An Algonquin Maiden Part 22

"Dear Wanda, forgive me; I am expecting too much of you. It is exceedingly cruel of me to make you suffer so."

"Wanda!" called one of a group of children, "come and swing us, please."

"Don't go," whispered Edward decisively. He himself strode over to them, lifted one chubby youngster after another into the huge swing, and sent them flying into the tree-tops. It was a form of pastime that he detested; but he was not going to have Wanda at the beck and call of "those little ruffians." At last, with the sympathetic a.s.surance that if they wanted any more swinging they were at liberty to get it from each other, he left them, and rejoined the Indian girl.

"Wanda!" said Helene, as she spread a shawl on the ground, "just step across to our carriage, will you, and bring me a cushion you will find there."

"You must not!" declared Edward, in a low savage whisper, preparing to go himself; but the girl was off like a swallow before the wind. He met her on the way back, took the cushion from her, and presented it to its owner with a bow of exaggerated deference. Helene's black brows expressed the utmost astonishment; but as she confronted Edward's wrathful gaze her own eyes caught fire, and the two who once had been so nearly lovers now manifested no other emotion toward each other save repressed and concentrated hate.

"I wish you to understand," said the exasperated young man to Wanda, as he accompanied her to dinner, "that you are not a servant, and you mustn't obey anyone's commands."

"No," was the slow reply, "I shall obey no one's commands, not even yours;" and with these words she turned and fled into the woods. The ever-present desire to escape had conquered at last.

"How kind you are to that unfortunate girl!" observed the lady next him at dinner. "She must try your patience so much."

Edward admitted that his patience had been tried; but he was in no mood to expatiate upon the subject. He had a very slight idea of what he was eating and drinking, or of what all the talking was about. The sunshine flecking the open clearing gave him a feeling that he would soon have a dreadful headache. After it was over he lay down, and tried to forget his troubles in a noontide nap. Gradually the voices about him softened and died away. For a moment he was floating upon the still waters of sleep, and then he drifted back to sh.o.r.e. Opening his eyes he found himself alone with Helene, who was asleep among her wrappings at a little distance. The rest had strayed away in pairs and groups, out of hearing if not out of sight. The unconscious figure seemed clothed in an atmosphere of ethereal sweetness, and Edward caught himself wondering whether the root of an affection, whose life is years long, is ever removed from the heart, unless the heart is removed with it. He began seriously to doubt, not his constancy to Wanda, but his inconstancy to Helene. Suddenly she opened her eyes and caught his glance. He withdrew it at once, and in the embarra.s.sment of the moment made some inane remark upon the beauty of the day. Helene rose with deliberation, put one white hand to the well-brushed head, trim and shining as a raven's wing, and with the utmost tranquillity answered "yes." Certainly she had the most irritating way in the world of p.r.o.nouncing the words which usually sound sweetest from a woman's lips. He did not wait to continue a conversation so unpropitiously begun, but went off on a lonely exploring tramp along the sh.o.r.e.

Late in the afternoon as he was returning, he noticed a nondescript figure sitting solitary on the bank, which, as he approached resolved itself into the superb outline of his Indian love. Unconscious of observation she threw herself backward, in an att.i.tude as remarkable for its beauty as for its unconventionality. She seemed to be luxuriating with a sort of animal content in the brightness of the sunshine, the softness of the odorous breeze, and the warmth of the water in which her slim bare feet were dabbling; she dug her brown fingers in the earth, as though the very touch of the soil was intense delight. The hated dress was reduced to ruinous pink rags, which became her untamed beauty as the habiliments of civilization never could have done. Her slowly approaching lover viewed her with mingled amus.e.m.e.nt and horror, while deep in his heart flowed the dark; current of a great despair. Hearing his footsteps she nerved herself for the expected reproaches, which he knew were worse than useless; but seeing in his face nothing but undisguised admiration, she sprang lightly to her feet and threw herself upon his neck. Edward kissed her, but it was with a thrill of ineffable self-contempt, and a sharp consciousness that the only charm this girl possessed for him was that she allowed him to kiss her. Then he drew away and brushed with fastidious glove the dust his coat retained from contact with her shoulder.

"See what I have found!" she exclaimed, holding up a small trinket that glittered in the sunlight. "It belongs to the Moon-in-a-black-cloud."

It was a little gold locket, which he had often noticed on the neck of Helene. Shortly before Wanda's abrupt flight, she had pointed with childish curiosity to the slender bright chain clearly visible beneath the transparent folds of the black gown, and the young lady had obligingly drawn the locket from its secret place upon her heart, for the gratification of its admirer. Left for a time on the outside of her dress, one of the tiny links must have severed, and the pretty trinket slipped to the ground unnoticed by its owner. The young man in whose hand it now lay was tempted to a dishonourable action. He had often begged Helene to show him the contents of this locket--a favour which had uniformly been denied. Now the opportunity was his without the asking. Nothing rewarded his curiosity save a lock of yellow hair, probably cut from the head of Rose. Queer fancy, he thought, for one girl to cherish the tresses of another. Suddenly he was struck by an idea that sent the blood throbbing to his temples. He examined the tress a second time. The bright hair growing upon his sister's head he knew had a reddish tinge, and its silky length terminated in ring-like curls. This was short and straight, of a pale colour, and showed by its unevenness that it had been "shingled." His heart beat as though it would burst. "You must take this back to its owner," he said imperatively.

Wanda slipped her hand in his. "We will go together," she said.

He glanced at her bare feet and ruined raiment, and realized with a burning flush that he was thoroughly ashamed of her. No, he could not take the hand of his future wife and face that crowd of curious worldlings. The mere touch of her soiled fingers was repugnant to him.

She seemed like some coa.r.s.e weed, whose vivid hues he might admire in pa.s.sing, but which he would shrink from wearing on his person.

"It will be better for you to go alone," he replied. "Don't tell the lady that anyone beside yourself has seen the locket. I will come presently."

But he lingered a long time after she left him, drinking against his will the sharp waters of bitter-sweet reflection. There came back to him an afternoon a year ago, when his sister Eva, out of childish love of mischief, had stolen up behind him, and cut off the lock of hair which fell over his brow.

"Mere masculine vanity," she had said, as the scissors snapped. He had sprung up instantly, and pursued her as she fled shrieking down the avenue. Helene, who was the only other occupant of the room had looked almost shocked at their conduct, and his pet lock of hair had mysteriously disappeared. Since then during how many days and nights had it been rising and falling upon the proud bosom, that he knew very well would be cold in death before it would give evidence of a quickened heart-beat in his presence. The knowledge he had gained by the discovery of the locket made Helene dangerously dear to him, and yet relieved him of not a particle of his duty towards Wanda. He saw neither of the girls again that day, but he carried home with him a stinging memory of both. Late that night he was pacing his room with sick heart and aching head, while in the next apartment Rose was a.s.suring herself that the picnic had been a great success. "Really,"

she meditated, "nothing could possibly be worse--or better--than the way in which Wanda behaved."

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE COMMODORE SURRENDERS.

A few weeks later there was another excursion to the emerald glooms of the forest, but this was limited in number to the Macleods and DeBerczys, with a few of their intimate friends. Wanda was absent on one of her indefinite expeditions--indefinite in length as well as in object, though the wigwam of her foster-feather was one of the points of interest visited by the party. Conspicuous among the numerous Indians in the settlement in the neighbourhood of Orillia was the last of the Algonquins, partly because of the pathos which attaches to the sole survivor in any region of a nearly extinct race, partly because of the mantle of traditional glory that had fallen upon him from the shoulders of valorous ancestors. He declined to join the revellers at their midday feasting under the trees, but his unexpected appearance afterwards suggested a pleasant subst.i.tute for the noon-day siesta.

"Talk about the storied memories of the past, in the old world," said Edward, leaning back on the mossy sward, and gazing up through green branches to the blue heaven, "this country has had its share of them, and here is the man," clapping a friendly hand on the Indian's shoulder, "who can tell us about them."

"Ah, do!" implored Herbert and Eva.

"Ah, don't!" entreated their father. "If there's anything that spoils the sylvan shades for me, it is to learn that they were once the scene of battle axes and blood spilling, and such like gruesomeness."

"But we _ought_ to know about it," said Helene. "It's history."

"That makes it all the worse. If it were fiction I wouldn't care."

"Now, Papa," said Rose, "that evinces a depraved taste. People will blame your home-training. Consider my feelings."

"That is what I supposed I was doing, my dear, in praying to be delivered from a tale that would make your blood run cold."

"What a delightful way for one's blood to run in this weather," lazily remarked one of the Boulton girls, and the other said she was pining for a story of particular horror.

"Oh, a story, by all means," said the Commodore, "but let it be a tradition or something of that sort." Then turning to the Chief: "Does not our brother know the legend of the unfortunate wretch of a man who was set upon and abused by a lot of unmerciful women, because he barbarously forbade them to learn all the history they wanted?

Something of that sort would be appropriate."

"Our brother" shook his head. "That is beyond my skill, but I can relate a story of the times before ever women were brought into the world."

"Rather dull times for the men, weren't they?" inquired one of the party.

"It is the belief of some of our race that they were very good times,"

replied the Chief, tranquilly. "The men of that period, free from the influence of the other s.e.x, have been spoken of as a much better race of beings than they are to-day. At that time you never heard of such a thing as a man being cross to his wife, or too attentive to his neighbour's wife, and when the husband came back from the chase without meat there was no one to scold him. Every man had his own way, and dwelt in peace in his own wigwam. As fast as they died out the Manito created more, and as they had no families they had nothing to fight for, nothing to defend, and, consequently, there were few wars among them. There were, I am sorry to say, some disadvantages. The men were obliged to weed corn, dry fish, mend nets, fell trees, carry logs, and do other women's work, which, as we know, is a great degradation. Also, when they were sick or in trouble, some of the weaker ones were heard to declare that they wished women were invented, but as a rule they were blithe and gay as warriors in the dance that follows a great victory. There were many enn.o.bling influences in this world before women entered it. Vanity did not exist. Simplicity was the rule, especially in attire, which ordinarily consisted of hunting coats and leggings, deerskin moccasins and coloured blankets, enriched with beads. It was only once in a while that they appeared in black eagle plumes, and gorgeous feathers, garters gay with beads, moccasins worked with stained porcupine quills, leggings of scarlet cloth, embroidered and decorated with tufts of moosehair, dyed blue and red, robes curiously plaited of the bark of the mulberry, and adorned with bear claws, hawks' bills and turtle sh.e.l.ls. Besides being plain and quiet in their dress they were very upright in their lives. No man ever was known to lie to his neighbour; but now when you see a man and woman too frequently together you may be sure he is telling her things that come true about as often as larks fall from the skies. Neither were men in those days ever deceived; but now they are tangled in women's wiles as easily as a partridge is caught in a net. There were no cowards, for men at all times are staunch and bold, whereas a woman has nothing but the heart of a little bird in her breast. All nature shared in man's prosperity.

The corn grew to the height of a young forest tree, and in the hunting-grounds the deer and bears were as thick as stars.

"But the chief glory of man in those days was his long, superb and glossy tail; for at that time it could not be said that the horses were more highly gifted than he. You must often have noticed the pride with which horses switch their tails about, apparently to drive off flies, but really to show their superiority to the race they serve.

The reproach of having no tail is one that is hard to bear; but at the time of which I speak all men were endowed with luxuriant tails, some of them black as the sh.e.l.l of a b.u.t.ternut when it is fully ripe, others the colour of the setting sun, but all trimmed with sh.e.l.ls, gay coloured beads and flowers, and strings of alligators' teeth. Those who say that there is nothing on earth so beautiful as a woman did not live in the time when tails were invented. Nothing could surpa.s.s the pride their owners took in them, nor the scorn that was heaped upon the hapless creature whose tail was short or scanty.

"But, as often happens to people who have all and more than they need, so it was with our ancestors. From being simply proud of their tails they began to grow vain and useless, caring for nothing but their own ease and adornment, neglecting to harvest the maize, feeble in the chase, sleeping sometimes for the s.p.a.ce of nearly a moon, and unable to take more than a woman's journey of six suns at a time. Then the Manito reflected and said to himself: 'This will never do. Man was not made to be a mere groundling. His greatest luxury must be taken from him, and in its place there must be given him something to tax his patience and strengthen his powers.' So one fine morning every man in the world woke up to find his tail missing. Great was the surprise and lamentation, and this was not lessened by the sudden appearance of the women, who came in number like that of the flight of pigeons in the moon before the snow moon. No prayers could avail to stay their coming, and from that time all the troubles in the world began. No man was allowed to have his own way thenceforward, nor was he permitted to plod along in his old, slow, comfortable fashion, but each one in terror went to work as swift as a loon flying before a high wind."

The laugh that arose at the end of this not strictly authentic narrative was prolonged by a strange voice, and Allan Dunlop, who, un.o.bserved, had made his appearance among them, now came forward to exchange greetings with his friends. Herbert and Eva Macleod hung enraptured about him, while he went to congratulate the old Indian upon his gifts as a story-teller. Then Edward's warm hand clasped his.

"Come over and see my father," he said. "Oh, no, he is asleep. He generally sleeps in the afternoon of the day."

"A very good plan when one comes to the afternoon of one's days,"

observed Allan, and then he went over to speak to Rose.

Her little soft hand fluttered up to his as a bird flutters to its nest. They had not met since that stormy March night. Since then he had confessed, in correspondence between them, that life was a perpetual struggle between him and love, and she had asked--though not in so many words--if it would make it any easier for him to know that she was engaged in the same struggle with the same great enemy. Ah, with what a fine pen had she written that, and with what pale ink, and nervous, nearly illegible strokes, and how she had crowded it down to the very edge of the paper. But he had read it, and it was fixed on his mind as clearly as though it had been written in lightning on the dark horizon of his future. And now, though his brown eyes were warming into black, and her cheeks were the colour of the flower after which she was named, they talked of conventional things in an indifferent way, as is the customary and proper thing to do. They saw little of each other through the remainder of the afternoon, but when they were making ready for the sail home, Eva, at Allan's invitation, sprang into his little light boat.

"Come with me, Rose," she cried, "Mr. Dunlop is going to row me home, and it will be better worth while if there are two of us."

The excuses which Rose instantly invented were not so strong as the vehement tones in which her sister uttered her invitation, and to avoid attracting attention or remark she gently seated herself in the boat, which Allan exultantly pushed away from the sh.o.r.e. The delight of being for a little while almost alone with his love was intoxicating. The younger girl, who had counted so ardently upon the pleasure of Allan's society, found herself in a short time too sleepy to enjoy it. Her pale, pretty head nodded drowsily, and at last found a resting-place in the lap of her sister. The other two did not exchange many words. It would have been a shame to disturb the play-worn little maid. The night was very beautiful; the stars seemed softly remote. Beneath their light the woods gleamed mysteriously, and the waves were hushed into a dream of peace. The bay that at sunset had seemed a sea of melted gold, now held the young moon trembling in its liquid embrace. About them played the ineffable caresses of the light evening breeze.

"Rose," said Allan, softly.

She looked up with conscious resistance, but it was too late for that now. The imperious pa.s.sion of his mood met the sad grace of her att.i.tude. His speech flowed fast and warm as if it had been blood from his veins. She felt herself weakening into helpless tears. "Ah, spare me!" she cried. "It is all so hopeless. My father--"

"I am coming to see your father to-morrow," he said. "It will be a hard battle, but it must be decided at once."

He helped them to land, and they walked in silence to the house. At the doorway, in which Eva had disappeared, Rose took Allan's outstretched hand in both of hers, and drawing it close, laid her weary, wet little face down upon it. The sound of voices and laughter came up from the beach, and she hastily released herself and fled to her room.

The next afternoon Eva Macleod, with an air of considerable importance, tapped at the door of her father's apartment. "Papa," she said, with that fondness for a choice diction observable in carefully reared young ladies at the beginning of their teens, "may I have a private conversation with you?"