Lords of the North Part 37

Ho-ho! List you all to my tale of truth.

'Tis I, Pierre, the rhymester, this glory tell Of freedom saved and brave hands laved In the blood of tyrants who fought and fell!

The whole scene was repugnant beyond endurance. My ears were so filled with the death cries heard in the afternoon, I had no relish for Pierre's crude recital of what seemed to him a glorious conquest. I could not rid my mind of that dying boy's sad face. Many half-breeds were preparing to pillage the settlement. Intending to protect the Sutherland home and seek the dead lad's body, I borrowed a fresh horse and left the tumult of the camp.

I made a detour of the battle-field in order to reach the Sutherland homestead before night. I might have saved myself the trouble; for every movable object--to the doors and window sashes--had been taken from the little house, whether by father and daughter before going to the fort, or by the marauders, I did not know.

It was unsafe to return by the wooded river trail after dark and I struck directly to the clearing and followed the path parallel to the bush. When I reached Seven Oaks, I was first apprised of my whereabouts by my horse p.r.i.c.king forward his ears and sniffing the air uncannily. I tightened rein and touched him with the spur, but he snorted and jumped sideways with a suddenness that almost unseated me, then came to a stand, shaking as if with chill. Something skulked across the trail and gained cover in the woods. With a rea.s.suring pat, I urged my horse back towards the road, for the prairie was pitted with badger and gopher holes; but the beast reared, baulked and absolutely refused to be either driven, or coaxed.

"Wise when men are fools!" said I, dismounting. Bringing the reins over his head, I tried to pull him forward; but he planted all fours and jerked back, almost dragging me off my feet.

"Are you possessed?" I exclaimed, for if ever horror were plainly expressed by an animal, it was by that horse. Legs rigid, head bent down, eyes starting forward and nostrils blowing in and out, he was a picture of terror.

Something wriggled in the thicket. The horse rose on his hind legs, wrenched the rein from my hand and scampered across the plain. I sent a shot into the bush. There was a snarl and a scurrying through the underbrush.

"Pretty bold wolf! Never saw a broncho act that way over a coyote before!"

I might as well find the body of the English lad before trying to catch my horse, so I walked on. Suddenly, in the silver-white of a starry sky, I saw what had terrified the animal. Close to the shrubbery lay the stark form of a white man, knees drawn upwards and arms spread out like the bars of a cross. Was that the lad I had known? I rushed towards the corpse--but as quickly turned away. From downright lack of courage, I could not look at it; for the body was mutilated beyond semblance to humanity. Would that I had strength and skill to paint that dead figure as it was! Then would those, who glory in the shedding of blood, glory to their shame; and the pageant of war be stripped of all its false toggery revealing carnage and slaughter in their revolting nakedness.

I could not look back to know if that were the lad, but ran aimlessly towards the scene of the Seven Oaks fray. As I approached, there was a great flapping of wings. Up rose buzzards, scolding in angry discord at my interruption. A pack of wolves skulked a few feet off and eyed me impatiently, boldly waiting to return when I left. The impudence of the brutes enraged me and I let go half a dozen charges, which sent them to a more respectful distance. Here were more bodies like the first. I counted eight within a stone's throw, and there were twice as many between Seven Oaks and the fort. Where they lay, I could tell very well; for hawks wheeled with harsh cries overhead and there was a vague movement of wolfish shapes along the ground.

What possessed me to hover about that dreadful scene, I cannot imagine, unless the fear of those creatures returning; but I did not carry a thing with which I could bury the dead. Involuntarily, I sought out Rogers and Governor Semple; for I had seen the death of each. It was when seeking these, that I thought I distinguished the faintest motion of one figure still clothed and lying apart from the others.

The sight riveted me to the spot.

Surely it was a mistake! The form could not have moved! It must have been some error of vision, or trick of the shadowy starlight; but I could not take my eyes from the prostrate form. Again the body moved--distinctly moved--beyond possibility of fancy, the chest heaving up and sinking like a man struggling but unable to rise. With the ghastly dead and the ravening wolves all about, the movement of that wounded man was strangely terrifying and my knees knocked with fear, as I ran to his aid.

The man was an Indian, but his face I could not see; for one hand staunched a wound in his head and the other gripped a knife with which he had been defending himself. My first thought was that he must be a Nor'-Wester, or his body would not have escaped the common fate; but if a Nor'-Wester, why had he been left on the field? So I concluded he was one of the camp-followers, who had joined our forces for plunder and come to a merited end. Still he was a man; and I stooped to examine him with a view to getting him on my horse and taking him back to the camp.

At first he was unconscious of my presence. Gently I tried to remove the left hand from his forehead, but at the touch, out struck the right hand in vicious thrusts of the hunting-knife, one blind cut barely missing my arm.

"Hold, man!" I cried, "I'm no foe, but a friend!" and I caught the right arm tightly.

At the sound of my voice, the left hand swung out revealing a frightful gash; and the next thing I knew, his left arm had encircled my neck like the coil of a strangler, five fingers were digging into the flesh of my throat and Le Grand Diable was making frantic efforts to free his right hand and plunge that dagger into me. The shock of the discovery threw me off guard, and for a moment there was a struggle, but only for a moment.

Then the wounded man fell back, writhing in pain, his face contorted with agony and hate. I do not think he could see me. He must have been blind from that wound. I stood back, but his knife still cut the air.

"Le Grand Diable! Fool!" I said, "I will not harm you! I give you the white man's word, I will not hurt you!"

The right arm fell limp and still. Had I, by some strange irony, been led to this spot that I might witness the death of my foe? Was this the end of that long career of evil?

"Le Grand Diable!" I cried, going a pace nearer, which seemed to bring back the ebbing life. "Le Grand Diable! You cannot stay here among the wolves. Tell me whereto find Miriam and I'll take you back to the camp!

Tell me and no one shall harm you! I will save you!"

The thin lips moved. He was saying, or trying to say, something.

"Speak louder!" and I bent over him. "Speak the truth and I take you to the camp!"

The lips were still moving, but I could not hear a sound.

"Speak louder!" I shouted. "Where is Miriam? Where is the white woman?"

I put my ear to his lips, fearful that life might slip away before I could hear.

There was a snarl through the glistening set teeth. The prostrate body gave an upward lurch. With one swift, treacherous thrust, he drove his knife into my coat-sleeve, grazing my forearm. The effort cost him his life. He sank down with a groan. The sightless, bloodshot eyes opened.

Le Grand Diable would never more feign death.

I jerked the knife from my coat, hurled it from me, sprang up and fled from the field as if it had been infected with a pest, or I pursued by gends. Never looking back and with superst.i.tious dread of the dead Indian's evil spirit, I tore on and on till, breath-spent and exhausted, I threw myself down with the North-West camp-fires in sight.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] It should scarcely be necessary for the author to state that these are the sentiments of the Indian poet expressing the views of the savage towards the white man, and not the white man towards the savage. The poem is as close a translation of the original ballad sung by Pierre in Metis dialect the night of the ma.s.sacre, as could be given. The Indian nature is more in harmony with the hawk and the coyote than with the white man; hence the references. Other thoughts embodied in this crude lay are taken directly from the refrains of the trappers chanted at that time.

[B] Governor Semple unadvisedly boasted that the shock of his power would be felt from Montreal to Athabasca.

CHAPTER XXIV

FORT DOUGLAS CHANGES MASTERS

I suppose there are times in the life of every one, even the strongest--and I am not that--when a feather's weight added to a burden may snap power of endurance. I had reached that stage before encountering Le Grand Diable on the field of ma.s.sacre at Seven Oaks.

With the events in the Mandane country, the long, hard ride northward and this latest terrible culmination of strife between Nor'-Westers and Hudson's Bay, the past month had been altogether too hard packed for my well-being. The madness of northern traders no longer amazed me.

An old nurse of my young days, whom I remember chiefly by her ramrod back and sharp tongue, used to say, "Nerves! nerves! nothing but nerves!" She thanked G.o.d she was born before the doctors had discovered nerves. Though neurotic theories had not been sufficiently elaborated for me to ascribe my state to the most refined of modern ills--nervous prostration--I was aware, as I dragged over the prairie with the horse at the end of a trailing bridle rein, that something was seriously out of tune. It was daylight before I caught the frightened broncho and no knock-kneed coward ever shook more, as I vainly tried to vault into the saddle, and after a dozen false plunges at the stirrup, gave up the attempt and footed it back to camp. There was a daze between my eyes, which the over-weary know well, and in the brain-whirl, I could distinguish only two thoughts, Where was Miriam--and Father Holland's prediction--"Benedicite! The Lord shall be your avenger! He shall deliver that evil one into the power of the punisher."

Thus, I reached the camp, picketed the horse, threw myself down in the tent and slept without a break from the morning of the 20th till mid-day of the 21st. I was awakened by the _Bois-Brules_ returning from a demonstration before the gateway of Fort Douglas. Going to the tent door, I saw that Pritchard, one of the captive Hudson's Bay men, had been brought back from a conference with the enemy. From his account, the Hudson's Bay people seemed to be holding out against us; but the settlers, realizing the danger of Indian warfare, to a man favored surrender. Had it not been for Grant, there would have been no farther parley; but on news that settlers were pressing for capitulation, the warden again despatched Pritchard to the Hudson's Bay post. In the hope of gaining access to Frances Sutherland and Eric Hamilton I accompanied him. Such was the terror prevailing within the walls, in spite of Pritchard's a.s.surance regarding my friendly purpose, admission was flatly denied me. I contented myself with verbal messages that Hamilton and Father Holland must remain. I could guarantee their safety. The same offer I made to Frances, but told her to do what was best for herself and her father. When Pritchard came out, I knew from his face that Fort Douglas was ours. Hamilton and Father Holland would stay, he reported; but Mistress Sutherland bade him say that after Seven Oaks her father had no friendly feeling for Nor'-Westers, and she could not let him go forth alone. Terms were stipulated between the two companies with due advantage to our side from the recent victory and the formal surrender of Fort Douglas took place the following day.

"What are you going to do with the settlers, Cuthbert?" I asked of the warden before the capitulation.

"Aye! That's a question," was the grim response.

"Why not leave them in the fort till things quiet down?"

"With all the Indians of Red River in possession of that fort?" asked Grant, sarcastically. "Were a few Nor'-Westers so successful in holding back the Metis at Seven Oaks, you'd like to see that experiment repeated?"

"'Twill be worse, Grant, if you let them go back to their farms."

"They'll not do that, if I'm warden of the plains," he declared with great determination. "We'll have to send them down the Red to the lake till that fool of a Scotch n.o.bleman decides what to do with his fine colonists."

"But, Grant, you don't mean to send them up north in this cold country.

They may not reach Hudson's Bay in time to catch the company ship to Scotland! Why, man, it's sheer murder to expose those people to a winter up there without a thing to shelter them!"

"To my mind, freezing is not quite so bad as a ma.s.sacre. If they won't take our boats to the States, or Canada, what else can Nor'-Westers do?"

And what else, indeed? I could not answer Grant's question, though I know every effort we made to induce those people to go south instead of north has been misrepresented as an infamous attempt to expel Selkirk settlers from Red River. Truly, I hope I may never see a sadder sight than the going forth of those colonists to the shelterless plain. It was disastrous enough for them to be driven from their native heath; but to be lured away to this far country for the purpose of becoming buffers between rival fur-traders, who would stop at nothing, and to be sacrificed as victims for their company's criminal policy--I speak as a Nor'-Wester--was immeasurably cruel.

Grant was, of course, on hand for the surrender, and he wisely kept the plain-rangers at a safe distance. Clerks lined each side of the path to the gate, and I pressed forward for a glimpse of Frances Sutherland.

There was the jar of a heavy bolt shot back. Confused noises sounded from the courtyard. The gates swung open, and out marched the sheriff of a.s.siniboia, bearing in one hand a pole with a white sheet tacked to the end for a flag of truce, and in the other the fort keys. Behind, sullen and dejected, followed a band of Hudson's Bay men. Grant stepped up to meet the sheriff. The terms of capitulation were again stated, and there was some signing of paper. Of those things my recollection is indistinct; for I was straining my eyes towards the groups of settlers inside the walls. When I looked back to the conferring leaders the silence was so intense a pinfall could have been heard. The keys of the fort were being handed to the Nor'-Westers and the Hudson's Bay men had turned away their faces that they might not see. The vanquished then pa.s.sed quickly to the barges at the river. Each of the six drunken fellows, whom I had last seen in the late Governor Semple's office, the Highlanders who had spied upon me when I visited Fort Douglas but a year before, the clerks whom I had heard talking that night in the great hall, and many others with whom I had but a chance acquaintance, filed down to the river. Seeing all ready, with a North-West clerk at the prow of each boat to warn away marauders, the men came back for settlers and wounded comrades. I would have proffered my a.s.sistance to some of the burdened people on the chance of a word with Frances Sutherland, but the colonists proudly resented any kind offices from a Nor'-Wester. I saw Louis Laplante come limping out, leaning on the arm of the red-faced man, whose eye quailed when it met mine. Poor Louis looked sadly battered, with his head in a white bandage, one arm in a sling, and a dejected stoop to his shoulders that was unusual with him.