The Law of the North Part 30

Paddling Indian fashion with both elbows held rigid and shoulders thrusting strongly forward at the end of each stroke, the travelers threaded for miles the island channels of the Blazing Pine. Basil Dreaulond had the bow, Dunvegan the stern. Father Brochet sat amidships.

They took advantage of the current and made rapid progress, their blades churning the water in long half-circular swirls. Skilled canoeists they accepted the aid of every sh.o.r.e-eddy, every rushing chute, every navigable cascade.

Down the Rapid Du Loup, a dangerous rock-split through which the river leaped rather than ran, their craft was snubbed with extreme care. The three shared the toil of portaging over to Lac Du Longe where a baffling head-wind blew.

"Ba gosh, I no lak dat, me," protested Basil, pointing to the great, white-crested combers which cannonaded the beach. "An' look at dose storm-clouds! _Saprie!_ she goin' thundaire an' lightnin'!"

But the chief trader would hear of no delay. Into the brunt of the tempest the bow was forced. Shooting the sheer wave-slopes, poising dizzily on crests where momentum raised them, rocking sickeningly in the trough of the swinging seas, the men rode in the teeth of the gale. Half way across Du Longe the thunder and lightning Dreaulond had prophesied burst with raucous bellowing, with vivid flame. The wind increased. The lake became a boiling cauldron.

Basil called upon his last ounce of reserve strength to meet the emergency. Brochet muttered as if in prayer while the leaden-backed surges lipped across the gunwales and the spume slashed across the bow.

But grim as the storm-wraiths themselves Dunvegan held to his course, wet drops glistening on his cheeks, wind furies reflected from his eyes.

By sunset they made the other sh.o.r.e, their craft ready to sink under water which could not be bailed out fast enough.

Tired to the bone, their sleeping camp was as the camp of the dead that night. An owl hooted on the tent boughs. A big moose splashed in the shallows. A gray timber wolf growled over its kill on the sh.o.r.e. But nothing quickened their dulled ears till dawn, red-eyed from his yesterday revelry, stared through the spruce tops.

Then like the revolving of a treadmill came hours of monotonous straight-water paddling, intervals of tracking and snubbing, occasional poling through cross-currents, swift, transient moments of hazardous rapid-running, and the hateful, staggering grind of slippery portages.

Across the Nisgowan; across the Wakibogan; across the Koo-wai-chew!

Through Wenokona, through Burnt Lake, through Lake of Stars! At Little Hayes Rapid, a half-day's paddle from Fort La Roche, came their first mishap. To Basil Dreaulond as bowsman the pa.s.sage which he had often run seemed unfamiliar.

"I'm not be know dis, me," he cried as the canoe swung for a second in the head-swirls before taking the meteor-like plunge downwards.

"You're joking," called the chief trader. His paddle urged. The craft shot forward.

"_Non_, ba gosh! Dat rock she be split wit' de frost an' de ice----" and his voice went up in an alarmed yell.

"_Diable!_" he roared. "Undaire de nose!"

A desperate thrust of his blade, a tremendous straining did not avail to clear them. The canoe bow struck a fang of submerged rock with a horrible, ripping sound. On the instant they capsized.

His lungs full of water and twin mill-races booming in his ears, Father Brochet hung limply under Bruce Dunvegan's arm as the latter struggled up the bouldered side of the shallow channel. It was the most realistic drowning sensation that he ever wished to experience. After them crawled the bedraggled courier, hauling the gashed canoe beyond the hammering eddies. Blood flowed over his temple. The battering he had received had re-opened the wound in his head.

A sound whacking between the shoulders relieved the priest. Basil's hurt was promptly staunched with balsam gum.

"_Mon Dieu_, dat be ver' close t'ing," he commented, shrugging his shoulders.

"Aye," agreed the chief trader, regretfully eyeing the torn canoe bow.

"We might guard our lives a little better. There is someone in Fort La Roche who needs them."

"_Oui_," returned Dreaulond, with deep significance, "an' eef I know anyt'ing, mebbe she be get dem _aussi_."

"Maybe," a.s.sented the chief trader, unmoved.

The priest uttered a thankful sigh. "We are in the hands of G.o.d," he declared. "White-water or Nor'westers, it is all the same!"

Bruce made a fatalistic gesture.

"I believe you, Father; I believe you," he returned. "Nevertheless we must always aid ourselves. Let us portage to the other end of the rapid and try to mend our canoe."

But first he fished their sunken outfit from the clear water of the channel. Brochet went down and found the paddles where they had been cast upon the sand below Little Hayes Rapid. Dreaulond pushed over a dead birch, heaping its dried husk and powdery center for a quick fire.

Then they stripped off their soaked garments and spread them upon the rocks under the perpendicular sun of high noon. There the steaming clothes dried more quickly than would have been possible before the flames. It was time to eat. The hot meal of fried fish newly caught, bannocks baked from the already wetted flour, and tea proved welcome. A pipe or two formed the dessert.

After the meal the men set about the task of mending the canoe. A long rent grinned in the right side of the bow, a bad gash that would require patience in the gumming. Basil measured it tentatively and went off into the forest to cut a strip of bark large enough to cover the opening generously. Dunvegan melted the pitch over the fire, getting it ready to cement the patch.

Basil returned. Skilfully the two accomplished the delicate work. The patch was gummed tight. Over all they spread an extra coat of pitch for surety. Then the canoe was set aside in the shade for a s.p.a.ce that the gum might cool and harden sufficiently against the water's friction.

The bark Dreaulond cut had fitted neatly, the gum stuck well. The finish of the thing pleased Basil. He gave vent to his satisfaction in a contented grunt as he lay back with lighted pipe among the greening shrubs and ferns.

"_Bien!_" he exclaimed. "She be carry us lak wan new _batteau_. Lak _batteaux sur_ de old Saguenay--dat's long way from here, ba gosh! I see heem some nights in ma dreams, me. An' dat's w'en de trails be ver' hard an' I'm ver' tired. Onlee las' night, _mes amis_, I see dat _cher_ old Saguenay an' Lac Saint Jean."

"Was St. John anything like Du Longe?" asked Dunvegan whimsically.

Basil shivered at the comparison. "_Non_," he protested. "Du Longe wan _diable_. Saint Jean wan angel. _Par Dieu_, I be tell you, _mes camarades_, dose _lacs_ an' _rivieres_ on ma home ain' lak dese in dis beeg _Nord_. _Non, M'sieu'_ Brochet! Back dere I be go out for some leetl' pleasure; nevaire be t'ink of dangaire--she so peaceful an'

sweet. _Mais_ oop here I always t'ink dis _Nord_ lak wan sharp enemy watchin' for take you off de guard, for catch you in some feex. Onlee de strong mans leeve in dis countree--you see dat. An' w'en I journey on dese _lacs_ an' _rivieres_ an' dese beeg woods, I kip de open eye, de tight hand."

"Feeling that if you ever relax your vigilance, the North will hurl you down," suggested Father Brochet.

"_Oui_, dat's way I feel. _Mais_ not dat way on ma home in de old days!

Las' night I be dream I dreeft lak I used to dreeft from Lac Saint Jean down de Saguenay. From Isle D'Alma to de Shipshaw--_oui_, an' all the way to Chicoutimi! All in ma new _batteau_!"

"And was there anyone in the bow?" ventured Dunvegan softly. He was strangely moved, recalling an ancient confidence of Dreaulond's.

"_Oui_," murmured Basil tenderly, "de _pet.i.te_ Therese, _ma fille_!"

"Man, man," cried Brochet earnestly, "haven't you forgotten yet? It is years since you told us of that sorrow."

"_Non_, not w'ile I leeve," Dreaulond replied, a suspicious moisture gathering on his lashes. "She be wit' me las' night, de leetl' Therese, black-eyed, wit' de angel smile--Therese from the quiet, green graveyard on de hill of St. Gedeon."

Silently they marveled at him, this man of iron strength, but of exquisite feeling, with poetic heart and temperament, who on the edge of danger could float with the dream-conjured vision of his dead child down between the water-cooled, moss-wrapped rocks of the Saguenay.

But Basil's att.i.tude changed swiftly as he sensed one of those northern menaces which he had mentioned minutes before. He rolled on his side and stared downstream.

"Who's dis?" His tone, low and harsh, seemed that of another person.

Bruce Dunvegan raised himself on one elbow, his face frowning in a cloud of smoke.

"A Nor'wester--curse it!" he muttered savagely. "Coming from La Roche!

He cannot miss us here. For see he's on the portage. Keep a still tongue till I speak and follow my lead. There is a chance that he may mistake us."

The chief trader lay back again with an a.s.sumption of careless indifference. The other two imitated it.

Meanwhile the Nor'wester was crossing the portage with a speed and ease which showed that he was not overburdened by traveling gear. The lines of the canoe on his head bespoke a fast, light craft. His dunnage was scant.

Ascending from the sh.o.r.e level to the hog-back of rock which ran along parallel with Little Hayes Rapid till it dipped down to clear water at the other end, the Nor'wester glimpsed beneath the broad band of the tump-line on his forehead the three strangers lolling beside their fire.

Immediately he dropped his load, paused, and glared uncertainly.

Dunvegan gave him a cheery call which rea.s.sured him.

"Knife me, but at first I was afraid you might be of the Hudson's Bay people," he laughed, coming on and depositing his canoe and luggage with their own. "Yet that was a foolish idea, for one does not see Company men so close to Fort La Roche. But your faces are strange to me!" He paused and puzzled them over. "To which of our parties do you belong?