A Little Girl in Old Detroit Part 43

"Yes," said Jeanne, rather absently.

"If you have a good blanket--the cold has sprung up suddenly. It is squaw winter, which comes sooner you know, like a woman's temper, and spends itself, clearing the way for smiles again."

Dame Loudac had given her a fur cap with lappets that made a hood of it.

She had Owaissa's blanket, and some warm leggings. The captain helped her ash.o.r.e, but it was a most uncheerful outlook. A few streets with roughly built cottages, some shops at the wharf, a packing house with the refuse of fish about, and a wide stretch of level land on which the wind had swept the trees so fiercely that most of them leaned westward.

"Oh, how can anyone live here!" cried Jeanne with a shiver, contrasting it with the beautiful island home of the White Chief.

The inhabitants were mostly French, rugged, with dull faces and clumsy figures. They looked curiously at Jeanne and then went on with their various employments.

But the walk freshened her and dispelled the listlessness. She gathered a few sh.e.l.ls on one strip of sandy beach, and watched many curious creeping things. A brown lizard glided in and out of some tufts of sedge gra.s.s; a great flock of birds high up in the air went flying southward.

Many gulls ran along with their shrill cries.

Oh, if she were at home! Would she ever reach there? For now gay-hearted Jeanne seemed suddenly dispirited.

All the day kept cold, though at sunset the western sky blazed out with glory and the wind died down. Captain Mallard would not start until morning, however, and though the air had a keenness in it the sun gave out a promising warmth.

Then they made Presque Isle, where there was much unloading, and some stores to be taken on board. After that it grew warmer and Jeanne enjoyed being on deck, and the memory of how she had come up the lake was like a vague dream. They sailed past beautiful sh.o.r.es, islands where vegetation was turning brown and yellow; here marshes still a vivid green, there great clumps of trees with scarlet branches dancing in the sun, the hickories beginning to shrivel and turn yellow, the evergreens black in the shady places. At night the stars came out and the moon swelled in her slender body, her horns losing their distinct outlines.

But Jeanne had no patience even with the mysterious, beautiful night.

The autumn was dying slowly, and she wondered who brought wood for Pani; if she sat by the lonely fire! It seemed months since she had been taken away.

Yes, here was the familiar lake, the sh.o.r.es she knew so well. She could have danced for very gladness, though her eyes were tear-wet. And here it narrowed into the river, and oh, was there ever such a blessed sight!

Every familiar point looked beautiful to her. There were some boats hurrying out, the captains hoping to make a return trip. But the crowded, businesslike aspect of summer was over.

They pushed along to the King's wharf. It seemed to her all were strange faces. Was it really Detroit? St. Anne's bell came rolling down its sweet sound. The ship crunched, righted itself, crunched again, the rope was thrown out and made fast.

"Mam'selle," said the captain, "we are in."

She took his hand, the mute grat.i.tude in her eyes, in her whole face; its sweetness touched him.

"I hope you will find your friends well."

"Oh, thank you!" she cried, with a long drawn breath. "Yes, that is my prayer."

He was handing her off. The crowd, not very large, indeed, was all a blur before her eyes. She touched the ground, then she dropped on her knees.

"No, no," to some one who would have raised her. "I must say a prayer, for I have come back to my own loved Detroit, my home. Oh, let me give thanks."

"The saints be praised! It is Jeanne Angelot."

She rose as suddenly as she had knelt. Up the narrow street she ran, while the astonished throng looked after her.

"Holy Mother defend us!" and a man crossed himself devoutly. "It is no living being, it is a ghost."

For she had disappeared. The wondering eyes glanced on vacancy, stupefied.

"I said she was dead from the first. She would never have gone off and left the poor Pani woman to die of grief. She sits there alone day after day, and now she will not eat, though Dame Margot and the Indian woman Wenonah try to comfort her. And this is Jeanne's spirit come for her.

You will find her dead body in the cottage. Ah, I have seen the sign."

"It was a strange disappearance!"

"The captain can tell," said another, "for if she was rescued from the Indians he must have brought her down."

"Yes, yes," and they rushed in search of the captain, wild with superst.i.tion and excitement.

It was really Jeanne Angelot. She had been rescued and left at Bois Blanc, and then taken over to another island. A pretty, sweet young girl and no ghost, Jeanne Angelot by name.

Jeanne sped on like a sprite, drawing her cap over her face. Ah, the familiar ways and sights, the stores here, the booths shut, for the outdoors trade was mostly over, the mingled French and English, the patois, the shouts to the horses and dogs and to the pedestrians to get out of the way. She glanced up St. Anne's street, she pa.s.sed the barrack, where some soldiers sat in the sunshine cleaning up their accouterments. Children were playing games, as the s.p.a.ce was wider here.

The door of the cottage was closed. There was a litter on the steps, dead leaves blown into the corners and crushed.

"O Pani! Pani!" she cried, and her heart stood still, her limbs trembled.

The door was not locked. The shutter had been closed and the room was dark, coming out of the sunshine. There was not even a blaze on the hearth. A heap of something at the side--her sight grew clearer, a blanketed bundle, oh, yes--

"Pani! Pani!" she cried again, all the love and longing of months in her voice--"Pani, it is I, Jeanne come back to you. Oh, surely G.o.d would not let you die now!"

She was tearing away the wrappings. She found the face and kissed it with a pa.s.sion of tenderness. It was cold, but not with the awful coldness of death. The lips murmured something. The hands took hold of her feebly.

"It is Jeanne," she cried again, "your own Jeanne, who loves you with all her heart and soul, Jeanne, whom the good G.o.d has sent back to you,"

and then the tears and kisses mingled in a rain on the poor old wrinkled face.

"Jeanne," Pani said in a quavering voice, in which there was no realizing joy. Her lifeless fingers touched the warm, young face, wet with tears. "_Pet.i.te_ Jeanne!"

"Your own Jeanne come back to you. Oh, Pani, you are cold and there is no fire. And all this dreary time--but the good G.o.d has sent me back, and I shall stay always, always--"

She ran and opened the shutter. The traces of Pani's careful housekeeping were gone. Dust was everywhere, and even food was standing about as Wenonah had brought it in last night, while piles of furs and blankets were lying in a corner, waiting to be put up.

"Now we must have a fire," she began, cheerily; and, shivering with the chill herself, she stirred the embers and ashes about. There was no lack of fuel. In a moment the flames began a heartsome sound, and the scarlet rays went climbing and racing over the twigs. There was a fragrant warmth, a brightness, but it showed the wan, brown face, almost ashen color from paleness, and the lack-l.u.s.ter eyes.

"Pani!" Jeanne knelt before her and shook back the curls, smiled when she would fain have cried over the pitiful wreck, and at that moment she hated Louis Marsac more bitterly than ever. "Pani, dear, wake up. You have been asleep and dreamed bad dreams. Wake up, dear, my only love."

Some consciousness stirred vaguely. It was as if she made a great effort, and the pale lips moved, but no sound came from them. Still the eyes lost some of their vacancy, the brow showed lines of thought.

"Jeanne," she murmured again. "_Pet.i.te_ Jeanne. Did some one take you away? Or was it a dream?"

"I am here, your own Jeanne. Look at the fire blaze. Now you will be warm, and remember, and we will both give thanks. Nothing shall ever part us again."

Pani made an attempt to rise but fell back limply. Some one opened the door--it was Margot, who uttered a cry of affright and stood as if she was looking at a ghost, her eyes full of terror.

"I have come back," began Jeanne in a cheerful tone. "Some Indians carried me away. I have been almost up to the Straits, and a good captain brought me home. Has she been ill?" motioning to Pani.

"Only grief, Mam'selle. All the time she said you would return until a week or so ago, then she seemed to give up everything. I was very busy this morning, there are so many mouths to feed. I was finishing some work promised, there are good people willing to employ me. And then I came in to see--"

"Jeanne has come home," Pani exclaimed suddenly. "Margot has been so good. I am old and of no use any more. I have been only a trouble."

"Yes, yes, I want you. Oh, Pani, if I had come home and found you dead there would have been no one--and now you will get well again."

Pani shook her head, but Jeanne could discern the awakening intelligence.