The Road to Frontenac. Merwin Samuel

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СКАЧАТЬ it was not entirely completed, and that–”

      “You will leave it at Montreal, then, at the Mission?”

      “Yes,–I suppose so. Yes, I shall plan to leave it there.”

      Menard leaned against a tree, and pressed the tobacco down in his pipe.

      “I have been doing some thinking in the last few minutes, Father. I’ve decided to make my first call on you for assistance.”

      “Very well, Captain.”

      “It is about the maid. Have you noticed?”

      “She seems of a sober mind.”

      “Don’t you see why? It is her father’s losses, and this journey. She is taking it very hard. She is afraid, Father, all the time; and she neither sleeps nor eats.”

      “It is naturally hard for such a child as she is to take this journey. She has had no experience,–she does not comprehend the easy customs and the hard travelling of the frontier. I think that in time–”

      Menard was puffing impatiently.

      “Father,” he said, “do you remember when Major Gordeau was killed, and I was detailed to bring his wife and daughter down to Three Rivers? It was much like this. They fretted and could not sleep, and the coarse fare of the road was beneath their appetites. Do you remember? And when it came to taking the rapids, with the same days of hard work that lie before us now, they were too weak, and they sickened, the mother first, then the daughter. When I think of that, Father, of the last week of that journey, and of how I swore never again to take a woman in my care on the river, I–well, there is no use in going over it. If this goes on, we shall not get to Frontenac in time, that is all. And I cannot afford to take such a chance.”

      The priest looked grave. The long struggle against the rapids from Montreal to La Gallette had tried the hardihood of more than one strong man.

      “It is probable, my son, that the sense of your responsibility makes you a little over-cautious. She is a strong enough child, I should say. Still, perhaps the food is not what she has been accustomed to. I have noticed that she eats little.”

      “Perrot is too fond of grease,” Menard said. “I must tell him to use less grease.”

      “If she should be taken sick, we could leave her with someone at Montreal.”

      “Leave her at Montreal!” exclaimed Menard. “When she breaks down, it will be in the rapids. And then I must either go on alone, or wait with you until she is strong enough to be carried. In any case it means confusion and delay. And I must not be delayed.”

      “What have you in mind to do?”

      “We must find a way to brighten her spirits. It is homesickness that worries her, and sorrow for her father, and dread of what is before and around her. I’ll warrant she has never been away from her home before. We must get her confidence,–devise ways to cheer her, brighten her.”

      “I can reason with her, and–”

      “This is not the time for reasoning, Father. What we must do is to make her stop thinking, stop looking backward and forward. And there is Danton; he can help. He is of an age with her, and should succeed where you and I might fail.”

      “He has not awaited the suggestion, Captain.”

      “Yes, I know. But he must,–well, Father, it has all been said. The maid is on our hands, and must be got to Frontenac. That is all. And there is nothing for it but to rely on Danton to help.”

      The priest looked at his brushes, and hesitated. “I am not certain,” he said, “she is very young. And Lieutenant Danton,–I have heard, while at Quebec,–”

      Menard laughed.

      “He is a boy, Father. These tales may be true enough. Why not? They would fit as well any idle lieutenant in Quebec, who is lucky enough to have an eye, and a pair of shoulders, and a bit of the King’s gold in his purse. This maid is the daughter of a gentleman, Father; she is none of your Lower Town jades. And Danton may be young and foolish,–as may we all have been,–but he is a gentleman born.”

      “Very well,” replied the priest, looking with regret at the failing light, and beginning to gather his brushes. “I will counsel her, but I fear it will do little good. If the maid is sick at heart, and we attempt to guide her thoughts, we may but drive the trouble deeper in. It is the same with some of the Indian maidens, when they have left the tribe for the Mission. Now and again there comes a time, even with piety to strengthen them,–and this maid has little,–when the yearning seems to grow too strong to be cured. Sometimes they go back. One died. It was at Sault St. Francis in the year of the–”

      “Yes, yes,” Menard broke in. “We have only one fact to remember; there must be no delay in carrying out the Governor’s orders. We cannot change our plans because of this maid.”

      “We must not let her understand, M’sieu.”

      Menard had been standing, with a shoulder against the tree, alternately puffing at his pipe and lowering it, scowling meanwhile at the ground. Now he suddenly raised his head and chuckled.

      “It will be many a year since I have played the beau, Father. It may be that I have forgotten the rôle.” He spread out his hands and looked at the twisted fingers. “But I can try, like a soldier. And there are three of us, Father Claude, there are three of us.”

      He turned to go back to the camp, but the priest touched him.

      “My son,–perhaps, before you return, you would look again at my unworthy portrait. I–about the matter of the canoe–”

      “Oh,” said Menard, “you’ve taken it out.”

      “Yes; it seemed best, considering the danger that others might feel the same doubts which troubled you.”

      “I wouldn’t do that. The canoe was all right, once the direction were decided on.”

      “Above all else, the true portrait should convey to the mind of the observer the impression that a single, an unmistakable purpose underlies the work. When one considers–”

      “Very true, Father, very true,” said Menard abruptly, looking about at the beginning of the twilight. “And now we had better get back. The supper will be ready.”

      Menard strode away toward the camp. Father Claude watched him for a time through the trees, then turned again to the picture. Finally he got together his materials, and carrying them in a fold of his gown, with the picture in his left hand, he followed Menard.

      The maid was leaning back against the tree, looking up at the sky, where the first red of the afterglow was spreading. She did not hear Menard; and he paused, a few yards away, to look at the clear whiteness of her skin and the full curve of her throat. Her figure and air, her habits of gesture and step, and carriage of the head, were those of the free-hearted maid of the seignory. They told of an outdoor life, of a good horse, and a light canoe, and the inbred love of trees and sky and running water. Here was none of the stiffness, the more than Parisian manner, of the maidens of Quebec. To stand there and look at her, unconscious as she was, pleased Menard.

      “Mademoiselle,” he said, coming nearer, “will you join us at supper?”

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