down at a pace past control ; as it sped 
 straight for the point of the smooth water, and so, 
 seeming to be warned by the roar it met, balanced 
 itself fore-and-aft for one swift instant, and plunged 
 with a swoop that caught away the breath. 
 
 The bows shot under the white water below the 
 fall, lifted to the first wave, knocking up foam out 
 of foam, and so dived to the next, quivering like a 
 reed shaken .in the hand. Dominique straightened 
 himself on his knees. In a moment he was working 
 his paddle like a madman, striking broad off with it 
 on this side and that, forcing the canoe into its course, 
 zigzagging within a hand's-breadth of rocks which, 
 at a touch' would have broken her like glass, and 
 across the edge of whirlpools waiting to drown a 
 man and chase his body round for hours within a 
 few inches of the surface ; and all at a speed of 
 fifteen to eighteen miles an hour, with never an 
 instant's pause between sight and stroke. The Indian 
 in the stern took his cue from Dominique ; now 
 paddling for dear life, now flinging his body back 
 as with a turn of the wrist he checked the steerage. 
 
 The priest sat with a white, drenched face ; a
 
 FATHER LAUNOY HAS HIS DOUBTS 95 
 
 brave man terrified. He felt the floor of the world 
 collapsing, saw its forests reeling by in the spray. 
 It cracked like a bubble and was dissolved in rain- 
 bows wisps caught in the rocks and fluttering in 
 the wind of the boat's flight. Then, as the pressure 
 on heart and chest grew intolerable, the speed began 
 to slacken, and he drew a shuddering breath ; but 
 his brain still kept the whirl of the wild minutes 
 past and his hand scarcely relaxed its grip on the 
 gunwale. As a runaway horse, still galloping, drops 
 back to control, so the canoe seemed to find her 
 senses and leapt at the waves with a cunning change 
 of motion, no longer shearing through their crests, 
 but riding them with a long and easy swoop. Still 
 Father Launoy did not speak. He sat as one for 
 whom a door has been held half-open, and closed 
 again, upon a vision. 
 
 Yet when he found his tongue which was not 
 until they reached the end of the white water, and 
 Dominique, after panting awhile, headed the canoe 
 for shore his voice did not shake. 
 
 " It was a bold thought of these men, or a fool- 
 hardy, to strike across the Wilderness," he said 
 meditatively, in the tone of one picking up a talk 
 which chance has interrupted. 
 
 " There are many ways through those woods," 
 Dominique answered. " Between here and Fort 
 Niagara you may hear tell of a dozen perhaps ; and 
 the Iroquois have their own." 
 
 " Let us hope that none of theirs crosses the one 
 you and Bateese taught to Monsieur Armand. v The 
 Seigneur will be uneasy about his son when he hears 
 'Polyte and Damase report ; and Monsieur Etienne 
 and Mademoiselle Diane will be uneasy also." 
 
 " But this Ojibway saw nothing of M. Armand 
 or his party."
 
 96 FORT AMITY 
 
 " No news is good news. As you owe the Seigneur 
 your duty, take your guests up to Fort Amitie to- 
 morrow and let them be interrogated." 
 
 " My Father, must I go ? " There was anguish 
 in Dominique's voice. " Surely Jo Lagasse or Pierre 
 Courteau will do as well ? and there is much work 
 at Boisveyrac which cannot be neglected." 
 
 They had come to shore, and the priest had stepped 
 out upon the bank after Dominique for a few parting 
 words. 
 
 " But that is not your true reason ? " He laid 
 his hand on the young man's shoulder and looked 
 him in the eyes. 
 
 Dominique'-s fell. " Father," he entreated in a 
 choking voice, " you know my secret : do not be 
 hard on me ! ' Lead us not into temptation '- 
 
 " It will not serve you to run from yours. You 
 must do battle with it. Bethink you that, as through 
 the wilderness, there are more ways than one in love, 
 and the best is that of self-denial. Mademoiselle 
 Diane is not for you, Dominique, her father's censi- 
 taire ; yet you may love her your life through and 
 do her lifelong service. To-morrow, by taking these 
 men to Fort Amitie, you may ease her heart of its 
 fears : and will you fail in so simple a devoir ? There 
 is too much of self in your passion, Dominique for 
 I will not call it love. Love finds itself in giving : 
 but passion is always a beggar." 
 
 ' My Father, you do not understand 
 
 " Who told you that I do not understand ? " the 
 priest interrupted harshly. " I, too, have known 
 passion, and learnt that it is full of self and comes 
 of Satan. Nay, is that not evident to you, seeing 
 what mischief it has already worked in your life ? 
 Think of Bateese." 
 
 "Do I ever cease thinking of Bateese ? Do I
 
 FATHER LAUNOY HAS HIS DOUBTS 97 
 
 ever cease lighting with myself ? " Dominique's 
 voice rose almost to a cry of pain. He stared across 
 the water with gloomy eyes, and added it seemed 
 quite inconsequently " The Cascades is a bad fall, 
 but I think it will be the Roches Fendues that gets 
 me in the end." 
 
 He said it calmly, wistfully : and, pausing for a 
 moment, met the priest's eyes. 
 
 " Your blessing, Father. I will go." 
 
 He knelt. 
 
 Generations of voyageurs, upward bound, and 
 porting their canoes to avoid the falls, had worn a 
 track beside the river bank. Dominique made such 
 speed back along it that he came in sight of Bois- 
 veyrac' as the bell in the little chapel of the Seigniory 
 began to ring the Angelus. Its note came floating 
 down the river distinct above the sound of the falls. 
 He bared his head, and repeated his Aves duly. 
 
 " But all the same," he added, working out the 
 train of his thoughts as he gazed across the deserted 
 harvest-fields, impoverished by tree-stumps, to the 
 dense forest behind the Chateau, " let God confound 
 the English, and New France shall belong to a new 
 noblesse that have learned, as the old will not, to 
 lay their hands on her wealth."
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 THE WHITE TUNIC 
 
 JOHN A CLEEVE lay on his bed in the guest-room of 
 the Seigniory listening to the sound of the distant 
 falls. 
 
 That song was his anodyne. All day he had let 
 it lull his conscience, rousing himself irritably as 
 from a drugged sleep to answer the questions put 
 to him by Dominique or the priest. Dominique's 
 questions had been few and easily answered, the 
 most of them relating to the battle. 
 
 " A brother of mine was there beyond doubt," 
 he had wound up wistfully. "He is a batteau-man, 
 by name Baptiste Guyon. But, of course, you will 
 not know him ? " 
 
 " Us m'ont tire pour la battue, moi," John had 
 fenced him off with a feeble joke and a feeble laugh. 
 (Why should he feel ashamed ? Was this not war, 
 and he a prisoner tricking his captors ?) 
 
 But the priest had been a nuisance. Heaven be 
 praised for his going ! 
 
 And now the shadows were closing upon the room, 
 and in the hush of sunset the voice of the waters had 
 lifted its pitch and was humming insistently, with 
 but a semitone's fall and rise. During the priest's 
 exhortations he had turned his face to the wall ; 
 but now for an hour he had lain on his other side, 
 
 98
 
 THE WHITE TUNIC 99 
 
 studying the rafters, the furniture, the ray of sunlight 
 creeping along the floor-boards and up the dark, 
 veneered face of an armoire built into the wall. 
 Behind the doors of it hung Sergeant Barboux's 
 white tunic ; and sometimes it seemed to him that 
 the doors were transparent and he saw it dangling 
 like a grey ghost within. 
 
 It was to avoid this sight that he had turned to 
 the wall when the priest began to interrogate him. 
 Heavens ! how incurably, after all, he hated these 
 priests ! 
 
 Menehwehna had answered most of the questions, 
 standing by the bed's foot : and Menehwehna was 
 seated there still in the dusk. 
 
 How many lies had Menehwehna told? John 
 himself had told none, unless it were a lie to pronounce 
 his name French-fashion " John a Cleeve," " Jean 
 a Clive." And, once more, was not this war ? 
 
 For the rest and for his own part it was astonishing 
 how easily, the central truth being hidden that the 
 tunic in the armoire was not his the deception had 
 run on its own wheels. Why, after all, should that 
 tunic frighten him ? He, John a Cleeve, had not 
 killed its wearer. He had never buttoned it about him 
 nor slipped an arm into one of its sleeves. Meneh- 
 wehna had offered to help him into it, and had shown 
 much astonishment on being refused. John's own 
 soiled regimentals they had weighted with a stone 
 and sunk in the river, and he had been lying all but 
 naked, with the accursed garment over his legs, when 
 the rescue-party found them on the bank. 
 
 How many lies had Menehwehna told ? John 
 could remember the sound of two voices, the priest's 
 and. the Indian's, questioning and explaining ;. but 
 the sound only. As soon as he shut his eyes, and 
 tried to recall the words, the priest's voice faded
 
 ioo FORT AMITY 
 
 down the song of the falls, and only the Indian and 
 himself were left, dropping dropping to the sound, 
 over watery ledges and beneath pendant boughs. 
 Then, as the walls of the room dissolved and the 
 priest's figure vanished with them, Menehwehna's 
 voice grew distinct. At one time it said : " What 
 is done is done. Come with me, and we will go up 
 through the Great Lakes, beyond Michilimackinac, 
 to the Beaver Islands, which are in the mouth of 
 Lake Michigan. There we will find the people of 
 my tribe, and when the snow comes and they separate 
 you shall go with me to the wintering-grounds and 
 learn to be a hunter." 
 
 In another dream the voice said : " You will not 
 come because you weary of me and wish to leave me. 
 We have voyaged together, and little by little my 
 heart has been opened to you ; but yours will not 
 open in return. I would have made you to me all 
 that Muskingon was ; but you would not. When 
 I killed that man it was for your sake no less than 
 Muskingon' s. I told him so when he died. Of what 
 avail is my friendship, brother, when you will give 
 me none in exchange ? . . ." 
 
 In yet a third dream the canoe floated on a mirror, 
 between a forest and the image of a forest. . . . His 
 eyes followed the silver wake of a musk-rat swimming 
 from shore to shore, and in his ear Menehwehna was 
 saying, " Your head is weak yet : when it grows 
 stronger you will wish to come. Muskingon struck 
 you too hard so with the flat of his tomahawk. 
 He did not mean it, but his heart was jealous that 
 already so much of my love had passed over to you. 
 Yet he was a good lad, and my daughter's husband. 
 The White-coat called across the stream to him to 
 kill you ; but he would not, nor would he bring you 
 over the ford until we had made the White-coat
 
 THE WHITE TUNIC 101 
 
 promise that you should not be killed for trying to 
 run away. The man could do nothing against us 
 two ; but he bore ill-will to Muskingon afterwards 
 and left him to die when we could have saved him." 
 
 So, while John had lain senseless, fate had been 
 binding him with cords cords of guilt and cords of 
 gratitude and twining them inextricably. There- 
 fore he feared sleep, because these dreams awoke him 
 to pluck again at the knot of conscience. Ease came 
 only with the brain's exhaustion, when in sheer weak- 
 ness he could let slip the tangle and let the song of the 
 rapids drug his senses once more. 
 
 He turned on his side and watched the sunbeam as 
 it crept up the face of the armoire. " Menehwehna ! " 
 he called weakly. 
 
 From his seat in the corner among the shadows the 
 Indian came and stood behind him. 
 
 " Menehwehna, this lying cannot go on ! Make 
 you for this fort they talk of ; tell your tale there, and 
 push on to join your tribe. Let us fix a length of 
 time, enough for your travel beyond reach, and at the 
 end of it I will speak." 
 
 " And what will my brother tell them ? " 
 
 " The truth that I am no Frenchman, but an 
 English prisoner." 
 
 " It is weakness makes you lose patience," answered 
 Menehwehna, as one might soothe a child. " Let the 
 weak listen to the strong. All things I have con- 
 trived, and will contrive ; there is no danger, and 
 will be none." 
 
 John groaned. How could he explain that he 
 abhorred this lying ? Worse how could he explain 
 that he loathed Menehwehna' s company, and could 
 not be friends with him as of old ; that something in 
 his blood, something deep and ineradicable as the 
 difference between white man and red man, cried out 
 
 D
 
 102 FORT AMITY 
 
 upon the sergeant's murder ? How could he make 
 this clear ? Menehwehna who had preserved his 
 life, nursed him, toiled for him cheerfully, borne with 
 him patiently would understand only that all these 
 pains had been spent upon an ingrate. John tugged 
 away from the bond of guilt only to tighten this other 
 yet more hateful bond of gratitude. He must sever 
 them both, and in one way only could this be done. 
 He and Menehwehna must part. " I do not fear to 
 be a prisoner. Moreover, it will not be for long. The 
 river leads, after all, to Quebec ; and the English, if 
 they take Louisbourg, will quickly push up that 
 way." 
 
 " The White-coat used to speak wisdom once in a 
 while," answered Menehwehna gravely. ' It is 
 a great battle,' he said, ' that battle of If ; only it 
 has the misfortune never to be fought.' Take heart, 
 brother, and come with me to the Isles du Castor. 
 When your countrymen take Quebec you shall return 
 to them, if you still have the mind, and I will swear 
 that we held you captive. But to tell this needless 
 tale is a sick man's folly." 
 
 John could not meet the Indian's eyes, full as they 
 were of a wondering simplicity. He feared they 
 might read the truth that his desire to escape was 
 dead. During Father Launoy's exhortations he had 
 lain, as it were, with his ear against its cold heart ; 
 had lain secretly whispering it to awake. But it 
 would not. The questions and cross-questions about 
 Douai he had answered almost inattentively. What 
 did it all matter ? 
 
 The priest had been merely tedious. Back on 
 Lake Champlain and on the Richelieu, when the world 
 of his ken, though lost, lay not far behind him, his 
 hope had been to escape and seek back to it ; his 
 comfort against failure the thought that here in the.
 
 THE WHITE TUNIC 103 
 
 north one restful, familiar face awaited him the 
 face of the Church Catholic. Now the hope and the 
 consolation were gone together. Perhaps under the 
 lengthening strain some vital spring had snapped in 
 him, or the forests had slowly choked it, or it had 
 died with a nerve of the brain under Muskingon's 
 tomahawk. N 
 
 He was not Sergeant a Clive of the regiment of 
 Beam ; but almost as little was he that Ensign John 
 a Cleeve, of the Forty-sixth, who had entered the 
 far side of the Wilderness. 
 
 He wanted only to be quit of Menehwehna and 
 guilt. It would be a blessed relief to lie lost, alone, 
 as a ball tossed into a large country. As he had fallen, 
 so he prayed to lie ; empty in the midst of a great 
 emptiness. The Communion of all the Saints could 
 not comfort him now, since he had passed all need of 
 comfort. 
 
 " You must go, Menehwehna. I will not speak 
 until you are beyond reach." 
 
 " It is my brother that talks so. Else would I call 
 it the twitter of a wren that has flown over. Is 
 Menehwehna a coward, that he spoke with thought of 
 saving himself ? " 
 
 " I know that you did not," answered John, and 
 cursed the knowledge. But the voice of the falls had 
 begun to lull him. " We will talk of it to-morrow," 
 he said drowsily. 
 
 " Yes, indeed ; for this is a thought of sickness, that 
 a man should choose to be a prisoner when by any 
 means he may be free." 
 
 He found a tinder-box and lit the night-lamp a 
 wick floating in a saucer of oil : then, having shaken 
 up John's pillow and given him to drink from a panni- 
 kin, went noiselessly back to his corner. 
 
 The light wavered on the dark panels of the armoire.
 
 104 FORT AMITY 
 
 While John watched, it fell into tune with the music 
 of the distant falls 
 
 He awoke, with the rhythm of dance-music in his 
 brain. In his dream the dawn was about him, and 
 he stood on the lawn outside the Schuylers' great 
 house above Albany. From the ballroom came the 
 faint sound of violins, while he lingered to say good- 
 bye to three night-gowned little girls in the window 
 over the porch ; and some way down the hill stood 
 young Sagramore, of the Twenty-seventh, who was 
 saying, " It is a long way to go. Do you think he 
 is strong enough ? " 
 
 Still in his dream, John turned on him indignantly. 
 And behold ! it was not young Sagramore, but 
 Dominique, standing by the bed and talking with 
 Menehwehna. 
 
 " We are to start for the Fort, it appears," said 
 Menehwehna to John. 
 
 " Let us first make sure," said Dominique, " that 
 he is strong enough to dress." He thrust his hand 
 within the armoire and unhitched the white tunic from 
 its peg. 
 
 John shrank back into his corner. 
 
 " Not that ! " he stammered. 
 
 Across the lamp smoking in the dawn, Dominique 
 stared at him.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 FORT AMITY 
 
 THE Fort stood high on a wooded slope around which 
 the river swept through narrows to spread itself below 
 in a lake three miles wide and almost thirty long. In 
 shape it was quadrilateral, with a frontage of fifty 
 toises and a depth of thirty, and from each angle of 
 its stone walls abutted a flanking tower, the one at 
 the western angle taller than the others by a good 
 twenty feet and surmounted by a flagstaff. 
 
 East, west, and south, the ground fell gently to the 
 water's edge, entirely clear of trees : even their 
 stumps had been uprooted to make room for small 
 gardens, in which the garrison grew its cabbages and 
 potherbs ; and below these gardens the Commandant's 
 'cows roamed in a green riverside meadow. At the 
 back a rougher clearing, two cannonshots in width, 
 divided the northern wall from the dark tangle of the 
 forest. 
 
 The canoe had been sighted far down the lake, and 
 the Commandant himself, with his brother M. Etienne 
 and his daughter Mademoiselle Diane, had descended 
 to the quay to welcome the voyageurs. A little apart 
 stood Sergeant Bedard, old Jere'mie Tripier (formerly 
 major-domo and general factotum at Boisveyrac, now 
 at Fort Amitie promoted to be marechal des logis), and 
 five or six militiamen. And to John, as he neared the 
 105
 
 io6 FORT AMITY 
 
 shore in the haze of a golden evening, the scene and 
 the figures the trim little fortress, the white banner 
 of France transparent against the sky, the sentry like 
 a toy, figure at the gate, the cattle browsing below, 
 the group at the river's brink appeared as a tableau 
 set for a child's play. 
 
 To add to the illusion, as the canoe came to the quay 
 the sun sank, a gun boomed out from the tallest of the 
 four towers, and the flag ran down its staff : all as 
 if by clockwork. As if by clockwork, too, the taller 
 of the two old gentlemen on the quay the one in a 
 gold-laced coat stepped forward with a wave of his 
 hand. 
 
 " Welcome, welcome, my good Dominique ! It 
 will be news you bring from Boisveyrac more news 
 of the great victory, perhaps ? And who are these 
 your comrades ? " 
 
 " Your servant, Monseigneur ; and yours, Monsieur 
 Etienne, and yours, Mademoiselle Diane ! " Dominique 
 brought his canoe alongside and saluted respectfully. 
 " All my own news is that we have gathered the 
 harvest at Boisveyrac ; a crop not far below the 
 average, we hope. But Father Launoy desired me 
 to bring you these strangers, who will tell of matters 
 more important." 
 
 "It is the wounded man the sergeant from Fort 
 Carillon ! " cried Diane, clasping her hands. 
 
 " Eh, my child ? Nonsense, nonsense he wears 
 no uniform, as you see. Moreover, 'Polyte Latulippe 
 brought word that he was lying at the point of death." 
 
 " It is he, nevertheless." 
 
 " Mademoiselle has guessed rightly," said Domi- 
 nique. " It is the wounded soldier. I have lent him 
 an outfit." 
 
 The Commandant stared incredulously from Domi- 
 nique to John, from John to Menehwehna, and back
 
 FORT AMITY 107 
 
 again to John. A delightful smile irradiated his 
 face. 
 
 " Then you bring us a good gift indeed ! Welcome, 
 sir, welcome to Fort Amitie ! where we will soon have 
 you hale and strong again, if nursing can do it." 
 
 Here, if John meant to play his part, was the moment 
 for him to salute. He half lifted his hand as he 
 reclined, but let it fall again. From the river-bank 
 a pair of eyes looked down into his : dark grey eyes 
 or were they violet ? shy and yet bold, dim and yet 
 shining with emotion. God help him ! This child she 
 could be little more was worshipping him for a hero ! 
 
 " Nay, sir, give it to me ! " cried the Commandant, 
 stooping by the quay's edge. " I shall esteem it an 
 honour to grasp the hand of one who comes from 
 Fort Carillon who was wounded for France in her 
 hour of victory. Your name, my friend ? for the 
 messengers who brought word of you yesterday had 
 not heard it, or perhaps had forgotten." 
 
 " My name is a Cleeve, monsieur." 
 
 " A Clive ? a Clive ? It is unknown to me, and yet 
 it has^a good sound, and should bejong to un homme 
 bien ne?" He turned inquiringly towards his brother, 
 a mild, elderly man with a scholar's stoop and a face 
 which assorted oddly with his uniform of captain of 
 militia, being shrivelled as parchment and snuff-dried 
 and abstracted in expression as though he had just 
 lifted his eyes from a book. " A Clive, Etienne. 
 From what province should our friend derive ? " 
 
 M. Etienne's eyes they were, in fact, short-sighted 
 seemed to search inwardly for a moment before he 
 answered : 
 
 " There was a family of that name in the Quercy ; 
 so late, I think, as 1650. I had supposed it to be 
 extinct. It bore arms counterpaly argent and gules, 
 a canton ermine "
 
 io8 FORT AMITY 
 
 " My brother, sir," the Commandant interrupted, 
 " is a famous genealogist. Do you accept this coat- 
 of-arms he assigns to you ? " 
 
 " If M. le Commandant will excuse me " 
 
 " Eh, eh ? an awkward question, no doubt, to 
 put to many a young man of family now serving with 
 the colours ? " The Commandant chuckled know- 
 ingly. " But I have an eye, sir, for nice shades, and 
 an ear too. Verbum sapienti satis. A sergeant, they 
 tell me and of the Bearnais ; but until we have 
 cured you, sir, and the active list again claims you, 
 you are Monsieur a Clive and my guest. We shall 
 talk, so, upon an easier footing. Tut, tut ! I have 
 eyes in my head, I repeat. And this Indian of yours 
 how does he call himself ? " 
 
 " Menehwehna, monsieur. He is an Ojibway." 
 
 " And you and he have come by way of the Wilder- 
 ness ? Now, what puzzles me 
 
 " Papa ! " interposed the girl gently, laying a hand 
 on her father's sleeve ; " ought we not to get him 
 ashore before troubling him with all these questions ? 
 He is suffering, I think." 
 
 " You say well, my child. A thousand pardons, 
 sir. Here, Bedard ! Jeremie ! " 
 
 But it was Menehwehna who, with inscrutable face, 
 helped John ashore, suffering the others only to hold 
 the canoe steady. John tried hard to collect his 
 thoughts to face this new situation. He had dreamed 
 of falling among savages in these backwoods ; but 
 he had fallen among folk gentle in manner and speech, 
 anxious to show him courtesy ; folk to whom (as in 
 an instant he divined) truth and uprightness were 
 dearer than life and judged as delicately as by his own 
 family at home in Devonshire. How came they here ? 
 Who was this girl whose eyes he avoided lest they should 
 weigh him, as a sister's might, in the scales of honour ?
 
 FORT AMITY 109 
 
 A man may go through life cherishing many beliefs 
 which are internecine foes ; unaware of their discord- 
 ance, or honestly persuaded that within him the lion 
 and the lamb are lying down together, whereas in 
 truth his fate has never drawn the bolts of their 
 separate cages. John had his doubts concerning God ; 
 but something deeper than reason within him detested 
 a lie. Yet as a soldier he had accepted without ex- 
 amination the belief that many actions vile in peace 
 are in war permissible, even obligatory ; a loose belief, 
 the limits of which no man in his regiment perhaps 
 no man in the two armies could have denned. In 
 war you may kill ; nay, you must ; but you must do 
 it by code, and with many exceptions and restrictions 
 as to the how and when. In war (John supposed) you 
 may lie ; nay, again, in certain circumstances you 
 must. 
 
 With this girl's eyes upon him, worshipping him for 
 a hero, John discovered suddenly that here, and now, 
 he could not. For an instant, as if along a beam of 
 light, he looked straight into Militarism's sham and 
 ugly heart. 
 
 Yes, he saw it quite clearly, and was resolved to end 
 the lie. But for the moment, in his bodily weakness, 
 his will lagged behind his brain. As a sick man tries 
 to lift a hand and cannot, so he sought to rally his will 
 to meet the crisis and was dismayed to find it be- 
 numbed and half asleep. 
 
 They were ascending the slope, and still as they 
 went the Commandant's voice was questioning him. 
 
 " Through the Wilderness ! That was no small 
 exploit, my friend, and it puzzles me how you came 
 to attempt it ; for you were severely wounded, were 
 you not ? " 
 
 " I received two wounds at Fort Carillon, monsieur. 
 The proposal to make across the woods was not mine. 
 
 D*
 
 no FORT AMITY 
 
 It came from the French sergeant in command of our 
 boat." 
 
 " So so. . I ought to have guessed it. You were 
 a whole boat's party then, at starting ? " John felt 
 the crisis near ; but the Commandant's mind was dis- 
 cursive, and he paused to wave a proprietary hand 
 towards the walls and towers of his fortress. " A 
 snug little shelter for the backwoods eh, M. a Give ? 
 I am, you must know, a student of the art of fortifica- 
 tion ; c'est ma rengaine, as my daughter will tell you, 
 and I shall have much to ask concerning that famous 
 outwork of M. de Montcalm's, which touches my 
 curiosity. So far as Damase could tell me, Fort 
 
 Carillon itself was never even in danger But 
 
 here Mademoiselle Diane again touched his sleeve. 
 " Yes, yes, to be sure, we will not weary our friend 
 just now. We will cure him first ; and while he is 
 mending, you shall look out a new uniform from the 
 stores and set your needle to work to render it as like 
 as you can contrive to the Bearnais. Nay, sir, to her 
 enthusiasm that will be but a trifle. Remember that 
 you come to us crowned with laurels, and with news 
 for which we welcome you as though you brought a 
 message from the General himself." A sudden 
 thought fetched the Commandant to a standstill. 
 " You are sure that the sergeant, your comrade, car- 
 ried no message ? " 
 
 John paused with Menehwehna's 'arm supporting 
 him. 
 
 " If he carried a message, monsieur, he told me of 
 none." 
 
 Where were his faculties ? Why were they hanging 
 back and refusing to come to grips with the crisis ? 
 Why did this twilit riverside persist in seeming unreal 
 to him, and the actors, himself included, as figures 
 moving in a shadow-play ?
 
 FORT AMITY in 
 
 Once, in a dream, he had seen himself standing at 
 the wings of a stage an actor, dressed for his part. 
 The theatre was crowded ; some one had begun to ring 
 a bell for the curtain to go up ; and he, the hero of the 
 piece, knew not one word of his part, could not even 
 remember the name of the play or what it was about. 
 The dream had been extraordinarily vivid, and he had 
 aw r akened in a sweat. 
 
 " But," the Commandant urged, " he must have 
 had some reason for striking through the forest. What 
 was his name ? " 
 
 " Barboux." 
 
 John, as he answered, could not see Menehwehna's 
 face ; but Menehwehna's supporting arm did not 
 flinch. 
 
 " Was he, too, of the regiment of Beam ? " 
 
 " He was of the Bearnais, monsieur." 
 
 "Tell us now. When the Iroquois overtook you, 
 could he have passed on a message, had he carried 
 one ? " 
 
 While John hesitated, Menehwehna answered him. 
 "It was I only who saw the sergeant die," said Meneh- 
 wehna quietly. " He gave me no message." 
 
 " You were close to him ? " 
 
 " Very close." 
 
 " It is curious," mused the Commandant, and turned 
 to John again. " Your falling in with the Iroquois, 
 monsieur, gives me some anxiety ; since it happens 
 that a party from here and from Fort Frontenac was 
 crossing the Wilderness at about the same time, with 
 messages for the General on Lake Champlain. You 
 saw nothing of them ? " 
 
 Again Menehwehna took up the answer. " We met 
 no one but these Iroquois," he said smoothly. 
 
 And as Menehwehna spoke the words John felt that 
 everyone in the group about him had been listening
 
 H2 FORT AMITY 
 
 for it with a common tension of anxiety. He gazed 
 around, bewildered for the moment by the lie. The 
 girl stood with clasped hands. " Thank God ! " he 
 heard the Commandant say, lifting his hat. 
 
 What new mystery was here ? Menehwehna stood 
 with a face immobile and inscrutable ; and John's 
 soul rose up against him in rage and loathing. The 
 man had dishonoured him, counting on his gratitude 
 to endorse the lie. Well, he was quit of gratitude now. 
 "To-morrow, my fine fellow," said he to himself, 
 clenching his teeth, " the whole tale shall be told ; 
 between this and the telling you may save your skin, 
 if you can ; " and so he turned to the Commandant. 
 
 " Monsieur," he said, with a meaning glance at 
 Menehwehna, " I beg you to accept no part of our story 
 until I have told it through to you." 
 
 The Commandant was plainly puzzled . ' ' Willingly, 
 monsieur ; but I beg you to consider the sufferings of 
 our curiosity and be kind in putting a term to them." 
 
 " To-morrow " began John, and, looking up, 
 
 came to a pause. Dominique Guyon had followed 
 them up from the boat and was thrusting himself un- 
 ceremoniously upon the Commandant's attention. 
 
 " Since this monsieur mentions to-morrow," inter- 
 rupted Dominique abruptly, " and before I am dis- 
 missed to supper, may I claim the Seigneur's leave to 
 depart early to-morrow morning ? " 
 
 The interruption was so unmannerly that John 
 stared from one to another of the group. The Com- 
 mandant's face had grown very red indeed. Domin- 
 ique himself seemed sullenly aware of his rudeness. 
 But John's eyes came to rest on Mademoiselle Diane's ; 
 on her eyes for an instant, and then on her lashes, as 
 she bent her gaze on the ground it seemed to him, 
 purposely, and to avoid Dominique's. 
 
 " Dominique," said the Commandant haughtily,
 
 FORT AMITY 113 
 
 " you forget yourself. You intrude upon my con- 
 versation with this gentleman." His voice shook, 
 and yet it struck John that his anger covered some 
 anxiety. 
 
 " Monseigneur must forgive me," answered Domin- 
 ique, still with an awkward sullenness. " But it is 
 merely my dismissal that I beg. I wish to return early 
 to-morrow to Boisveyrac ; the harvest there is gath- 
 ered, to be sure, but no one can be trusted to finish 
 the stacks. With so many dancing attendance on the 
 military, the Seigniory suffers ; and, by your leave, I 
 am responsible for it." 
 
 He glared upon John, who gazed back honestly 
 puzzled. The Commandant seemed on the verge of 
 an explosion, but checked himself. 
 
 " My excellent Dominique Guyon," said he, " uses 
 the freedom of an old tenant. But here we are at the 
 gate. I bid you welcome, Monsieur a Clive, to my small 
 fortress ! Tut, tut, Dominique ! We will talk of 
 business in the morning." 
 
 Alone with Menehwehna in the bare hospital ward 
 to which old J6remie as marechal des logis escorted 
 them, John turned on the Ojibway and let loose his 
 indignation. 
 
 " And look you," he wound up, " this shall be the 
 end. At daybreak to-morrow the gate of the fort will 
 be opened. Take the canoe and make what speed you 
 can. I will give you until ten o'clock, but at that hour 
 I promise you to tell my tale to the Commandant, and 
 to tell him all." 
 
 "If my brother is resolved," said Menehwehna com- 
 posedly, " let him waste no words. What is settled 
 is settled, and to be angry will do his head no good." 
 
 He composed himself to sleep on the floor at the 
 foot of John's bed, pulling his rug up to his ears.
 
 H4 FORT AMITY 
 
 There were six empty beds in the ward, and one had 
 been prepared for him, but Menehwehna despised 
 beds. 
 
 John awoke to sunlight. It poured in through three 
 windows high in the whitewashed wall opposite, and 
 his first thought was to turn over and look for Meneh- 
 wehna. 
 
 Menehwehna had disappeared. 
 
 John lay back on the pillow and stared up at the 
 ceiling. Menehwehna had gone ; he was free of him, 
 and this day was to deliver his soul. In an hour or so 
 he would be sitting under lock and key, but with a 
 conscience bathed and refreshed, a companion to be 
 looked in the face, a clear-eyed counsellor. The morn- 
 ing sunlight filled the room with a clean cheerfulness, 
 and he seemed to drink it in through his pores. For- 
 getting his wound, he jumped Out of bed with a laugh. 
 
 As he did so his eye travelled along the empty beds 
 in the ward, and along a row of pegs above them, and 
 stiffened suddenly. 
 
 There were twelve pegs, and all were bare save one 
 the one in the wall-space separating his bed from the 
 bed which had been prepared for Menehwehna ; and 
 from this peg hung Sergeant Barboux's white tunic. 
 
 It had not been hanging there last night when he 
 dropped asleep : to that he could take his oath. He 
 had supposed it to be left behind in the armoire at 
 Boisveyrac. For a full minute he sat on the bed's 
 edge gazing at it in sheer dismay, its evil menace 
 closing like a grip upon his heart. 
 
 But by-and-by the grip relaxed as dismay gave 
 room to rage, and with rage came courage. 
 
 He laughed again fiercely. Up to this moment he 
 had always shrunk from touch of the thing ; but now 
 he pulled it from its peg, held it at arm's length for a 
 moment, and flung it contemptuously on the floor.
 
 FORT AMITY 115 
 
 " You at least, I am not going to fear any longer ! " 
 
 As he cast it from him something crackled under his 
 fingers. For a second or two he stood over the tunic, 
 eyeing it between old disgust and new surmise. Then, 
 dropping on one knee, he fumbled it over, found the 
 inner breast-pocket, and pulled from it a paper. 
 
 It was of many sheets, folded in a blue wrapper, 
 sealed with a large red seal, and addressed in cipher. 
 
 Turning it over in his hand, he caught sight, in the 
 lower left-hand corner, of a dark spot which his thumb 
 had covered. He stared at it ; then at his thumb, to 
 the ball of which some red dust adhered ; then at the 
 seal. The wax bore the impress of a flying Mercury, 
 with cap, caduceus, and winged sandals. The 
 ciphered address he could not interpret ; it was brief, 
 written in two lines, in a bold, clear hand. 
 
 This, then, was the missive which Barboux had 
 carried. 
 
 Had Menehwehna discovered it and placed it here 
 for him to discover ? Yes, undoubtedly. And this 
 was a French despatch ; and at any cost he must inter- 
 cept it ! His soldier's sacrament required no less. 
 He must conceal it seek his opportunity to escape 
 with it go on lying meanwhile in hope of an oppor- 
 tunity. 
 
 Where now was the prospect of his soul's deliver- 
 ance ? 
 
 He crept back to bed, and was thrusting the letter 
 under his pillow when a slight sound drew his eyes 
 towards the door. 
 
 In the doorway stood Menehwehna with a breakfast- 
 tray. The Indian's eyes travelled calmly across the 
 room as he entered, and set the tray down on the bed 
 next to John's. Without speaking, he picked up the 
 tumbled tunic from the floor and set it back on its peg.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 AGAIN THE WHITE TUNIC 
 
 "BUT touching this polygon of M. de Mont- 
 calm's " 
 
 Within the curtain-wall facing the waterside the 
 ground had been terraced up to form a high platform 
 or terre-plein, whence six guns, mounted in embrasures, 
 commanded the river. Hither John had crept, with 
 the support of a stick, to enjoy the sunshine and the 
 view, and here the Commandant had found him and 
 held him in talk, walking him to and fro, with pauses 
 now and again beside a gun for a few minutes' rest. 
 
 " But touching this polygon of M. de Montcalm's, 
 he would doubtless follow Courmontaigne rather than 
 Vauban. The angles, you say, were boldly advanced ? " 
 
 " So they appeared to me, monsieur ; but you 
 understand that I took no part 
 
 " By advancing the angles boldly "here the Com- 
 mandant pressed his finger-tips together by way of 
 illustration " we allow so much more play to enfilad- 
 ing fire. I speak only of defence against direct assault; 
 for of opposing such a structure to artillery the General 
 could have had no thought." 
 
 " Half-a-dozen six-pounders, well directed, could 
 have knocked it about his ears in as many minutes." 
 
 " That does not detract from his credit. Every 
 general fights with two heads his own and his adver- 
 sary's ; and, for the rest, we have to do what we can 
 
 116
 
 AGAIN THE WHITE TUNIC 117 
 
 do with our material." The Commandant halted and 
 gazed down whimsically upon the courtyard, in the 
 middle of which his twenty-five militiamen were being 
 drilled by M. Etienne and Sergeant Bedard. " My 
 whole garrison, sir ! Eh ? you seem incredulous. 
 My whole garrison, I give you my word ! Five-and- 
 twenty militiamen to defend a post of this importance ; 
 and up at Fort Frontenac, the very key of the West, 
 my old friend Payan de Noyan has but a hundred in 
 command ! I do not understand it, sir. Stores we 
 have in abundance, and ammunition and valuable 
 presents to propitiate the Indians who no longer exist 
 in this neighbourhood. Yes, and would you believe 
 it ? no longer than three months ago the Governor 
 sent up a boatload of women. It appeared that his 
 Majesty had forwarded them all the way from France, 
 for wives for his faithful soldiers. I packed them off, 
 sir, and returned them to M. de Vaudreuil. ' With all 
 submission to his Majesty's fatherly wisdom,' I wrote, 
 ' the requirements of New France at this moment are 
 best determined by sterner considerations ' ; and I 
 asked for fifty regulars to man our defences. M. de 
 Vaudreuil replied by sending me up one man, and he 
 had but one arm ! I made Noyeau a present of him ; 
 his notions of fortification were rudimentary, not to 
 say puerile." 
 
 The Commandant paused and dug the surface of the 
 terre-plein indignantly with his heel. " As for forti- 
 fication, do I not know already what additional de- 
 fences we need ? Fort Amitie, monsieur, was con- 
 structed by the great Frontenac himself, and with 
 wonderful sagacity, if we consider the times. Take, 
 for example, the towers. You are acquainted, of 
 course, with the modern rule of giving the bastions a 
 salient angle of fifteen degrees in excess of half the angle 
 of the figure in all figures from the square up to the
 
 n8 FORT AMITY 
 
 dodecagon ? Well, Fort Amitie being a square or 
 rather a right-angled quadrilateral the half of its 
 angle will be forty-five degrees ; add fifteen, and we 
 get sixty ; which is as nearly as possible the salience 
 of our flanking towers ; only they happen to be round. 
 So far, so good ; but Frontenac had naturally no op- 
 portunity of studying Vauban's masterpieces, and 
 perhaps, as the older man, he never digested Vauban's 
 theories. He did not see that a quadrilateral measuring 
 fifty toises by thirty must need some protection mid- 
 way in its longer curtains, and more especially on the 
 river-side. A ravelin is out of the question, for we 
 have no counterscarp to stand it on no ditch at all, 
 in fact, our glacis slopes straight from the curtain to 
 the river. I have thought of a tenaille of a flat 
 bastion. We could do so much if only M. de Vaudreuil 
 would send us men ! but, as it is, on what are we rely- 
 ing ? Simply, M. a Clive, on our enemies' ignorance 
 of our weakness." 
 
 John turned his face away and stared out over the 
 river. The walls of the fort seemed to stifle him ; but 
 in truth his own breast was the prison. 
 
 " Well, now," the Commandant pursued, " your 
 arrival has set me thinking. We cannot strengthen 
 ourselves against artillery ; but they say that these 
 English Generals learn nothing. They may come 
 against us with musketry, and what served Fort 
 Carillon may also serve Fort Amitie'. A breastwork 
 call it a lunette half-way down the slope yonder, 
 so placed as to command the landing-place at close 
 musket range it might be useful, eh ? There will be 
 trouble with Polyphile Cartier ' Sans Quartier,' as 
 they call him. He is proud of his cabbages, and we 
 might have to evict them ; yes, certainly our lunette 
 would impinge upon his cabbages. But the safety of the 
 Fort would, of course, override all such considerations."
 
 AGAIN THE WHITE TUNIC 119 
 
 He caught John by the arm and hurried him along 
 for a better view of Sans Quartier's cabbage-patch. 
 And just then Mademoiselle Diane came walking 
 swiftly towards them from the end of the terra-plein 
 by the flagstaff tower. An instant later the head and 
 shoulders of Dominique Guyon appeared above the 
 ascent. 
 
 Clearly he was following her ; and as she drew near 
 John read, or thought he read, a deep trouble in the 
 child's eyes. But from her eyes his glance fell upon a 
 bundle that she carried, and his own cheek paled. 
 For the bundle was a white tunic, and it took a second 
 glance to assure him that the tunic was a new one and 
 not Sergeant Barboux's ! 
 
 " Eh ? What did I tell you ? She has been rifling 
 the stores already ! " Here the Commandant caught 
 sight of Dominique and hailed him. " Hola, Domi- 
 nique ! " 
 
 Dominique halted for a moment and then came 
 slowly forward ; while the girl, having greeted John 
 with a grown woman's dignity, stood close by her 
 father's elbow. 
 
 " Dominique, how many men can you spare me from 
 Boisveyrac, now that the harvest is over ? " 
 
 " For what purpose do you wish men, Monseigneur?" 
 
 " Eh ? That is my affair, I hope." 
 
 The young man's face darkened, but he controlled 
 himself to say humbly, " Monseigneur rebukes me 
 with justice. I should not have spoken so ; but it 
 was in alarm for his interests." 
 
 " You mean that you are unwilling to spare me a 
 single man ? Come, come, my friend the harvest 
 is gathered ; and, apart from that, my interests are 
 the King's. Positively you must spare me half a 
 dozen for His Majesty's corvee." 
 
 ' ' The harvest is gathered, to be sure ; but no one
 
 120 FORT AMITY 
 
 at Boisveyrac can be truzted to finish the stacks. 
 They are a good-for-nothing lot ; and now Damase, 
 the best thatcher among them, has, I hear, been sent 
 up to Fort Frontenac along with Tolyte Latu- 
 lippe." 
 
 " By my orders." 
 
 Dominique bent his eyes on the ground. 
 
 " Monseigneur's orders shall be obeyed. May I 
 have his permission to return at once to Boisveyrac ? 
 at least, as soon as we have discussed certain matters 
 of business ? " 
 
 " Business ? But since it is not convenient just 
 now It seemed to John that the old gentleman 
 
 had suddenly grown uneasy. 
 
 " I speak only of certain small repairs ; the matter 
 of Legasse's holding, for example," said Dominique 
 tranquilly. " The whole will not detain Monseigneur 
 above ten minutes." 
 
 " Ah, to be sure ! " The Commandant's voice 
 betrayed relief. " Come to my orderly-room, then. 
 You will excuse me, M. a Clive ? " 
 
 He turned to go, and Dominique stepped aside to 
 allow the girl to accompany her father. But she 
 made no sign. He shot a look at her, and sullenly 
 descended the terrace at his seigneur's heels. 
 
 Mademoiselle Diane's brow grew clear again as the 
 sound of his footsteps died away, and presently she 
 faced John with a smile so gay and frank that (al- 
 though, quite involuntarily, he had been watching 
 her) the change startled him. There was something 
 in this girl at once innocently candid and curiously 
 elusive ; to begin with, he could not decide whether 
 to think of her as child or woman. Last night her 
 eyes had rested on him with a child's open wonder, 
 and a minute ago in Dominique's presence she had 
 seemed to shrink close to her father with a child's
 
 AGAIN THE WHITE TUNIC iSi 
 
 timidity. Now, gaily as she smiled, her bearing had 
 grown dignified and self-possessed. 
 
 " You are not to leave me, please, M. a Clive 
 seeing that I came expressly to find you." 
 
 John lifted his hat with mock gravity. " You do 
 me great honour, mademoiselle. And Dominique ? " 
 he added. " Was he also coming in search of me ? " 
 
 She frowned, and turning towards a cannon in the 
 embrasure behind her, spread the white tunic care- 
 fully upon it. " Dominique Guyon is tiresome," she 
 said. " At times, as you have heard, he speaks with 
 too much freedom to my father ; but it is the free- 
 dom of old service. The Guyons have farmed Bois- 
 veyrac for our family since first the Seigniory was 
 built." She seemed about to say more, but checked 
 herself, and stood smoothing an arm of the tunic 
 upon the gun. " Ah, here is Felicite ! " she exclaimed, 
 as a stout, middle-aged woman came bustling along 
 the terrace towards them. " You have kept me 
 waiting, Felicite. And, good heavens ! what is that 
 you carry ? Did I not tell you that I would get 
 Jeremie to find me a tunic from the stores ? See, I 
 have one already." 
 
 " But this is not from the stores, mademoiselle ! " 
 panted Felicit^, as she came to a halt. " It appears 
 that monsieur brought his tunic with him Jeremie 
 told me he had seen it hanging by his bed in the sick 
 ward and here it is, see you ! " She displayed it 
 triumphantly, spreading its skirts to the sunshine. 
 " A trifle soiled ! but it will save us all the trouble in 
 the world with the measurements eh, mademois- 
 elle ? " 
 
 Diane's eyes were on John's face. For a moment 
 or two she did not answer, but at length she said 
 slowly : 
 
 " Nevertheless you shall measure monsieur. Have
 
 122 FORT AMITY 
 
 you the tapes ? Good : give me one, with the blue 
 chalk, and I will check off your measurements." 
 
 She seated herself on the gun-carriage and drew the 
 two tunics on to her lap. John shivered as she 
 touched the dead sergeant's. 
 
 Felicite grinned as she advanced with the tape. 
 " Do not be shy of me, monsieur," she encouraged 
 him affably. " You are a hero, and I myself am the 
 mother of eight, which is in its way heroic. There 
 should be a good understanding between us. Raise 
 your arms a little, pray, while I take first of all the 
 measure of your chest." 
 
 Her two arms and they were plump, not to say 
 brawny went about him. " Thirty-eight," she 
 announced, after examining the tape. " It's long 
 since I have embraced one so slight." 
 
 " Thirty-eight," repeated Mademoiselle Diane, 
 puckering up her lips and beginning to measure off 
 the pouces across the breast and back of Sergeant 
 Barboux's tunic. " Thirty-eight, did you say ? " 
 
 " Thirty-eight, mademoiselle. We must remember 
 that these brave defenders of ours sometimes pad 
 themselves a little ; it will be nothing amiss if you 
 allow for forty. Eh, monsieur ? " Felicite laughed 
 up in John's face. " But you find some difficulty, 
 mademoiselle. Can I help you ? " 
 
 " I thank you it is all right," Diane answered 
 hurriedly. 
 
 " Waist, twenty-nine," Felicite continued. " One 
 might even say twenty-eight, only monsieur is draw- 
 ing in his breath." 
 
 " Where are the scissors, Felicite ? " demanded her 
 mistress, who had carefully smuggled them beneath 
 her skirt as she sat. 
 
 " The scissors ? Of a certainty now I brought 
 them but the sight of that heathen Ojibway, when
 
 . AGAIN THE WHITE TUNIC 123 
 
 he gave me the tunic, was enough to make any decent 
 woman faint ! I shook like an aspen, if you will 
 credit me, all the way across the drill-ground, and 
 perhaps the scissors ... no, indeed, I cannot find 
 them . . . but if mademoiselle will excuse me while 
 I run back for another pair. ..." She bustled off 
 towards the Commandant's quarters. 
 
 Mademoiselle Diane reached down a hand to the 
 tunic, which had fallen at her feet, and drew it on to 
 her lap again, as if to examine it. But her eyes were 
 searching John's face. 
 
 " Why do you shiver ? " she asked. 
 
 " I beg of you not to touch it, mademoiselle. It 
 it hurts to see you touching it." 
 
 " Did you kill him ? " 
 
 " Of whom is mademoiselle speaking ? " 
 
 " Pray do not pretend to be stupid, monsieur. I 
 am speaking of that other man the owner of this 
 tunic the sergeant who took you into the forest. 
 Did you kill him ? " 
 
 " He died in fair fight, mademoiselle." 
 
 " It was a duel, then ? " He did not answer, and 
 she continued, " I can trust your face, monsieur. I 
 am sure it was only in fair fight. But why should 
 you think me afraid to touch this ? Oh, why, M. a 
 Clive, will men take it so cruelly for granted that 
 we women are afraid of the thought of blood nay, 
 even that we owe it to ourselves to be afraid ? If 
 we are what you all insist we should be, what right 
 have we to be born in these times ? Think of New 
 France fighting now for dear life ah ! why should 
 I ask you to think, who have bled for her ? Yet you 
 would have me shudder at the touch of a stained piece 
 of cloth ; and while you hold these foolish prejudices, 
 can you wonder that New France has no Jeanne 
 d'Arc ? When I was at the Ursulines at Quebec,
 
 124 FORT AMITY 
 
 they used to pray to her and ask for her intercession ; 
 but what they taught was needlework." 
 
 " The world has altered since her time, mademoi- 
 selle," said John, falsely and lamely. 
 
 " Has it ? It burnt her ; even in those days it 
 did its best according to its lights," she answered 
 bitterly. " Only in these days there are no heroines 
 to burn. No heroines ... no fires . , . and even 
 in our needlework we must be demure, and not touch 
 a garment that has been touched with blood ! Mon- 
 sieur, was this man a coward ? " She lifted the 
 tunic. 
 
 " He was a vain fellow and a bully, mademoiselle, 
 but by no means a coward." 
 
 " He fought for France ? " 
 
 " Yes ; and, I believe, with credit." 
 
 " Then, monsieur, because he was a bully, I com- 
 mend the man who killed him fairly. And because 
 he was brave and fought for France, I am proud to 
 handle his tunic." 
 
 As John a Cleeve gazed at her kindled face, the one 
 thought that rose above his own shame was a thought 
 that her earnestness marvellously made her beautiful.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE SECOND DESPATCH 
 
 DOMINIQUE GUYON departed shortly before noon ; 
 and a week later half a dozen habitants arrived from 
 Boisveyrac to work at the entrenchment which the 
 Commandant had already opened across Sans Quar- 
 tier' s cabbage plot. The Commandant himself donned 
 a blouse and dug with the rest ; and M. Etienne ; and 
 even old Jeremie Tripier, though grumbling over his 
 rheumatism almost as bitterly as Sans Quartier over 
 his wasted cabbages. Everyone, in fact, toiled, and 
 with a will, at the King's corvee ; everyone, that is, 
 except the women, and John, and Menehwehna 
 (whose Indian dignity revolted against spadework), 
 and old Father Joly, the chaplain of the fort, who was 
 too infirm. 
 
 From him, as they sat together and watched the 
 diggers, John learned much of the fort's history, and 
 something, too, of his host's ; for Father Joly delighted 
 in gossip, and being too deaf to derive much profit 
 from asking questions, kept the talk to himself 
 greatly to John's relief. His gossip, be it said, was 
 entirely innocent. The good man seemed to love 
 every one in his small world, except Father Launoy. 
 And again this exception was fortunate ; for on learn- 
 ing that John had been visited and exhorted at Bois- 
 veyrac by Father Launoy, Father Joly showed no 
 125
 
 126 FORT AMITY 
 
 further concern in his spiritual health. He was per- 
 haps the oldest parochial priest in New France, and 
 since leaving the seminary at Quebec had spent almost 
 all his days at Boisveyrac. He remembered the 
 Seigneur's father (he always called the Commandant 
 "the Seigneur"). "Such a man, monsieur! He 
 stood six feet four inches in his stockings, and could 
 lift and cast a grown bullock with his own hands." 
 John pointed out that the present Seigneur in his 
 working blouse especially made a fine figure of a 
 man ; but this the old priest could hardly be brought 
 to allow. " A heart of gold, I grant you ; but to 
 have seen his father striding among his censitaires on 
 St. Martin's Feast ! It may be that, having watched 
 the son from childhood, I still think of him as a 
 boy. . . ." 
 
 Of Fort Amitie itself Father Joly had much to tell. 
 It dated from the early days of the great Frontenac, 
 who had planted a settlement here a collection of 
 wooden huts within a stockade to be an entrepot of 
 commerce with the Indians of the Upper Lakes. 
 Later it became a favourite haunt of deserters from 
 the army and couriers de bois outlawed by royal 
 edict ; and, strangely enough, these had been the 
 days of its prosperity. Its real decline began when 
 the Governor, toward the end of his rule, replaced the 
 wooden huts with a fortress of stone. The traders, 
 trappers, ne'er-do-wells, and Indians deserted the 
 lake-head, which had been a true camp of amity, and 
 moved their rendezvous farther west, leaving the 
 fortress to its Commandant and a sleepy garrison. 
 
 From that time until the war the garrison had been 
 composed of regulars, who lived on the easiest terms 
 with their Commandant and his officers, and retired 
 at the age of forty or fifty, when King Louis presented 
 them with a farm and farm stock and provisions for
 
 THE SECOND DESPATCH 127 
 
 two or three years, and often completed the outfit 
 with a wife. 
 
 " A veritable Age of God, monsieur ! But war 
 has put an end to it all war, and the greed of these 
 English, whom God will confound ! The regulars 
 went their ways, leaving only Sergeant Bedard ; who 
 had retired upon a farm, but was persuaded by the 
 Seigneur to come back and drill the recruits of the 
 militia." 
 
 " Who take very kindly to garrison life, so far as I 
 can see." 
 
 " Fort Amitie has its amenities, monsieur," said 
 Father Joly, catching John's glance rather than hear- 
 ing the words. " There are the allotments, to begin 
 with the fences between them, you may not have 
 observed, are made of stakes from the original pali- 
 sade ; the mould is excellent. The Seigneur, too, 
 offers prizes for vegetable-growing and poultry-rais- 
 ing ; he is an unerring judge of poultry, as one has 
 need to be at Boisveyrac, where the rents are mostly 
 paid in fowls. Indeed, yes, the young recruits are 
 well enough content. The Seigneur feeds them well, 
 and they can usually have a holiday for the asking 
 and go a-hunting in the woods or a-fishing in the river. 
 But, for my part, I regret Boisveyrac. A man of my 
 years does not readily bear transplanting. And here 
 is a curious thing, monsieur ; deaf though I am, I 
 miss the sounds of the rapids. I cannot tell you 
 how ; nevertheless it seems to me that something 
 has gone out of my daily life, and the landscape here 
 is still and empty." 
 
 " And how," John managed to make him hear, 
 " did the Seigneur come to command Fort 
 Amitie ? " 
 
 Father Joly glanced nervously down the slope and 
 lowered his voice. -' That was M. Armand's doing,
 
 128 FORT AMITY 
 
 monsieur.'* Then, seeing that John did not under- 
 stand, " M. Armand mademoiselle's brother and the 
 Seigneur's only son. He went to Quebec, when the 
 Governor had given him a post in his household ; a 
 small post, but with good prospects for a young man 
 of his birth and address. He had wits, monsieur, and 
 good looks ; everything, in short, but money ; and 
 there is no better blood in the province than that of 
 the des Noel-Tilly. They have held Boisveyrac now 
 for five generations, and were Seigneurs of Deux- 
 manoirs and Pre-aux-Sources even before that. Well, 
 as I say, the lad started with good prospects ; but 
 by-and-by he began to desert the Chateau St. Louis 
 for the Intendant's Palace. Monsieur has heard of 
 the Intendant Bigot is perhaps acquainted with 
 him ? No ? Then I may say without hurting any- 
 one's feelings what I would say to the Intendant 
 himself were he here that he is a corrupter of youth, 
 and a corrupter of the innocence of women, and a 
 corrupter of honest government. If New France lie 
 under the scourge to-day, it is for the sins of such men 
 as he." The old man's voice shook with sudden 
 anger, but he calmed himself. " In brief, there was a 
 gambling debt a huge sum owing ; and the Seigneur 
 was forced to travel to Quebec and fetch the lad home. 
 How he paid the amount I cannot tell you ; belike 
 he raised the money on Boisveyrac, but pay he did. 
 Dominique Guyon went with him to Quebec, having 
 just succeeded his father, old Bonhomme Guyon, 
 as Boisveyrac' s man of business ; and doubtless 
 Dominique made some arrangements with the mer- 
 chants there. He has a head on his shoulders, that 
 lad. M. de Vaudreuil, too, taking pity on a distressed 
 gentleman of New France, gave the Seigneur the 
 command of this fort, to grow fat on it, and hither 
 we have all migrated. But our good Seigneur will
 
 THE SECOND DESPATCH 129 
 
 never grow fat, monsieur ; he is of the poor to whom 
 shall belong the Kingdom of God." 
 
 John did not clearly understand this, being un 
 acquainted with the official system of peculation by 
 false vouchers a system under which the command 
 of a backwoods fort was reckoned to be worth a small 
 fortune. His mind recurred to Dominique and to the 
 Commandant's uneasiness at Dominique's mention of 
 business. 
 
 " A queer fellow, that Dominique ! " he muttered, 
 half to himself ; " and a queer fate that made him 
 the brother of Bateese." 
 
 The priest heard, as deaf men sometimes will hear 
 a word or two spoken below ordinary pitch. 
 
 " Ah ! " said he, shaking his head. " You have 
 heard of Bateese ? A sad case a very sad case ! " 
 
 " There was an accident, I have heard." 
 
 Father Joly glanced at John's face and, reading the 
 question, bent his own dim eyes on the river. John 
 divined at once that the old man knew more than he 
 felt inclined to tell. 
 
 " It was at Bord-a-loup, a little above Boisveyrac, 
 four years ago last St. Peter's tide. The two brothers 
 were driving some timber which the Seigneur had 
 cleared there ; the logs had jammed around a rock 
 not far from shore and almost at the foot of the fall. 
 The two had managed to get across and were working 
 the mass loose with handspikes when, just as it began 
 to break up, Bateese slipped and fell between two 
 logs." 
 
 " Through some careless push of Dominique's, was 
 it not ? " 
 
 But Father Joly did not hear, or did not seem to. 
 
 " He was hideously broken, poor Bateese. For 
 weeks it did not seem possible that he could live. The 
 habitants find Dominique a queer fellow, even as you
 
 130 FORT AMITY 
 
 do ; and I have observed that even Mademoiselle 
 Diane treats him somewhat impatiently. But in 
 truth he is a lad grown old before his time. It is 
 terrible when such a blow falls upon the young. He 
 and Bateese adored one another." 
 
 And this was all John learned at the time. But 
 three days later he heard more of the story, and from 
 Mademoiselle Diane. 
 
 She was seated in an embrasure of the terrace the 
 same, in fact, in which she had taken measurements 
 for John's new tunic. She was embroidering it now 
 with the Bearnais badge, and had spread Barboux's 
 tunic on the gunbreach to give her the pattern. John, 
 passing along the terrace in a brown study, while his 
 eyes followed the evolutions of Sergeant Bedard's 
 men at morning parade in the square below, did not 
 catch sight of her until she called to him to come and 
 admire her handiwork. 
 
 " Monsieur is distrait, it appears," she said, mis- 
 chievously. " It must be weary work for him, whiling 
 away the hours in this contemptible fortress ? " 
 
 " I do not find Fort Amitie contemptible, made- 
 moiselle." 
 
 She shook her head and laughed. " If you wish 
 to please me, monsieur, you must find some warmer 
 praise for it.* For in some sort it is my ancestral 
 home, and I love every stone of it." 
 
 " Mademoiselle speaks in riddles. I had thought 
 that every one of the Commandant's household 
 except the Commandant himself, perhaps was pining 
 to get back to Boisveyrac." 
 
 She let her needlework lie for a moment, and sat 
 with her eyes resting on the fa9ade of the Command- 
 ant's quarters across the square. 
 
 " It is foolish in me," she said musingly ; " for in 
 the days of which I am thinking not one of these
 
 THE SECOND DESPATCH 131 
 
 stones was laid. You must know, monsieur, that in 
 those days many and many a young man of family 
 took to the woods ; no laws, no edicts would restrain 
 them ; the life of the forest seemed to pass into their 
 blood, and they could not help themselves . . . ah, 
 I myself understand that, sometimes ! " she added, 
 after a pause. 
 
 " Well, monsieur," she went on, " there came to 
 Forte Amitie a certain young Raoul de Tilly, who 
 suffered from this wandering fever. The Government 
 outlawed him in the end ; but as yet his family had 
 hopes to reclaim him, and, being powerful in New 
 France , they managed to get his sentence delayed . He 
 came here, and here he fell in love with an Indian girl, 
 and married her putting, they say, a pistol at the 
 priest's head. The girl was a Wyandot from Lake 
 Huron, and had been baptized but a week before. 
 For a year they lived together in the Fort here ; but 
 when a child was born the husband sent her down the 
 river to his father's Seigniory below Three Rivers, 
 and himself wandered westward into the Lakes, and 
 was never again heard of. The mother died on the 
 voyage, it is said ; but the child a daughter reached 
 the Seigniory and was acknowledged, and lived to 
 marry a cousin, a de Tilly of Roc-Sainte Anne. My 
 mother was her grand-daughter." 
 
 Why had she chosen to tell him this story ? He 
 turned to her in some wonder. But, for whatever 
 reason she had told it, the truth of the story was 
 written in her face. Hardly could he recognise the 
 Mademoiselle Diane who had declaimed to him of 
 Joan of Arc and the glory of fighting for New France. 
 She was gone, and in her place a girl fronted him, a 
 child almost, with a strange anguish in her voice, and 
 in her eyes the look of a wild creature trapped. She 
 was appealing to him. But again, why ?
 
 I 3 2 FORT AMITY 
 
 " I think you must be in some trouble, made- 
 moiselle," said he, speaking the thought that came 
 uppermost. Something prompted him to add, " Has 
 it to do with Dominique Guyon ? " The question 
 seemed to stab her. She stood up trembling, with a 
 scared face. 
 
 " Why should you think I am troubled ? What 
 
 made you suppose " she stammered, and stopped 
 
 again in confusion. " I only wanted you to under- 
 stand. Is it not much better when folks speak to one 
 another frankly ? Something may be hidden which 
 seems of no importance, and yet for lack of knowing it 
 we may misjudge utterly, may we not ? " 
 
 Heaven knew that of late John had been feeling 
 sorely enough the torment of carrying about a secret. 
 But to the girl's broken utterances he held no clue at 
 all, nor could he hit on one. 
 
 " See now," she went on, almost fiercely ; " you 
 speak of Dominique Guyon. You suspected some- 
 thing what, you could not tell ; perhaps it had not 
 even come to be a suspicion. But, seeing me troubled 
 as you think at once Dominique's name comes to 
 your lips. Now listen to the truth, how simple it is. 
 When Armand and I were children . . . you have 
 heard of Armand ? " 
 
 " A little ; from Father Joly." 
 
 " Papa thinks he has behaved dishonourably, and 
 will scarcely allow his name to be uttered until he 
 shall return from the army, having redeemed his 
 fault. Papa, though he seems easy, can be very 
 stern on all questions of honour. Well, when Armand 
 and I were children, we played with the two Guyon 
 boys. Their father, Bonhomme Guyon, was only my 
 father's farmer ; but in a lonely place like Boisveyrac, 
 and with no one to instruct us in difference of rank 
 and birth for my mother died when I was a baby -
 
 THE SECOND DESPATCH 133 
 
 " I understand, mademoiselle." 
 
 " And so we played about the farm, as children 
 will. But by-and-by, and a short while before I left 
 Boisveyrac to go to school with the Ursulines, Domi- 
 nique began to be what shall I say ? He was very 
 tiresome." 
 
 She paused. "I understand," repeated John 
 quietly. 
 
 " At first I did not guess what he meant. And the 
 others, of course, did not guess. But he was furiously 
 jealous, even of his brother, poor Bateese. And when 
 Bateese met with his accident 
 
 " One moment, mademoiselle. When Bateese fell 
 between the logs, was it because Dominique had 
 pushed him ? " 
 
 She wrung her hands as in a sudden fright. " You 
 guessed that ? How did you guess ? No one knows 
 it but I, and Father Launoy, no doubt, and perhaps 
 Father Joly. But Dominique knows that / know ; 
 and his misery seems to give him some hold over me." 
 
 " In what way can I help you, mademoiselle ? " 
 
 " Did I ask you to help me ? " She had resumed 
 her seat on the gun-carriage and, drawing Sergeant 
 Barboux's tunic off its gun, began with her embroidery 
 scissors to snip at the shanks of its breast-buttons. 
 His cheeks were burning now ; she spoke with a 
 strained accent of levity. " I called you, monsieur, 
 to say that I cannot, of course, copy these buttons, 
 and to ask if you consent to my using them on your 
 new tunic, or if you prefer to put up with plain ones. 
 But it appears that I have wandered to some distance 
 from my question." She attempted a laugh ; which, 
 however, failed dolefully. 
 
 " Decidedly I prefer any buttons to those. But, 
 excuse me," persisted John, drawing nearer, " though 
 you asked for no help and need none, yet I will not 
 
 E
 
 134 FORT AMITY 
 
 believe you have honoured me so far with your con- 
 fidence and all without purpose." 
 
 " Oh," she replied, still in the same tone of hard, 
 almost contemptuous, levity. "I had a whim, mon- 
 sieur, to be understood by you, that is all ; and per- 
 haps to rebuke you by contrast for telling us so little 
 of yourself. It is as Felicite said you messieurs of 
 the army keep yourselves well padded over the heart. 
 See here " She began to dig with her scissor- 
 point and lay bare the quilting within Barboux's 
 tunic ; but presently stopped, with a sharp cry. 
 
 " What is the matter, mademoiselle ? " 
 
 For a second or two she snipped furiously, and 
 then " This is the matter ! " she cried, plunging her 
 fingers within the lining. " A despatch ! He carried 
 one after all ! " She dragged forth a paper and held 
 it up in triumph. 
 
 " Give it to me, please. But I say that you must 
 and shall, mademoiselle ! " John's head swam, but he 
 stepped and caught her by the wrists. 
 
 And with that the paper fell to the ground. He held 
 her wrist ; he felt only the magnetic touch, looked into 
 her eyes, and understood. From wonder at his out- 
 burst they passed to fear, to appeal, to love. Yes, 
 they shrank from him, sick with shame and self-com- 
 prehension, pitifully seeking to hide the wound. But 
 it would not by any means be hid. A light flowed 
 from it, blinding him. 
 
 " You hurt ! Oh, you hurt ! " 
 
 He dropped her hands and strode away, leaving the 
 paper at her feet.
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 THE DISMISSAL 
 
 THE Commandant tapped the despatch on the table 
 before him, with a ruse smile. 
 
 " I was right then, after all, M. a Clive, in main- 
 taining that your comrade carried a message from the 
 General. My daughter has told me how you came, 
 between you, to discover it. That you should have 
 preserved the tunic is no less than povidential ; 
 indeed, I had all along supposed it to be your own." 
 
 John waited, with a glance at the document, which 
 lay with the seal downward, seemingly intact. 
 
 "It is addressed," the Commandant pursued, " in 
 our ordinary cypher to the Marquis de Vaudreuil at 
 Montreal. In my own mind I have not the least 
 doubt that it instructs him the pressure of the south 
 having been relieved by the victory at Fort Carillon 
 to send troops up to us and to M. de Noyan at Fort 
 Frontenac. My good friend up there has been send- 
 ing down appeals for reinforcements at the rate of two 
 a week, and has only ceased of late in stark despair. 
 It is evident that your comrade carried a message of 
 some importance to Montreal ; and I have sent for 
 you, monsieur, to ask : Are you in a condition to 
 travel ? " 
 
 ' You wish me to carry this despatch, monsieur ? ' 
 
 "If you tell me that you are fit to travel. Indeed
 
 136 FORT AMITY 
 
 it is a privilege which you have a right to claim, and 
 M. de Vaudreuil will doubtless find some reward for 
 the bearer. Young men were ambitious in my day 
 eh, M. a Clive ? " 
 
 John, averting his face, gazed out of the window upon 
 the empty courtyard, the slope of the terrace and the 
 line of embrasures above it. Diane was not there 
 beside her accustomed gun, and he wondered if he 
 should see her again before departing. He wondered 
 if he desired to see her. To be sure he must accept 
 this mission, having gone so far in deceit. It would 
 set him free from Fort Amitie ; and, once free, he 
 could devise with Menehwehna some plan of escaping 
 southward. Within the fort he could devise nothing. 
 He winced under the Commandant's kindness ; yet 
 blessed it for offering, now at last, a term to his 
 humiliation. 
 
 " M. de Vaudreuil will not be slow, I feel sure, to 
 recognise your services," pursued the Commandant 
 genially. " But, that there may be no mistake about 
 it, I have done myself the pleasure to write him a 
 letter commending you. Would you care to hear a 
 sentence or two ? No ? " for John's hand went up in 
 protest " Well, youth is never the worse for a touch 
 of modesty. Be so good, then, monsieur, as to pass 
 me the seal yonder." 
 
 John picked up and handed the seal almost without 
 glancing at it. His thoughts were elsewhere as the 
 Commandant lit a taper, heated the wax, and let it 
 drop upon the letter. But just as the seal was 
 impressed, old Jeremie Tripier entered without 
 knocking and in a state of high perturbation. " Mon- 
 seigneur ! Monseigneur ! A whole fleet of boats in 
 sight coming down the river ! " 
 
 The Commandant pushed back his chair. 
 
 " Boats ? Down the river ? Nonsense, Jeremie,
 
 THE DISMISSAL 137 
 
 it is up the river you mean ; you have the message 
 wrong. They must be the relief from Montreal ! " 
 
 " Nay, Monseigneur, it is down the river they are 
 approaching. The news came in from Sans Quartier, 
 who is on sentry-go up-stream. He has seen them 
 from Mont-aux-Ours, and reports them no more than 
 three miles away." 
 
 "Please God no ill has befallen de Noyan ! " 
 muttered the Commandant. " Excuse me, M. a Clive ; 
 I must look into this. We will talk of our business 
 later." 
 
 But John scarcely heard. His eyes had fallen on' 
 the seal of the Commandant's letter. It stared back 
 at him a facsimile of the one hidden in his pocket 
 a flying Mercury, with cap, winged sandals, and 
 caduceus. 
 
 He pulled his wits together to answer the Com- 
 mandant politely, he scarcely knew how, and followed 
 him out to the postern gate. Half a dozen of the 
 garrison all, in fact, who happened to be off duty 
 were hurrying along the ridge to verify Sans Quartier's 
 news. John, still weak from his wound, could not 
 maintain the pace. Halting on the slope for breath, 
 while the Commandant with an apology left him and 
 strode ahead, he turned, caught sight of Diane, and 
 waited for her. 
 
 She came as one who cannot help herself, with 
 panting bosom and eyes that supplicated him for 
 mercy. But Love, not John a Cleeve, was the master 
 to grant her remission and who can supplicate 
 Love ? 
 
 They met without greeting, and for a while walked 
 on in silence, he with a flame in his veins and a weight 
 of lead in his breast. 
 
 " Is papa sending you to Montreal ? " she asked, 
 scarcely above a whisper.
 
 138 FORT AMITY 
 
 " He was giving me my orders when this news 
 came." 
 
 There was a long pause now, and when next she 
 spoke he could hardly catch her words. " You will 
 come again ? " 
 
 His heart answered, " My love ! O my love ! " 
 But he could not speak it. He looked around upon 
 sky, forest, sweeping river all the landscape of his 
 bliss, the prison of his intolerable shame. A fierce 
 peremptory longing seized him to kill his bliss and 
 his shame at one stroke. Four words would do it. He 
 had but to stand up and cry aloud, " I am an English- 
 man 1 " and the whole beautiful, hideous dream would 
 crack, shiver, dissolve. Only four words ! Almost 
 he heard his voice shouting them and saw through the 
 trembling heat her body droop under the stab, her 
 love take the mortal hurt and die with a face of scorn. 
 Only four words, and an end desirable as death ! What 
 kept him silent then ? He checked himself on the 
 edge of a horrible laugh. The thing was called 
 Honour : and its service steeped him in dishonour to 
 the soul. 
 
 " You will come again ? " her eyes repeated. 
 
 He commanded himself to say, " It may be that 
 there is now no need to go. If Fort Frontenac has 
 fallen " 
 
 " Why should you believe that Fort Frontenac has 
 fallen ? ^ she broke in ; and then, clasping her hands, 
 added in a sort of terror, <( Do you know that that 
 now I hardly seem able to think about Fort Front- 
 enac, or to care whether it has fallen or not ? What 
 wickedness has come to me that I should be so cruelly 
 selfish ? " 
 
 He set his face. Even to comfort her he must not 
 let his look or voice soften ; one touch of weakness 
 now would send him over the abyss.
 
 THE DISMISSAL 139 
 
 " Let us go forward," said he. " At the next bend 
 we shall know what has happened." 
 
 But around the bend came a procession which told 
 plainly enough what had happened ; a procession of 
 boats filled with dark-coated provincial soldiers, a 
 few white-coats, many women and children. No flags 
 flew astern ; the very lift of the oars told of disgrace 
 and humiliation. Thus came Payan de Noyan with 
 his garrison, prisoners on parole, sent down by the 
 victorious British to report the fall of Frontenac and 
 be exchanged for prisoners taken at Ticonderoga. 
 
 Already the Commandant and his men had surmised 
 the truth, and \vere hurrying back along the ridge to 
 meet the unhappy procession at the quay. John 
 and Diane turned with them and walked hofneward in 
 silence. 
 
 The flotilla passed slowly beneath their eyes, but 
 did not head in toward the quay. An old man in the 
 leading boat waved an arm from mid-stream or, 
 rather, lifted it in salutation and let it fall again 
 dejectedly. 
 
 This was de Noyan himself, and apparently his 
 parole forbade him to hold converse with his country- 
 men before reaching Montreal. On them next, for 
 aught the garrison of Fort Amitie could learn, the 
 enemy were even now descending. 
 
 Diane, halting on the slope, heard her father call 
 across the water to de Noyan, who turned, but shook 
 his head and waved a hand once more with a gesture 
 of refusal. 
 
 " He was asking him to carry the despatch to 
 Montreal. Since he will not, or cannot, you must 
 follow with it." 
 
 " For form's sake," John agreed. " It can have 
 no other purpose now." 
 
 They were standing at the verge of the forest, and
 
 140 ' FORT AMITY 
 
 she half turned towards him \vith a little choking cry 
 that asked, as plainly as words, " Is this all you have 
 to say ? Are you blind, that you cannot see how I 
 suffer ? " 
 
 He stepped back a pace into the shadow of the 
 trees. She lifted her head and, as their eyes met, 
 dropped it again, faint with love. He stretched out 
 his arms. 
 
 " Diane ! " 
 
 But as she ran to him he caught her by the shoulders 
 and held her at arms' length. Her eyes, seeking his, 
 saw that his gaze travelled past her and down the 
 slope. And, turning in his grasp, she saw Meneh- 
 wehna running towards them across the clearing from 
 the postern gate, and crouching as he ran. 
 
 He must have seen them ; for he came straight to 
 where they stood, and, gripping John by the arm, 
 pointed towards the quay, visible beyond the edge of 
 the flagstaff tower. 
 
 " Who are these newcomers ? " cried Diane, re- 
 covering herself. " Why, yes, it is Father Launoy 
 and Dominique Guyon ! Yes, yes and Bateese ! 
 whom you have never seen." 
 
 John turned to her quietly, without haste. 
 
 " Mademoiselle," said he, in a voice low and firm, 
 and not altogether unhappy, " I have met Bateese 
 Guyon before now. And these men bring death to 
 me. Run, Menehwehna ! For me, I return to the 
 Fort with mademoiselle." 
 
 She stared at him. " Death ? " she echoed, 
 wondering. 
 
 " Death," he repeated, " and I deserve it. On 
 (nany accounts I have deserved it, but most of all 
 'or having stolen your trust. I am an English- 
 man." 
 
 For a moment she did not seem to hear. Then
 
 THE DISMISSAL 141 
 
 slowly, very slowly, she put out both hands and 
 cowered from him. 
 
 " Return, Menehwehna ! " commanded John firmly. 
 " Yes, mademoiselle, I cannot expiate what I have 
 done. But I go to expiate what I can." 
 
 He took a step forward ; but she had straightened 
 herself up and stood barring his path with her arm, 
 fronting him with terrible scorn. 
 
 " Expiate ! What can you expiate ? You can 
 only die ; and are you so much afraid of death that 
 . you think it an atonement ? You can only die, and 
 and ' she hid her face in her hands. " Oh, 
 Menehwehna help me ! He can only die, and I 
 cannot let him die ! " 
 
 Menehwehna stepped forward with impassive face. 
 " If my brother goes down the hill, I go with him," 
 he announced calmly. 
 
 " You see ? " Diane turned on John wildly. 
 " You will only kill your friend and to what purpose ? 
 The wrong you have done you cannot remedy ; the 
 remedy you seek would kill me surely. Ah, go ! go ! 
 Do not force me to kneel and clasp your knees you 
 that have already brought me so low ! Go, and let 
 me learn to hate as well as scorn you. You wish to 
 expiate ? This only will I take for expiation." 
 
 " Come, brother ! " urged Menehwehna, taking 
 him by the arm. 
 
 Diane bent close to the Indian, whispered a word 
 in his ear, and, turning about, looked John in the face. 
 
 " Are you sorry at all ? If you are sorry, you will 
 obey me now." 
 
 With one long, searching look she left him and 
 walked down the slope. Menehwehna dragged him 
 back into the undergrowth as the postern door opened, 
 and M. Etienne came through it, followed by Father 
 Launoy, Dominique, and Bateese.
 
 142 FORT AMITY 
 
 Peering over the bushes, Menehwehna saw Diane 
 descend to meet them he could not see with what 
 face. 
 
 Marvellous is woman. She met them with a gay 
 and innocent smile. 
 
 Her whispered word to Menehwehna had been to 
 keep by the waterside And late that night, when the 
 garrison had given over beating the woods for the 
 fugitives, a canoe stole up the river, close under the 
 north bank. One man sat in it ; and after paddling 
 for a couple of miles up-stream he began to sing as he 
 went softly at first, but raising his voice by little 
 and little : 
 
 Chante, rossignol, chante, 
 Toi qui as le coeur gai ; 
 Tu as le coeur a rire, 
 Moi je 1'ait- a pleurer. 
 
 No answer came from the dark forest. He took up 
 his chant again, more boldly : 
 
 Tu as le coeur a rire, 
 
 Moi je l'ai-t a pleurer ; 
 
 J'ai perdu ma maitresse 
 
 Sans pouvoir la trouver. 
 
 Lui y a longtemps que je t'aime, 
 
 Jamais je ne t'oublierai. 
 
 He listened. A low call sounded from the trees on 
 his right, and he brought the canoe under the bank. 
 
 " Is that you, Bateese ? " 
 
 " Monsieur, forgive me ! I said as little as I could, 
 but the Reverend Father and Dominique were too 
 clever for me. And how was I to have known ? . . . 
 Take the canoe and travel fast, my friends ; they will 
 be searching again at dawn." 
 
 " Did mademoiselle send the canoe ? " 
 
 " Yes ; and she charged you to answer one question. 
 It was her brother M. Armand whom the Iroquois
 
 THE DISMISSAL 143 
 
 slew in the Wilderness. Ah, that cry ! Can one ever 
 forget ? " 
 
 " Her brother ! " John's hand went to his breast 
 in the darkness. 
 
 " Monsieur did not know then ? I was sure that 
 monsieur could not have known ! For myself I did 
 not know until four days ago. The Iroquois had not 
 seen us, and we escaped back to the Richelieu to 
 Sorel to Montreal, where I left my wounded man. 
 Ah, monsieur, but we suffered on the way ! And 
 from Montreal I made for Boisveyrac, and there my 
 tongue ran loose but in all innocence. And there I 
 heard that M. Armand had been crossing the Wilder- 
 ness . . . but monsieur did not know it was her 
 brother ? " 
 
 " That, at least, I never knew nor guessed, Bateese. 
 Was this the question Mademoiselle Diane desired 
 you to ask me ? " 
 
 " It \vas/ w monsieur. And, according to your 
 answer, I was to give you her word." 
 
 " What is her word, Bateese ? " 
 
 " She commends you to God, monsieur, and will 
 pray for you." 
 
 " Take back my word that I will pray to deserve 
 her prayers, who can never deserve her pardon."
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 FRONTENAp SHORE 
 
 "*' AND what will my brother do ? " 
 
 For minutes before John heard and answered it 
 the question had been singing in his ears to the beat 
 of the paddles. He supposed that Menehwehna had 
 .asked it but a moment ago. 
 
 " I cannot tell. Let us press on ; it may be we 
 shall find my countrymen at Frontenac." 
 
 " As a child breaks down a lodge which another 
 child has built, and runs away, so your countrymen 
 will have departed." 
 
 Fort Amitie lay far behind. They were threading 
 their way now among the Thousand Isles, and soon 
 Lake Ontario opened before them, spreading its blue 
 waters to the horizon. But John heeded neither green 
 islands nor blue lake, nor their beauty, nor their peace, 
 but only the shame in his heart. He saw only the 
 dazzle on the water, heard only the swirl around his 
 paddle, stroke by stroke, hour after hour ; prayed 
 only for fatigue to drug the ache and bring about 
 oblivion with the night. 
 
 Coasting the shore they came at the close of day 
 upon the charred skeletons of three ships lifting their 
 ribs out of the shallows against the sunset, and beyond 
 these, where the water deepened, to a deserted quay. 
 
 They landed ; and while they climbed the slope 
 144
 
 FRONTENAC SHORE 145 
 
 towards the fort, out of one of its breaches its only 
 inhabitant crawled to them a young dog, gaunt and 
 tame with hunger. 
 
 The dog fawned upon Menehwehna. But John 
 turned his back on the smoke-blackened walls in a 
 sick despair, seated himself on the slope, and let his 
 gaze travel southward over the shoreless water. 
 Beyond the rim of it would lie Oswego, ruined by the 
 French as the English had ruined Frontenac. 
 
 The dog came and stretched itself at his feet, 
 staring up with eyes that seemed at once to entreat 
 his favour and to marvel why he sat there motionless. 
 Menehwehna had stepped down to the canoe to fetch 
 food for it, and by-and-by returned with a handful 
 of biscuit. 
 
 " He will be useful yet," said Menehwehna, seating 
 himself beside the dog and feeding it carefully with 
 very small pieces. " He cannot be more than a year 
 old, and before the winter is ended we will make a 
 hunter of him." 
 
 John did not answer. 
 
 " You will come with me now, brother ? " Still 
 Menehwehna kept his eyes on the dog. " There is no 
 other way." 
 
 " There is one way only," answered John, with his 
 eyes fastened on the south. " Teach me to build a 
 canoe, and let me cross the water alone. If I drown, 
 I drown." 
 
 " And if you reached ? Your countrymen are all 
 gathering back to the south ; until the snow has come 
 and passed, there will be no more fighting. You are 
 better with me. Come, and when the corn begins 
 to shoot again you shall tell me if you are minded to- 
 return." 
 
 " Menehwehna, you do not understand." 
 
 " I have studied you, my brother, when you have
 
 146 FORT AMITY 
 
 not guessed it ; and I say to you that if you went back 
 now to your people it would be nothing to their gain, 
 nor to yours, for the desire of fighting has gone out of 
 you. Now in my nation we do not wonder when a 
 man loses that desire, for we put it away as men by 
 eating put away the desire of food. All things come 
 to us in their season. This month the corn ripens, 
 and at home my wife and children are gathering it in ; 
 but anon comes the Moon of Travel, and they will 
 weary of the village and watch the lake for me to 
 arrive and lead them away to the hunting-grounds. 
 So the beasts have their seasons ; the buck his month 
 for belling, and the beaver his month for taking shelter 
 in his house which he has stored. And with us, when 
 the snow melts, it may happen that the war-talk 
 begins none knowing how and spreads through 
 the villages : first the young men take to dancing and 
 painting their faces, and the elder men catch fire, 
 and a day sees us taking leave of our womankind to 
 follow the war-path. But in time we surfeit even of 
 fighting, and remember our lodges again." 
 
 Menehwehna paused awhile, and patted the dog's 
 head. 
 
 " Therefore, brother, were you of our race, I should 
 not wonder that the spirit of war has gone out of you. 
 I myself am weary of it for a season ; I forget that 
 Frenchman differs from Englishman, and think of 
 the sound of thin ice above the beaver's wash, the 
 blood of the red-deer's hocks on the snow, the smell 
 of his steak over the fire. But of the pale-faces some 
 are warriors, some are not ; and the warriors fight, 
 year in and year out, whenever they can. That is 
 your calling, brother, is it not ? " 
 
 " I am not grown a coward, I hope." 
 
 " No," said Menehwehna thoughtfully, " you are 
 not a coward ; else my heart had never gone out to
 
 FRONTENAC SHORE 147 
 
 you. But I think there is something dead within you 
 that must come to life, and something alive within 
 you that must die, before you grow into a warrior 
 again. As for your going back to-day, listen 
 
 " There was war once between our nation and the 
 Pottawatamies, and in an open fight our braves killed 
 many of their enemies and scattered the rest to their 
 villages. Great was the victory, but mournful ; for 
 in the chase that followed it an arrow pierced the 
 throat of the leader of the O jib ways. His name was 
 Daimeka, and he a chief in my own island of Michili- 
 mackinac. Where he fell there he lay. His people 
 lifted the body and propped it against a tree, seated, 
 with its face towards the forest into which the Pot- 
 tawatamies had fled. They wiped the dirt from his 
 head-dress, set his bow against his shoulder, and so, 
 having lamented him, turned their faces northward to 
 their own country. 
 
 " But Daimeka, although he could neither speak nor 
 stir, saw all that his friends did, and heard all that they 
 said. He listened to their praises of him and their 
 talk of their victory, and was glad ; he felt the touch 
 of their hands as they set out his limbs against the 
 tree, but his own hands he could not lift. His tears, 
 indeed, ran as they turned to abandon him ; but 
 this sign they did not see, and he could give no other. 
 
 " The story says that little by little his hot tears 
 melted the frost that bound him ; and by-and-by, as 
 he remembered the cry of home-coming ' Kumad-ji- 
 wug ! We have conquered ! ' his spirit put forth 
 an effort as a babe in its mother's travail, and he 
 found his feet and ran after the braves. Then was he 
 mad with rage to find that they had no eyes for him, 
 and he no voice to call their attention. When they 
 walked forward he walked forward, when they halted 
 he halted, -when they slept he slept, when they awoke
 
 148 FORT AMITY 
 
 he awoke ; nay, when they were weary he felt weari- 
 ness. But for all the profit it brought him he might 
 still have been sitting under the tree ; for their eyes 
 would not see him, and his talk to them was as wind. 
 
 " And this afflicted him so that at length he began 
 to tear open his wounds, saying, ' This, at least, will 
 move them to shame, who ow r e their victory to me ! ' 
 But they heeded nothing ; and \vhen he upbraided 
 them they never turned their heads. 
 
 " At length they came to the shore where they had 
 left the canoes, and put across for the island. As they 
 neared it the men in Daimeka's canoe raised the war 
 shout, ' Kumad-ji-wug ! We have conquered ! ' and 
 old men, wives and children came running from the 
 village, his own father and wife and children among 
 them. ' Daimeka is dead ! ' was shouted many 
 times in the uproar ; and the warriors spoke his 
 praises while his father wept, and his wife, and his 
 two small ones. 
 
 " ' But I am alive ! ' Daimeka shouted ; for by 
 this time he was in a furious passion. Then he ran 
 after his \vife, who was fleeing towards his own lodge, 
 tearing her hair as she went. ' Listen to me, woman ! ' 
 he entreated, and would have held her, but could not. 
 He followed her into the lodge, and stood over her 
 as she sat on the bed, with her hands in her lap, des- 
 pairing. ' But I am alive ! ' he shouted again. ' See 
 how my wounds bleed ; bind them, and give me food. 
 To bleed like this is no joke, and I am hungry.' ' I 
 have no long time to live/ said the woman to one of 
 the children, ' even now I hear my man calling me 
 far away.' Daimeka, beside himself, beat her across 
 the head with all his force. She put up a hand. 
 ' Children, even now I felt his hand caressing me. 
 Surely I have not long to live.' 
 
 " ' I was better off under the tree/ said Daimeka
 
 FRONTENAC SHORE 149 
 
 to himself, and strode forth from the lodge. By the 
 shore he launched one of the canoes ; and now he felt 
 no wish in his heart but to return to the battlefield 
 and sit there dead, if only he could find his body again 
 which he had left as he now felt sure sitting 
 beneath the tree. 
 
 " On the fourth day he reached the battle-field. 
 Night was falling, and as he sought the tree he came 
 on a blazing fire. Across it he could see the tree 
 plainly, and at the foot of it his body with the light 
 on its face. 
 
 " He stepped aside to walk round the fire ; but it 
 moved as he moved, and again stood in his path. A 
 score of times he tried to slip by it, but always it barred 
 his way, and always beyond it stood the tree, with 
 his own face fronting him across the blaze. 
 
 ' Fire, I am a fool/ said he at the last ; ' but, fire, 
 thou art a worse fool to think that Daimeka would 
 turn his back ! ' And so saying he strode straight 
 through its flame. At once he found himself seated 
 with his back to the tree in his dress of war, with his 
 bow resting against his shoulder. ' Now I am dead,' 
 said he, contentedly ; nevertheless he began to finger 
 his bow. ' On what do the dead feed themselves ? ' 
 he wondered ; and, for a trial, fixed and shot an arrow 
 at a passing bird : for above the tree there was clear 
 sky, though darkness lay around its foot and in the 
 darkness the fire still burned. The bird fell ; he 
 plucked it, cooked it at the fire, and ate. 
 
 ' In life I never ate better partridge,' said 
 Daimeka, ' but now that I am a real ghost I will 
 return once more to Michilimackinac and frighten my 
 wife out of her senses, for she deserves it.' 
 
 " So when the fire died down he arose, warm in all 
 his limbs, and started northward again. On the 
 fourth day he found his canoe where he had left it,
 
 150 FORT AMITY 
 
 and pushed off for the island. But, as he neared the 
 shore, a man who had been standing there ran back 
 to the village, and soon all his folk came running down 
 to the beach, his wife in their midst. 
 
 ' Daimeka ! ' they cried. ' It is indeed Daimeka 
 returned to us ! ' 
 
 ' That may be/ said Daimeka, as his wife flung 
 her arms around him ; ' and again, it may not be. 
 But, dead or alive, I find it good enough.' 
 
 " Such, my brother, is the tale of Daimeka. Is it 
 better, now, to return to your people as a ghost or as a 
 man who has found himself ? " 
 
 John lifted a face of misery. 
 
 " Come," said Menehwehna, looking him straight 
 in the eyes, and letting his hand rest from patting the 
 dog, which turned and licked it feebty. 
 
 " I will come," said John.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 NETAWIS 
 
 THE encampment stood under the lee of a tall sand- 
 hill, a few paces back from the brink of a frozen river. 
 Here the forest ended in a ragged fringe of pines ; 
 and, below, the river spread into a lagoon, with a 
 sandy bar between it and the lake, and a narrow 
 outlet which shifted with every storm. The summer 
 winds drove up the sand between the pine-stems and 
 piled it in hummocks, gaining a few yards annually 
 upon the forest as the old trees fell. The winter 
 winds brought down the snow and whirled it among 
 the hummocks until these too were covered. 
 
 For three weeks the encampment had been pitched 
 here ; and for two weeks snow had fallen almost 
 incessantly, banking up the lodges and freezing as it 
 fell. At length wind and snow had ceased and given 
 place to a hard, black frost, still and aching, and a sky 
 of steel, and a red, rayless sun. 
 
 A man came down the river-bank, moving clumsily 
 in his snow-shoes over the hummocks ; a man dressed 
 as an Indian, in blanket-cloak and scarlet mitases. 
 His head was shaven to the crown around a top-knot 
 skewered with heron's feathers ; his face painted 
 with black, vermilion, and a single streak of white 
 between the eyebrows. He carried a gun under his 
 left arm, and over his shoulder a pole to which he had
 
 152 FORT AMITY 
 
 slung the bodies of five beavers. Two dogs ran ahead 
 of him straight for the encampment, which he had 
 not discerned until they began to salute it with glad 
 barking. 
 
 Five lodges formed the encampment four of them 
 grouped in a rough semi-circle around the main lodge, 
 which stood back close under the sand-bank where 
 an eddy of wind had scooped it comparatively clear 
 of snow. 
 
 The hunter followed his dogs to the door of the 
 main lodge and lifted its frozen tent-flap. 
 
 " Is it well done, Menehwehna ? " he asked, and 
 casting his pole with its load upon the floor he clapped 
 his mittened hands together for warmth. " Ough ! " 
 He began to pull the mittens off cautiously. 
 
 Menehwehna, seated with his back against the 
 roof-pole (he had lain sick and fasting there all day), 
 looked triumphantly towards his wife, who crouched 
 with her two daughters by the lodge fire. 
 
 " Said I not that he would bring us luck ? And, 
 being bitten, did they bite, my brother ? " he asked 
 mischievously. 
 
 " A little. It did not hurt at the time." 
 
 One of the two girls rose from beside the fire. 
 
 " Show me your hands, Netawis," she said. 
 
 Netawis that is to say, John a Cleeve stretched 
 out his lacerated hands to the firelight. As he did so 
 his blanket-cloak fell back, showing a necklace of 
 wampum about his throat and another looser string 
 dangling against the stained skin of his breast. On 
 his outstretched wrists two silver bangles twinkled, 
 and two broad bands of silver on the upper arms. 
 
 The girl fetched a bladder of beaver-fat and anointed 
 his hands, her own trembling a little. Azoka was 
 husband-high, and had been conscious for some weeks 
 of a bird in her breast, which stirred and began to
 
 NETAWIS 153 
 
 flutter whenever she and Netawis drew close. At 
 first, when he had been fit for little but to make kites 
 for the children, she had despised him and wondered 
 at her father's liking. " f But Netawis did not seem to 
 care whether folks despised him or not ; c.nd this 
 piqued her. Whatever had to be learnt he learned 
 humbly, and now the young men had ceased to speak 
 of him as a good-for-nothing, Azoka began to think 
 that his differing from them was not wholly against 
 him ; and all the women acknowledged him to be 
 slim and handsome. 
 
 " Many thanks, cousin," said Netawis, as she bound 
 up the wounds. Then he began to talk cheerfully 
 over his shoulder to Menehwehna. " Five washes I 
 tried, and all were empty ; but by the sixth the water 
 bubbled. 'Then I wished that I had you with me, 
 for I knew that my hands would suffer." He smiled ; 
 this was one of his un-Indian tricks. 
 
 " It was well done, brother," said Menehwehna, 
 and his eyes sought those of his wife Meshu-kwa who, 
 still crouching by the fire, gazed across it at the 
 youth and the girl. 
 
 " But that is not all. While I was at work the 
 dogs left me. At first I did not miss them ; and then, 
 finding them gone, I made sure they had run home 
 in scorn of my hunting. But no ; their tracks led 
 me to a tree, not far up the stream, and there I found 
 them. They were not barking, but sometimes they 
 would nose around the trunk and sometimes fall back 
 to a little distance and sit whining and trembling while 
 they stared up at it." 
 
 " And the tracks around the tree ? " 
 
 " I could find none but what the dogs themselves 
 had made. I tapped the tree, and it was hollow. 
 Then I saw on the north side, a little above my head, 
 many deep scratches with moss hanging in strips from
 
 154 FORT AMITY 
 
 them. The trunk ran up straight, and was so stout 
 that my two arms would not span more than a tenth 
 of it ; but the scratches went up to the first fork, and 
 there must be the opening, as I guess." 
 
 " Said I not that Netawis would become a hunter 
 and bring us luck ? " asked Menehwehna again. 
 " He has found bear." 
 
 " Bear ! Bear ! Our Netawis has found bear ! " 
 cried two small urchins who had been rolling and 
 tumbling with the dogs, and almost burning their toes 
 at the edges of the fire. They were the children of 
 Azoka's elder sister Seeu-kwa, Muskingon's widow. 
 Scrambling past Menehwehna, who never spoke 
 harshly to them, and paying no heed to their mother's 
 scolding, they ran out into the snow to carry the 
 news to the other lodges. 
 
 " Our Netawis has found bear ! " 
 
 " What news is this ? " asked some of the young 
 men who lived in a lodge apart the bachelor's lodge 
 gathering round the doorway. " Seeu-kwa, look to 
 it that your children do not grow up to be little liars." 
 
 Now John, surprised to find his news so important, 
 had turned to Azoka with a puzzled smile. The fire- 
 light which danced on his face danced also on the long 
 bead necklace heaving like a snake with the rise and 
 fall of her bosom. He stared down at it, and Azoka 
 poor girl felt his wrist trembling under her touch ; 
 but it was with the thought of another woman. She. 
 caught her hand away ; and John, looking up, saw 
 a young Indian, Ononwe by name, watching him 
 gloomily from the doorway. 
 
 " Ask Netawis to tell the story," said Menehwehna. 
 So John told it again, and added that it had been 
 difficult to call the dogs away from the tree. 
 
 " But about the bear I say nothing ; that is Meneh- 
 wehna's talk. I only tell you what I saw."
 
 NETAWIS 155 
 
 " The wind has fallen," said one, " and soon the 
 moon will be up. Let us go and prove this tale of 
 Netawis." 
 
 Meshu-kwa opposed this, calling it folly. " We 
 have no axes heavy enough for tree cutting," she said ; 
 not giving her real reason, which was that she came 
 of a family which claimed descent from a bear. When 
 they mocked at her she said, " Also why should I 
 hide it ? there came to me an evil dream last night." 
 
 " This is the first that I have heard of your evil 
 dream," answered Menehwehna, and gave order that 
 after supper Netawis should lead the party to the 
 tree, promising that he himself would follow as soon 
 as the sickness left him. 
 
 At moonrise, therefore, they set out men and 
 women together, and even the small children. But 
 Menehwehna called Azoka back from the door of 
 the lodge. 
 
 " My daughter," he asked, they two being left 
 alone, " has Ononwe a cause of quarrel against 
 Netawis ? " 
 
 " They are good friends," Azoka answered inno- 
 cently. " Ononwe never speaks of Netawis but to 
 praise. Surely my father has heard him ? " 
 
 " That is returning a ball I never flung," her father 
 said, fixing grave eyes on her, under which she flinched. 
 " I am thinking that the face of Netawis troubles the 
 clear water that once was between you and Ononwe. 
 Yet you tell me that Ononwe praises him. Sit down, 
 therefore, and hear this tale." 
 
 Azoka looked rebellious; but no one in his own 
 household disobeyed Menehwehna or out of it, 
 except at peril. 
 
 " There was a man of our nation once, a young man, 
 and good-looking as Ononwe ; so handsome that all 
 the village called him the Beau-man. This Beau-man
 
 156 FORT AMITY 
 
 fell deeply in love with a maiden called Mamondago- 
 k\va, who also was passably handsome ; but she had 
 no right to scorn him as she did, both in private and 
 openly, so that all the village talked of his ill-success. 
 This talk so preyed on his mind that he fell ill, and 
 when his friends broke up their camp after a winter's 
 hunting to return to the village, he lay on his bed 
 and would not stir, but declared he would remain 
 and die in the snow rather than look again on the 
 face of her who scorned him. So at length they 
 took down the lodge about him and went their ways, 
 leaving him to die. 
 
 " But when the last of them was out of sight this 
 Beau-man arose, and, wandering over the ground 
 where the camp had been, he gathered up all kinds 
 of waste that his comrades had left behind scraps of 
 cloth, beads, feathers, bones, and offal of meat, with 
 odds and ends of chalk, soot, grease, everything that 
 he could pick out of the trodden snow. Then, having 
 heaped them together, he called on his guardian 
 manitou, and together they set to work to make a 
 man. They stitched the rags into coat, mitases, 
 and mocassins, and garnished them with beads and 
 fringes ; of the feathers they made a head-dress, 
 with a frontlet ; and then, taking mud, they plastered 
 the offal and bones together and stuffed them tightly 
 into the garments. The manitou breathed once, 
 and to the eye all their patchwork became fresh and 
 fine clothing. The manitou breathed twice, and 
 life came into the figure, which the Beau-man had 
 been kneading into the shape of a handsome youth. 
 ' Your name.' said he, ' is Moowis, or the Muck-man, 
 and by you I shall take my revenge.' 
 
 " So he commanded the Muck-man to follow, and 
 together they went after the tracks of the tribe and 
 came to the village. All wondered at the Beau-man's
 
 NETAWIS 157 
 
 friend and his fine new clothes ; and, indeed, this 
 Moowis had a frank appearance that won all hearts. 
 The chief invited him to his lodge, and begged the 
 Beau-man to come too ; he deserved no less for 
 bringing so distinguished a guest. The Beau-man 
 accepted, but by-and-by began to repent of his 
 deception when he saw the Muck-man fed with deer 
 tongue and moose's hump while he himself had to 
 be content with inferior portions, and when he 
 observed further that Mamondago-kwa had no eyes 
 for anyone but the Muck-man, who began to prove 
 himself a clever rogue. The chief would have pro- 
 motefd Moowis to the first place by the fire ; but 
 this (for it would have melted him) he modestly 
 refused. He kept shifting his place while he talked, 
 and the girl thought him no less vivacious than 
 modest, and no more modest than brave, since he 
 seemed even to prefer the cold to the cheerful warmth 
 of the hearth. The Beau-man attempted to talk ; 
 but the Muck-man had always a retort at which the 
 whole company laughed, until the poor fellow ran 
 out of the lodge in a fury of shame and rage. As 
 he rose he saw the Muck-man rise, with the assent of 
 all, and cross over to the bridegroom's seat beside 
 Mamondago-kwa, who welcomed him as a modest 
 maiden should when her heart has been fairly won. 
 
 " So it happened attend to me well, my daughter 
 that Mamondago-kwa married a thing of rags and 
 bones, put together with mud. But when the dawn 
 broke her husband rose up and took a bow and spear, 
 saying, ' I must go on a journey/ ' Then I will go 
 with you,' said his bride. ' My journey is too long 
 for you,' said the Muck-man. ' Not so,' answered 
 she ; ' there is no journey that I could not take 
 beside you, no toil that I could not share for love of 
 you.' He strode forth, and she followed him at a
 
 158 FORT AMITY 
 
 distance ; and the Beau-man, who had kept watch 
 all night outside their lodge, followed also at a dis- 
 tance, unseen. All the way along the rough road 
 Mamondago-kwa called to her husband ; but he 
 went forward rapidly, not turning his head, and she 
 could not overtake Jhim. Soon, as the sun rose, he 
 began to melt. Mamondago-kwa did not see the 
 gloss go out of his clothes, nor his handsome features 
 change back again into the mud and snow and filth. 
 But still as she followed she came on rags and feathers 
 and scraps of clothing, fluttering on bushes, or caught 
 in the crevices of the rocks. She passed his mittens, 
 his moccasins, his mitases, his coat, his plume of 
 feathers. At length, as he melted, his footsteps 
 grew fainter, until she lost even his track on the snow. 
 ' Moowis ! Moowis ! ' she cried ; but now there was 
 none to answer her, for the Muck-man had returned 
 to that out of which he was made." 
 
 Menehwehna ceased and looked at his daughter 
 steadily. 
 
 "And did the Beau-man find her and fetch her 
 back ? " asked Azoka. 
 
 " The story does not say, to my knowledge ; but 
 it may be that Ononwe could tell you." 
 
 Azoka stepped to the moonlit doorway and gazed 
 out over the snow. 
 
 " And yet you Lave Netawis," she asked, turning 
 her head. 
 
 " So much that I keep him in trust for his good, 
 against a day when he will go and never return. 
 But that is not a maiden's way of loving, unless 
 maidens have changed since I went a-courting them." 
 
 Netawis, having led them to the tree, the young 
 men fell to work upon it at once. It measured well 
 over ten fathoms in girth ; and by daybreak, their 
 axes being light, they had hewed it less than half-way
 
 NETAWIS 159 
 
 through. After a short rest they attacked it again, 
 but the sun was close upon setting when the tree fell 
 with a rending scream which swelled into a roar 
 so human-like that the children ran with one accord 
 and caught hold of their elders' hands. 
 
 John, with Seeu-kwa's small boys clinging to him, 
 stood about thirty paces from the fallen trunk. 
 Two or three minutes passed, and he wondered why 
 the men did not begin to jeer at him for having found 
 them a mare's nest. For all was quiet. He wondered 
 also why none of them approached the tree to examine 
 it. 
 
 " I shall be the mock of the camp from this moment," 
 he thought, and said aloud, " Let go of my hands, 
 little ones ; there is no more danger." 
 
 But they clung to him more tightly than ever, for 
 a great cry went up. From the opening by the fork 
 of the trunk a dark body rolled lazily out upon the 
 snow an enormous she-bear. She uncurled and 
 gathered herself up on all fours, blinking and shaking 
 her head as though the fall had left her ears buzzing, 
 and so began to waddle off. Either she had not seen 
 the crowd of men and women, or perhaps she despised 
 it. 
 
 " Ononwe ! Ononwe ! " shouted the Indians ; for 
 Ononw r e, gun in hand, had been posted close to the 
 opening. 
 
 He half -raised his gun, but lowered it again. 
 
 " Netawis found her," he said quietly. " Let 
 Netawis shoot her." 
 
 He stepped back towards John, who, almost before 
 he knew, found the gun thrust into his hands ; for 
 the children had let go their clasp. 
 
 Amid silence he lifted and took aim, wondering 
 all the while why Ononwe had done this. The light 
 was fading. To be sure he could not miss the bear's
 
 160 FORT AMITY 
 
 haunches, now turned obliquely to him ; but to hit 
 her without killing would be scarcely less dishonouring 
 than to miss outright, and might be far more dan- 
 gerous. His hand and forearm trembled too with 
 the exertion of hewing, or perhaps from the strain of 
 holding the children. Why had he been fool enough 
 to take the gun ? He foretasted his disgrace even 
 as he pulled the trigger. 
 
 It seemed to him that as the smoke cleared the 
 bear still walked forward slowly. But a moment later 
 she turned her head with one loud snap of the jaws 
 and lurched over on her side. Her great fore-pads 
 smote twice on the powdery snow, then were still. 
 
 He had killed her, then ; and, as he learned from 
 the applause, by an expert's shot, through the spine 
 at the base of the skull. John had aimed at this 
 merely at a guess, knowing nothing of bears or their 
 vulnerable points, and in this ignorance neglecting 
 a far easier mark behind the pin of the shoulder. 
 
 But more remained to wonder at ; for the beast 
 being certified for dead, Meshu-kwa ran forward, and, 
 kneeling in the snow beside it, began to fondle and 
 smooth the head, calling it by many endearing names. 
 She seated herself presently, drew the great jaws on 
 to her lap, and spoke into its ear, beseeching its 
 forgiveness. " O bear ! " she cried for all to hear, 
 " O respected grandmother ! You yourself saw that 
 this was a stranger's doing. Believe not that Meshu- 
 kwa is guilty of your death, or any of her tribe. It 
 was a stranger that disturbed your sleep, a stranger 
 who fired upon you with this unhappy result ! " 
 
 The men stood around patiently until this propiti- 
 ation was ended ; and then fell to work to skin the 
 bear, while Meshu-kwa went off with her daughters 
 to the lodges, to prepare the cooking pots. In passing 
 John she gave him a glance of no good will.
 
 NETAWIS 161 
 
 That night, as Azoka stood by a cauldron in which 
 the bear's fat bubbled, and the young men idled 
 around the blaze, she saw Netawis draw Ononwe 
 aside into the darkness. Being a quick-witted girl 
 she promptly let slip her ladle into the fat, as if by 
 mischance, and ran to her father's lodge for another, 
 followed by Meshu-kwa's scolding voice. The lodge 
 had a back-exit towards the wall of the sandhill, where 
 the wind's eddy had swept a lane almost clear of 
 snow ; and Azoka pushed her pretty head through 
 the flap-way here in time to spy the dark shadows 
 of the pair before they disappeared behind the bache- 
 lors' lodge. Quietly as a pantheress she stole after 
 them, smoothing out her footprints behind her until 
 she reached the trampled snow ; and so, coming to 
 the angle of the bachelors' lodge, cowered listening. 
 
 " But suppose that I had missed my shot ? " said 
 the voice of Netawis. " I tell you that my heart 
 was as wax ; and when the lock fell, I saw nothing. 
 Why, what is the matter with you, Ononwe ? " 
 
 " I thought you had led me here to quarrel with 
 me," Ononwe answered slowly, and Azoka held her 
 breath. 
 
 " Quarrel, brother ? Why should I quarrel with 
 you ? It was a risk, as I am telling you ; but you 
 trusted me, and I brought you here to thank you 
 that in your good heart you gave the shot up to me." 
 
 " But it was not my good heart." Ononwe's voice 
 had grown hoarse. " It was an evil thought in my 
 head, and you will have to quarrel with me, Netawis." 
 
 " That Ononwe is a good man," said Azoka to 
 herself. 
 
 " I do not understand. Did you expect me, then, 
 to miss ? Do not say, brother, that you gave me 
 the gun wishing me to miss and be the mock of the 
 camp ! "
 
 162 FORT AMITY 
 
 " Yes, and no. I thought, if you took the gun, 
 it would not matter whether you hit or missed." 
 
 " Why ? " 
 
 " Are you so simple, Netawis ? Or is it in revenge 
 that you force me to tell? . . . Yes, I have played 
 you an evil trick, and by an evil tempting. I saw 
 you with Azoka. ... I gave you the gun, thinking, 
 ' If he misses, the whole camp will mock him, and a 
 maid turns from a man whom others mock. But if 
 he should kill the bear, he will have to reckon with 
 Meshu-kwa.' Meshu-kwa fears ill-luck, and she will 
 think more than twice before receiving a son-in-law 
 who has killed her grandmother the bear.' ' 
 
 " I will marry Netawis," said Azoka to herself, 
 shutting her teeth hard. And yet she could not feel 
 angry with Ononwe as she ought. 
 
 But it seemed that neither was Netawis angry ; for 
 he answered with one of those strange laughs of his. 
 She had never been able to understand them, but she 
 had never heard one that sounded so unhappy as did 
 this. 
 
 " My brother," said Netawis and his voice was 
 gentle and bitterly sorrowful " if you did this in 
 guile, I have shot better indeed than you to-day. As 
 for Meshu-kwa, I must try to be on good terms with 
 her again ; and as for Azoka, she is a good girl, and 
 thinks as little of me as I of her. Last night when you 
 saw us ... I remember that I looked down on her, 
 and something reminded me ... of one . . ." He 
 leaned a hand against a pole of the lodge and gripped 
 it as the anguish came on him and shook him in the 
 darkness. " Damn ! " cried John a Cleeve, with a sob. 
 
 " Was that her name ? " asked Ononwe gravely, 
 hardly concealing the relief in his voice. 
 
 But Azoka did not hear Netawis' answer as she crept 
 back, smoothing the snow over traces.
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 THE LODGES IN THE SNOW 
 
 THE fat lay six inches deep on the bear's ribs ; and, 
 being boiled down, filled six porcupine skins. 
 
 " Said I not that Netawis would bring us good 
 luck ? " demanded Menehwehna. 
 
 But Meshu-kwa claimed the head of her ancestress, 
 and set it up on a scaffold within the lodge, spreading 
 a new blanket beneath it and strewing tobacco-leaf in 
 front of its nose. As though poor Azoka had not enough 
 misery, her mother took away her trinkets to decorate 
 the bear, and forced her to smear her pretty, ochred 
 face with cinders. Then for a whole day the whole 
 family sat and fasted ; and Azoka hated fasting. But 
 next morning she and Seeu-kwa swept out the lodge, 
 making all tidy. Pipes were lit, and Menehwehna, 
 after blowing tobacco-smoke into the bear's nostrils, 
 began a long harangue on the sad necessity which lay 
 upon men to destroy their best friends. His wife's 
 eye being upon him, he made an excellent speech ; 
 though he did not believe a word of it ; but as a chief 
 who had married the daughter of a chief, he laid great 
 stress upon her pedigree, belittling his own descent 
 from the canicu, or war eagle, with the easier politeness 
 because he knew it to be above reproach. > When he 
 had ended, the family, Meshu-kwa included, seated 
 themselves and ate of the bear's flesh very heartily. 
 
 163
 
 164 FORT AMITY 
 
 A few days later they struck their camp and moved 
 inland, for the beaver were growing scarcer, and the 
 heavy fall of snow hid their houses and made it difficult 
 to search the banks for washes. But raccoon were 
 plentiful at their new station, and easy to hunt. 
 Before the coming of the Cold Moon which is Janu- 
 ary John was set to number the peltries, which 
 amounted to three hundred odd ; and the scaffold, on 
 which the dried venison hung out of reach of the 
 wolves, was a sight to gladden the heart. Only the 
 women grumbled when Menehwehna gave orders to 
 strike camp, for theirs were the heaviest loads. 
 
 Azoka did not grumble. She could count now on 
 Ononwe to help her with her burden, since, like a 
 sensible girl, she had long since made up her quarrel 
 with him, and they were to be married in the spring on 
 their return to the village. She had quite forgiven 
 Netawis. Hers was that delicious stage of love when 
 the heart, itself so happy, wants all the world to be 
 happy too. Once or twice John caught her looking 
 at him with eyes a little wistful in their gladness ; he 
 never guessed that she had overheard his secret and 
 pitied him, but dared not betray herself. Ononwe, 
 possessed with his new felicity, delighted to talk of it 
 whenever he and John hunted together. 
 
 Did it hurt ? Not often ; and at the moment not 
 much. But at night, when sleep would not come, 
 when John lay staring at the chink in the doorway 
 beyond which the Northern Lights flickered, then the 
 wound would revive and ache with the aching silence. 
 Once, only once, he had started out of sleep to feel his 
 whole body flooded with happiness ; in his dream the 
 curtains of the lodge had parted and through them 
 Diane had come to him. Standing over his head she 
 had shaken the snow from her cloak and from her hair, 
 and the scattered flakes had changed into raindrops,
 
 THE LODGES IN THE SNOW 165 
 
 and the raindrops into singing birds, and the lodge 
 into a roof of sunlit boughs, breaking into leaf with a 
 scent of English hawthorn, as she stretched out her 
 hands and knelt and he drew her to his heart. Her 
 cheek was cold from her long journey ; but a warm 
 breeze played beneath the boughs, and under her 
 falling hair against his shoulder her small hand stole 
 up and touched his silver armlets. Nay, surely that 
 touch was too real for any dream. . . . 
 
 He had sprung up and pulled aside the curtain ; 
 but she was gone. His eyes searched across a waste 
 where only the snow-wraiths danced, and far to the 
 north the Aurora flickered with ribbons of ghostly 
 violet. 
 
 Would she come again ? Yes, surely, under the 
 stars and across the folds and hollows of the snow, 
 that vision would return, disturbing no huddled bird, 
 waking no sleeper in the lodge ; would lift the curtain 
 and stretch out both hands and be gathered to him. 
 Though it came but once in a year he could watch 
 for it b}' night, live for it by day. 
 
 But by day he knew his folly. He was lost, and 
 in forgetting lay his only peace. He never once 
 accused his fortune nor railed against a God he could 
 not believe in. He had come to disaster through his 
 own doubts ; himself had been the only real enemy, 
 and that sorry self must be hidden and buried out of 
 sight. 
 
 On the whole he was burying it successfully. He 
 liked these Ojibways, and had unlearnt his first disgust 
 of their uncleanly habits, though as yet he could not 
 imitate them. He had quite unlearnt his old loathing 
 of Menehwehna for the sergeant's murder. Meneh- 
 wehna was a fine fellow, a chief, too, respected among 
 all the nations west of Fort Niagara. John's surprise 
 had begun at Fort Rouille, where, on Menehwehna's 
 
 F
 
 166 FORT AMITY 
 
 word of credit only, the Tobacco Indians had fetched 
 out paint and clothes to disguise him, and had 
 smuggled him, asking no questions, past the fort and 
 up through the Lake aux Claies to Lake Huron. At 
 Michilimackinac a single speech from Menehwehna 
 had won his welcome from the tribe ; and they were 
 hunting now on the borders of the Ottawas through 
 the favour of Menehwehna's friendship with the 
 Ottawa chief at 1'Arbre Croche. John saw that the 
 other Indians considered him fortunate in Meneh- 
 wehna's favour, and if he never understood the full 
 extent of the condescension, at least his respect grew 
 for one who was at once so kingly and so simple, who 
 shared his people's hardships, and was their master 
 less by rank than by wisdom in counsel, skill of hand, 
 and native power to impress and rule. 
 
 Of the deer especially, Menehwehna was a mighty 
 hunter ; and in February the wealth of the camp 
 increased at a surprising rate. For at this season the 
 snow becomes hard enough to bear the hunter and 
 his dogs, but the sharp feet of the deer break through 
 its crust and his legs are cut to the bone. Often a 
 hunting party would kill a dozen stags in two or 
 three hours, and soon the camp reckoned up five 
 thousand pounds of dried venison, all of which had to 
 be carried back seventy miles to the shore of the lake 
 near 1'Arbre Croche, where the canoes had been left. 
 
 Early in March the women began to prepare the 
 bundles, and in the second week the return began, 
 all starting at daybreak with as much as they could 
 carry, and marching until noon, when they built a 
 scaffold, piled their loads upon it, and returned to 
 the camp for more. When all had been carried for- 
 ward one stage, the lodge itself was removed, and so, 
 stage by stage, they brought their wealth down to 
 the const. As they neared it they fell in with other
 
 THE LODGES IN THE SNOW 167 
 
 lodges of Ojibways, mostly from Michilimackinac, 
 gathering for the return voyage up the lake. 
 
 Having recovered and launched their canoes, which 
 had lain hidden among the sandhills, they loaded up 
 and coasted cheerfully homewards by way of La 
 Grande Traverse and 1'Arbre Croche, and on the last 
 day of April landed under the French fort of Mackinac, 
 which looked across the strait to Cap Saint Ignace. 
 A dozen traders were here awaiting them ; and with 
 these Menehwehna first settled out of the common 
 fund for guns, powder, and stores supplied on credit 
 for the winter's hunting. He then shared the residue 
 among the camp, each hunter receiving the portion 
 fixed by custom ; and John found himself the owner 
 of one hundred and twenty beaver skins, fifty raccoon, 
 and twelve otter, besides fifty dubious francs in cash. 
 The bear skin, which also fell to his share, he kept 
 for his wedding gift to Ononwe. Twenty pounds of 
 beaver bought a couple of new shirts ; another twenty 
 a blanket ; and a handsome pair of scarlet mitases, 
 fashionably laced with ribbon, cost him fifteen. Out 
 of what remained he offered to pay Menehwehna for 
 his first outfit, but received answer that he had amply 
 discharged this debt by bringing good luck to the 
 camp. Under Menehwehna' s advice, therefore, he 
 spent his gains in powder and ball, fishing-lines, 
 tobacco, and a new lock for his gun. 
 
 " And I am glad," said Menehwehna, " that you 
 consulted me to-day, for to-night I shall drink too 
 much rum." 
 
 So, indeed, he did. That night his people women 
 and men lay around the fort in shameless intoxica- 
 tion. It pleased John to observe that Azoka drank 
 nothing ; but on the other hand she made no attempt 
 to restrain her lover, who, having stupefied himself 
 with rum, dropped asleep with his head on her lap.
 
 168 FORT AMITY 
 
 John, seated and smoking his pipe by the camp 
 fire, watched her across its blaze. She leaned back 
 against a pole of the lodge, her hands resting on 
 Ononwe's head, her eyes gazing out into the purple 
 night beyond the doorway. They were solemn, with 
 the awe of a deep happiness. " And why not ? " 
 John asked himself. Her father, mother, and kinsfolk 
 lay drunk around her ; even the children had taken 
 their share of the liquor. A disgusting sight, no 
 doubt ! yet somehow it did not move him to repro- 
 bation. He had lived for six months with this people, 
 and they had taught him some lessons outside the 
 craft of hunting : for example, that it takes all sorts 
 to make a world, and that only a fool condemns his 
 fellows for being unlike himself. At home in Devon- 
 shire he had never understood why the best farm- 
 labourers and workmen broke out at times into reck- 
 less drinking, and lay sodden for days together ; or 
 how their wives could accept these outbursts as a 
 matter of course. He understood now, having served 
 apprentice to hardship, how the natural man must 
 revolt now and again from the penalty of Adam, the 
 grinding toil, day in and day out, to wrest food from 
 the earth for himself, his womenkind, and children. 
 He understood, too, how noble is the discipline, though 
 pardonable the revolt. He had discovered how little 
 a man truly needs. He had seen in this strange life 
 much cruelty, much crazy superstition, much dirt and 
 senseless discomfort ; but he had made acquaintance 
 with love and self-denial. He had learnt, above all, 
 the great lesson to think twice before judging, and 
 thrice before condemning. 
 
 The camp fire was dying down untended. He arose 
 and cast an armful of logs upon it ; and at the sound 
 Azoka withdrew her eyes from the doorway and 
 fastened them upon him.
 
 THE LODGES IN THE SNOW 169 
 
 " Netawis," said she, " when will you be leaving 
 us ? " 
 
 " I have no thought of leaving." 
 
 " You are not telling me the truth, now." 
 
 " Indeed, I believe I am," John assured her. 
 
 " But what, then, of the girl yonder, whom you 
 wanted to marry ? Has she married another man, 
 or is she dead ? Yes, I know something about it," 
 Azoka went on, as he stood staring amazedly. " For 
 a long time I have wanted to tell you. That night, 
 after you had killed the bear and Ononwe took you 
 aside -I was afraid that you two would be quarrelling, 
 and so I crept after you She waited for him 
 
 to understand. 
 
 " I see," said John gravely. 
 
 " Tell me what has become of her." 
 
 " I suppose that she is living still with her own 
 people ; and there is nothing more to tell, Azoka, 
 except that she cannot be mine, and would not if she 
 could." 
 
 " Whose fault was it, Netawis ? Yours or hers ? '" 
 
 " There was much fault indeed, and all of it mine ; 
 but against my marrying her it did not count, for 
 that was impossible from the beginning. Suppose, 
 now, your nation were at war with the Ottawas, and 
 a young Ottawa brave fell in love with you. What 
 would you do ? " 
 
 " That is idle talk, for of course I should do 
 nothing," said Azoka composedly. " But if I were 
 a man and fell in love with an Ottawa maiden, it 
 would be simple. I should carry her off." 
 
 John, being unable to find an answer to this, lit 
 his pipe and sat staring into the fire. 
 
 " Was she an Englishwoman then ? " Azoka asked 
 after a while. 
 
 " An Englishwoman ? " He looked up in surprise ;
 
 170 FORT AMITY 
 
 then, with a glance around at the sleepers, he leaned 
 forward until his eyes met the girl's at close range 
 across the flame. " Since you have learnt one secret, 
 Azoka, I will tell you another. She was a French- 
 woman, and it is I who am English." 
 
 But Azoka kept her composure. " My father is 
 always wise," she said quietly. J' If he had told the 
 truth, you would have been in great danger ; for 
 many had lost sons and brothers in the righting, and 
 those who came back were full of revenge. You 
 heard their talk." 
 
 "Then you have only to tell them, Azoka, and 
 they may take fheir revenge. I shall not greatly 
 care." 
 
 " I am no babbler, Netawis ; and, moreover, the 
 men have put their revenge away. When the summer 
 comes very few will want to go fighting. For my 
 part, I pay little heed to their talk of killing and 
 scalping ; to me it is all boys' play, and I do not 
 want to understand it. But from what I hear they 
 think that the Englishmen will be victorious, and it 
 is foolishness to fight on the losing side. If so 
 Azoka broke off and pressed her palms together in 
 sudden delight. 
 
 " If so ? " echoed John. 
 
 "If the English win, why then you may carry off 
 your Frenchwoman, Netawis ! I do very much want 
 you to be happy." 
 
 " And I thank you a thousand times, Azoka, for 
 your good wishes ; but I fear it will not happen in 
 that way." 
 
 She smoothed the head of Ononwe in her lap. 
 " Oh yes, it will," she assured him. " My father 
 told me that you would be leaving us some day ; 
 and now I know what he meant. He has seen her, 
 has he not ? "
 
 THE LODGES IN THE SNOW 171 
 
 " He has seen her." 
 
 " My father is never mistaken. You will go back 
 when the time comes, and take her captive. But 
 bring her back that I may see her, Netawis." 
 
 " But if she should resist ? " 
 
 Azoka shook her pretty head. " You men never 
 understand us. She will not resist when once you 
 have married her ; and" I do very much want you to 
 be happy." 
 
 For three days the O jib ways sprawled in drunken- 
 ness around Fort Mackinac, but on the fourth arose 
 and departed for their island ; very sullenly at first, 
 as they launched their canoes, but with rising spirits 
 as they neared home. And two days after their 
 arrival Ononwe and Azoka were married. 
 
 In the midst of the marriage feast, which lasted a 
 week, the great thaw began ; and thereafter for a 
 month Menehwehna watched John closely. But the 
 springtime could not thaw the resolve which had been 
 hardening John's heart all the winter to live out his 
 life in the wilderness, and, when his time came, to 
 die there a forgotten man. He wondered now that 
 he had ever besought Menehwehna for help to return. 
 Although it could never be proved against him, he 
 must acknowledge to himself that he, a British officer, 
 was now in truth a willing deserter. But to be a 
 deserter he found more tolerable than to return at 
 the price of private shame. 
 
 Menehwehna, cheated of his fears, watched him 
 with a new and growing hope. The snows melted ; 
 May came with its flowers, June with its heat, July 
 with the roaring of bucks in the forest ; and still the 
 men hung about the village, fishing and shooting, or 
 making short excursions to Sault Saint Marie or the 
 bay of Boutchitounay, or the mouth of the Mississaki 
 river on the north side of the lake (where the wild-fowl
 
 172 FORT AMITY 
 
 were plentiful), but showing no disposition to go 
 out again upon the war path as they had gone the 
 year before. The frenzy which then had carried them 
 hundreds of miles from their homes seemed now to be 
 entirely spent, and the war itself to have faded far 
 away. Once or twice a French officer from Fort 
 Mackinac was paddled across, and landed and 
 harangued the Indians ; and the Indians listened 
 attentively, but never stirred. Of the French soldiers 
 drilling at the fort they spoke now with contempt. 
 
 John saw no reason for this change, and set it down 
 to that flightiness of purpose which as he had read 
 in books is common to all savages. He had yet to 
 learn that in solitary lands the very sky becomes as 
 it were a vast sounding-board, and rumour travels 
 no man knows how. 
 
 It was on his return from the Isles aux Castors, 
 where with two score young men of his tribe he had 
 spent three weeks in fishing for sturgeon, that he 
 heard of the capture of Fort Niagara by the English. 
 Azoka announced it to him. 
 
 " Said I not how it would happen ? " she reminded 
 him. " But if you leave us now, you must come back 
 with her and see my boy. When he comes to be born 
 he shall be called Netawis. Ononwe and I are agreed 
 on it." 
 
 " I have no thought of leaving," John answered. 
 " Fort Niagara is far from here." 
 
 " They say also," Menehwehna announced later, 
 " that Stadacona has fallen." 
 
 " Stadacona ? " 
 
 " The great fortress Quebec." 
 
 John mused for a while. " I had a dear friend 
 once," he said, " and he laid me a wager that he 
 would enter Quebec before me. It appears that he 
 has won."
 
 THE LODGES IN THE SNOW 173 
 
 " A friend, did my brother say ? V 
 " And a kinsman," John answered, recognising the 
 old note of jealousy in Menehwehna's voice. " But 
 there's no likeness between us ; for he is one that 
 always goes straight to his mark." 
 . " There was a name brought me with the news. 
 Your chief was the Wolf, they said ; but whether it 
 be his own name or that of his manitou I know not."
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 THE REVEILLE 
 
 A BAND of five-and-twenty Ojibvvays came filing down 
 through the woods to the shore of Lake Ontario, at 
 the point where the City of Toronto now stands. 
 Back beyond the Lake aux Claies they had passed 
 many lodges inhabited by women and children only, 
 and had heard everywhere the same story : the men 
 were all gone southward to Fort Niagara to take 
 counsel with the English. This, too, was the goal of 
 the Ojibways' journey, and Menehwehna hurried them 
 forward. 
 
 Fort Rouille, by the waterside, stood deserted and 
 half ruined. They had hoped to find canoes here to 
 carry them across the lake to Niagara ; but here, too, 
 all the male population had stampeded a week ago 
 for the south, and those who wanted canoes must 
 make them. This meant two days' - delay, but it 
 could not be helped. They fell to work at once, 
 cutting down elm-trees by the shore and stripping off 
 their bark, while the children gathered from the lodges 
 and stood at a little distance watching. 
 
 It was by no desire of his own th;.t John made one 
 of the embassage. As rumour after rumour of British 
 successes came westward to Michilimackinac, and the 
 Indians held long and anxious councils, he had grown 
 aware that Menehwehna was watching him furtively,
 
 THE REVEILLE 175 
 
 as if for a sign which could not be demanded in 
 words. 
 
 " Menehwehna," said he at length, " what is all 
 this talk of English vengeance ? It is not the way 
 of my countrymen to remember wrongs after they 
 have won the battle." 
 
 "But who will assure my people of that?" asked 
 Menehwehna. " They have heard that certain things 
 were done in the south, and that toll will be taken." 
 
 " What matters that to your people, though it be 
 true ? They were not at Fort William Henry.!' 
 
 " But, again, how shall they tell this to the English 
 and hope to be believed ? " 
 
 " You cannot hide your heart from me, Meneh- 
 wehna. You wish two things of me, and the first is 
 my leave to tell your people that I am English." 
 
 " Without your leave I will never tell them, my 
 brother." 
 
 " Did I ever suppose that you would ?. Well, as 
 soon as you have told them they will clamour for 
 me to go to Fort Niagara, and at need to entreat for 
 them. Now I say that there will be no need ; but 
 they will compel me to go, and you, too, will wish it. 
 Have I not guessed ? " 
 
 Menehwehna was silent a while. " For my people 
 I wish it," he said at length, " but for my own part 
 I fear more than I wish." <. 
 
 " You fear it because I go into great danger. By 
 my countrymen I shall be rightly held a deserter ; 
 and, among them, for an officer to desert is above all 
 things shameful." 
 
 " But," answered Menehwehna, with a cheerful 
 readiness which proved that he had thought the 
 matter out, " if, as you say, the Governor receive us 
 kindly, we will hide that you are English ; to that 
 every man shall give his oath beforehand. If things
 
 176 FORT AMITY 
 
 go ill, we will hand you back as our prisoner, and 
 prove that we have kept you against your will." 
 
 John shook his head, but did not utter the firm 
 resolve of his heart that even from ignominy no 
 such lies should save him while he had a gun to turn 
 against himself. " Why do you fear, then, Meneh- 
 wehna," he demanded, " if not for me ? " 
 
 " Do not ask, my brother ! " Menehwehna's voice 
 was troubled, constrained, and his eyes avoided 
 John's. 
 
 " Ah, well," said John lightly, after regarding him 
 for a moment, " to you at least I will pay some of 
 my debt. Go and tell your people that I am English ; 
 and add for it will save talk that I am ready to 
 go with them to Fort Niagara." 
 
 By dawn on the third day at Fort Rouille three 
 canoes lay finished and ready, each capable of carry- 
 ing eight or nine men. Pushing off from the Toronto 
 shore, the embassage paddled southward across the 
 lake. 
 
 They came late that evening to a point of land four 
 miles from Niagara, on the north side of the river 
 mouth. Approaching it, they discerned many clusters 
 of Indian encampments, each sending iip its thin 
 column of smoke against the sunset-darkened woods ; 
 but night had fallen long before they beached their 
 canoes, and for the last three miles they paddled wide 
 of the shore to skirt a fleet of fishing-boats twinkling 
 with flambeaux, from the rays of which voices chal- 
 lenged them. The Ojibways answered with their own 
 call, and were made welcome. A common fear, it 
 seemed, lay over all the nations Wyandots and 
 Attiwandaronks from the west and north of Lake 
 Erie, Nettaways and Tobacco Indians from around
 
 THE REVEILLE ' 177 
 
 Nottavvasaga Bay, Ottawas and Pottawatamies from 
 the far west who had not yet made their peace with 
 the English. But Menehwehna, whose fear of arriving 
 too late had kept him anxious throughout the voyage, 
 grew cheerful again. 
 
 They landed and pitched their camp on a spit of 
 land close beside their old friend the Ottawa chief 
 from L'Arbe Croche, to whose lodge Menehwehna at 
 once betook himself to learn the news. But John 
 weary with the day's toil, threw himself down and slept. 
 
 A touch on his shoulder awakened him at dawn, 
 and he opened his eyes to see Menehwehna standing 
 above him, gun in hand and dressed for an expedition. 
 
 " Come," commanded Menehwehna, adding, as 
 John's gaze travelled around upon the sleepers, " We 
 two, alone." 
 
 John caught up his gun, and the pair stepped out 
 into the dawn together. An Indian path led through 
 the forest to the southward, and Menehwehna took it, 
 walking ahead and rapidly. Twice he turned about 
 and looked John in the face with a searching gaze, 
 but held on his way again without speaking. They 
 walked in a dawn which as yet resembled night 
 rather than day ; a night grown diaphanous and 
 ghost-like, a summer night surprised in its sleep and 
 vanishing before their footfall. The flicker of fire- 
 flies hurrying into deeper shades seemed, by a trick of 
 eyesight, to pass into the glint of dew. 0The birds 
 had not yet broken into singing, the shadows stirred 
 with whispers, as though their broods of winged and 
 creeping things held breath together in alarm. A 
 thin mist drifted through the undergrowth, muffling 
 the roar of distant waters ; and at intervals the path 
 led across a clearing where, between the pine-trunks 
 to the left, the lake itself came into view, with clouds 
 of vapour heaving on its bosom.
 
 178 FORT AMITY 
 
 These clearings grew more frequent until at length 
 Menehwehna halted on the edge of one which sloped 
 straight from his feet to a broad and rushing river. 
 There, stepping aside, he watched John s eyes as 
 they fell on Fort Niagara. It stood over the angle 
 where the river swept into the lake ; its stone walls 
 terraced high upon earthworks rising from the water- 
 side, its towers already bathed in sunlight, its founda- 
 tions standing in cool shadow. Eyes no doubt were 
 watching the dawn from its ramparts ; but no sign 
 of life appeared there. It seemed to sleep with the 
 forests around it, its river gate shut close-lidded 
 against the day, its empty flagstaff a needle of gold 
 trembling upon the morning sky. 
 
 Menehwehna had seated himself, his gun across his 
 knees, upon a fallen trunk ; and John, turning, met 
 his eyes. 
 
 " Do we cross over ? " 
 
 " To-day, or perhaps to-morrow. I wished you 
 to see it first." 
 
 "But why ?" 
 
 ".Does my brother ask why? Well, then, I was 
 afraid." 
 
 " Were you afraid that I might wish to go back ? 
 Answer me, Menehwehna By whose wish am I here 
 at all?" 
 
 " When I was a young man," answered Meneh- 
 wehna, " in the days when I went wooing after 
 Meslm-kwa, I would often be jealous, and this jealousy 
 would seize me when we were alone together. ' She 
 is loving another now,' I said ; ' but how will it be 
 when other young 'men are around her ? ' This thought 
 tormented me so that many times it drove me to 
 prove her, pretending to be cold and purposely throw- 
 ing her 'in 'the company of others who were glad 
 chough for she had many suitors. Then I would
 
 THE REVEILLE 179 
 
 watch with pain in my heart, but secretly, that my 
 shame and rage might be hidden." 
 
 John eyed him for a moment in wonder. " For 
 what did you bring me this long way from Michili- 
 mackinac ? " he asked. " Was it not to speak at 
 need for you and your nation ? " 
 
 " For that, but not for that only. Brother, have 
 you never loved a friend so that you felt his friendship 
 worthless to you unless you owned it all ? Have you 
 never felt the need on you to test him, though the 
 test lay a hundred leagues away ? So far have I 
 brought you; O Netawis, to show you your country- 
 men. In a while the fort yonder will wake, and you 
 shall see them on the walls in their red coats, and if 
 the longing come upon you to return to them, we will 
 cross over together and I will tell my tale. They will 
 believe it. Look ! Will you be an Englishman 
 again ? " 
 
 " Let us turn back," answered John wearily. 
 " That life is gone from me for ever." . 
 
 " Say to me that you have no wish to go." 
 
 " I had- a wish once," said John, letting the words 
 fall slowly as his eyes travelled over the walls of the 
 fort. " It seemed to me then that no wish on earth 
 could be dearer. Many things have helped to kill 
 it; I think." He passed a hand over his eyes and 
 let it drop by his side, " I have no wish to leave you, 
 Menehwehna." 
 
 The Indian stood up with a short cry of joy and 
 laid a hand on his shoulder. 
 
 " No, my friend," John continued, in the same 
 dull voice ; " I will say to you only what is honest. 
 If I return with you/ it is not for your sake." 
 
 " So that you return, Netawis, I will have patience. 
 There was a time when you set your face against me ; 
 and this I overcame. Again there was a time when
 
 i8o FORT AMITY 
 
 you pleaded with me that I should let you escape ; 
 and still I waited, though with so small a hope that 
 when my child Azoka began to listen for your step I 
 scolded her out of her folly." 
 
 " In that you did wisely, Menehwehna. It is not 
 everything that I have learned to forget." 
 
 " I told her," said Menehwehna simply, " that, as 
 the snow melts and slides from the face of a rock, so 
 one day all thought of us would slip from your heart, 
 and you would go from us, not once looking back. 
 Even so I believed. But the spring came, and the 
 summer, and I began to doubt ; and, as I questioned 
 you, a hope grew in my heart, and I played with it 
 as a dog plays with her pups, trying its powers little 
 by little, yet still in play, until a day came when I 
 discovered it to be strong and the master of me. Then 
 indeed, my brother, I could not rest until I had put 
 it to this proof." He lit his pipe solemnly, drew ? 
 puff or two and handed it to John. " Let us smoke 
 together before we turn back. He that has a friend 
 as well as wife and children needs not fear to grow old." 
 
 John stretched out a hand and touched the earthen 
 pipe bowl. His fingers closed on it but only to let 
 it slip. It fell, struck against the edge of the tree 
 stump, and was shivered in pieces. 
 
 Across the valley in Fort Niagara the British drums 
 were sounding the reveille. . 
 
 He did not hear Menehwehna' s voice lamenting 
 the broken pipe. He stood staring across at the fort. 
 He saw the river-gate open, the red-coats moving 
 there, relieving guard. He saw the flag-staff halliards 
 shake out the red cross of England in the morning 
 sunlight. And still, like a river, rolled the music oi 
 British drums. 
 
 " Netawis ! " 
 
 Menehwehna touched his arm. At first John did
 
 THE REVEILLE 181 
 
 not seem to hear, then his hand went up and began to 
 unfasten the silver armlets there. 
 
 " Netawis ! O my brother ! " 
 
 But the ice had slipped from the rock and lay around 
 its base in ruin, and the music which had loosened it 
 still sang across the valley. He took a step down the 
 slope towards it. 
 
 " You shah 1 not go ! " cried Menehwehna, and, 
 lifting his gun, pointed it full at John's back. And 
 JoHi knew that Menehwehna' s finger was on the 
 trigger. He walked on unregarding. 
 
 But Menehwehna did not fire. He cast down his 
 gun with a cry and ran to clasp his friend's feet. What 
 was he saying ? Something about " two years." 
 
 "Two years?" Had they passed so quickly? 
 God ! how long the minutes were now ! He must 
 win across before the drums ceased. . . . 
 
 He halted and began to talk to Menehwehna very 
 patiently, this being the easiest way to get rid of him. 
 " Yes, yes," he heard himself saying, " I go to them 
 as an Indian, and they will not know me. I shall be 
 safe. Return now back to my brothers and tell them 
 that, if need be, they will find me there, and I will 
 speak for them." 
 
 And his words must have prevailed, for he stood by 
 the river's edge alone, and Menehwehna was striding 
 back towards the wood. A boat lay chained by the 
 farther shore, and two soldiers came down from the 
 fort and pushed across to him. 
 
 They wore the uniform of the Forty-sixth, and one 
 had been a private in his company ; but they did not 
 recognise him. And he spoke to them in the Ojibway 
 speech, which they could not understand. 
 
 From the edge of the woods Menehwehna watched 
 the three as they landed. They climbed the slope and 
 passed into the fort.
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 FORT AMITY LEARNS ITS FATE 
 
 THAT Spring, three British generals sat at the three 
 gates of Canada, waiting for the signal to enter and 
 end the last agony of New France. But the snows 
 melted, the days lengthened, and still the signal did 
 not come ; for the general by the sea gate was him- 
 self besieged. 
 
 Through the winter he and his small army sat 
 .patiently in the city they had ruined. Conquerors 
 in lands more southerly may bury their dead with 
 speed, rebuild captured walls, set up a pillar and 
 statue of Victory, and in a month or two, the green 
 grass helping them, forget all but the glory of the 
 battle. But here in the north the same hand arrests 
 them, and for six months petrifies the memorials of 
 their rage. Until the spring dissolves it, the image 
 of war lives face to face with them, white, with frozen 
 eyes, sparing them only the colour of its wounds. 
 
 General Murray, like many a soldier in his army, 
 had dreams of emulating Wolfe's glory. But Wolfe 
 had snatched victory out of the shadow of coming 
 winter ; and, almost before Murray's army could cut 
 wood for fuel, the cold was upon them. For two 
 months Quebec had been pounded with shot and shell. 
 Her churches and hospitals stood roofless ; hundreds 
 of houses had been fired, vaults and storehouses 
 
 182
 
 FORT AMITY LEARNS ITS FATE 183 
 
 pillaged, doors and windows riddled everywhere. 
 There was no digging entrenchments in the frozen 
 earth. Walls six feet thick had been breached by 
 artillery ; and the loose stones, so cold they were, 
 could hardly be handled. 
 
 Among these ruins, on the frozen cliff over the 
 frozen river, Murray and his seven thousand men 
 settled down to wear the winter through. They were 
 short of food, short of fuel. Frost-bite maimed them 
 at first ; then scurvy, dysentery, fever, began to kill. 
 They laid their dead out on the snow, to be buried 
 when spring should return and thaw the earth ; and 
 by the end of April their dead numbered six hundred 
 and fifty. Yet they kept up their spirits. Early in 
 November there had been rumours that the French 
 under Levis meant to march on the city and retake 
 it. In December deserters brought word that he was 
 on his way that he would storm the city on the 
 twenty-second, and dine within the citadel on Christ- 
 mas Day. In January news arrived that he was pre- 
 paring scaling-ladders and training his men in the use 
 of them. Still the days dragged by. The ice on the 
 river began to break up and swirl past the ramparts 
 on the tides. The end of April came, and with it a 
 furious midnight storm, and out of the storm a feeble 
 cry the voice of a half-dead Frenchman clinging to a 
 floe of ice far out on the river. He was rescued, placed 
 in a hammock, and carried up Mountain Street to the 
 General's quarters ; and Murray, roused from sleep 
 at three o'clock in the morning, listened to his story. 
 He was an artillery-sergeant of Levis' army ; 'and 
 that army, twelve thousand strong, was close to the 
 gutes of Quebec. 
 
 The storm had fallen to a cold drizzle of rain when 
 at dawn Murray's troops issued from the St! Louis 
 gate and dragged their guns out through the slush of
 
 184 FORT AMITY 
 
 the St. Foy road. On the ground where Wolfe had 
 given battle, or hard by, they unlimbered in face of 
 the enemy and opened fire. Two hours later, out- 
 flanked by numbers, having lost a third of their three 
 thousand in the short fight, they fell back on the 
 battered walls they had mistrusted. For a few hours 
 the fate of Quebec hung on a hair. But the garrison 
 could build now ; and, while Levis dragged up his 
 guns from the river, the English worked like demons. 
 They had guns, at any rate, in plenty ; and, while the 
 French dug and entrenched themselves on the ground 
 they had won, daily the breaches closed and the 
 English fire grew hotter. 
 
 April gave place to May , and the artillery fire con- 
 tinued on the heights ; but as it grew noisier it grew 
 also less important, for now the eyes of both com- 
 manders were fastened on the river. Two fleets were 
 racing for Quebec, and she would belong to the first 
 to drop anchor within her now navigable river. 
 
 Then came a day when, as Murray sat brooding by 
 the fire in his quarters in St. Louis Street, an officer 
 ran in with the news of a ship of war in the Basin, 
 beating up towards the city. " Whatever she is," 
 said the General, " we will hoist our colours." 
 Weather had frayed out the halliards on the flagstaff 
 over Cape Diamond, but a sailor climbed the pole 
 and lashed the flag of St. George beneath the truck. 
 By this time men and officers in a mob had gathered 
 on the ramparts of the Chateau St. Louis, all straining 
 their eyes at a frigate fetching up close-hauled against 
 the wind. 
 
 Her colours ran aloft ; but they were bent, sailor- 
 fashion, in a tight bundle, ready to be broken out when 
 they reached the topgallant masthead. 
 
 An officer, looking through a glass, cried out ner- 
 vously that the bundle was white. But this they
 
 FORT AMITY LEARNS ITS FATE 185 
 
 knew without telling. Only what would the flag 
 carry on its white ground ? The red cross ? or the 
 golden fleur-de-lys ? 
 
 The halliards shook ; the folds flew broad to the 
 wind ; and, with a gasp, men leaped on the ramparts 
 flung their hats in the air and cheered dropped, 
 sobbing, on their knees. 
 
 It was the red cross of England ! 
 
 They were cheering yet and shouting themselves 
 hoarse when the Lowestoffe frigate dropped anchor 
 and saluted with all her twenty-four guns. On the 
 heights the French guns answered spitefully. Levis 
 would not believe. He had brought his artillery at 
 length into position, and began to knock the defences 
 vigorously. He lingered until the battleship Van- 
 guard and the frigate Diane came sailing up into 
 harbour ; until the Vanguard, pressing on with the 
 Lowestoffe, took or burned the vessels which had 
 brought his artillery down from Montreal. Then, in 
 the night, he decamped, leaving his siege-train, 
 baggage, and sick men behind him. News of his 
 retreat reached Murray at nightfall, and soon the 
 English guns were bowling round-shot after him in 
 the dusk across the Plains of Abraham ; but by day- 
 break, when Murray pushed out after him, to fall on 
 his rear, he had hurried his columns out of reach. 
 
 Three months had passed since the flying of the 
 signal from the Lowestoffe, and now in the early days 
 of August three British armies were moving slowly 
 upon Montreal, where Levis and Governor Vaudreuil 
 had drawn the main French forces together for a last 
 resistance. 
 
 Murray came up the river from Quebec with twenty- 
 four hundred men, in thirty-two vessels and a fleet 
 of boats in company ; followed by Lord Rollo with
 
 186 FORT AMITY 
 
 thirteen hundred men drawn off from dismantled 
 Louisbourg. As the ships tacked up the river, with 
 their floating batteries ranged in line to protect the 
 advance, bodies of French troops followed them along 
 the shore regiments of white-coated infantry and 
 horsemen in blue jackets faced with scarlet. Bour- 
 lamaque watched from the southern shore, Dumas 
 from the northern. But neither dared to attack ; 
 and day after day through the lovely weather, past 
 fields and settlements and woodlands, between banks 
 which narrowed until from deck one could listen to 
 the song of birds on either hand and catch the wafted 
 scent of wild flowers, the British wound their way to 
 Isle Sainte-Therese below Montreal, encamped, and 
 waited for their comrades. 
 
 From the south came Haviland. He brought 
 thirty-four hundred regulars, provincials, and Indians 
 from Crown Point to Lake Champlain, and moved 
 down the Richelieu, driving Bougainville before 
 him. 
 
 Last, descending from the west by the gate of the 
 Great Lakes, came the Commander-in-Chief, the 
 cautious Amherst, with eighteen hundred soldiers and 
 Indians and over eight hundred batteaux and whale- 
 boats. He had gathered them at Oswego in July, 
 and now in the second week of August had crossed 
 the lake to its outlet, threaded the channels of the 
 Thousand Islands, and was bearing down on the broad 
 river towards Fort Amitie. 
 
 And how did it stand with Fort Amitie ? 
 
 Well, to begin with, the Commandant was 
 thoroughly perplexed. The British must be near ; 
 by latest reports they had reached the Thousand 
 Islands ; even hours were becoming preckms, and 
 yet most unaccountably the reinforcements had not 
 arrived !
 
 FORT AMITY LEARNS ITS FATE 187 
 
 What could M. de Vaudreuil be dreaming of? 
 Already the great Indian leader, Saint Luc de la 
 Corne, had reached Coteau du Lac with a strong 
 force of militia. Dominique Guyon had been sent 
 down with an urgent message of inquiry. But what 
 had been La Corne's answer ? " I know not what 
 M. de Vaudreuil intends. My business is to stay 
 here and watch the rapids." 
 
 " Now, what can be the meaning of that ? " the 
 Commandant demanded of his brother. 
 
 M. Etienne shook his head pensively. " Rusticus 
 i:\pectat ... I should have supposed the rapids to 
 stand in no danger." 
 
 " Had the Governor sent word to abandon the 
 Fort, I might have understood. It would have been 
 the bitterest blow of my life 
 
 ' Yes, yes, brother," M. Etienne murmured in 
 sympathy. 
 
 " But to leave us here without a word ! No ; it is 
 impossible. They must be on their way ! " 
 
 In the strength of this confidence Dominique and 
 Bateese had been despatched down the river again to 
 meet the reinforcements and hurry them forward. 
 
 Dominique and Bateese had been absent for a week 
 now on this errand. Still no relief-boats hove in sight, 
 and the British were coming down through the 
 Thousand Islands. 
 
 Save in one respect the appearance of the Fort had 
 not changed since the evening of John a Cleeve's 
 dismissal. The garrison cows still grazed along the 
 river-bank, and in the clearing under the eastern 
 wall the Indian corn was ripe for harvest (M. Etienne 
 suggested reaping it ; the labour, he urged, would 
 soothe every one's nerves). Only on Sans Ouartier's 
 cabbage-patch the lunette now stood compfete. All 
 the habitants of Boisveyrac had been brought up to
 
 i-88 FORT AMITY 
 
 labour in its erection, building it to the height of ten 
 feet, with an abattis of trees in front and a raised 
 platform within for the riflemen. Day after day 
 the garrison manned it and burned powder in defence 
 against imaginary assaults, and by this time the 
 Commandant and Sergeant Bedard between them 
 had discussed and provided against every possible 
 mode of attack. 
 
 Diane stood in the dawn on the terre-plein of the 
 river-wall. The latest news of the British had arrived 
 but a few hours since, with a boatload of fugitives 
 from the up-stream mission-house of La Galette, off 
 which an armed brig lay moored with ten cannon 
 and one hundred men to check the advance of the 
 flotilla. It could do no more. 
 
 The fugitives included Father Launoy, and he had 
 landed and begged Diane to take his place in the 
 crowded boat. For himself (he said) he would stay 
 and help to serve out ammunition to Fort Amitie 
 that was, if the Commandant meant to resist. 
 
 "Do you suppose, then, that I would retire?" 
 the Commandant asked with indignation. 
 
 " It may be possible to do neither," suggested 
 Father Launoy. 
 
 But this the Commandant could by no means 
 understand. It seemed to him that either he must 
 be losing his wits, or the whole of New France, from 
 M. de Vaudreuil down, was banded in a league of 
 folly. " Resist ? Of course I shall resist. My men 
 are few enough, Father ; but I beg you to dismiss the 
 notion that Fort Amitie is garrisoned by cowards." 
 
 " I will stay with you, then," said the Jesuit. 
 " I may be useful in many ways. But mademoiselle 
 will take my place in the boat and escape to Montreal." 
 
 " I also stay," answered Diane simply.
 
 FORT AMITY LEARNS ITS FATE 189 
 
 " Excuse me, but there is like to be serious work. 
 They bring the Iroquois with them, besides Indians 
 from the west." Father Launoy spoke as one reason- 
 ing with a child. 
 
 Diane drew a small pistol from her bodice. " I 
 have thought of that, you see." 
 
 " But M. de Noel He swung round upon 
 
 the Commandant expostulating. 
 
 " In a few hours," said the Commandant, meeting 
 his eyes with a smile, " New France will have ceased 
 to be. I have no authority to force my child to- 
 endure what I cannot endure myself. She has 
 claimed a promise of me, and I have given it." 
 
 The priest stepped back a pace, wondering. Swiftly 
 before him passed a vision of the Intendant's palace 
 at Quebec, with its women and riot and rottenness. 
 His hand went up to his eyes, and under the shade 
 of it he looked upon father and daughter this pair 
 of the old noblesse, clean, comely, ready for the sacri- 
 fice. What had New France done for these that 
 they were cheerful to die for her ? She had doled 
 them out poverty, and now, in the end, betrayal - 
 she had neglected her children for aliens, she had 
 taken their revenues to feed extortioners and wantons, 
 and now, in the supreme act of treachery, herself 
 falling with them, she turned too late to read in their 
 eyes a divine and damning love. There all the while 
 she had lived the true New France, loyally trusted, 
 innocently worshipped. " Blessed are the meek, for 
 they shall inherit the earth." . . . Father Launoy 
 lowered his gaze to the floor. He had looked and 
 learned why some nations fall and other worthily 
 endure. 
 
 All that night the garrison had slept by their arms,, 
 until with the first streak of day the drums called 
 them out to their alarm-post.
 
 igo FORT AMITY 
 
 Diane stood on the terre-plein watching the sunrise. 
 As yet the river lay indistinct, a broad, wan-coloured 
 band of light stretching away across the darkness. 
 The outwork on the slope beneath her was a formless 
 shadow astir with smaller shadows equally formless. 
 She heard the tread of feet on the wooden platform, 
 the clink of side-arms and accoutrements, the soft 
 thud of ramrods, the voice of old Bedard, peevish 
 and grumbling as usual. * 
 
 Her face, turned to the revealing dawn, was like 
 and yet curiously unlike the face into which John a 
 Cleeve had looked and taken his dismissal ; a woman's 
 face now, serener than of old and thoughtfuller. 
 These two years had lengthened it to a perfect oval, 
 adding a touch of strength to the brow, a touch of 
 decision to the chin ; and, lest these should over- 
 weight it, had removed from the eyes their clouded 
 trouble and left them clear to the depths. The elfin 
 Diane, the small woodland-haunted Indian, no 
 longer looked forth from those windows ; no search 
 might find her captive shadow behind them. She 
 had died young, or had faded away perhaps and 
 escaped back to her native forests. 
 
 But she is not all forgotten, this lost playmate. 
 Some trick of gesture re-appears as Diane lifts her 
 face suddenly towards the flagstaff tower. The 
 watchman there has spied something on the river, 
 and is shouting the news from the summit. 
 
 His arm points down the river. What has he seen ? 
 " Canoes ! " the relief is at hand, then ! No : 
 there is only one canoe. It comes swiftly, and 
 yet the day overtakes and passes it, spreading a 
 causeway of light along which it shoots to the landing- 
 quay. 
 
 Two men paddle it Dominique and Bateese 
 Guy on. Their faces are haggard, their eyes glassy
 
 FORT AMITY LEARNS ITS FATE 191 
 
 with want of sleep, their limbs so stiff that they have 
 to be helped ashore. 
 
 The Commandant steps forward. " What news, 
 my children ? " he asks. His voice is studiously 
 cheerful. 
 
 Dominique shakes his head. 
 
 " There is no relief, Monseigneur." 
 
 " You have met none, you mean ? " 
 
 " None is coming, Monseigneur. We have heard 
 it in Montreal."
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 DOMINIQUE 
 
 " MONTREAL ? " 
 
 While they stood wondering, a dull wave of sound 
 broke on their ears from the westward, and another, 
 and yet another the booming of cannon far up the 
 river. 
 
 " That will be at La Galette," said the Commandant, 
 answering the question in Dominique's eyes. " Come 
 up to your quarters, my children, and get some sleep. 
 We have work before us." He motioned the others 
 to fall back out of hearing while he and Dominique 
 mounted the slope together. " You had audience, 
 then, of the Governor ? " he asked 
 
 " He declined to see us, Monseigneur, and I do not 
 blame him, since he could not send us back telling 
 you to fight. Doubtless it does not become one in 
 M. de Vaudreuil's position to advise the other thing 
 aloud." 
 
 " I do not understand you. Why could not M. de 
 Vaudreuil order me to fight ? " 
 
 Dominique stared at his master. " Why, Mon- 
 seigneur seeing that he sends no troops, it would be 
 a queer message. He could not have the face." 
 
 " Yet he must be intending to strike at the English 
 coming from Quebec ? " 
 
 " They are already arrived and encamped at Isle 
 Sainte-Therese below the city, and another army 
 
 192
 
 DOMINIQUE 193 
 
 has come down the Richelieu from the south and 
 joined them." 
 
 " It is clear as daylight. M. de Vaudreuil must be 
 meaning to attack them instantly, and therefore he 
 cannot spare a detachment You follow me ? " 
 
 " It may be so, Monseigneur," Dominique assented 
 doubtfully. 
 
 ' May be so ! ' It must be so ! But unhappily 
 he does not know of this third army descending upon 
 him ; or, rathes, he does not know how near it is. 
 Yet, to win time for him, we must hold up this army 
 at all costs." 
 
 "It is I, Monseigneur, who am puzzled. You 
 cannot be intending 
 
 " Eh ? Speak it out, man ! " 
 
 " You cannot be intending to await these English ! " 
 
 " Name of thunder! What else do you suppose ? 
 Pray, my dear Dominique, use your wits. We have 
 to gain time, I tell you time for our friends below 
 at Montreal." 
 
 " With twenty odd men against as many hundreds ? 
 Oh, pardon me, Monseigneur, but I cannot bring my 
 mind to understand you." 
 
 " But since it gains time " 
 
 "They will not stay to snap up such a mouthful. 
 They will sail past your guns, laughing ; unless great 
 God, Monseigneur ! If in truth you intend this folly, 
 where is Mademoiselle Diane ? I did not see her in 
 any of the boats from La Galette. Whither have you 
 sent her, and in whose charge ? " 
 
 " She is yonder on the wall, looking down on us. 
 She will stay ; I have given her my promise." 
 
 Dominique came to a halt, white as a ghost. His 
 tongue touched his dry lips. " Monseigneur ! " the 
 cry broke from him, and he put out a hand and caught 
 his seigneur by the coat-sleeve.
 
 194 FORT AMITY 
 
 " What is the matter with the man ? " The 
 Commandant plucked his arm away and stood back, 
 outraged by this breach of decorum. 
 
 But Dominique, having found his voice, continued, 
 heedless : " She must go ! She shall go ! It is a 
 wickedness you are doing do you hear me, Mon- 
 seigneur ? a wickedness, a wickedness. But you 
 shall not keep her here ; I will not allow it ! " 
 
 " Are you stark mad, Dominique Guyon ? " 
 
 " I will not allow it. I love her, -I tell you there, 
 I have said it ! Listen again, Monseigneur, if you 
 do not understand : I love her, I love her oh, get 
 that into your head ! I love her, and will not allow 
 it!" 
 
 " Certainly your brain is turned. Go to your 
 quarters, sir ; it must be sleep you want. Yes, yes, 
 my poor fellow, you are pale as a corpse ! Go, get 
 some sleep, and when you wake we will forget all 
 this." 
 
 " Before God, Monseigneur, I am telling you the 
 truth. I need no sleep but the sleep of death, and 
 that is like to come soon enough. But since we were 
 children I have loved your daughter, and in the 
 strength of that love I forbid you to kill her." 
 
 The Commandant swung round on his heel. 
 
 " Follow me, if you please." 
 
 He led the way to his orderly-room, seated himself 
 at the table, and so confronted the young man, who 
 stood humbly enough, though with his pale face 
 twitching. 
 
 " Dominique Guyon, once in my life I made a 
 great mistake ; and that was when, to save my poor 
 son's honour, I borrowed money of one of my censi- 
 taires. I perceive now what hopes you have nursed, 
 feeding them on my embarrassrnents. You saw me 
 impoverished, brought low, bereaved by God's will of
 
 DOMINIQUE 195 
 
 my only son ; you guessed that I lay awake of nights, 
 troubled by the thought of my daughter, who must 
 inherit poverty ; and on these foundations you laid 
 your schemes. You dreamed of becoming a gentil- 
 homme, of marrying my daughter, of sitting in my 
 chair at Boisveyrac and dealing justice among the 
 villagers. And a fine dream it seemed to you, -eh ? " 
 He paused. 
 
 " Monseigneur," Dominique answered simply, " you 
 say some things that are true ; but you say them so 
 that all seems false and vile. Yes, I have dreamed 
 dreams even dreams of becoming a gentilhomme, as 
 you say ; but my dreams were never wicked as you 
 colour them, seeing that they all flowed from love of 
 Mademoiselle Diane, and returned to her." 
 
 He glanced towards the window, through which the 
 pair could see Diane pacing the terre-plein in the sun- 
 light. The sight kindled the elder man to fresh anger. 
 
 " If," said he harshly, " I tried to explain to you 
 exactly how you insult us, it would be wasting my 
 time and yours ; and, however much you deserve it, 
 I have no wish to wound your feelings beyond need. 
 Let us come to business." He unlocked a drawer and 
 drew out three bundles of notes. " As my farmer 
 you will know better than I the current discount on 
 these. You come from Montreal. ' At what price 
 was the Government redeeming its paper there ? " 
 
 As he unfolded them, Dominique glanced at the 
 notes, and then let his gaze wander out through the 
 window. 
 
 "Is Monseigneur proposing to pay me the interest 
 on his bonds ? " 
 
 " To be sure I am." 
 
 " I do not ask for it." 
 
 " Devil care I if you ask or not ! Count the notes, 
 if you please."
 
 196 FORT AMITY 
 
 Dominique took a packet in his hands for a moment, 
 still with his eyes bent absently on the window, 
 fingered the notes, and laid them back on the table. 
 
 " Monseigneur will do me the justice to own that 
 in former times I have given him good advice in 
 business. I beg him to keep these notes for a while. 
 In a month or two their value will have trebled, which- 
 ever Government redeems them." 
 
 The Commandant struck the table. " In a few 
 hours, sir, I shall be a dead man. My honour cannot 
 wait so long ; and since the question is now of honour, 
 not of business, you will keep your advice to yourself. 
 Be quick, please ; for time presses, and I have some 
 instructions to leave to my brother. At my death 
 he will sell the Seigniory. The Government will take 
 its quint of the purchase-money, and out of the 
 remainder you shall be paid. My daughter will then 
 go penniless, but at least I shall have saved her from 
 a creditor with such claims as you are like to press. 
 And so, sir, I hope you have your answer." 
 
 " No, Monseigneur, not my answer. That I will 
 never take but from Mademoiselle Diane herself." 
 
 " By God, you shall have it here and now ! " The 
 Commandant stepped to the window and threw open 
 the casement. " Diane ! " he called. 
 
 She came. She stood in the doorway ; and Domi- 
 nique a moment before so bold lowered his eyes 
 before hers. At sight of him her colour rose, but 
 bravely. She was young, and had been making her 
 account with death. She had never loved Dominique ; 
 she had feared him at times, and at times pitied him ; 
 but now fate had lifted her and set her free on a 
 height from which she looked down upon love and 
 fear with a kind of wonder that they had ever seemed 
 important, and even her pity for him lost itself in 
 compassion for all men and women in trouble. In
 
 DOMINIQUE 197 
 
 truth, Dominique looked but a miserable culprit 
 before her. 
 
 The Commandant eyed him grimly for a moment 
 before turning to her. 
 
 " Diane," he said, with grave irony, " you will be 
 interested to learn that Monsieur Dominique Guyon 
 here has done you the honour to request your hand 
 in marriage." 
 
 She did not answer, but stood reading their faces. 
 
 " Moreover, on my declining that honour, he tells 
 me that he will take his answer from you alone." 
 
 Still for a few seconds she kept silence. 
 
 " Why should I not answer him, papa ? " she said 
 at length, and softly. "It is not for us to choose 
 what he should ask." She paused. " All his life 
 Dominique Guyon has been helping us ; see how he 
 has, even in these few days, worn himself in our 
 service ! " 
 
 Her father stared at her, puzzled, not following 
 her thought. He had expected her to be shocked, 
 affronted ; he did not know that Dominique's passion 
 was an old tale to her, and as little did he perceive 
 that in her present mood she put herself aside and 
 thought only of Dominique as in trouble and needing 
 help. 
 
 But apparently something in her face reassured 
 him, for he stepped toward the door. 
 
 " You prefer to give him his answer alone ? " 
 
 She bent her head. 
 
 For a while after the door had closed upon the 
 Commandant, Dominique stood with eyes abashed. 
 Then, looking up and meeting the divine compassion 
 in hers, he fell on his knees and stretched out both 
 hands to her. 
 
 " Is there no hope for me, ma'amzelle ? " 
 
 She shook her head. Looking down on him through 
 
 G
 
 198 FORT AMITY 
 
 tears, she held out a hand ; he took it between his 
 palms and clung to it, sobbing like a child. 
 
 Terrible, convulsive sobs they were at first, but 
 grew quieter by degrees, and as the outburst spent 
 itself a deep silence fell upon the room. 
 
 A tear had fallen upon his clasped knuckles. He 
 put his lips to it, and, imprisoning her fingers, kisced 
 them once, reverently. 
 
 He was a man again. He stood up, yet not releasing 
 her hand, and looked her in the face. 
 
 " Ma'amzelle, you will leave the Fort ? You will 
 let Bateese carry you out of danger ? For me, of 
 course, I stay with the Seigneur." 
 
 " No, Dominique. All New France is dying around 
 us, and I stay with my father to see the end. Perhaps 
 at the last I shall need you to help me." She smiled 
 bravely. " You have been trying to persuade my 
 father, I know." 
 
 " I have been trying to persuade him, and yet- 
 yet - Oh, I will tell to you a wickedness in my 
 heart that I could not tell even to Father Launoy ! 
 There was a moment when I thought to myself that 
 even to have you die here and to die beside you were 
 better than to let you go. Can you forgive me such a 
 thought as that ? " 
 
 " I forgive." 
 
 " And will you grant one thing more ? " 
 
 " What is it, Dominique ? " 
 
 " A silly favour, ma'amzelle but why not ? The 
 English will be here soon, maybe in a few hours. 
 Let me call Bateese, and we three will be children 
 again, and go up to the edge of the forest and watch 
 for our enemies. They will be real enemies, this 
 time ; but even that we may forget, perhaps." 
 
 She stood back a pace and laughed yes, laughed 
 and gaily, albeit with dewy .eyes. Her hands went
 
 DOMINIQUE 199 
 
 up as if she would have clapped them. " Why, to be 
 sure ! " she cried. " Let us fetch Bateese at once ! " 
 
 They passed out into the sunlight together, and 
 she waited in the courtyard while Dominique ran 
 upstairs to fetch Bateese. In five minutes' time 
 the two brothers appeared together, Bateese with his, 
 pockets enormously bulging whereat Diane laughed 
 again. 
 
 " So you have brought the larder, as ever. Bateese 
 was always prudent, and never relied on the game he 
 killed in hunting. You remember, Dominique ? " 
 
 " He was always a poor shot, ma'amzelle," answered 
 Dominique gravely. 
 
 "But this is not the larder!" Bateese began 
 to explain with a queer look at his brother. 
 
 " Eh ? " 
 
 " Never mind explanations ! Come along, all 
 three ! " cried Dominique, and led the way. They 
 passed out by the postern unobserved for the 
 garrison was assembled in the lunette under the 
 river-wall and hurried toward the shade of the 
 forest. 
 
 How well Diane remembered the old childish make- 
 believe ! How many scores of times had they played 
 it together, these three, in the woods around Boisvey- 
 rac ! when Dominique and Bateese were bold hunts- 
 men, and she kept house for them, cooking their 
 imaginary spoils of the chase. 
 
 "We must have a fire?" she exclaimed, and 
 hurried off to gather sticks. But when she returned 
 with the lap of her gown well filled, a fire was already 
 lit and blazing. 
 
 "How have you managed it so quickly?" she, 
 asked, and with that her eyes fell on a scrap of ashes. 
 " Where did you get this ? You have been lighting 
 with paper, Bateese and that is not playing fair !"
 
 200 FORT AMITY 
 
 Bateese, very red in the face, stooped in the smoke 
 and crammed another handful upon the blaze. 
 
 " They were papers, ma'amzelle, upon which 
 Dominique and I for a long time could not agree. 
 But now" he turned to Dominique "there is no 
 longer any quarrel between us. Eh, brother ? " 
 
 " None, Bateese ; none, if you forgive." 
 
 " What did I tell you ? " cried Bateese triumphantly. 
 " Did I not always tell you that your heart would be 
 lighter with this shadow gone ? And there was 
 never any shadow but this ; none none ! " 
 
 "That is all very well," Diane remonstrated; 
 " but you two have no business to hide a secret from 
 me to-day, even though it make you happier." 
 
 " We have burnt it for a propitiation, ma'amzelle ; 
 it no longer exists." Bateese cast himself on his back 
 at full length in the herbage and gazed up through 
 the drifting smoke into the tree-tops and sky. " A-ah 
 " A-ah ! " said he, with a long sigh, " how good God 
 has been to me ! How beautiful He has made all my 
 life ! " He propped himself on one elbow, and con- 
 tinued, with shining eyes : " What things we were 
 going to do, in those days ! What wonders we looked 
 forward to ! And all the while we were doing the 
 most wonderful thing in the world, for we loved one 
 another." He stretched out a hand and pointed. 
 " There by the bend, the English boats will come in 
 sight. Suppose, Dominique, that as they come you 
 launched out against them, and fought and sank the 
 fleet single-handed, like the men in the old tales 
 
 " He would save New France, and live in song," 
 Diane put in. " Would that not content any man, 
 r>aicese ? " She threw back her head with a gesture 
 which Dominique noted ; a trick of her childhood, 
 when in moments of excitement her long hair fell 
 across her eyes and had to be shaken back.
 
 DOMINIQUE 201 
 
 " Ma'amzelle," he pleaded, "there is yet one favour." 
 
 " Can I grant it easily ? " 
 
 " I hope so ; it is that you will let down your hair 
 for us." 
 
 Diane blushed, but put up a hand and began to 
 uncoil the tresses. " Bateese has not answered me," 
 she insisted. " I tell him that a man who should do 
 such a feat as he named would live in song for ever 
 and ever." 
 
 " But I say to you humbly, ma'amzelle, that, though 
 he lived in song for ever and ever, the true sweetness 
 of his life would be unknown to the singers ; for he 
 found it here under the branches, and, stepping forth 
 to his great deed, he left the memory for a while, to 
 meet him again and be his reward in Heaven." 
 
 " And I say to you ' no,' and ' no,' and again 
 ' no ' ! " cried Diane, springing to her feet the 
 childish, impetuous Diane of old. " It is in the great 
 deed that he lives the deed, and the moment that 
 makes him everlasting ! If Dominique now, or I, as 
 these English came round the bend 
 
 She paused, meeting Dominique's eyes. She had 
 not said " or you," and could not say it. Why? 
 Because Bateese was a cripple. " Bateese's is a 
 cripple's talk," said their glances one to another, 
 guiltily, avoiding him. 
 
 Dominique's gaze, flinching a little, passed down 
 the splendid coils of her hair and rested on the grass 
 at her feet. She lifted a tress on her forefinger and 
 smoothed it against the sunlight. 
 
 " There was a war once," said she, " between the 
 Greeks and the Persians ; and the Persians overran 
 the Greek's country until they came to a pass in the 
 mountains where a few men could stand against many. 
 There three hundred of the Greeks had posted them- 
 selves, despising death, to oppose an army of tens and
 
 202 FORT AMITY 
 
 hundreds of thousands. The Persian king sent for- 
 ward a horseman, and he came near and looked along 
 the pass, and saw but a few Greeks combing their hair 
 and dressing it carefully, as I am dressing mine." 
 
 " What happened, ma'amzelle ? " 
 
 " They died, and live in song for ever and ever ! 
 
 She faced them, her cheeks glowing, and lifted a 
 hand as the note of a sweet-toned bell rose upon the 
 morning air above the voices of the birds ; of the 
 chapel-bell ringing the garrison to Mass. 
 
 The two young men scrambled to their feet. 
 
 " Come ! " said Diane, and they walked back to the 
 Fort together.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 THE FLAGSTAFF TOWER 
 
 TIME pressing, the Commandant had gone straight 
 from the orderly-room in search of Father Joly. As 
 a soldier and a good Catholic he desired to be shriven, 
 and as a man of habit he preferred the old Cure to 
 Father Launoy. To be sure the Cure was deaf as a 
 post, but on the other hand the Commandant's worst 
 sins would bear to be shouted. 
 
 " There is yet one thing upon my conscience," he 
 wound up. " The fact is, I feel pretty sure of myself 
 in this business, but I have some difficulty in trusting 
 God." 
 
 It is small wonder that a confession so astonishing 
 had to be repeated twice, and even when he heard it 
 Father Job/ failed to understand. 
 
 " But how is it possible to mistrust God ? " he asked. 
 
 " Well, I don't know. I suppose that even in 
 bringing New France so near to destruction He is 
 acting in loving mercy ; but all the same it will be a 
 wrench to me if these English pass without paying us 
 the honour of a siege. For if we cannot force them 
 to a fight Montreal is lost." The Commandant 
 believed this absolutely. 
 
 Father Joly was Canadian born and bred ; had 
 received his education in the Seminary of Quebec ; 
 and, knowing nothing of the world beyond New France, 
 
 203
 
 204 FORT AMITY 
 
 felt no doubt upon which side God was fighting. If it 
 were really necessary to New France that the English 
 should be delayed and he would take the Com- 
 mandant's word for it why, then, delayed they 
 would be. This he felt able to promise. " And I in 
 my heart of hearts am sure of it," said the Command- 
 ant. " But in war one has to take account of every 
 chance, and this may pass sometimes for want of 
 faith." 
 
 So, like an honest gentleman, he took his absolution, 
 and afterwards went to Mass and spent half an hour 
 with his mind withdrawn from all worldly care, greatly 
 to his soul's refreshment. But with the ringing of 
 the sanctus bell a drum began to beat as it seemed, 
 on the very ridge of the chapel roof, but really from 
 the leads of the flagstaff tower high above it. Father 
 Launoy paused in the celebration, but was ordered 
 by a quiet gesture to proceed. Even at the close the 
 garrison stood and waited respectfully for their Com- 
 mandant to walk out, and followed in decent order to 
 the porch. Then they broke into a run pell-mell for 
 the walls. 
 
 But an hour passed before the first whaleboat with 
 its load of red uniforms pushed its way into sight 
 through the forest screen. Then began a spectacle 
 slow, silent, by little and little overwhelming. It 
 takes a trained imagination to realise great numbers, 
 and the men of Fort Amitie were soon stupefied and 
 ceased even to talk. It seemed to them that the 
 forest would never cease disgorging boats. 
 
 " A brave host, my children ! But we will teach 
 them that they handle a wasps' nest." 
 
 His men eyed the Commandant in doubt ; they 
 could scarcely believe that he intended to resist, now 
 that the enemy's strength was apparent. To their 
 minds war meant winning or losing, capturing or
 
 THE FLAGSTAFF TOWER 205 
 
 being captured. To fight an impossible battle, for 
 the mere sake of gaining time for troops they had 
 never seen, did not enter into their calculations. 
 
 So they eyed him, while still the flotilla increased 
 against the far background and came on whaleboats, 
 gunboats, batteaux, canoes ; and still in the lessening 
 interval along the waterway the birds sang. For the 
 British moved, not, as once upon Lake George, start- 
 ling the echoes with drums and military bands, but so 
 quietly that at half a mile's distance only the faint 
 murmur of splashing oars and creaking thole-pins 
 reached the ears of the watchers. 
 
 The Commandant suddenly lowered his glass and 
 closed it with a snap, giving thanks to God. For at 
 that distance the leading boats began heading in for 
 shore. 
 
 " Etienne, he intends at least to summon us ! " 
 
 So it proved. General Amherst was by no means 
 the man to pass and leave a hostile post in his rear. 
 His detractors, indeed, accused him of spending all 
 his time upon forts, either in building or in reducing 
 them. But he had two very good reasons for pausing 
 before Fort Amitie ; he did not know the strength of 
 its defenders, and he wanted pilots to guide his boats 
 down the rapids below. 
 
 Therefore he landed and sent an officer forward to 
 summon the garrison. 
 
 The officer presented himself at the river-gate, 
 and, having politely suffered Sergeant Bedard to 
 blindfold him, was led to the Commandant's quarters. 
 A good hour passed before he reappeared, the Com- 
 mandant himself conducting him ; and meantime 
 the garrison amused itself with wagering on the terms 
 of capitulation. 
 
 At the gate the Englishman's bandage was removed. 
 He saluted, and was saluted, with extreme ceremony.
 
 206 FORT AMITY 
 
 The Commandant watched him out of earshot, and 
 then, rubbing his hands, turned with a happy smile. 
 
 " To your guns, my children ! " 
 
 They obeyed him, while they wondered. He 
 seemed to take for granted that they must feel the 
 compliment paid them by a siege in form. 
 
 The day was now well advanced, and it seemed 
 at first that the British meant to let it pass without 
 a demonstration. Toward nightfall, however, four 
 gun-boats descended the river, anchored, and dropped 
 down the current, paying out their hawsers and feeling 
 their way into range. But the Fort was ready for 
 them, and opened fire before they could train their 
 guns ; a lucky shot cut the moorings of one clean 
 and close by the stem ; and, the current carrying her 
 inshore, she was hulled twice as she drifted down- 
 stream. The other three essayed a few shots without 
 effect in the dusk, warped back out of range, and 
 waited for daylight to improve their marksmanship. 
 
 And with daylight began one of the strangest of 
 sieges, between an assailant who knew only that 
 he had to deal with stout walls and a defender who 
 dared not attempt even a show of a sortie for fear of 
 exposing the weakness of his garrison. The French 
 had ammunition ^enough to last for a month, and 
 cannon enough to keep two hundred men busy ; and 
 ran from one gun to another, keeping up pretences, 
 but doing little damage in their hurry. Their lucky 
 opening shots had impressed Amherst, and he was 
 one to cling to a notion of his enemy's strength. He 
 solemnly effected a new landing at six hundred yards' 
 distance, opened his lines across the north-western 
 corner of the fort, kept his men entrenching for two 
 days and two nights, brought up thirty guns, and, 
 advancing them within two hundred yards, began 
 at his leisure to knock holes in the walls. Meantime
 
 THE FLAGSTAFF TOWER 20^ 
 
 twenty guns, anchored in the river, played on the 
 broad face of the fort and swept the Commandant's 
 lunette out of existence. And with all this prodigious 
 waste of powder but five of the garrison had fallen, 
 and three of these by the bursting of a single shell. 
 The defenders understood now that they were fighting 
 for time, and told each other that when their comedy 
 was played out and the inevitable moment came, 
 the British General would not show himself fierce in 
 revenge " provided," they would add, " the Seigneur 
 does not try his patience too far." It was Father 
 Launoy who set this whisper going from lip to lip, 
 and so artfully that none suspected him for its author ; 
 Father Launoy, who had been wont to excite the 
 patriotism of the faithful by painting the English as 
 devils in human shape. He was a brave man ; but 
 he held this resistance to be senseless, and did not 
 believe for an instant that Montreal would use the 
 delay, or, using it, would strike with any success. 
 
 At first the tremendous uproar of the enemy's 
 artillery and its shattering effect on the masonry of 
 their fortress had numbed the militiamen's nerves ; 
 they felt the place tumbling about their ears. But 
 as the hours passed they discovered that round-shot 
 could be dodged, and that even bursting shells, though 
 effective against stones and mortar, did surprisingly 
 small damage to life and limb ; and with this dis- 
 covery they began almost to taste the humour of the 
 situation. They fed and rested in bomb-proof 
 chambers which the Commandant and M. Etienne 
 had devised in the slope of earth under the terre- 
 plein ; and from these they watched and discussed 
 in safety the wreckage done upon the empty buildings 
 across the courtyard. 
 
 One of these caves had at the beginning of the siege 
 been assigned to Diane ; and from the mouth of it,
 
 2oS FORT AMITY 
 
 seated with Felicite beside her, she too watched the 
 demolition ; but with far different thoughts. She 
 knew better than these militiamen her father's obsti- 
 nacy, and that his high resolve reached beyond the 
 mere gaining of time. It seemed to her that God 
 was drawing out the agony ; and with the end before 
 her mind, she prayed Him to shorten this cruel interval. 
 
 Early on the third morning the British guns had 
 laid open a breach six feet wide at the north-western 
 .angle, close by the foot of the flagstaff tower; and 
 Amherst, who had sent off a detachment of the Forty- 
 sixth with a dozen Indian guides to fetch a circuit 
 through the woods and open a feint attack in the 
 rear of the fort, prepared for a general assault. But 
 first he resolved to summon the garrison again. 
 
 To carry his message he chose the same officer 
 .as before a Captain Muspratt, of the Forty-fourth 
 vRegiment. 
 
 Now as yet the cannonade had not slackened, and 
 it chanced that as the General gave Muspratt his 
 instructions an artillery sergeant, in command of a 
 battery of mortars on the left, which had been advanced 
 within two hundred yards of the walls, elevated one 
 of his pieces and lobbed a bomb clean over the summit 
 of the flagstaff tower. 
 
 It was a fancy shot, fired as the army learnt 
 afterwards for a wager ; but its effect staggered all 
 who watched it. The fuse was quick, and the bomb, 
 mounting on its high curve, exploded in a direct line 
 between the batter}' and the flagstaff. One or two 
 men from the neighbouring guns shouted bravos. 
 The sergeant slapped his thigh, and was turning for 
 congratulations, but suddenly paused, stock-still and 
 staring upward. 
 
 The flagstaff stood, apparently untouched, but 
 what had become of the flag ?
 
 THE FLAGSTAFF TOWER 209 
 
 A moment before it had been floating proudly enough 
 shaking its folds loose to the light breeze. Now it 
 was gone. Had the explosion blown it to atoms ? 
 Not a shred of it floated away on the wind. 
 
 A man on the sergeant's right called out positively 
 that a couple of seconds after the explosion, and 
 while the smoke was clearing, he had caught a glimpse 
 of something white something which looked like a 
 flag close by the foot of the staff ; and that an arm 
 had reached up and drawn it down hurriedly. He 
 would swear to the arm ; he had seen it distinctly 
 above the edge of the battlements. In his opinion 
 the fort was surrendering, and some one aloft there 
 had been pulling down the flag as the bomb burst. 
 
 The General, occupied for the moment in giving 
 Captain Muspratt his instructions, had not witnessed 
 the shot. But he turned at the shout which followed, 
 caught sight of the bare flagstaff, and, ordering his 
 bugler to sound the " Cease firing," sent forward the 
 captain at once to parley. 
 
 With Muspratt went a sergeant of the Forty-sixth 
 and a bugler. The sergeant carried a white flag. 
 Ascending the slope briskly, they were met at the gate 
 by M. Etienne. 
 
 The sudden disappearance of the flag above the 
 tower had mystified the garrison no less thoroughly 
 than the British. They knew the Commandant to 
 be aloft there with Sergeant Bedard, and the most of 
 the men could only guess, as their enemies had guessed, 
 that he was giving the signal of surrender. 
 
 But this M. Etienne could by no means believe ; 
 it belied his brother's nature as well as his declared 
 resolve. And so, while the English captain with 
 great politeness stated his terms which were un- 
 conditional surrender and nothing less the poor 
 gentleman kept glancing over his shoulder and
 
 210 FORT AMITY 
 
 answering at random, " Yes, yes," or " Precisely if 
 you will allow me," or " Excuse me a moment until 
 my brother In short, he rambled so that 
 
 Captain Muspratt could only suppose his wits un- 
 hinged. It was scarce credible that a sane man 
 could receive such a message inattentively, and yet 
 this old gentleman did not seem to be listening. 
 
 Diane meanwhile stood at the mouth of her shelter 
 with her eyes lifted, intent upon the tower's summit. 
 She, too, had seen the flag run down with the bursting 
 of the bomb, and she alone had hit in her mind on 
 the true explanation that a flying shard had cut 
 clean through the up halliard close to the staff, and 
 the flag heavy with golden lilies of her own working 
 had at once dropped of its own weight. She had, 
 caught sight, too, of her father's arm reaching up to 
 grasp it, and she knew why. The flagstaff had a 
 double set of halliards. 
 
 She waited waited confidently, since her father 
 was alive up there. She marvelled that he had escaped, 
 for the explosion had seemed to wrap the battlements 
 in one sheet of fire. Nevertheless he was safe she 
 had seen him and she waited for the flag to rise 
 again . 
 
 Minutes passed. She took a step forward from her 
 shelter. The firing had ceased and the courtyard 
 was curiously still and empty. Then four of the five 
 militiamen posted to watch the back of the building 
 came hurrying across towards the gateway. She 
 understood her senses being strung for the moment 
 so tensely that they seemed to relieve her of all trouble 
 of thinking she understood that a parley was going 
 forward at the gate, and that these men were hurrying 
 from their posts to hear it. In her ears the bugles 
 still sounded the " Cease firing " ; and still she gazed 
 up at the tower.
 
 THE FLAGSTAFF TOWER 211 
 
 Yes she had made no mistake ! The spare hal- 
 liards were shaking ; in a second or two but why 
 did they drag so interminably ? the flag would rise 
 again. 
 
 And it rose. Before her eyes, before the eyes of the 
 parleyers in the gateway and of the British watching 
 from their batteries ; it rose above the edge of the 
 battlements, and climbed half-way up the mast, or a 
 little short of half-way. Then it stopped climbed 
 a few feet higher and stopped again climbed yet 
 another foot and slowly, very slowly, fluttered 
 downward. * 
 
 With a dreadful surmise Diane started to run across 
 the courtyard toward the door at the foot of the tower ; 
 and even as she started a yell went up from the rear 
 of the fort, followed by a random volley of musketry 
 and a second yell a true Iroquois war-whoop. 
 
 In the gateway Captain Muspratt called promptly 
 to his bugler. The first yell had told him what was 
 happening : that the men of the Forty-sixth, sent 
 round for the feint attack, had found the rear wall 
 defenceless, and were escalading, in ignorance of the 
 parley at the gate. 
 
 Quick as thought the bugler sounded the British 
 recall, and its notes were taken up by bugle after 
 bugle down the slope. The Major commanding the 
 feint attack heard, comprehended after a fashion, and 
 checked his men ; and the Forty-sixth, as a well- 
 disciplined regiment, dropped off its scaling ladders 
 and came to heel. 
 
 But he could not check his Indian guides. Once 
 already on their progress down the river they had 
 been baulked of their lust to kill ; and this restraint 
 had liked them so little that already three-fourths of 
 Sir William Johnson's Iroquois were marching back 
 to their homes in dudgeon. These dozen bra\ es would
 
 212 FORT AMITY 
 
 not be cheated a second time if they could help it. 
 Disregarding the shouts and the bugle-calls, they 
 swarmed up the ladders, dropped within the fort, and 
 swept through the Commandant's quarters into the 
 courtyard. 
 
 In the doorway at the foot of the flagstaff tower a 
 woman's skirt fluttered for an instant and was gone. 
 They raced after it like a pack of mad dogs, and with 
 them ran one, an Ojibway, whom neither hate nor 
 lust, but a terrible fear, made fleeter than any. 
 
 Six of them reached the narrow doorway together, 
 snarling and jostling in their rage. The Ojibway 
 broke through first and led the way up the winding 
 stairway, taking it three steps at a time, with death 
 behind him now though of this he recked nothing 
 since he had clubbed an Oneida senseless in the door- 
 way, and these Indians, Oneidas all, had from the 
 start resented his joining the party of guides. 
 
 Never a yard separated him from the musket-butt 
 of the Indian who panted next after him ; but above, 
 at the last turning of the stair" under a trap-door 
 through which the sunlight poured, he caught again 
 the flutter of a woman's skirt. A ladder led through 
 the hatchway, and almost grasping her frock he 
 sprang up after Diane, flung himself on the leads, 
 reached out, and, clutching the hatch, slammed it 
 down on the foremost Oneida' s head. 
 
 As he slipped the bolt thank God it had a bolt ! 
 he heard the man drop from the ladder with a muffled 
 thud. Then, safe for a moment, he ran to the battle- 
 ments and shouted down at the pitch of his voice : 
 
 " Forty-sixth ! This way, Forty-sixth ! " 
 
 His voice sounded passing strange to him. Not 
 for two years had it been lifted to pronounce an 
 English word. 
 
 Having sent down his call, he ran back swiftly to
 
 THE FLAGSTAFF TOWER 213 
 
 the closed hatchway ; and as he knelt, pressing upon 
 it with both hands, his eyes met Diane's. 
 
 She stood by the flagstaff with a pistol in her hand. 
 But her hand hung stiffly by her hip as it had dropped 
 at the sound of his shout, and her eyes stared on him. 
 At her feet lay the Commandant, his hand still rigid 
 upon the halliards, his breast covered by the folds of 
 the fallen flag, and behind her, as the bursting shell had 
 killed and huddled it, the body of old Sergeant Bedard. 
 
 Why she stood there, pistol in hand, he could partly 
 guess. How these two corpses came here he could 
 not guess at all. The Commandant, mortally wounded, 
 had grasped at the falling flag, and with a dying effort 
 had bent it upon the spare halliards and tried to hoist. 
 It lay now, covering a wound which had torn his 
 chest open, coat and flesh, and laid his ribs bare. 
 
 But John a Cleeve, kneeling upon the hatchway, 
 understood nothing of this. What beat on his brain 
 was the vision of a face below the face of the officer 
 commanding turned upwards in blank astonish- 
 ment at his shout of " Forty-sixth ! This way, 
 Forty-sixth ! " 
 
 The Indians were battering the hatch with their 
 musket-butts. The bolt shook. He pressed his 
 weight down on the edge, keeping his head well back 
 to be out of the way of bullets. Luckily the timbers 
 of the hatch were stout, and moreover it had a leaden 
 casing, but this would avail nothing when the Indians 
 began to fire at the hinges as they surely would. 
 
 He found himself saying aloud in French, " Run, 
 mademoiselle ! I won't answer for the hinges. Call 
 again to the red-coats ! They will help ! " 
 
 But still, while blow after blow shook the hatch, 
 Diane crouched motionless, staring at him with wild 
 eyes. 
 
 " They will help," he repeated, with the air of one
 
 214 FORT AMITY 
 
 striving to speak lucidly ; then, with a change of 
 tone, " Give me your pistol, please." 
 
 She held it out obediently, at arm's length ; but 
 as he took it she seemed to remember, and crept close. 
 
 " Non non ! " she whispered. " C'est a moi 
 que tu le dois, enfin ! " 
 
 From the staircase- not close beneath the hatch, 
 but, as it seemed, far below their feet came the 
 muffled sound of shots, and between the shots hoarse 
 cries of rage. 
 
 " Courage ! " whispered John. He could tear 
 that men were grappling and fighting down there, 
 and supposed the Forty-sixth to be at hand. He 
 could not know that the parleyers at the gate, appalled 
 for an instant by the vision of Diane with a dozen 
 savages in chase, had rallied at a yell from Dominique 
 Guyon, pelted after him to the rescue, and were now 
 at grips with the rearmost Oneidas a locked and 
 heaving mass choking the narrow spirals of the stair- 
 way. 
 
 " Courage ! " he whispered again, and, pressing a 
 knee on the edge of the hatch, reached out a hand to 
 steady her. What mattered it if they died now- 
 together he and she ? " Tu dois " she loved him ; 
 her lips had betrayed her. " Tu dois " the words 
 sang through him, thrilling, bathing him in bliss. 
 
 " O my love ! O my love ! " 
 
 The blows beat upward against the hatch and 
 ceased. He sprang erect, slid an arm around her 
 and dragged her back not a second too soon. A 
 gun exploded against the hinges at their feet, blowing 
 one loose. John saw the crevices gaping and the 
 muzzle of a gun pushed through to prise it open. He 
 leaped upon the hatch, pistol in hand. 
 
 " Forty-sixth ! Forty-sixtli ! " 
 
 What was that ? Through the open crevice a
 
 THE FLAGSTAFF TOWER 215 
 
 British cheer answered him. The man levering 
 against his weight lost hold of the gun, leaving it 
 jammed. John heard the slide and thud of his fall. 
 
 " Hulloa ! " hailed a cheerful voice from the foot 
 of the ladder. " You there ! open the trap-way 
 and show us some light ! " 
 
 John knelt, slipped back the bolt, and turned to 
 Diane. She had fallen on her knees but what had 
 happened to her ? She was cowering before the joy 
 in his face, shrinking away from him and yet beseech- 
 ing him. 
 
 " Le pistolet donne-moi le pistolet ! " her voice 
 hissed on the word, her eyes petitioned him desper- 
 ately. " Ah, de grace ! tu n'a pas le droit 
 
 He understood. With a passing bitter laugh he 
 turned from her entreaties and hurled the pistol 
 across the battlements into air. A hand flung open 
 the latch. A British officer Etherington, Major 
 of the Forty-sixth pushed his head and shoulders 
 through the opening and stared across the leads, 
 panting, with triumphant, jolly face.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 \ 
 
 THE FORT SURRENDERS 
 
 THE red-coats, who had forced their way up the tower 
 by weight of numbers and at the point of the bayonet, 
 were now ordered to face about and clear the stair- 
 way ; which they did, driving the mixed rabble of 
 Canadians and Indians down before them, and collect- 
 ing the dead and wounded as they went. Five of 
 the Oneidas had been bayoneted or trampled to death 
 in the struggle ; two of the garrison would never fight 
 again, and scarcely a man had escaped cuts or bruises. 
 
 But Diane, as she followed her father's body down 
 the stairs, knew nothing of this. The dead and 
 wounded had been removed. The narrow lancet 
 windows let in a faint light, enough to reveal some 
 ugly stains and splashes on the walls ; but she walked 
 with fixed, unseeing eyes. Once only on the way 
 down her foot slid on the edge of a slippery step, and 
 she shivered. 
 
 In the sunlight outside the doorway a group of men, 
 mauled and sullen, some wearing bandages, others 
 with blood yet trickling down their faces, stood listen- 
 ing to an altercation between M. Etienne and a couple 
 of spick-and-span British officers. As their Com- 
 mandant's body came through the doorway they 
 drew together with a growl. Love was in that sound, 
 and helpless rage. One or two broke into sobs. 
 
 216
 
 THE FORT SURRENDERS 217 
 
 The British officers one of them was the General 
 himself, the other his messenger, Captain Muspratt, 
 bared their heads. M. Etienne, checked in the midst 
 of an harangue, stepped to Diane and took her hand 
 tenderly. 
 
 She gazed slowly around the group of battered 
 men. There was no reproach in her look Had she 
 not failed as miserably as they ? and yet it held a 
 world of injustice. She could not know that for her 
 sake they carried these wounds. And Dominique 
 Guyon, the one man who could have answered her 
 thoughts, stared savagely at the ground, offering no 
 defence. 
 
 " Dominique Guyon," commanded M. Etienne, 
 " four of you will relieve these messieurs of their 
 burden. Carry your master to the chapel where you 
 will find Father Launoy and Father Joly." 
 
 " But pardon me, monsieur," interposed Amherst 
 politely, " my soldiers will be proud to bear so gallant 
 a foe." 
 
 " I thank you" M. Etienne's brow was stiff and 
 obstinate " but I assert again that I still command 
 this fortress, and the bearers shall be of my choosing." 
 
 Diane laid a hand on her uncle's arm. " He is 
 dead," said she. " What matters it ? " She did 
 not understand this dispute. " Perhaps if I promise 
 M. le General that these men shall return to him 
 when they have laid my father in the chapel 
 
 The General a tall, horse-faced man with a shrewd 
 and not unkindly eye yielded the point at once. 
 " Willingly, mademoiselle, and with all the respect 
 an enemy may pay to your sorrow." 
 
 He ordered the men to give place to the new bearers. 
 
 In the chapel Diane sank on her knees, but not to 
 pray rather to escape the consolations of the two 
 priests and be alone with her thoughts. And her
 
 218 FORT AMITY 
 
 thoughts were not of her father. The stroke had 
 fallen ; but not yet could she feel the pain. He \vas 
 happy ; he alone of them all had kept his quiet vow, 
 and died disdaining defeat ; whereas she ah, there 
 lay the terrible thought ! she had not merely failed, 
 had not been overpowered. In the crisis, beside her 
 father's corpse, she had played the traitress to her 
 resolve. 
 
 The two priests moved about the body, arranging it, 
 fetching trestles, draperies, and candle for the lit de 
 parade, always with stealthy glances at the bowed 
 figure in the shadow just within the door. But she 
 knelt on, nor lifted her face. 
 
 In the sunlit courtyard without the two commanders 
 were still disputing. M. Etienne flatly refused to yield 
 up his sword, maintaining that he had never surren- 
 dered, had agreed to no terms of capitulation ; that 
 the red-coats had swarmed over his walls in the tem- 
 porary absence of their defenders, gathered at the 
 gateway to parley under a flag of truce, and should be 
 drawn off at once. 
 
 The mischief was, he could not be gainsaid. Major 
 JEtherington explained at first in English, to his Gen- 
 eral, and again, at his General's request, in the best 
 French, he could command, for the benefit of all, that 
 he had indeed heard the recall blown, and had with 
 difficulty drawn off his men from the scaling-ladders, 
 persuading them (as he himself was persuaded) that 
 the fort had surrendered. He knew nothing of the 
 white flag at the gateway, but had formed his conclu- 
 sions from the bugle-calls and the bare flagstaff above 
 the tower. 
 
 " Nevertheless, we had not capitulated," persisted 
 M. Etienne. 
 
 The Major continued that, albeit he had tried his 
 best, the Indians were not to be restrained. They had
 
 THE FORT SURRENDERS 219 
 
 poured into the fort, and, although he had obeyed the 
 bugles and kept his men back, it had cost him grave 
 misgivings. But when the jib way called down so 
 urgently from the summit of the tower, he had risked 
 disobedience, hoping to prevent the massacre which 
 he knew to be afoot. He appealed to his General to 
 approve, or at least condone, this breach of orders. 
 For undoubtedly massacre had been prevented. Wit- 
 ness the crowd he had found jammed in the stairway 
 and fighting ferociously. Witness the scene that had 
 met him at the head of the stairs. Here he swung 
 round upon John and beckoned him to stand out from 
 the listening group of red-coats. 
 
 " It can be proved, sir," he went on, addressing M. 
 Etienne, " that the lady your niece, is she not ? 
 owes her life, and more than her life perhaps, to this 
 savage. I claim only that, answering his call, I led 
 my men with all possible speed to the rescue. Up 
 there on the leads I found your brother lying dead, 
 with a sergeant dead beside him ; and their wounds 
 again will prove to you that they had perished by the 
 bursting of a shell. But this man alone stood on the 
 hatchway and held it against a dozen Iroquois, as your 
 niece will testify. What you suppose yourself to owe 
 him, I won't pretend to say ; but I tell you and I tell 
 you, General that cleaner pluck I never saw in my 
 life." 
 
 John, the soldiers pushing him forward, stood out 
 with bent head. He prayed that there might be no 
 Ojibway interpreter at hand ; he knew of none in the 
 fort but Father Launoy, now busy in the chapel laying 
 out the Commandant's body. Of all the spectators 
 there was but one the General himself who had not 
 known him either as Ensign John a Cleeve or as the 
 wounded sergeant from Ticonderoga. He had met 
 Captain Muspratt at Albany, and remembered him
 
 220 FORT AMITY 
 
 well on the march up the Hudson to Lake George. 
 With Major Etherington he had marched, messed, 
 played at cards, and lived in close comradeship for 
 months together only two years ago ! It was not 
 before their eyes that he hung his head, but before the 
 thought of two eyes that in the chapel yonder were 
 covered by the hands of a kneeling girl. 
 
 M. Etienne stepped forward and took his hand. 
 
 " I thank you, my friend if you can understand 
 my thanks." 
 
 Dominique Guy on, returning from the chapel, saw 
 only an Indian stepping back upon the ranks of 
 the red-coats, who clapped him on the shoulder for 
 a good fellow ; and Dominique paid him no more 
 attention, being occupied with M. Etienne's next 
 words. 
 
 " Nevertheless," said M. Etienne, turning upon 
 Amherst, " my duty to his Majesty obliges me to insist 
 that I have not capitulated ; and your troops, sir, 
 though they have done me this service, must be at once 
 withdrawn." 
 
 And clearly, by all the rules of war, M. Etienne had 
 the right on his side. Amherst shrugged his shoulders, 
 frowning and yet forced to smile the fix was so en- 
 tirely absurd. As discipline went in these North 
 American campaigns, he commanded a well-disciplined 
 army ; but numbers of provincials and batteau-men 
 had filtered in through the breaches almost unobserved 
 during the parley, and were now strolling about the 
 fortifications like a crowd of inquisitive tourists. He 
 ordered Major Etherington to clear them out, and 
 essayed once more to reason with the enemy. 
 
 " You do not seriously urge me, monsieur, to with- 
 draw my men and renew the bombardment ? " 
 
 " That is precisely what I require of you." 
 
 " But good heavens, my dear sir ! look at the
 
 THE FORT SURRENDERS 221 
 
 state of your walls ! " He waved a hand towards the 
 defences. 
 
 " I see them ; but you, sir, as a gentleman, should 
 have no eyes for their condition on this side." 
 
 The General arched his eyebrows and glanced from 
 M. Etienne to the Canadians ; he did not for a moment 
 mean to appeal to them, but his glance said involun- 
 tarily, " A pretty madman you have for commander ! " 
 
 And in fact they were already murmuring. What 
 nonsense was this of M. Etienne' s ? The fort had 
 fallen, as any man with eyes could see. Their Com- 
 mandant was dead. They had fought to gain time ? 
 Well, they had succeeded, and won compliments even 
 from their enemy. 
 
 Corporal Sans Quartier spoke up, " With all re- 
 spect, M. le Capitaine, if we fight again some of us 
 would like to know what we are fighting for." 
 
 M. Etienne swung round upon him. 
 
 " Tais-toi, poltron ! " 
 
 A murmur answered him ; and looking along the 
 line of faces he read sympathy, respect, even a little 
 shame, but nowhere the response he sought. 
 
 Nor did he reproach them. Bitter reproaches in- 
 deed shook his lips, but trembled there and died un- 
 uttered. For five maybe ten long seconds he 
 gazed, and so turned towards the General. 
 
 " Achevez, monsieur ! . . . Je vous demande par- 
 don si vous me trouvez un peu pointilleux." His 
 voice shook ; he unbuckled his sword, held it for a 
 moment between his hands as if hesitating, then offered 
 it to Amherst with the ghost of a bitter smile. " Cela 
 ne vaut pas sauf a moi la peine de le casser. ..." 
 
 He bowed, and would have passed on towards the 
 chapel. Amherst gently detained him. 
 
 " I spare you my compliments, sir, and my condo- 
 lence ; they would be idly offered to a brave man at
 
 222 FORT AMITY 
 
 such a moment. Forgive me, though, that I cannot 
 spare to consult you on my own affairs. Time presses 
 with us. You have, as I am told, good pilots here who 
 know the rapids between this and Montreal, and I 
 must beg to have them pointed out to me." 
 
 M. Etienne paused. " The best pilots, sir, are 
 Dominique Guyon there, and his brother Bateese. 
 But you will find that most of these men know the 
 river tolerably well." 
 
 " And the rest of your garrison ? Your pardon, 
 again, but I must hold you responsible, to deliver up 
 all your men within the Fort." 
 
 " I do not understand. . . . This, sir, is all the 
 garrison of Fort Amitie." 
 
 Amherst stared at the nineteen or twenty hurt and 
 dishevelled men ranged against the tower wall, then 
 back into a face impossible to associate with untruth. 
 
 " M. le Capitaine," said he very slowly, " if with 
 these men you have made a laughing-stock of me for 
 two days and a half, why then I owe you a grudge. 
 But something else I owe, and must repay at once. 
 Be so good as to receive back a sword, sir, of which I 
 am all unworthy to deprive you." 
 
 But as he proffered it, M. Etienne put up both hands 
 to thrust the gift away, then covered his face with 
 them. 
 
 " Not now, monsieur not now ! To-morrow, per- 
 haps . . . but not now, or I may break it indeed ! " 
 
 Still with his face covered, he tottered off towards 
 the chapel.
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 
 THE RAPIDS 
 
 THEY had run the Galops Rapids, Point Iroquois, 
 Point Cardinal, the Rapide Plat, without disaster 
 though not without heavy toil. The fury of the falls 
 far exceeded Amherst's expectations, but he believed 
 that he had seen the worst, and he blessed the pilotage 
 of Dominique and Bateese Guyon. 
 
 Here and there the heavier batteaux carrying the 
 guns would be warped or pushed and steadied along 
 shore in the shallow water under the bank, by gangs, 
 to avoid some peril over which the whaleboats rode 
 easily ; and this not only delayed the flotilla, but 
 accounted for the loss of a. few men caught at unawares 
 by the edge of the current, swept off their legs, and 
 drowned. 
 
 On the first day of September they ran the Long 
 Saut and floated across the still basin of Lake St. 
 Francis. At the foot of the lake the General landed a 
 company or two of riflemen to dislodge La Corne's 
 militia ; but La Corne was already falling back upon 
 the lower rapids, and, as it turned out, this redoubt- 
 able partisan gave no trouble at all. 
 
 They reached and passed Coteau du Lac on the 3rd. 
 
 Dominique and Bateese steered the two leading 
 whaleboats, setting the course for the rest as they 
 had set it all the way down from Fort Amitie. By 
 
 223
 
 224 FORT AMITY 
 
 M. Etienne's request, he and his niece and the few dis- 
 abled prisoners from the fort travelled in these two 
 boats under a small guard. It appeared that the 
 poor gentleman's wits were shaken ; he took an 
 innocent pride now in the skill of the two brothers, his 
 family's censitaires, and throughout the long days 
 he discoursed on it wearisomely. The siege his 
 brother's death Fort Amitie itself and his two years 
 and more of residence there seemed to have faded 
 from his mind. He spoke of Boisveyrac as though he 
 had left it but a few hours since. 
 
 " And the General," said he to Diane, " will be 
 interested in seeing the Seigniory." 
 
 " A sad sight, monsieur ! " put in Bateese, over- 
 hearing him. (Just before embarking, M. Etienne, 
 Diane, and Felicite had been assigned to Bateese's 
 boat, while Father Launoy, Father Joly, and two 
 wounded prisoners travelled in Dominique's.) " A 
 sight to break the heart ! We passed it, Dominique and 
 I, on our way to and from Montreal. Figure to your- 
 self that the corn was standing already over-ripe, and 
 it will be standing yet, though we are in September ! " 
 
 "The General will make allowances," answered 
 M. Etienne with grave simplicity. " He will under- 
 stand that we have had no time for harvesting of late. 
 Another year 
 
 Diane shivered. And yet was it not better to 
 dote thus, needing no pity, happy as a child, than to 
 live sane and feel the torture ? Better, perhaps, but 
 best and blessedest to escape the choice as her father 
 had escaped it ! As the river bore her nearer to 
 Boisveyrac she saw his tall figure pacing the familiar 
 shores, pausing to con the acres that were his, and had 
 been his father's and his father's father's. She saw 
 and understood that smile of his which had so often 
 puzzled her as a child when she had peered up into his
 
 THE RAPIDS 225 
 
 face under its broad-brimmed hat and noted his eyes 
 as they rested on the fields, the clearings, the forest ; 
 noted his cheeks reddened with open-air living ; his 
 firm lips touched with pride the pride of a king tread- 
 ing his undisputed ground. In those days she and 
 Armand had been something of an enigma to their 
 father, and he to them ; their vision tinged and 
 clouded, perhaps, by a drop or two of dusky Indian 
 blood. But now he had suddenly become intelligible 
 to her, an heroic figure, wonderfully simple. She let 
 her memory call up picture after picture of him as 
 he sat in the great parlour hearing " cases," dispensing 
 fatherly justice ; as he stood up at a marriage feast to 
 drink the bride's and bridegroom's health and com- 
 mend their example to all the young habitants ; as he 
 patted the heads of the children trooping to their first 
 communion ; as he welcomed his censitaires on St. 
 Martin's day, when they poured in with their rents 
 wheat, eggs, and poultry the poultry all alive, heels 
 tied, heads down, throats distended and squalling 
 until the barnyard became Babel, and still he went 
 about pinching the fowls' breasts, running the corn 
 through his hands, dispensing a word of praise here, 
 a prescription there, and kindness everywhere. Now 
 bad harvests would vex him no more, nor the fate of 
 his familiar fields. In the wreck of all he had lived 
 for, his life had stood up clear for a moment, complete 
 in itself and vindicated. And the moment which had 
 revealed had also ended it ; he lay now beneath the 
 chapel pavement at Fort Amitie, indifferently awaiting 
 judgment, his sword by his side. 
 
 They ran the Cedars and, taking breath on the 
 smooth waters below, steered for the shore where the 
 towers and tall chimneys of Boisveyrac crept into 
 view, and the long facade of the Seigniory slowly 
 unfolding itself from the forest.
 
 226 FORT AMITY 
 
 Here the leading boats were brought to land while 
 the flotilla collected itself for the next descent. A 
 boat had capsized and drowned its crew in the Long 
 Saut, and Amherst had learnt the lesson of tint acci- 
 dent, and thenceforward permitted no struggling. 
 Constant to his rule, too, of leaving no post in his rear 
 until satisfied that it was harmless, he proposed to 
 inspect the Seigniory, and sent a message desiring 
 M. Etienne's company and mademoiselle's, if to 
 grant this favour would not distress her. 
 
 Diane prayed to be excused ; but M. Etienne 
 accepted with alacrity. He had saluted the first 
 glimpse of the homestead with a glad cry, eager as a 
 school-boy returning for his holidays. He met the 
 General on the slope with a gush of apologies. " He 
 must overlook the unkempt condition of the fields. 
 . . . Boisveyrac was not wont to make so poor a 
 show . . . the estate, in fact, though not rich, had 
 always been well kept up ... the stonework was 
 noted throughout New France, and every inch of 
 timber (would M. le General observe ?) thoroughly 
 well seasoned. . . . Yes, those were the arms above 
 the entrance Noel quartering Tilly two of the 
 oldest families in the province. . . . If M. le General 
 took an interest in heraldry, these other quarterings 
 were worth perusal . . . de Repentingy, de Con- 
 trecoeur, Traversy, St. Ours, de Valrennes, de la 
 Mothe, d'Ailleboust . . . and the windmill would 
 repay an ascent . . . the view from its summit was 
 magnificent. . . ." 
 
 Diane, seated in the boat and watching, saw him 
 halt and point out the escutcheons ; saw him halt 
 again in the gateway and spread out his arms to indi- 
 cate the solidity of the walls ; could almost, reading 
 his gestures, hear the words they explained : and her 
 cheeks burned with shame.
 
 THE RAPIDS 227 
 
 *' A fine estate ! " said a voice in the next boat. 
 
 " Yes, indeed," answered Bateese at her elbow ; 
 " there is no Seigniory to compare with Boisveyrac. 
 And we will live to welcome you back to it, made- 
 moiselle. The English are no despoilers, they tell 
 me." 
 
 She glanced at Dominique. He had filled a pipe, 
 and, as he smoked, his eyes followed her uncle's ges- 
 tures placidly. Scorn of him, scorn of herself, intoler- 
 able shame, rose in a flood together. 
 
 " If my uncle behaves like a roturier, it is because 
 his mind is gone. Shall we spy on him and laugh ? 
 ghosts of those who are afraid to die ! " 
 
 Father Launoy looked up from his breviary. 
 
 " Mademoiselle is unjust," said he quietly. ''' To 
 my knowledge, those servants of hers, whom she 
 reproaches, have risked death and taken wounds, in 
 part for her sake." 
 
 Diane sat silent, gazing upon the river. Yes, she 
 had been unjust, and she knew it. Felicite had told 
 her how the garrison had rushed after Dominique to 
 rescue her, and of the struggle in the stairway of the 
 tower. Dominique bore an ugly cut, half-healed yet, 
 reaching from his right eyebrow across the cheekbone 
 the gash of an Indian knife. Bateese could steer 
 with his left hand only ; his right he carried in a sling. 
 And the two men lying at this moment by Father 
 Launoy' s feet had taken their wounds for her sake. 
 Unjust she had been ; bitterly unjust. How could 
 she explain the secret of her bitterness that she 
 despised herself ? 
 
 Boats were crowding thick around them now, many 
 of them half filled with water. The crews, while they 
 baled, had each a separate tale to tell of their latest 
 adventure ; each, it seemed, had escaped destruction 
 by a hair's-breadth. The Cedars had been worse 'even
 
 228 FORT AMITY 
 
 than the Long Saut. They laughed and boasted, 
 wringing their clothes. The nearest flung questions 
 at Dominique, at Bateese. The Cascades, they under- 
 stood, were the worst in the whole chain of rapids, 
 always excepting the La Chine. But the La Chine 
 were not to be attempted ; the army would land 
 above them, at Isle Perrot perhaps, or at the village 
 near the falls, and cover the last nine or ten miles on 
 foot. But what of the Buisson ? and of the Roches 
 Fendues ? 
 
 More than an hour passed in this clamour, and still 
 the boats continued to crowd around. The first- 
 comers, having baled, were looking to their accoutre- 
 ments, testing the powder in their flasks, repolishing 
 the locks and barrels of their muskets. " To be sure 
 La Corne and his militiamen had disappeared, but 
 there was still room for a skirmish between this and 
 Lake St. Louis ; if he had posted himself on the bank 
 below, he might prove annoying. The rapids were 
 bad enough without the addition of being fired upon 
 during the descent, when a man had work enough to 
 hold tight by the gunwale and say his prayers. Was the 
 General sending a force down to clear La Corne out ? " 
 
 " Diane ! " 
 
 A crowd of soldiers had gathered on the bank, shut- 
 ting out all view of the Seigniory. Diane, turning at 
 the sound of her uncle's voice, saw the men make way, 
 and caught her breath. He was not alone. He came 
 through the press triumphantly, dragging by the hand 
 an Indian an Indian who hung back from the river's 
 brink with eyes averted, fastened on the ground the 
 man whom, of all men, she most feared to meet. 
 
 " Diane, the General has been telling me this 
 honest fellow we have been most remiss 
 
 M. Etienne panted, as he picked his steps down the 
 the bank. His face was glowing.
 
 THE RAPIDS 229 
 
 He understands a little French, it seems. I 
 have the General's permission to give him a seat in 
 our boat. He tells me he is averse to being thanked, 
 but that is nonsense. I insisted on his coming." 
 
 " You have thanked me once already, monsieur," 
 urged John a Cleeve in a voice as low as he could 
 pitch it. 
 
 " But not sufficiently. You hear, Diane ? he 
 speaks French ! I was confused at the time ; I did 
 not gather " 
 
 She felt Dominique's eyes upon her. Was her face 
 so white then ? He must not guess. . . . She held 
 out her hand, commanding her voice to speak easily, 
 wondering the while at the sound of it. 
 
 " Welcome, my friend. Mty uncle is right ; we 
 have been remiss " 
 
 Her voice trailed off, as her eyes fell on Father 
 Launoy. He was staring, not at her, but at the 
 Indian ; curiously at first, then with dawning sus- 
 picion. 
 
 Involuntarily she glanced again towards Dominique. 
 He, too, slowly moved his gaze from her face and 
 fastened it on the Indian. 
 
 He knew. . . . Father Launoy knew. . . . Oh, 
 when would the boats push off ? 
 
 They pushed off and fell into their stations at length, 
 amid almost interminable shouting of orders and cross- 
 shouting, pulling and backing of oars. She had stolen 
 one look at Bateese. . . . He did not suspect . . . 
 but, in the other boat, they knew. 
 
 Her uncle's voice ran on like a brook. She could 
 not look up, for fear of meeting her lover's eyes yes, 
 her lover's ! She was reckless now. They knew. 
 She would deceive herself no longer. She was base 
 base. He stood close, and in his presence she was 
 glad fiercely, deliciously, desperately. She, betrayed 
 
 H'
 
 230 FORT AMITY 
 
 in all her vows, was glad. The current ran smoothly. 
 If only, bej^ond the next ledge, might lie annihilation ! 
 
 The current ran with an oily smoothness. They 
 were nearing the Roches Fendues. 
 
 Dominique's boat led. 
 
 A clear voice began to sing, high and loud, in a ring- 
 ing tenor : 
 
 " Malbrouck s'en va t'en guerre : 
 Mironton, mironton, mirontaine. . . ." 
 
 At the first note John a Cleeve, glancing swiftly at 
 Bateese, saw his body stiffen suddenly with his hand 
 on the tiller ; saw his eyes travel forward, seeking his 
 brother's ; saw his face whiten. Dominique stood 
 erect, gazing back, challenging. Beyond him John 
 caught a glimpse of Father Launoy looking up from 
 his breviary ; and the priest's face, too, was white 
 and fixed. 
 
 Voices in the boats behind began to curse loudly ; 
 for " Malbrouck " was no popular air with the 
 English. But Bateese took up the chant : 
 
 " Malbrouck s'en va t'en guerre 
 Ne sais quand reviendra ! " 
 
 They were swinging past Bout de 1'Isle. Already 
 the keel under foot was gathering way. From 
 Bateese, who stood with eyes stiffened now and 
 inscrutable, John looked down upon Diane. She 
 lifted her face with a wan smile, but she, too, was 
 listening to the challenge flung back from the leading 
 boat. 
 
 " II reviendra-z a Paques. . . ." 
 
 He flung one glance over his shoulder, and saw the 
 channel dividing ahead. Dominique was leaning 
 over, p/essing down the helm to starboard. Over 
 Dominique's arm Father Launoy stared rigidly.
 
 THE RAPIDS 231 
 
 Father Joly, as if aware of something amiss, had cast 
 out both hands and was grasping the gunwale. The 
 boat, sucked into the roar of the rapids, shot down 
 the left channel the channel of death. 
 
 " II reviendra-z a Paques, 
 Ou a la Trinite ! " 
 
 The voice was lost in the roar of the falls, now 
 drumming loud in John's ears. He knew nothing of 
 these rapids ; but two channels lay ahead, and the 
 choice between them. He leapt across M. Etienne, 
 and, hurling Bateese aside, seized the tiller and thrust 
 it hard over, heading for the right. 
 
 Peering back through the spray as he bent, he saw 
 the helmsmen astern staring hesitating. They had 
 but a second or two in which to choose. He shouted 
 and shouted again in English. But the tumbling 
 waters roared high above his shouts. 
 
 He reached out and, gripping Bateese by the collar, 
 forced the tiller into his hand. Useless now to look 
 back and try to discover how many boats were follow- 
 ing ! 
 
 Bateese, with a sob, crept -back to the tiller and 
 steered. 
 
 Not until the foot of the falls was reached did John 
 know that the herd had followed him. But forty-six 
 boats had followed Dominique's fatal lead : and of 
 their crews ninety red-coated corpses tossed with 
 Dominique's and the two priests' and spun in the 
 eddies beneath the Grand Bouittie. 
 
 At dawn next morning the sentries in Montreal 
 caught sight of them drifting down past the walls, and 
 carried the news. So New France learnt that its hour 
 was near.
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 DICK'S JUDGMENT 
 
 Two days later Amherst landed his troops at La Chine, 
 marched them unopposed to Montreal, and encamped 
 before the city on its western side. Within the walls 
 M. de Vaudreuil called a council of war. 
 
 Resistance was madness. From east, south, west, 
 the French commanders Bourlamaque, Bougain- 
 ville, Roquemaure, Dumas, La Corne had all fallen 
 back, deserted by their militias. The provincial 
 army had melted down to two hundred men ; the 
 troops of the line numbered scarce above two 
 thousand. The city, crowded with non-combatant 
 refugees, held a bare fortnight's provisions. Its 
 walls, built for defence against Indians, could not 
 stand against the guns which Amherst was already 
 dragging up from the river ; its streets of wooden 
 houses awaited only the first shell to set them 
 ablaze. 
 
 On the eastern side Murray was moving closer, to 
 encamp for the siege. To the south the tents of 
 Haviland's army dotted the river shore. Seventeen 
 thousand British and British-Colonials ringed about 
 all that remained of New France, ready to end her by 
 stroke of sword if Vaudreuil would not by stroke of 
 pen. 
 
 Next morning Bougainville sought Amherst's tent
 
 DICK'S JUDGMENT 233 
 
 and presented a bulky paper containing fifty-five 
 articles of capitulation. Amherst read them through, 
 and came to the demand that the troops should 
 march out with arms, cannon, flags, and all the 
 honours of war. " Inform the Governor," he an- 
 swered, " that the whole garrison of Montreal, and 
 all other French troops in Canada, must lay down their 
 arms, and undertake not to serve again in this war." 
 Bougainville bore his message, and returned in a little 
 while to remonstrate ; but in vain. Then Levis 
 tried his hand, sending his quarter-master-general to 
 plead against terms so humiliating, " terms," he 
 wrote, " to which it will not be possible for us to 
 subscribe." Amherst replied curtly that the terms 
 were harsh, and he had made them so intentionally ; 
 they marked his sense of the conduct of the French 
 throughout the \var in exciting their Indian allies to 
 atrocity and murder. 
 
 So Fort William Henry was avenged at length, in 
 the humiliation of gallant men ; and human ven- 
 geance proved itself, perhaps, neither more nor less 
 clumsy than usual. 
 
 Vaudreuil tried to extract that the English should, 
 on their side, pack off their Indians. He represented 
 that the townsfolk of Montreal stood in terror of 
 being massacred. Again Amherst refused. " No 
 Frenchman," said he, " surrendering under treaty 
 has ever suffered outrage from the Indians of our 
 army."^ This was on the 7th of September. 
 
 Early on the 8th Vaudreuil yielded and signed the 
 capitulation. Levis, in the name of the army, pro- 
 tested bitterly. " If the Marquis de Vaudreuil, 
 through political motives, believes himself obliged to 
 surrender the colony at once, we beg his leave to 
 withdraw with the troops of the line to Isle Sainte- 
 Helene, to maintain there, on our own behalf, the
 
 234 FORT AM IT* 
 
 honour of the King's Arms." To this, of course, the 
 Governor could not listen. Before the hour of 
 surrender the French regiments burnt their flags. 
 
 On the southern shore of the St. Lawrence, in the 
 deepest recess of a small, curving bay, the afternoon 
 sun fell through a screen of bulrushes upon a birch 
 canoe and a naked man seated in the shallows beside 
 it. In one hand he held out, level with his head, a 
 lock of hair, dark and long and matted, while the other 
 sheared at it with a razor. The razor flashed as he 
 turned it this way and that against the sun. On his 
 shoulders and raised upper arm a few water-drops 
 glistened, for he had been swimming. 
 
 The severed locks fell into the stream that rippled 
 beside him through the bulrush stems. Some found a 
 channel at once and were swept out of sight, otheis 
 were caught against the stems and trailed out upon 
 the current like queer water-flags. He laid the razor 
 back in the canoe, and, rising cautiously, looked about 
 for a patch of clear, untroubled w r ater to serve him 
 for a mirror ; but small eddies and cross-currents 
 dimpled the surface everywhere, and his search was 
 not a success. Next he fetched forth from the canoe 
 an earthenware pan with lye and charcoal, mixed a 
 paste and began to lather his head briskly. 
 
 Twice he paused in his lathering. Before his 
 shelter rolled the great river, almost two miles broad ; 
 and clear across that distance, from Montreal, came 
 the sound of drums beating, bells ringing, men shout- 
 ing and cheering. In the Place d'Armes, over yonder, 
 Amherst was parading his troops to receive the formal 
 surrender of the Marquis de Vaudreuil. Murray and 
 Haviland were there, leading their brigades, with 
 Gage and Fraser and Burton ; Carleton and Haldi- 
 mand and Howe Howe of the Heights of Abraham,
 
 DICK'S JUDGMENT 235 
 
 brother of him who fell in the woods under Ticon- 
 deroga ; the great Johnson of the Mohawk Valley, 
 whom the Iroquois obeyed ; Rogers of the backwoods 
 and his brothers, bravest of the brave ; Schuyler 
 and Lyman ; and over against them, drinking the 
 bitterest cup of their lives, Levis and Bourlamaque 
 and Bougainville, Dumas, Pouchot, and de la Corne 
 victors and vanquished, all the surviving heroes 
 of the five years' struggle face to face in the city 
 square. 
 
 Hi motus animorum atque hcec certamina tanta the 
 half of North America was changing hands at this 
 moment, and how a bare two miles' distance dimin- 
 ished it all ! What child's play it made of the rattling 
 drums ! From his shelter John a Cleeve could see 
 almost the whole of the city's river front all of it, 
 indeed, but a furlong or two at its western end ; and 
 the clean atmosphere showed up even the loopholes 
 pierced in the outer walls of the great Seminary. 
 Above the old-fashioned square bastions of the citadel 
 a white flag floated ; and that this flag bore a red 
 cross instead of the golden lilies it had borne yesterday 
 was the one and only sign, not easily discerned, of a 
 reversal in the fates of two nations. The steeples and 
 turrets of Montreal, the old windmill, the belfry and 
 high-pitched roof of Notre Dame de Bonsecours, the 
 massed buildings of the Seminary and the Hotel Dieu, 
 the spire of the Jesuits, rose against the green shaggy 
 slopes of the mountain, and over the mountain the 
 sky paled tranquilly toward evening. Sky, mountain, 
 forests, mirrored belfry and broad, rolling river a 
 permanent peace seemed to rest on them all. 
 
 Half a mile down-stream, where Haviland's camp 
 began, the men of the nearest picket were playing 
 chuck-farthing. Duty deprived them of the spectacle 
 in the Place d'Armes, and thus, as soldiers, they
 
 236 FORT AMITY 
 
 solaced themselves. Through the bulrush stems John 
 heard their voices and laughter. 
 
 A canoe came drifting down the river, across the 
 opening of the little creek. A man sat in it with his 
 paddle laid across his knees ; and as the stream bore 
 him past, his eyes scanned the water in-shore. John 
 recognised Bateese at once ; but Bateese, after a 
 glance, went by unheeding. It was no living man 
 he sought. 
 
 John finished his lathering at leisure, waded out 
 beyond the rushes, and cast himself forward into deep 
 water. He swam a few strokes, ducked his head, 
 dived, and swam on again ; turned on his back and 
 floated, staring up into the sky ; breasted the strong 
 current and swam against it, fighting it in sheer light- 
 ness of heart. Boyhood came back to him with his 
 cleansing, and a boyish memory of an hour between 
 sunset and moonrise ; of a Devonshire lane, where 
 the harvest waggons had left wisps of hay dangling 
 from the honeysuckles ; of a triangular patch of turf 
 at the end of the lane, and a whitewashed Meeting- 
 House with windows open, and through the windows 
 a hymn pouring forth upon the Sabbath twilight : 
 
 " Time, like an ever-rolling stream, 
 Bears all his sons away. . ." 
 
 An ever-rolling stream ! It would bear him down, 
 and the generals yonder, victors and vanquished, 
 drums and trumpets, hopes and triumphs and despair 
 overwhelming, making equal the greater with the 
 less. But meanwhile, how good to be alive and a 
 man, to swim and breast it ! So this river, if he 
 fought it, would out-tire him, sweep him away, and 
 roll on unheeding, majestic, careless of life and of 
 time. But for this moment he commanded it. Let 
 his new life bring what it might, this hour the river
 
 DICK'S JUDGMENT 237 
 
 should be his servant, should prepare and wash him 
 clean, body and soul. He lifted his head, shaking 
 the water from his eyes, and the very volume of the 
 lustral flood contented him. He felt the strong 
 current pressing against his arms, and longed to 
 embrace it all. And again, tickled by the absurdity 
 of his fancies, he lay on his back and laughed up at 
 the sky. 
 
 He swam to shore, flung himself down, and panted. 
 Across the river, by the landing-stage beneath the 
 citadel, a band was playing down Haviland's brigade 
 to its boats ; and one of the boats was bringing a 
 man whom John had great need to meet. When the 
 sun had dried and warmed him, he dressed at leisure, 
 putting on a suit complete, with striped shirt, socks, 
 and cowhide boots purchased from a waterside trader 
 across the river, and paid for with the last of his 
 moneys earned in the wilderness. The boots, though 
 a world too wide, cramped him painfully ; and he 
 walked up and down the bank for a minute or two, 
 to get accustomed to them, before strolling down to 
 meet the challenge of the pickets. 
 
 They were men of the lyth, and John inquired for 
 their adjutant. They pointed to the returning boats. 
 The corporal in charge of the picket, taking note of 
 his clothes, asked if he belonged to Loring's batteau- 
 men, and John answered that he had come down with 
 them through the falls. 
 
 " A nice mess you made of it up yonder," was 
 the corporal's comment. " Two days we were on 
 fatigue duty picking up the bodies you sent down to 
 us, and burying them. Only just now a fellow came 
 along in a canoe a half-witted kind of Canadian. 
 Said he was searching for his brother." 
 
 " Yes," said John, " I saw him go by. I know the 
 man." 
 
 H*
 
 238 FORT AMITY 
 
 " Hell of a lot of brother he's likely to find. We've 
 tidied up the whole length of the camp front. But 
 there's corpses yet, a mile or two below, they sa} r . 
 I sent- him down to take his pick." 
 
 He put a question or two about the catastrophe. 
 " Scandalous sort of bungle," he pronounced it, be'ing 
 alike ignorant of the strength of the rapids, and fain, 
 as an honest soldier of Haviland's arm y, to take a 
 discrediting view of anything done by Amherst's. 
 He waxed very scornful indeed. 
 
 " Now we was allowing you didn't find the stream 
 fast enough, by the way you kept us cooling our heels 
 here." Perceiving that John was indisposed to 
 quarrel, he went wearily back to his chuck-farthing. 
 
 John sat down and waited, scanning the boats 
 as they drew to shore. Dick, whom he had left an 
 ensign, was now adjutant of the I7th. This meant, 
 of course, that he had done creditably and made 
 himself felt. It meant certain promotion, too ; Dick 
 being the very man, as adjutant, to lick a regiment 
 into shape. John could not help pondering a little, 
 by contrast, on his own career, but without any tinge 
 of jealousy or envy. Dick owed nothing to luck ; 
 would honestly earn or justify any favour that Fortune 
 might grant. 
 
 The young adjutant, stepping ashore, swung round 
 on his heel to call an order to the crowding boats. 
 His voice, albeit John thrilled to the sound of it, was 
 not the voice he remembered. It had hardened 
 somehow. And his face, when John caught sight of 
 it in profile, was not the face of a man on the sunny 
 side of favour. It was manlier, more resolute per- 
 haps than of old, but it had put on reserve, and 
 showed even some discontent in the set of, the chin 
 a handsome face yet, and youthful, and full of eager 
 strength ; but with a shadow on it (thought John)
 
 DICK'S JUDGMENT 239 
 
 that it had not worn in the days when Dick Mont- 
 gomery took his young ease in Sion and criticised 
 men and generals. 
 
 He was handling the disembarkation well. Clearly, 
 too, his men respected and liked him. But (thought 
 John again) who could help loving him ? John had 
 not bargained for the rush of tenderness that shook 
 him as he stood there unperceived and left him 
 trembling. For a moment he longed only to escape ; 
 and then, mastered by an impulse, scarce knowing 
 what he did, stepped forward and touched his cousin's 
 arm. 
 
 " Dick ! " he said softly. 
 
 Montgomery turned, cast a sharp glance at him, 
 and fell back staring. 
 
 " YouJ" John saw the lips form the word, but 
 no sound came. He himself was watching Dick's 
 eyes. 
 
 Yes, as incredulity passed, joy kindled in them, 
 and the old affection. For once in his life Richard 
 Montgomery fairly broke down. 
 
 "Jack!" he stretched out both hands. "We 
 heard You were not among the prisoners 
 His voice stammered to a halt ; his eyes brimmed. 
 
 " Come, and hear all about it. Oh, Dick, Dick, 
 'tis good to see your face again ! " 
 
 They linked arms, and Dick suffered John to lead 
 him back to the canoe among the rushes. 
 
 " My mother . . . ? " asked John, halting there 
 1 y the brink. 
 
 " You haven't heard ? " Dick turned his face and 
 stared away across the river. 
 
 " I have heard nothing. ... Is she dead ? " 
 
 Dick bent his head gravely. " A year since. . . . 
 Your brother Philip wrote the news to me. It was
 
 240 FORT AMITY 
 
 sudden : just a failure of the heart, he said. She 
 had known of the danger for years, but concealed 
 it." 
 
 John seated himself on the bank, and gazed out 
 over the river for a minute or so in silence. " She 
 believed me dead, of course ? " he began, but did not 
 ask how the blow had affected her. Likely enough 
 Dick would not know. " Is there any more bad 
 news ? " he asked at length. 
 
 " None. Your brother is well, and there's another 
 child born. The a Cleeves are not coming to an end 
 just yet. No more questions, Jack, until you've 
 told me all about yourself ! " 
 
 He settled down to listen, and John, propping 
 himself on an elbow, began his tale. 
 
 Twice or thrice during the narrative Dick furrowed 
 his brows in perplexity. When, however, John came 
 to tell of his second year's sojourn with the O jib ways, 
 he sat up with a jerk and stared at his cousin in a 
 blank dismay. 
 
 " But, good Lord ! You said just now that this 
 fellow this Menehwehna had promised to help you 
 back to the army as soon as Spring came. Did he 
 break his word then ? " 
 
 " No : he would have kept his word. But I didn't 
 want to return." 
 
 ' You didn't want to return ! " Dick repeated 
 the words slowly, trying to grasp them. " Man alive, 
 were you clean mad ? Don't you see what cards you 
 held ? Oh," he groaned, " you're not going on to tell 
 me that you threw them away the chance of a 
 lifetime ! " 
 
 " I don't see," answered John simply. 
 
 Dick sprang up and paced the bank with his hands 
 clenched, half lifted. " God ! if such a chance had 
 fallen to me ! You had intercepted two despatches,
 
 DICK'S JUDGMENT 241 
 
 one of which might have hurried the French up from 
 Montreal here to save Fort Frontenac. Wherever 
 you could you bungled ; but you rode on the full tide 
 of luck. And even when you tumbled in love with 
 this girl oh, you needn't deny it ! even when you 
 walked straight into the pitfall that ninety-nine men 
 in a hundred would have seen and avoided your 
 very folly pulled you out of the mess ! You escaped 
 by her grace, having foiled two despatches and 
 possessed yourself of knowledge that might have 
 saved Amherst from wasting ten minutes where he 
 wasted two days. And now you stare at me when I 
 tell you that you held the chance of a lifetime ! Why, 
 man, you could have asked what promotion you 
 
 willed ! Some men have luck ! " Speech failed 
 
 him, and he cast himself down at full length on the 
 turf again. " Go on," he commanded grimly. 
 
 And John resumed, but in another, colder tone. 
 The rest of the story he told perfunctorily, omitting 
 all mention of the fight on the flagstaff tower, and 
 telling no more than was needful of the last adventure 
 of the rapids. Either he or Dick had changed. 
 Having begun, he persevered, but now without hope 
 to make himself understood. 
 
 " Did ever man have such luck ? " grumbled Dick. 
 " You have made yourself a deserter. You did all 
 you could to earn being shot ; you w r alked back, and 
 again did all you could to leave Amherst no other 
 choice but to shoot you. And, again, you blunder into 
 saving half an army ! Have you seen Amherst ? " 
 
 " He sent for me at La Chine, to reward me." 
 
 : ' You told him all, of course ? " 
 
 " I did or almost all ! " 
 
 " Then, since he has not shot you, I presume you 
 are now restored to the Forty-sixth, and become the 
 just pride of the regiment ? "
 
 242 FORT AMITY 
 
 Dick's voice had become bitter with a bitterness 
 at which John wondered ; but all his answer was : 
 
 " Look at these clothes. They will tell you ii I 
 am restored to the Forty-sixth." 
 
 " So that was more than Amherst could bring 
 himself to stomach ? " 
 
 "On the contrary, he gave me my choice. But I 
 am resigning my commission." 
 
 " Eh ? Well, I suppose your monstrous luck with 
 the despatches had earned you his leniency. You 
 told him of Fort Frontenac, I presume ? " 
 
 " I did not tell him of that. But someone else had 
 taken care that he should learn something of it." 
 
 " The girl ? You don't mean to tell me that your 
 luck stepped in once again ? " 
 
 " Mademoiselle Diane must have guessed that I 
 meant to tell the General all. She left a sealed letter, 
 which he opened in my presence. As for my luck," 
 continued John and now it was his turn to speak 
 bitterly " you may think how I value it when I tell 
 you how the letter ended. With the General's help, 
 it said, she was hiding herself for ever ; and as a man 
 of honour I must neither seek her nor hope for sight 
 of her again." 
 
 And Dick's comment finally proved to John that 
 between them these two years had fixed a gulf im- 
 passable. " Well, and you ought to respect her 
 wishes," he said. " She interfered to save you, if 
 ever a woman saved a man." He was striding to and 
 fro again on the bank. " And what will you do now ? " 
 he demanded, halting suddenly. 
 
 " The General thinks Murray will be the new Gover- 
 nor, and promises to recommend me to him. There's 
 work to be done in reducing the outlying French forts 
 and bringing the Indians to reason. Probably I shall 
 be sent west."
 
 DICK'S JUDGMENT 243 
 
 " You mean to live your life out in Canada ? " 
 
 " I do." 
 
 " Tell me at least that you have given up hope of 
 this girl." 
 
 John flushed. " I shall never seek her," he ans- 
 wered. " But while life lasts I shall not give up hope 
 of seeing her once again." 
 
 "And I am waiting for my captaincy," said Dick 
 grimly ; " who with less than half your luck would 
 have commanded a regiment ! " 
 
 He swung about suddenly to confront a corporal 
 John's critical friend of the picket who had come up 
 the bank seeking him. 
 
 " Beg pardon, sir," said the corporal, saluting, 
 " but there's a Canadian below that has found a corpse 
 along-shore, and wants to bury him on his own ac- 
 count." 
 
 " That will be Bateese Guyon," said John. They 
 walked together down the shore to the spot where 
 Bateese bent over his brother. 
 
 " This is the man," said he, " who led us through 
 the Roches Fendues. Respect his dead body, Dick." 
 
 " I hope," said Dick, half-lifting his hat as he stood 
 by the corpse, " I can respect a man who did a brave 
 deed and died for his country."
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 PRES-DE-VILLE 
 
 FIFTEEN years have gone by, and a few months. In 
 December, 1775, on the rock of Quebec, Great Britain 
 clung with a last desperate grip upon Canada, which 
 on that September day in 1760 had passed so com- 
 pletely into her hands. 
 
 All through December the snow had fallen almost 
 incessantly ; and almost incessantly, through the short 
 hours of daylight, the American riflemen, from their 
 lodgings in the suburbs close under the walls, had kept 
 up a fire on the British defenders of Quebec. For the 
 assailants of Great Britain were her own children ; and 
 the man who led them now was a British subject still, 
 and but three years ago had been a British officer. 
 
 Men see their duty by different lights, but Richard 
 Montgomery had always seen his clearly. He had 
 left the British Army for sufficient cause ; had sought 
 America, and married an American wife. He served 
 the cause of political freedom now, and meant to serve 
 it so as to win an imperishable name. The man 
 whom King George had left for ten years a captain 
 had been promoted by Congress Brigadier-General 
 at a stroke. It recognised the greatness of which his 
 own soul had always assured him. " Come what will," 
 he had promised his young wife at partiiu;, " you shall 
 never be ashamed of me." His men adored him for 
 
 244
 
 PRES-DE-VILLE 245 
 
 his enthusiasm, his high and almost boyish courage, 
 his dash, his bright self-confidence. 
 
 And his campaign had been a triumph. Ticon- 
 deroga and Crown Point had fallen before him. He 
 had swept down the Richelieu, capturing St. John's, 
 Chambly, Sorel. Montreal had capitulated without 
 a blow. And so success had swept him on to the cliffs 
 of Quebec there to dash itself and fail as a spent wave. 
 
 He would not acknowledge this ; not though small- 
 pox had broken out among his troops, and they, re- 
 membering that their term of service was all but 
 expired, began to talk of home ; not though his guns, 
 mounted on frozen mounds, had utterly failed to 
 batter a way into the city. As a subaltern he had 
 idolised Wolfe, and here on the ground of Wolfe's 
 triumphant stroke he still dreamed of rivalling it. In 
 Quebec a cautious, phlegmatic British General sat 
 and waited, keeping, as the moonless nights drew on, 
 his officers ready against surprise. For a week they had 
 slept in their clothes and with their arms beside them. 
 
 From the lower town of Quebec a road, altered 
 now beyond recognition, ran along the base of Cape 
 Diamond between the cliff and the river. As it 
 climbed it narrowed to a mere defile, known as Pres- 
 de-Ville, having the scarped rock on one hand and on 
 the other a precipice dropping almost to the water's 
 edge. Across this defile the British had drawn a 
 palisade and built, on the edge of the pass above, a 
 small three-pounder battery, with a hangar in its 
 rear to shelter the defenders. 
 
 Soon after midnight, on the last morning of the year,, 
 a man came battling his way down from the upper 
 town to the Pres-de-Ville barrier. A blinding snow- 
 storm raged through the darkness, and although it 
 blew out of the north the cliff caught its eddies and
 
 246 FORT AMITY 
 
 beat them back swirling about the useless lantern he 
 carried. The freshly fallen snow, encumbering his 
 legs held him steady against the buffets of the wind ; 
 and foot by foot, feeling his way for he could only 
 guess how near lay the edge of the precipice he 
 struggled toward the stream of light issuing from the 
 hangar. 
 
 As he reached it the squall cleared suddenly. 
 He threw back his snow-caked hood and gazed up at 
 the citadel on the cliff. The walls aloft there stood 
 out brilliant against the black heavens, and he mut- 
 tered approvingly ; for it was he who, as Officer of the 
 Works, had suggested to the Governor the plan of 
 hanging out lanterns and firepots from the salient 
 angles of the bastions ; and he flattered himself that, 
 if the enemy intended an assault up yonder, not a dog 
 could cross the great ditch undetected. 
 
 But it appeared to him that the men in the hangar 
 were not watching too alertly, or they would never 
 have allowed him to draw so near unchallenged. 
 
 He was lifting a hand to hammer on the rough 
 door giving entrance from the rear, when it was 
 flung open and a man in provincial uniform 
 peered out upon the night. 
 
 " Is that you, Captain Chabot ? " asked the visitor. 
 
 The man in the doorway smothered an exclamation. 
 " The wind was driving the snow in upon us by the 
 shovelful," he explained. " We are keeping a sharp 
 enough look-out down the road." 
 
 " So I perceived," answered John a Cleeve curtly, 
 and stepped past him into the hangar. About fifty 
 men stood packed there in a steam of breath around 
 the guns the most of them Canadians and British 
 militiamen, with a sprinkling of petticoated sailors. 
 
 " Who is working these ? " asked John a Cleeve, 
 laying his hand on the nearest three-pounder.
 
 PRES-DE-VILLE 247 
 
 " Captain Barnsfare." A red-faced seaman stepped 
 forward and saluted awkwardly : Adam Barnsfare, 
 master of the Tell transport. 
 
 " Your crew all right, captain ? " 
 
 " All right, sir." 
 
 " The Governor sends me down with word that he 
 believes the enemy means business to-night. Where's 
 your artilleryman ? " 
 
 " Sergeant McQuarters, sir ? He stepped down, 
 a moment since, to the barrier, to keep the sentry 
 awake." 
 
 John a Cleeve glanced up at the lamp smoking under 
 the beam. 
 
 " You have too much light here," he said. " If 
 McQuarters has the guns well pointed, you need only 
 one lantern for your lint-stocks." 
 
 He blew out the candle in his own, and reaching up 
 a hand, lowered the light until it was all but extinct. 
 As he did so his hood fell back and the lamp-rays 
 illumined his upturned face for two or three seconds ; 
 a tired face, pinched just now with hard living and 
 wakefulness, but moulded and firmed by discipline. 
 Fifteen years had bitten their lines deeply about the 
 under-jaw and streaked the temples with grey. But 
 they had been years of service ; and whatever he had 
 missed in them, he had found self-reliance. 
 
 He stepped out upon the pent of the hangar, and, 
 with another glance up at the night, plunged into the 
 deep snow, and trudged his way down to the barricade. 
 
 " Sergeant McQuarters ! " 
 
 " Here, sir ! " The Highlander saluted in the 
 darkness. " Any word from up yonder, sir ? " A 
 faint glow touched the outline of his face as he lifted 
 it toward the illuminated citadel. 
 
 " The Governor looks for an assault to-night. So 
 you know me, McQuarters ? "
 
 248 FORT AMITY 
 
 " By your voice, sir," answered McQuarters, and 
 added quaintly, " Ah, but it was different weather 
 in those days ! " 
 
 " Ay," said John, " we have come around by 
 strange roads ; you an artilleryman, and I 
 He broke off, musing. For a moment, standing there 
 knee-deep in snow, he heard the song of the waters, 
 saw the forests again, the dripping hedges, the cool, 
 pendant boughs, and smelt the fragrance of the young 
 spruces. The spell of the woodland silence held him, 
 and he listened again for the rustle of wild life in the 
 undergrowth. 
 
 " Hist ! What was that ? " 
 
 " Another squall coming, sir. It's on us, too, and 
 a rasper ! " 
 
 But as the snow-charged gust swept down and 
 blinded them in its whirl. John leaned towards 
 McQuarters and lifted his voice sharply. 
 
 " It was more than that Hark you ! " He 
 gripped McQuarters' arm and pointed to the barricade, 
 over which for an instant a point of steel had glimmered. 
 " Back, man ! back to the guns ! " he yelled to the 
 sentry. But the man was already running ; and 
 together the three floundered back to the hangar. 
 Behind them blows were already sounding above the 
 howl of the wind ; blows of musket-butts hammering 
 on the wooden palisade. 
 
 " Steady, men," grunted McQuarters, as he reached 
 the pent. " Give them time to break an opening 
 their files will be nicely huddled by this." 
 
 John a Cleeve glanced round and was satisfied. 
 Captain Chabot had his men lined up and ready : two 
 ranks of them, the front rank kneeling. 
 
 " Give the word, my lad," said Captain Barnsfare 
 cheerfully, lintstock in hand. 
 
 " Fire then ! and God defend Quebec ! "
 
 PRES-DE-VILLE 249 
 
 The last words were lost in an explosion which 
 seemed to lift the root off the hangar. In the flare of 
 it John saw the faces of the enemy their arms out- 
 stretched and snatching at the palisade. Down 
 upon them the grape-shot whistled, tearing through 
 the gale it outstripped, and close on it followed the 
 Canadians' volleys. 
 
 Barnsfare had sprung to the second gun. Mc- 
 Ouarters nodded to him. . . . 
 
 For ten minutes the guns swept the pass. The 
 flame of them lit up no faces now by the shivered 
 palisade, and between the explosions came no cheering 
 from down the road. The riflemen loaded, fired, 
 and re-loaded ; but they aimed into darkness and 
 silence. 
 
 Captain Chabot lifted a hand. 
 
 The squall had swept by. High in the citadel, 
 drums were beating ; and below, down by the water- 
 side to the eastward, volleys of musketry crackled 
 sharply. But no sound came up the pass of Pres-de- 
 Ville. 
 
 " That will be at the Sault-au-Matelot barrier," 
 said McOuarters, nodding his head in the direction 
 of the musketry. 
 
 " We've raked decks here, anyhow," Captain 
 Barnsfare commented, peering down the road ; and 
 one or two Canadians volunteered to descend and 
 explore the palisade. For a while Captain Chabot 
 demurred, fearing that the Americans might have 
 withdrawn around the angle of the cliff and be holding 
 themselves in ambush there. 
 
 " A couple of us could make sure of that," urged 
 John. " They have left their wounded, at all events, 
 as you may hear by the groans. With your leave, 
 Captain "
 
 250 FORT AMITY 
 
 Captain Chabot yielded the point, and John with 
 a corporal and a drummer descended the pass. 
 
 A dozen bodies lay heaped by the palisade. For 
 the moment he could not stay to attend them, but, 
 passing through, followed the road down to the end 
 of its curve around the cliff. Two corpses lay here 
 of men who, mortally wounded, had run with the 
 crowd before dropping to rise no more. The tracks 
 in the snow told plainly enough that the retreat had 
 been a stampede. 
 
 Returning to the palisade he shouted up that the 
 coast was clear, and fell to work searching the faces of 
 the fallen. The fresh snow, in which they lay deep, 
 had already frozen about them ; and his eyes, as he 
 swung the lantern slowly round, fell on a hand and 
 arm which stood up stiffly above the white surface. 
 
 He stepped forward, flashing his lantern on the dead 
 man's face and dropped on his knees beside it. 
 
 " Do you know him, sir ? " McQuarters' voice was 
 speaking, close by. 
 
 " I know him/' answered John dully, and groped 
 and found a thin blade which lay beside the corpse. 
 " He was my cousin, and once my best friend." 
 
 He felt the edge of the sword with his gloved hand, 
 all the while staring at the arm pointing upwards and 
 fixed in the rigor of death, frozen in its last gesture as 
 Richard Montgomery had lifted it to wave forward 
 his men. And as if the last thirty or forty minutes 
 had never been, he found himself saying to McQuarters 
 
 " We have come around by strange roads, sergeant, 
 and some of us have parted with much on the way." 
 
 He looked up ; but his gaze, travelling past Mc- 
 Ouarters who stooped over the corpse, fell on the 
 figure of a woman who had approached and halted at 
 three paces' distance ; a hooded figure in the dress of 
 the Hospitalieres.
 
 PRES-DE-VILLE 251 
 
 Something in her attitude told him that she had 
 heard. He arose, holding the lantern high; and 
 stared, shaking, into a face which no uncomely linen 
 swathings could disguise from him into eyes which 
 death only would teach him to forget. 
 
 The fatigue-party lifted the corpse. So Richard 
 Montgomery entered Quebec as he had promised a 
 General of Brigade. 
 
 The drums had ceased to call the alarm from the 
 Citadel ; musketry no longer crackled in the riverside 
 quarter of Sault-au-Matelot. The assault had been 
 beaten off, and close on four hundred prisoners were 
 being marched up the hill, followed by crowds of 
 excited Quebecers. But John a Cleeve roamed 
 the streets at random, alone, unconscious that all 
 the while he gripped the hilt of his cousin's naked 
 sword. 
 
 He was due to carry his report to the Governor. 
 By-and-by he remembered this, and ploughed his way 
 ,up the snowy incline to the Citadel. The sentry told 
 him that the Governor was at the Seminary, and from 
 the doorway John spied the Governor at the far end, 
 interrogating them. 
 
 " Eh ? " Carleton turned, caught sight of him and 
 smiled gaily. " I fancy, Mr. a Cleeve, that your post 
 is going to be a sinecure after to-night's work. Chabot 
 reports that you were at Pres-de-Ville and discovered 
 General Montgomery's body." 
 
 He turned at the sound of a murmur among the 
 prisoners behind him. One or two had turned to the 
 wall and were weeping audibly. Others stared at 
 John, and one or two pointed. 
 
 John, following their eyes, looked down at the 
 sword in his hand and stammered an apology. 
 
 ." Excuse me I did not know that I carried it. . . j
 
 252 FORT AMITY 
 
 Sirs, believe me, I intended no offence ! Richard 
 Montgomery was my cousin." 
 
 From the Seminary he walked back to his quarters, 
 meaning to snatch a few hours' sleep before daybreak. 
 But having lit his candle, he found that he could not 
 undress. The narrow room stifled him. He flung 
 the sword on his bed, and went down to the streets 
 again. 
 
 Dawn found him pacing the narrow side-walk 
 opposite a small log house in St. Louis Street. Lights 
 shone from the upper storey. In the room to the 
 right they had laid Montgomery's body, and were 
 arraying it for burial. 
 
 The house door opened, and a lamp in the passage 
 behind it cast a broadening ray across the snow. A 
 woman stepped out, and, in the act of closing the door, 
 caught sight of him. He made no doubt that she 
 would pass up the street ; but, after seeming to 
 hesitate, she came slowly over and stood before him. 
 ' You knew me, then ? " she asked. 
 
 He bent his head humbly. 
 
 ' I have seen you many times, and heard of you," 
 she continued. " I heard what you said, down 
 yonder. . . . Has life been so bitter for you ? " 
 
 " Diane." 
 
 He turned towards the house. " He has a noble 
 face," she said, gazing up at the bright window. 
 
 " He was a great man." 
 
 " And yet he fought in the end against his country." 
 
 " He believed that he did right." 
 
 " Should you have believed it right ! " 
 
 John was silent. 
 
 " John ! " 
 
 He gave a start at the sound of his name, and she 
 smiled faintly. 
 
 " I have learnt to say it in English, you see."
 
 PRES-DE-VILLE 253 
 
 " Do not mock me, mademoiselle ! Fifteen years 
 
 " That is just what I was going to say. Fifteen 
 years is a very long time and and it has not been 
 easy for me, John. I do not think I can do without 
 you any longer." 
 
 So, in the street, under the dawn, they kissed for 
 the first time.
 
 EPILOGUE 
 I 
 
 HUDSON RIVER 
 
 " II reviendra-z a Paques, 
 Ou a la T finite ! " 
 
 ON a summer's afternoon of the year 1818, in the deep 
 verandah of a house terraced high above the Hudson 
 a small company stood expectant. Schuylers and 
 Livingstones were there, with others of the great 
 patroon families ; one or two in complete black, and 
 all wearing some badge of mourning. Some were 
 j'oung, others well advanced in middle life ; but 
 amidst them, and a little apart, reclined a lady to 
 whose story the oldest had listened in his childhood. 
 
 She lay back in an invalid chair, with her face set 
 toward the noble river sweeping into view around the 
 base of a wooded bluff, and toward the line of its 
 course beyond, where its hidden waters furrowed the 
 forests to the northward and divided hill from hill. 
 Yet to her eyes the landscape was but a blur, and she 
 saw it only in memory. 
 
 For forty-three years she had worn black and a 
 widow's goffered cap. The hair beneath it was thin 
 now, and hqr body frail and very far on its decline to 
 the grave. On the table at her elbow lay a letter 
 
 254
 
 HUDSON RIVER 255 
 
 beside a small field-glass, towards which, once and 
 again, she stretched out a hand. 
 
 It is heavy for you, aunt ? " said her favourite 
 grandniece, who stood at the back of her chair a 
 beautiful girl in a white frock, high-waisted, and tied 
 with a broad black sash. ' ' We will tell you when they 
 come in sight." 
 
 " I know, my dear ; I know. It was only to make 
 sure." 
 
 " But you tried yesterday, and with the glass your 
 sight was as good as mine, almost." 
 
 " Even so short a while makes a difference, now. 
 You cannot understand that, Janet ; you will, some 
 day." 
 
 " We will tell you," the girl repeated, " as soon 
 as ever they come in sight ; perhaps before. We 
 may see the smoke first between the trees, you 
 know." 
 
 " Aye," the old lady answered, and added, " there 
 was no such thing in those days." Her hand went out 
 toward the field-glass again, and rested, trembling a 
 little, on the edge of the table. " I thought yester- 
 day that the trees had grown a good deal. They 
 have closed in, and the river is narrower ; or perhaps 
 it looks narrower through a glass." 
 
 The men at the far end of the- verandah, who had 
 been talking apart while they scanned the upper bends 
 of the river, lowered their voices suddenly. They had 
 heard a throbbing sound to the northward ; either the 
 beat of a drum or the panting stroke of a steamboat's 
 paddles. 
 
 All waited, with their eyes on the distant woods. 
 By-and-by a film of dark smoke floated up as through 
 a crevice in the massed tree-tops, lengthened, and 
 spread itself in the sunlight. The throbbing grew 
 louder the beat of a drum, slow and funereal, with
 
 256 FORT AMITY 
 
 the clank of paddle-wheels tilling its pauses. And 
 now hark ! a band playing the Dead March ! 
 
 The girl knelt and lifted the glass, ready focussed. 
 The failing woman leaned forward, and with fingers 
 that trembled on the tube, directed it where the river 
 swept broadly around the headland. 
 
 What did she see ? At first an ugly steamboat 
 nosing into view and belching smoke from its long 
 funnel ; then a double line of soldiers crowding the 
 deck, and between their lines what seemed at first to 
 be a black mound with a scarlet bar across it. But 
 the mound was the plumed hearse of her husband, 
 and the scarlet bar the striped flag of the country for 
 which he had died his adopted country, long since 
 invited to her seat among the nations. 
 
 The men in the verandah had bared their heads. 
 They heard a bell ring on board the steamboat. Her 
 paddles ceased to rotate, and after a moment began 
 to churn the river with reversed motion, holding the 
 boat against its current. The troops on her deck, 
 standing with reversed arms ; the muffled drums ; the 
 half-masted flag ; all saluted a hero and the widow of 
 a hero. 
 
 So, after forty-three years, Richard Montgomery 
 returned to the wife he had left with a promise that, 
 come what might, she should be proud of him. 
 
 Proud she was ; she, a worn old woman sitting in the 
 shadow of death, proud of a dry skeleton and a handful 
 of dust under a crape pall. And they had parted in 
 the heyday of youth, young and ardent, with arms 
 passionately loth to untwine. 
 
 What did her eyes seek beneath the pall, the phi; 
 the flag ? Be sure she saw him laid there at his manly 
 length, inert, with cheeks only a little paler than they 
 had been as he stood looking down into her eyes a 
 moment before he strode away. In truth, the searchers,
 
 HUDSON RIVER 257 
 
 opening his grave in Quebec, had found a few bones, 
 and a skull from which, as they lifted it, a musket-ball 
 dropped back into the rotted coffin ; these, and a lock 
 of hair, tied with a leathern thong. 
 
 They did not bring him ashore to her. Even after 
 forty years his return must be for a moment only ; his 
 country still claimed him. The letter beside her was 
 from Governor Clinton, written in courtliest words, 
 telling her of the grave in New York prepared for him 
 beneath the cenotaph set up by Congress many years 
 before. 
 
 Again a bell rang sharply, the paddles ceased back- 
 ing, and ploughed forward again. To the sound of 
 muffled drums he passed down the river, and out of 
 her sight for ever.
 
 II 
 
 THE PHANTOM GUARD 
 
 JUST a hundred years have passed since the assault 
 on Pres-de-Ville. It is the last day of 1875, and in the 
 Citadel above the cliff the Commandant and his lady 
 are holding a ball. Outside the warm rooms winter 
 binds Quebec. The St. Lawrence is frozen over, and 
 the copings and escarpments of the old fortress sparkle 
 white under a flying moon. 
 
 The Commandant's lady had decreed fancy dress 
 for her dancers, and, further, that their costumes shall 
 be those of 1775. The Commandant himself wears 
 the antique uniform of the Royal Artillery, and some 
 of his guests salute him in the very coats, and carry 
 the very swords, their ancestors wore this night a 
 hundred years ago. They pass up the grand staircase, 
 hting with standards golden leopards of England, 
 golden irises of France, the Dominion ensign, the Stars 
 and Stripes and come face to face with a trophy, on 
 the design of which Captain Larne, of the B Battery, 
 has spent some pious hours. Here, above stacks of 
 muskets piled over drums and trumpets, is draped the 
 red and black "rebel" pennant so that its folds fall 
 over the escutcheon of the United States ; and against 
 this hangs a sword, heavily craped, with the letters 
 R.I. P. beneath it. 
 
 It is the same thin blade of steel which dropped on 
 258
 
 THE PHANTOM GUARD 259 
 
 the snow, its hilt warm from Richard Montgomery's 
 hand, as he turned to wave forward his men. His 
 enemies salute it to-night. 
 
 They pass into the upper ballroom. They are met 
 to dance a new year in, and the garrison band is 
 playing a waltz of Strauss' s " Die guten alten 
 Zeiten." So dance follows dance, and the hours fly 
 by to midnight outside, the moon in chase past the 
 clouds and over fields and wastes of snow inside, the 
 feet of dancers warming to their work under the 
 clustered lights. 
 
 But on the stroke of midnight a waltz ceases sud- 
 denly. From the lower ballroom the high, clear note 
 of a trumpet rings out, silencing the music of the 
 bandsmen. A panel has flown open there, and a 
 trumpeter steps forth blowing a call which, as it dies 
 away, is answered by a skirl of pipes and tapping of 
 drums from a remote corner of the barracks. The 
 guests fall back as the sound swells on the night, 
 drawing nearer. Pipes are shrieking now ; the rattle 
 of drums shakes the windows. Two folding doors 
 fall wide, and through them stalks a ghostly guard 
 headed by the ghost of Sergeant Hugh McQuarters, 
 in kilt and tartan and cross-belt yet spotted with the 
 blood of a brave Highlander who died in 1775, defend- 
 ing Quebec. The guard looks neither to right nor to 
 left ; it passes on through hall and passage and ball- 
 room, halts beneath Montgomery's sword, salutes it 
 in silence, and vanishes. 
 
 Some of the ladies are the least bit scared. But 
 the men are pronouncing it a brilliant coup de theatre, 
 and presently crowd about the trophy, discussing 
 Montgomery and what manner of man he was. 
 
 Down in St. Louis Street the windows have been 
 illuminated in the old house in which his body lay 
 Up in the Citadel the boom of guns salutes his memory.
 
 260 FORT AMITY 
 
 So the world commemorates its heroes, the brave 
 hearts and high minds that never doubted, but pressed 
 straight to their happy or unhappy goals. But some 
 of us hear the guns saluting those who doubted and 
 were lost, or seemed to achieve little ; whose high 
 hopes perished by the way ; w r hom fate bound or 
 frustrated ; whom conscience or divided counsel 
 drove athwart into paths belying their promise ; 
 whom, wrapping both in one rest, earth covers at 
 length indifferently with its heroes. 
 
 So let these guns, a hundred years late, salute the 
 meeting of two lovers who, before they met and were 
 reconciled, suffered much. The flying moon crosses 
 the fields over which they passed forth together, and 
 a hundred winters have smoothed their tracks on the 
 snow. There is a tradition that they sought Bois- 
 veyrac ; that children were born to them there ; and 
 that they lived and died as ordinary people do. But 
 a thriving town hides the site of the Seigniory, and 
 their graves are not to be found. 
 
 And north of Lake Michigan there long lingered 
 another tradition but it has died now of an English- 
 man and his wife who came at rare intervals and 
 would live among the Ojibways for a while, accepted 
 by them and accepting their customs ; that none 
 could predict the time of their coming or of their 
 departure ; but that the man had, in his time, been a 
 famous killer of bears. 
 
 THE END 
 
 London HoiUt;- an '. .'tangliton
 
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