A Little Girl in Old Quebec Part 9

She was gaining every day and went out on the gallery for exercise. She was a very cheerful invalid; indeed miladi was so entertaining she was never weary when with her, and if her husband needed her, Wanamee came to sit with the child. Rose knew many words in the language, as well as that of the unfortunate Iroquois.

All they had been able to learn about Catherine Arlac was that she had come from Paris to Honfleur, a widow, with a little girl. And Paris was such a great and puzzling place for a search.

"But she is a sweet human rose with no thorns, and I must keep her,"

declared miladi.

Laurent Giffard made no demur. He was really glad for his wife to have an interest while he was away.

The party threaded their way through the narrow winding paths that were to be so famous afterward and witness the heroic struggle, when the lilies of France went down for the last time, and the heritage that had cost so much in valiant endeavor and blood and treasure was signed away.

There were flaming torches and swinging lanterns and throngs wending to the part beyond the tents. The dance was not to pa.s.s a certain radius, where guards were stationed. Already there was a central fire of logs, around which the braves sat with their knees drawn up and their chins resting upon them, looking as if they were asleep.

"A fire this warm night," said miladi, in irony.

"We could hardly see them without it," returned her husband.

At the summons of a rude drum that made a startling noise, the braves rose, threw down their blankets and displayed their holiday attire of paint, fringes, beads, and dressed deerskins with great headdresses of feathers. Another ring formed round them. One brave, an old man, came forward, and gesticulating wildly, went through a series of antics. One after another fell in, and the slow tread began to increase. Then shrill songs, with a kind of musical rhythm, low at first, but growing louder and louder, the two or three circles joining in, the speed increasing until they went whirling around like madmen, shouting, thrusting at each other with their brawny arms, until all seemed like a sudden frenzy.

"Oh, they will kill each other!" almost shrieked Madame.

"_Non, non_, but small loss if they did," commented Madame Dubray.

They paused suddenly. It seemed like disentangling a chain. The confusion was heightened by the cries and the dancing feather headdresses that might have been a flock of giant birds. But presently they resolved into a circle again, and began to march to a slow chant.

One young fellow seized a brand from the fire and began a wild gyration, pointing the end to the circle, at random, it seemed. Then another and another until the lights flashed about madly and there was a scent of burning feathers. The circle stood its ground bravely, but there were shrieks and mocking laughter as they danced around, sometimes making a lunge out at the spectators, who would draw back in affright, a signal for roars of mirth.

"They will burn each other up," cried Madame. "Oh, let us go. The noise is more than I can bear. And if they should attack us. Do you remember what M. du Parc was telling us?"

"I think we have had enough of it," began M. Giffard. "They are said to be very treacherous. What is to hinder them from attacking the whites?"

"The knowledge that they have not yet received any pay, and their remaining stock would be confiscated. They are not totally devoid of self-interest, and most of them have a respect for the fighting powers of the Sieur and his punishing capacity, as well."

As they left the place the noise seemed to subside, though it was like the roar of wild animals.

"Am I to remain here all winter with these savages? Can I not return with M. de Champlain?" pleaded Madame Giffard.

"Such a time would be almost a G.o.dsend in the winter," declared Destournier. "But they will be hundreds of miles away, and the near Indians are sometimes too friendly, when driven by hunger to seek the fort. Oh, you will find no cause for alarm, I think."

"And how long will they keep this up?" she asked, as they were ascending the parapet from which they could still see the moving ma.s.s and the flashing lights, weird amid the surrounding darkness.

"They will sit in a ring presently and smoke the pipe of peace and enjoyment, and drop off to sleep. And for your satisfaction, not a few among those were fur-hunters and traders, white men, who have given up the customs of civilized life and enjoy the hardships of the wilderness, but who will fight like tigers for their brethren when the issue comes.

They are seldom recreant to their own blood."

"I do not want to see it again, ever," she cried pa.s.sionately. "I shall hardly sleep for thinking of it and some horrible things a sailor told on shipboard. I can believe them all true now."

"And we have had horrible battles, cruelty to prisoners," declared her husband. "These poor savages have never been taught anything better, and are always at war with each other. But for us, who have a higher state of civilization, it seems incredible that we should take a delight in destroying our brethren."

It was quiet and peaceful enough inside the fort. The Sieur was still engrossed with his papers, marking out routes and places where lakes and rivers might be found and where trading posts might be profitably set, and colonies established. It was a daring ambition to plant the lilies of France up northward, to take in the mighty lakes they had already discovered and to cross the continent and find the sure route to India.

There were heroes in those days and afterwards.

CHAPTER V

CHANGING ABOUT

"If you are ready for your sail and have the courage----"

Laurent Giffard kissed his pretty wife as she sat with some needlework in her hand, telling legendary tales, that were half fairy embellishments, to the little Rose, who was listening eager-eyed and with a delicious color in her cheeks. The child lived in a sort of fairy land. Miladi was the queen, her gowns were gold and silver brocade, but what brocade was, it would have been difficult for her to describe. She was very happy in these days, growing strong so she could take walks outside the fort, though she did not venture to do much climbing. The old life was almost forgotten. Mere Dubray was very busy with her own affairs, and her husband was as exigent as any new lover. Her cookery appealed to him in the most important place, his stomach.

"And to think I have done without thee these two years," he would moan.

When she saw her, the little girl had a strange fear that at the last moment they would seize her and take her up to the fur country with them. Pani was to go; he was of some service, if you kept a sharp eye on him, and had a switch handy.

"I'll tell you," he said to Rose when he waylaid her one day, "because you never got me into trouble and had me beaten. I shall have to start with them and I will go two days' journey, so they won't suspect. Then at night I'll start back. I like Quebec, and you and the good gentleman who throws you a laugh when he pa.s.ses, instead of striking you. And I'll hunt and fish, and be a sailor. I'll not starve. And you will not tell even miladi, who is so beautiful and sweet. Promise."

Rose promised. And now they were to go down the river.

"The courage, of course," and Madame glanced up smilingly. "We take the child for the present."

"I shall soon be jealous, _ma mie_, but it is a pleasure to see a bright young thing about that can talk with her eyes and not chatter shrilly.

_Mon dieu!_ what voices most of the wives have, and they are transmitting them to their children. Yes; we will start at noon, and be gone two days. Destournier has some messages to deliver. Put on thy plainest frock, we are not in sunny France now."

She had learned that and only dressed up now and then for her husband's sake, or to please the child. And she had made her some pretty frocks out of petticoats quite too fine for wear here.

Rose was overjoyed. Wanamee was to accompany them. When they were ready they were piloted down to the wharf by Monsieur, and there was M. Ralph to welcome them. The river was brisk with boats and canoes and shallops.

The sun glistened on the naked backs of Indian rowers bending with every stroke of the paddles to a rhythmic sort of sound, that later on grew to be regular songs. There were squaws handling canoes with grace and dexterity. One would have considered Quebec a great _entrepot_.

But the river with its beautiful bank, its groves of trees that had not yet been despoiled, its frowning rocks glinting in the sunshine, its wild flowers, its swift dazzle of birds, its great flocks of geese, snowy white, in the little coves that uttered shrill cries and then huddled together, the islands that reared gra.s.sy heads a moment and were submerged as the current swept over them.

"Why are they not drowned?" asked Rose. "Or can they swim like the little Indian boys?"

M. Giffard laughed--he often did at her quaint questions.

"They are like the trees; they have taken root ever so far down, and the tide cannot sweep them away."

"And is Quebec rooted that way? Do the rocks hold fast? And--all the places, even France?"

"They have staunch foundations. The good G.o.d has anch.o.r.ed them fast."

A puzzled look wavered over her face. "Monsieur, it is said the great world is round. Why does not the water spill out as it turns? It would fall out of a pail."

"Ah, child, that once puzzled wiser heads than thine. And years must pa.s.s over thy head before thou canst understand."

"When I am as big as miladi?"

"I am afraid I do not quite understand myself, though I learned it in the convent, I am quite sure. And I could not see why we did not fall off. Some of the good nuns still believed the world was flat," and miladi laughed. "Women's brains were not made for over-much study."