Montlivet Part 22

I looked for my crew. The men were curled under trees, but Singing Arrow had used more craft. She had hidden herself under her light canoe,--which she had first secured with pegs that it might not blow away,--and she lay as compact and comfortable as a tree-housed grub. I lifted the corner of the canoe and peered at her, whereat she giggled happily, serene in the thought that I was wet while she was dry. She was as restful to the brain as a frolicking puppy, and I shook my head at her to hear her giggle again. I was about to wonder whether she had ever known awe of anything, but just then the thunder, which had been merely growling, barked out like a howitzer above us, and she covered her head and screamed like any of her s.e.x.

The thunder sent me back to the woman. I crept, wet as I was, into her pine-needled hollow, and started to ask if she were afraid. But the question died at sight of her. She was propped on her elbows, and had parted the low boughs in front of her that she might look out at the storm. She turned at sound of me, and the blood was in her cheeks as I felt it in mine.

"Come," she cried with her motion.

I went and lay close beside her, peering, as she did, through the trees. The world was all wind and red light and churning water. I could feel her quick breathing.

"I can hear the spirit of the wilderness crying," she said to me. The lightning played over her face and eyes, and they shone like flame.

I laid a hand on her wet blankets. "Has the rain soaked through?"

But she did not listen. The exultation in her look I have seen sometimes in the face of a young priest; I have also seen it in a savage dancer. It is all one. It is the leaping response of the soul to the call of a great freedom. Storm was summoning storm. I found the woman's hand, and lay with it in mine.

She remembered me again after a time. "Does it call to you?" she cried.

I could feel the blood racing in her palm. "As it does to you," I answered, and I lay still, and let the storm riot in me, and around me, with her hand held close.

We could not speak for some time. The thunder was constant, and the play of the lightning was like the dazzle of a fencer's sword. Mingled with the thunder came the slap of frothing water and the whine of bending trees. The wind was ice to the cheeks.

At the first lull the woman turned to me. "If you had followed my wishes we should have been drowned."

I nodded. I had no wish to speak. The storm in me was not lessening.

I kept the woman's hand and was swept on by the tempest.

And the woman, too, lay silent. I saw her look at me once, and look away. And then, because I could think more coherently, it came to me that she had changed. The change had come since she had read Cadillac's letter. She had said nothing, but she was different. What did it mean? Was she natural at last because she thought succor was near? I was not ready to know. The moments that I had now were mine.

Ten minutes later they might, if she decreed, belong to Benjamin Starling.

The storm pa.s.sed as swiftly as the shifting of a tableau. The rain stopped, not lingeringly, but as if a key had been turned, and cracks came in the clouds like clefts in black ice and showed the blue beyond.

In five minutes the sun was shining. We all crept out from under trees and canoes, and shook ourselves like drenched fowls.

It was magic the way the world changed. The wind died, and the sun shone low and yellow, and a robin began to sing. The water was still white and fretting, and the sand was strewn with torn leaves, but otherwise there was peace. I told Pierre to take one of the men and find dry fuel for a fire, and Labarthe to take the other and attend to gumming the canoes. Then I went to the woman, who had slipped dry and red-cheeked from her wrappings, and was walking in the sun.

"Well, Madame Montlivet," I said, with a bow, "what shall we do about Monsieur Cadillac's letter?"

There was laughter in my voice, and it confused her. "What shall we do?" she echoed doubtfully. "Did you mean to say 'we'?"

I bowed again. "'We' a.s.suredly. It must be a joint decision. Come, it is for you to declare your mind. Do we seek Lord Starling, do we hide from him, or do we stand still and let Fate throw the dice for us?

What do you wish, madame?"

She looked at me with a little puzzled withdrawal. "Why do you laugh?"

she asked.

I was loath to vex her. But, indeed, I could not check the tide of joyous excitement that was surging through me. "I do not know quite why I laugh," I answered truly. "Perhaps it is because the sun is shining, and because life looks so fair and rich and full of possibilities. But, madame, we have been tragic too long; it irks us both. Tell me, now. It rests with you. Shall we paddle northwest and search for your cousin, Lord Starling?"

She thought a moment. "You wish it?"

"No, madame."

She turned away. "Then why ask me? You said there could not be two heads in this command."

I sobered. "Now that was a cat's scratch," I rebuked. "You have never done that before."

The gentleness of her look made me ashamed. "You are suspicious of me," she said a little sadly. "That was not a scratch, monsieur. I said what I mean; I prefer to leave the decision in your hands."

"But your wish?"

"It is confused, monsieur."

"But your sense of justice in the matter?"

She was silent a moment, and walked up and down. "I have been trying to see the right ever since I read the letter," she said quietly.

"This is the best answer I can make. I think that we had better avoid meeting Lord Starling, monsieur."

I stepped to her side and matched my pace to hers. The robin had been joined by his mate, and they were singing. "Why, madame?" I asked her, and when she was still silent I persisted. "Why, madame?"

She lifted grave eyes to me. "I think it will be wise to keep Lord Starling in the wilderness as long as possible," she answered. "If he does not find me it may be that he will keep on searching. He may not,--but again he may. On the other hand, if he finds me he will a.s.suredly go home."

"And if he does go home? I a.s.sure you the wilderness is no sweeter in my eyes while he is here."

She handed me Cadillac's letter. "I think that you know what I mean,"

She said. "Your commandant is a wise man. Monsieur, I do not understand Lord Starling's purpose in this journey, but I am afraid that Monsieur de la Mothe-Cadillac is right. My cousin may be treating secretly with the Indians. He is a capable man, and not easy to read.

I do not know why he should be here."

I looked down at her. "But I know. He is here to find you. Have you forgotten what I said to you yesterday morning? He will not rest till he has found you. Ought we to save him anxiety? I can understand that he has suffered."

But she shook her head, and her eyes as she looked up at me showed the deep sadness that always seemed, while it lasted, to be too rooted ever to be erased.

"You are an idealist, monsieur. You believe in man's constancy as I do not. I cannot believe that I am the moving cause of Lord Starling's journey. He would undoubtedly like to find me, for I am of his house and of use to him, but he has other purposes. Of that I am sure."

I grew cruel because I was glad; there is nothing so ruthless as happiness. "And you would thwart his purposes, madame?" I cried.

She looked at me coldly. "I will not be used as a tool against you,"

she said.

"And that is all?"

"It is enough. I have said this to you many times. Why do you make me say it again? I have undertaken to do something, and I will carry it through. I will not lend myself to any plot against your interests. I will not. So long as we are together, I will play the game fair."

"And when we are no longer together?"

She pushed out her hands. "I do not know. I am glad that you asked me that. Monsieur, if any chance should free us from each other, if we should reach Montreal in safety, why, then, I do not know. I come of an ambitious race. It may be that I shall use the information that I have. I love my country as you do yours, and when a woman has had some beliefs taken from her there is little remaining her but ambition. So let me know as little as possible of your plans, for I may use my knowledge. I give you warning, monsieur."

The happiness in me would not die, and so, perhaps, I smiled. She looked at me keenly.

"You think that I am vaunting idly," she said. "Perhaps I am. I do not know what I shall do. But, monsieur, for your own sake do not underestimate my capacity for doing you harm. I mean that as a gauge."

She stood against the sunset, and her delicate height and proud head showed like a statue's. I stooped and lifted an imaginary glove from the sand.