The Mississippi Bubble Part 18

"Myself," said Pierre Noir, "shall sleep beneath the boat to-night, for since she sheds water from below, she may do as well from above."

"Even so, Pierre Noir," said Du Mesne, "but get you the boat farther toward your own camp to-night. Do you not see that Monsieur L'as is not with us?"

"_Eh bien_?"

"And were he not surely with us at such time, unless--?"

"Oh, _a.s.surement_!" replied Pierre Noir. "Jean Breboeuf, aid me in taking the boat back to our camp in the woods."

Now came the rain. Not in steady and even downpour, not with intermittent showers, but in a sidelong, terrifying torrent, drenching, biting, cutting in its violence. The swift weight of the rain gave to the trees more burden than they could bear. As before the storm, when all was still, there had come time and again the warning boom of a falling tree, stricken with mysterious mortal dread of that which was to come, so now, in the riot of that arrived danger, first one and then another wide-armed monarch of the wood crashed down, adding with its downfall to the testimony of the a.s.sailing tempest's strength and fury.

The lightning now came not only in ragged blazes and long ripping lines of light, but in bursts and shocks, and in bomb-like b.a.l.l.s, exploding with elemental detonations. b.a.l.l.s of this tense surcharged essence rolled out over the comb of the bluff, fell upon the shadows of the water, and seemed to bound from crest to white-capped crest, till at last they split and burst asunder like some ominous missiles from engines of wrath and destruction.

And now, suddenly, all grew still again. The sky took on a lighter, livid tone, one of pure venom. There came a whisper, a murmur, a rush as of mighty waters, a sighing as of an army of the condemned, a shrieking as of legions of the lost, a roaring as of all the soul-felt tortures of a world. From the forest rose a continuous rending crash. The whiplash of the tempest cracked the tree trunks as a child beheads a row of daisies. Piled up, falling, riven asunder, torn out by the wind, the giant trees joined the toys which the cynic storm gathered in its hands and bore along until such time as it should please to crush and drop them.

There pa.s.sed out over the black sea of Michiganon a vast black wraith; a thing horrible, tremendous, t.i.tanic in organic power. It howled, execrated, menaced; missed its aim, and pa.s.sed. The little swaying house still stood! Under the sheltered log some tiny sparks of fire still burned, omen of the unquenchable hearthstones which the land was yet to know!

"Holy G.o.d! what was it? What was that which pa.s.sed?" cried Jean Breboeuf, crawling out from beneath his shelter. "Saint Mary defend us all this night! 'Twas the great Canoe of the d.a.m.ned, running _au large_ across the sky! Mary, Mother of G.o.d, hear my vow! Prom this time Jean Breboeuf shall lead a better life!"

The storm, baffled, pa.s.sed on. The rain, unsatisfied, sullenly ceased in its attack. The waves, hopeless but still vindictive, began to call back their legions from the narrow sh.o.r.e. The lightnings, unsated in their wrath, flared and flickered on and out across the eastward sea. With wild laughter and shrieks and imprecations, the spirit of the tempest wailed on its furious way. The red West had raised its hand to smite, but it had not smitten sure.

In the silence of the night, in the hush following the uproar of the storm, there came a little wailing cry; so faint, so feeble, yet so mighty, so conquering, this sign of the coming generation, the voice of the new-born babe. At this little human voice, born of sorrow and sin, born to suffering and to knowledge, born to life in all its wonders and to death in all its mystery--the elements perchance relented and averted their fury. Not yet was there to be punished sin, or wrong, or doubt, or weakness. Not at once would justice punish the parents of this babe and blot out at once the record of their fault. Storm and lightning, darkness and the night yielded to the voice of the infant and allowed the old story of humanity and sin, and hope and mercy to run on.

The babe wailed faintly in the silence of the night. Under the hearth-log there still endured the fire. And then the red West, seeing itself conquered, smiled and flung wide its arms, and greeted them with the burgeoning dawn, and the voices of birds, with a sky blue and repentant, a sun smiling and not unkind.

CHAPTER III

AU LARGE

It was weeks after the night of the great storm, and the camp of the _voyageurs_ still held its place on the sh.o.r.e of the great Green Bay.

The wild game and the abundant fishes of the lake gave ample provender for the party, and the little bivouac had been rendered more comfortable in many ways best known to those dwellers of the forest. The light jest, the burst of laughter, the careless ease of att.i.tude showed the light-hearted _voyageurs_ content with this, their last abode, nor for the time did any word issue which threatened to end their tarrying.

Law one morning strolled out from the lodge and seated himself on a bit of driftwood at the edge of the forest's fringe of cedars, where, seemingly half forgetting himself in the witchery of the scene, he gazed out idly over the wide prospect which lay before him. He was the same young man as ever. Surely, this increased gauntness was but the result of long hours at the paddle, the hollow cheeks but betokened hard fare and the defining winds of the outdoor air. If the eye were a trace more dim, that could be due but to the reflectiveness induced by the quiet scene and hour. Yet why should John Law, young and refreshed, drop chin in hand and sit there moodily looking ahead of him, comprehending not at all that which he beheld?

Indeed there appeared now to the eye of this young man not the white sh.o.r.es and black crowned bluffs and distant islands, not the sweep of broad-winged birds circling near the waters, nor the shadow of the high-poised eagle drifting far above. He felt not the soft wind upon his cheek, nor noted the warmth of the on-coming sun. In truth, even here, on the very threshold of a new world and a new life, he was going back, pausing uncertainly at the door of that life and of that world which he had left behind. There appeared to him not the rolling undulations of the black-topped forest, not the tossing surface of the inland sea, nor the white-pebbled beach laved by its pulsing waters. He saw instead a white and dusty road, lined by green English hedge-rows. Back, over there, beyond these rolling blue waves, back of the long water trail over which he had come, there were chapel and bell and robed priest, and the word which made all fast forever. But back of the wilderness mission, back of the straggling settlements of Montreal and Quebec, back of the blue waters of the ocean, there, too, were church and minister; and there dwelt a woman whose figure stood now before his eyes, part of this mental picture of the white road lined with the hedges of green.

A hand was laid on his shoulder, and he half started up in sudden surprise. Before him, the sun shining through her hair, her eyes dark in the shadow, stood Mary Connynge. A fair woman indeed, comely, round of form, soft-eyed, and light of touch, she might none the less have been a very savage as she stood there, clad no longer in the dress of civilization, but in the soft native garb of skins, ornamented with the stained quills of the porcupine and the bizarre adornments of the native bead work; in her hair dull metal bands, like any Indian woman, upon her feet little beaded moccasins--the very moccasin, it might have been, which Law had first seen in ancient London town and which had played so strange a part in his life since then.

"You startled me," said Law, simply. "I was thinking."

A sudden jealous wave of woman's divining intuition came upon the woman at his side. "I doubt not," said she, bitterly, "that I could name the subject of your thought! Why? Why sit here and dream of her, when here am I, who deserve everything that you can give?"

She stood erect, her eyes flashing, her arms outstretched, her bosom panting under the fringed garments, her voice ringing as it might have been with the very essence of truth and pa.s.sion. Law looked at her steadily. But the shadow did not lift from his brow, though he looked long and pondered.

"Come," said he, at length, gently. "None the less we are as we are. In every game we take our chances, and in every game we pay our debts. Let us go back to the camp."

As they turned back down the beach Law saw standing at a little distance his lieutenant, Du Mesne, who hesitated as though he would speak.

"What is it, Du Mesne?" asked Law, excusing himself with a gesture and joining the _voyageur_ where he stood.

"Why, Monsieur L'as," said Du Mesne, "I am making bold to mention it, but in good truth there was some question in my mind as to what might be our plans. The spring, as you know, is now well advanced. It was your first design to go far into the West, and there to set up your station for the trading in furs. Now there have come these little incidents which have occasioned us some delay. While I have not doubted your enterprise, Monsieur, I bethought me perhaps it might be within your plans now to go but little farther on--perhaps, indeed, to turn back--"

"To go back?" said Law.

"Well, yes; that is to say, Monsieur L'as, back again down the Great Lakes."

"Have you then known me so ill as this, Du Mesne?" said Law. "It has not been my custom to set backward foot on any sort of trail."

"Oh, well, to be sure, Monsieur, that I know quite well," replied Du Mesne, apologetically. "I would only say that, if you do go forward, you will do more than most men accomplish on their first voyage _au large_ in the wilderness. There comes to many a certain shrinking of the heart which leads them to find excuse for not faring farther on. Yonder, as you know, Monsieur, lie Quebec and Montreal, somewhat better fitted for the abode of monsieur and madame than the tents of the wilderness. Back of that, too, as we both very well know, Monsieur, lie London and old England; and I had been dull of eye indeed did I not recognize the opportunities of a young gallant like yourself. Now, while I know yourself to be a man of spirit, Monsieur L'as, and while I should welcome you gladly as a brother of the trail, I had only thought that perhaps you would pardon me if I did but ask your purpose at this time."

Law bent his head in silence for a moment. "What know you of this forward trail, Du Mesne?" said he. "Have you ever gone beyond this point in your own journeyings?"

"Never beyond this," replied Du Mesne, "and indeed not so far by many hundred miles. For my own part I rely chiefly upon the story of my brother, Greysolon du L'hut, the boldest soul that ever put paddle in the St. Lawrence. My brother Greysolon, by the fire one night, told me that some years before he had been at the mouth of the Green Bay--perhaps near this very spot--and that here he and his brothers found a deserted Indian camp. Near it, lying half in the fire, where he had fallen in exhaustion, was an old, a very old Indian, who had been abandoned by his tribe to die--for that, you must know, Monsieur, is one of the pleasant customs of the wilderness.

"Greysolon and his men revived this savage in some fashion, and meantime had much speech with him about this unknown land at whose edge we have now arrived. The old savage said that he had been many moons north and west of that place. He knew of the river called the Blue Earth, perhaps the same of which Father Hennepin has told. And also of the Divine River, far below and tributary to the Messasebe. He said that his father was once of a war party who went far to the north against the Ojibways, and that his people took from the Ojibways one of their prisoners, who said that he came from some strange country far to the westward, where there was a very wide plain, of no trees. Beyond that there were great mountains, taller than any to be found in all this region hereabout.

Beyond these mountains the prisoner did not know what there might be, but these mountains his people took to be the edge of the world, beyond which could live only wicked spirits. This was what the prisoner of the Ojibways said. He, too, was an old man.

"The captive of my brother Greysolon was an Outagamie, and he said that the Outagamies burned this prisoner of the Ojibways, for they knew that he was surely lying to them. Without doubt they did quite right to burn him, for the notion of a great open country without trees or streams is, of course, absurd to any one who knows America. And as for mountains, all men know that the mountains lie to the east of us, not to the westward."

"'Twould seem much hearsay," said Law, "this information which comes at second, third and fourth hand."

"True," said Du Mesne, "but such is the source of the little we know of the valley of the Messasebe, and that which lies beyond it. None the less this idea offers interest."

"Yet you ask me if I would return."

"'Twas but for yourself, Monsieur. It is there, if I may humbly confess to you, that it is my own ambition some day to arrive. Myself--this West, as I said long ago to the gentlemen in London--appeals to me, since it is indeed a land unoccupied, unowned, an empire which we may have all for ourselves. What say you, Monsieur L'as?"

John Law straightened and stiffened as he stood. For an instant his eye flashed with the zeal of youth and of adventure. It was but a transient cloud which crossed his face, yet there was sadness in his tone as he replied.

"My friend," said he, "you ask me for my answer. I have pondered and I now decide. We shall go on. We shall go forward. Let us have this West, my friend. Heaven helping us, let me find somewhere, in some land, a place where I may be utterly lost, and where I may forget!"

CHAPTER IV

THE PATHWAY OF THE WATERS

The news of the intended departure was received with joy by the crew of _voyageurs_, who, on the warning of an instant, fell forthwith to the simple tasks of breaking camp and storing the accustomed bales and bundles in their places in the great _canot du Nord_.

"_La voila_!" said Tete Gris. "Here she sits, this canoe, eager to go on. 'Tis forward again, _mes amis_! Forward once more; and glad enough am I for this day. We shall see new lands ere long."

"For my part," said Jean Breboeuf, "I also am most anxious to be away, for I have eaten this white-fish until I crave no more. I had bethought me how excellent are the pumpkins of the good fathers at the Straits; and indeed I would we had with us more of that excellent fruit, the bean."

"Bah! Jean Breboeuf," retorted Pierre Noir. "'Tis but a poor-hearted _voyageur_ would hang about a mission garden with a hoe in his hand instead of a gun. Perhaps the good sisters at the Mountain miss thy skill at pulling weeds."