Delphi Complete Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated) (450 page)

CHAPTER XXXIX
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THE TWO SWIMMERS
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Charles de la Noue, Seigneur de Sainte Marie, was a hard and self-contained man, but a groan and a bitter curse burst from him when he saw his Indian wife in the hands of her kinsmen, from whom she could hope for little mercy. Yet even now his old-fashioned courtesy to his guest had made him turn to De Catinat with some words of sympathy, when there was a clatter of wood, something darkened the light of the window, and the young soldier was gone. Without a word he had lowered the ladder and was clambering down it with frantic haste. Then as his feet touched the ground he signalled to his comrades to draw it up again, and dashing into the river he swam towards the canoe. Without arms and without a plan he had but the one thought that his place was by the side of his wife in this, the hour of her danger. Fate should bring him what it brought her, and he swore to himself, as he clove a way with his strong arms, that whether it were life or death they should still share it together.

But there was another whose view of duty led him from safety into the face of danger. All night the Franciscan had watched De Catinat as a miser watches his treasure, filled with the thought that this heretic was the one little seed which might spread and spread until it choked the chosen vineyard of the Church. Now when he saw him rush so suddenly down the ladder, every fear was banished from his mind save the overpowering one that he was about to lose his precious charge. He, too, clambered down at the very heels of his prisoner, and rushed into the stream not ten paces behind him.

And so the watchers at the window saw the strangest of sights. There, in mid-stream, lay the canoe, with a ring of dark warriors clustering in the stern, and the two women crouching in the midst of them. Swimming madly towards them was De Catinat, rising to the shoulders with the strength of every stroke, and behind him again was the tonsured head of the friar, with his brown capote and long trailing gown floating upon the surface of the water behind him. But in his zeal he had thought too little of his own powers. He was a good swimmer, but he was weighted and hampered by his unwieldy clothes. Slower and slower grew his stroke, lower and lower his head, until at last with a great shriek of In manus tuas, Domine! he threw up his hands, and vanished in the swirl of the river. A minute later the watchers, hoarse with screaming to him to return, saw De Catinat pulled aboard the Iroquois canoe, which was instantly turned and continued its course up the river.

“My God!” cried Amos hoarsely. “They have taken him. He is lost.”

“I have seen some strange things in these forty years, but never the like of that!” said Du Lhut.

The seigneur took a little pinch of snuff from his gold box, and flicked the wandering grains from his shirt-front with his dainty lace handkerchief.

“Monsieur de Catinat has acted like a gentleman of France,” said he. “If I could swim now as I did thirty years ago, I should be by his side.”

Du Lhut glanced round him and shook his head. “We are only six now,” said he. “I fear they are up to some devilry because they are so very still.”

“They are leaving the house!” cried the censitaire, who was peeping through one of the side windows. “What can it mean? Holy Virgin, is it possible that we are saved? See how they throng through the trees. They are making for the canoe. Now they are waving their arms and pointing.”

“There is the gray hat of that mongrel devil amongst them,” said the captain. “I would try a shot upon him were it not a waste of powder and lead.”

“I have hit the mark at as long a range,” said Amos, pushing his long brown gun through a chink in the barricade which they had thrown across the lower half of the window. “I would give my next year’s trade to bring him down.”

“It is forty paces further than my musket would carry,” remarked Du Lhut, “but I have seen the English shoot a great way with those long guns.”

Amos took a steady aim, resting his gun upon the window sill, and fired.

A shout of delight burst from the little knot of survivors. The Flemish

Bastard had fallen. But he was on his feet again in an instant and

shook his hand defiantly at the window.

“Curse it!” cried Amos bitterly, in English. “I have hit him with a spent ball. As well strike him with a pebble.”

“Nay, curse not, Amos, lad, but try him again with another pinch of powder if your gun will stand it.”

The woodsman thrust in a full charge, and chose a well-rounded bullet from his bag, but when he looked again both the Bastard and his warriors had disappeared. On the river the single Iroquois canoe which held the captives was speeding south as swiftly as twenty paddles could drive it, but save this one dark streak upon the blue stream, not a sign was to be seen of their enemies. They had vanished as if they had been an evil dream. There was the bullet-spotted stockade, the litter of dead bodies inside it, the burned and roofless cottages, but the silent woods lay gleaming in the morning sunshine as quiet and peaceful as if no hell-burst of fiends had ever broken out from them.

“By my faith, I believe that they have gone!” cried the seigneur.

“Take care that it is not a ruse,” said Du Lhut. “Why should they fly before six men when they have conquered sixty?”

But the censitaire had looked out of the other window, and in an instant he was down upon his knees with his hands in the air, and his powder blackened face turned upwards, pattering out prayers and thanksgivings. His five comrades rushed across the room and burst into a shriek of joy. The upper reach of the river was covered with a flotilla of canoes from which the sun struck quick flashes as it shone upon the musket-barrels and trappings of the crews. Already they could see the white coats of the regulars, the brown tunics of the coureurs-de-bois, and the gaudy colours of the Hurons and Algonquins. On they swept, dotting the whole breadth of the river, and growing larger every instant, while far away on the southern bend, the Iroquois canoe was a mere moving dot which had shot away to the farther side and lost itself presently under the shadow of the trees. Another minute and the survivors were out upon the bank, waving their caps in the air, while the prows of the first of their rescuers were already grating upon the pebbles. In the stern of the very foremost canoe sat a wizened little man with a large brown wig, and a gilt-headed rapier laid across his knees. He sprang out as the keel touched bottom, splashing through the shallow water with his high leather boots, and rushing up to the seigneur, he flung himself into his arms.

“My dear Charles,” he cried, “you have held your house like a hero.

What, only six of you! Tut, tut, this has been a bloody business!”

“I knew that you would not desert a comrade, Chambly. We have saved the house, but our losses have been terrible. My son is dead. My wife is in that Iroquois canoe in front of you.”

The commandant of Fort St. Louis pressed his friend’s hand in silent sympathy.

“The others arrived all safe,” he said at last. “Only that one was taken, on account of the breaking of a paddle. Three were drowned and two captured. There was a French lady in it, I understand, as well as madame.”

“Yes, and they have taken her husband as well.”

“Ah, poor souls! Well, if you are strong enough to join us, you and your friends, we shall follow after them without the loss of an instant. Ten of my men will remain to guard the house, and you can have their canoe. Jump in then, and forward, for life and death may hang upon our speed!”

CHAPTER XL
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THE END

The Iroquois had not treated De Catinat harshly when they dragged him from the water into their canoe. So incomprehensible was it to them why any man should voluntarily leave a place of safety in order to put himself in their power that they could only set it down to madness, a malady which inspires awe and respect among the Indians. They did not even tie his wrists, for why should he attempt to escape when he had come of his own free will? Two warriors passed their hands over him, to be sure that he was unarmed, and he was then thrust down between the two women, while the canoe darted in towards the bank to tell the others that the St. Louis garrison was coming up the stream. Then it steered out again, and made its way swiftly up the centre of the river. Adele was deadly pale and her hand, as her husband laid his upon it, was as cold as marble.

“My darling,” he whispered, “tell me that all is well with you — that you are unhurt!”

“Oh, Amory, why did you come? Why did you come, Amory? Oh, I think I could have borne anything, but if they hurt you I could not bear that.”

“How could I stay behind when I knew that you were in their hands?

I should have gone mad!”

“Ah, it was my one consolation to think that you were safe.”

“No, no, we have gone through so much together that we cannot part now.

What is death, Adele? Why should we be afraid of it?”

“I am not afraid of it.”

“And I am not afraid of it. Things will come about as God wills it, and what He wills must in the end be the best. If we live, then we have this memory in common. If we die, then we go hand-in-hand into another life. Courage, my own, all will be well with us.”

“Tell me, monsieur,” said Onega, “is my lord still living?”

“Yes, he is alive and well.”

“It is good. He is a great chief, and I have never been sorry, not even now, that I have wedded with one who was not of my own people. But ah, my son! Who shall give my son back to me? He was like the young sapling, so straight and so strong! Who could run with him, or leap with him, or swim with him? Ere that sun shines again we shall all be dead, and my heart is glad, for I shall see my boy once more.”

The Iroquois paddles had bent to their work until a good ten miles lay between them and Sainte Marie. Then they ran the canoe into a little creek upon their own side of the river, and sprang out of her, dragging the prisoners after them. The canoe was carried on the shoulders of eight men some distance into the wood, where they concealed it between two fallen trees, heaping a litter of branches over it to screen it from view. Then, after a short council, they started through the forest, walking in single file, with their three prisoners in the middle. There were fifteen warriors in all, eight in front and seven behind, all armed with muskets and as swift-footed as deer, so that escape was out of the question. They could but follow on, and wait in patience for whatever might befall them.

All day they pursued their dreary march, picking their way through vast morasses, skirting the borders of blue woodland lakes where the gray stork flapped heavily up from the reeds at their approach, or plunging into dark belts of woodland where it is always twilight, and where the falling of the wild chestnuts and the chatter of the squirrels a hundred feet above their heads were the only sounds which broke the silence. Onega had the endurance of the Indians themselves, but Adele, in spite of her former journeys, was footsore and weary before evening. It was a relief to De Catinat, therefore, when the red glow of a great fire beat suddenly through the tree-trunks, and they came upon an Indian camp in which was assembled the greater part of the war-party which had been driven from Sainte Marie. Here, too, were a number of the squaws who had come from the Mohawk and Cayuga villages in order to be nearer to the warriors. Wigwams had been erected all round in a circle, and before each of them were the fires with kettles slung upon a tripod of sticks in which the evening meal was being cooked. In the centre of all was a very fierce fire which had been made of brushwood placed in a circle, so as to leave a clear space of twelve feet in the middle. A pole stood up in the centre of this clearing, and something all mottled with red and black was tied up against it. De Catinat stepped swiftly in front of Adele that she might not see the dreadful thing, but he was too late. She shuddered, and drew a quick breath between her pale lips, but no sound escaped her.

“They have begun already, then,” said Onega composedly. “Well, it will be our turn next, and we shall show them that we know how to die.”

“They have not ill-used us yet,” said De Catinat. “Perhaps they will keep us for ransom or exchange.”

The Indian woman shook her head. “Do not deceive yourself by any such hope,” said she. “When they are as gentle as they have been with you it is ever a sign that you are reserved for the torture. Your wife will be married to one of their chiefs, but you and I must die, for you are a warrior, and I am too old for a squaw.”

Married to an Iroquois! Those dreadful words shot a pang through both their hearts which no thought of death could have done. De Catinat’s head dropped forward upon his chest, and he staggered and would have fallen had Adele not caught him by the arm.

“Do not fear, dear Amory,” she whispered. “Other things may happen but not that, for I swear to you that I shall not survive you. No, it may be sin or it may not, but if death will not come to me, I will go to it.”

De Catinat looked down at the gentle face which had set now into the hard lines of an immutable resolve. He knew that it would be as she had said, and that, come what might, that last outrage would not befall them. Could he ever have believed that the time would come when it would send a thrill of joy through his heart to know that his wife would die?

As they entered the Iroquois village the squaws and warriors had rushed towards them, and they passed through a double line of hideous faces which jeered and jibed and howled at them as they passed. Their escort led them through this rabble and conducted them to a hut which stood apart. It was empty, save for some willow fishing-nets hanging at the side, and a heap of pumpkins stored in the corner.

“The chiefs will come and will decide upon what is to be done with us,” said Onega. “Here they are coming now, and you will soon see that I am right, for I know the ways of my own people.”

An instant later an old war-chief, accompanied by two younger braves and by the bearded half-Dutch Iroquois who had led the attack upon the manor-house, strolled over and stood in the doorway, looking in at the prisoners, and shooting little guttural sentences at each other. The totems of the Hawk, the Wolf, the Bear, and the Snake showed that they each represented one of the great families of the Nation. The Bastard was smoking a stone pipe, and yet it was he who talked the most, arguing apparently with one of the younger savages, who seemed to come round at last to his opinion. Finally the old chief said a few short stern words, and the matter appeared to be settled.

“And you, you beldame,” said the Bastard in French to the Iroquois woman, “you will have a lesson this night which will teach you to side against your own people.”

“You half-bred mongrel,” replied the fearless old woman, “you should take that hat from your head when you speak to one in whose veins runs the best blood of the Onondagas. You a warrior? You who, with a thousand at your back, could not make your way into a little house with a few poor husbandmen within it! It is no wonder that your father’s people have cast you out! Go back and work at the beads, or play at the game of plum-stones, for some day in the woods you might meet with a man, and so bring disgrace upon the nation which has taken you in!”

The evil face of the Bastard grew livid as he listened to the scornful words which were hissed at him by the captive. He strode across to her, and taking her hand he thrust her forefinger into the burning bowl of his pipe. She made no effort to remove it, but sat with a perfectly set face for a minute or more, looking out through the open door at the evening sunlight and the little groups of chattering Indians. He had watched her keenly in the hope of hearing a cry, or seeing some spasm of agony upon her face, but at last, with a curse, he dashed down her hand and strode from the hut. She thrust her charred finger into her bosom and laughed.

“He is a good-for-nought!” she cried. “He does not even know how to torture. Now, I could have got a cry out of him. I am sure of it. But you — monsieur, you are very white!”

“It was the sight of such a hellish deed. Ah, if we were but set face to face, I with my sword, he with what weapon he chose, by God, he should pay for it with his heart’s blood.”

The Indian woman seemed surprised. “It is strange to me,” she said, “that you should think of what befalls me when you are yourselves under the same shadow. But our fate will be as I said.”

“Ah!”

“You and I are to die at the stake. She is to be given to the dog who has left us.”

“Ah!”

“Adele! Adele! What shall I do!” He tore his hair in his helplessness and distraction.

“No, no, fear not, Amory, for my heart will not fail me. What is the pang of death if it binds us together?”

“The younger chief pleaded for you, saying that the Mitche Manitou had stricken you with madness, as could be seen by your swimming to their canoe, and that a blight would fall upon the nation if you were led to the stake. But this Bastard said that love came often like madness among the pale-faces, and that it was that alone which had driven you. Then it was agreed that you should die and that she should go to his wigwam, since he had led the war-party. As for me, their hearts were bitter against me, and I also am to die by the pine splinters.”

De Catinat breathed a prayer that he might meet his fate like a soldier and a gentleman.

“When is it to be?” he asked.

“Now! At once! They have gone to make all ready! But you have time yet, for I am to go first.”

“Amory, Amory, could we not die together now?” cried Adele, throwing her arms round her husband. “If it be sin, it is surely a sin which will be forgiven us. Let us go, dear. Let us leave these dreadful people and this cruel world and turn where we shall find peace.”

The Indian woman’s eyes flashed with satisfaction.

“You have spoken well, White Lily,” said she. “Why should you wait until it is their pleasure to pluck you. See, already the glare of their fire beats upon the tree-trunks, and you can hear the howlings of those who thirst for your blood. If you die by your own hands, they will be robbed of their spectacle, and their chief will have lost his bride. So you will be the victors in the end, and they the vanquished. You have said rightly, White Lily. There lies the only path for you!”

“But how to take it?”

Onega glanced keenly at the two warriors who stood as sentinels at the door of the hut. They had turned away, absorbed in the horrible preparations which were going on. Then she rummaged deeply within the folds of her loose gown and pulled out a small pistol with two brass barrels and double triggers in the form of winged dragons. It was only a toy to look at, all carved and scrolled and graven with the choicest work of the Paris gunsmith. For its beauty the seigneur had bought it at his last visit to Quebec, and yet it might be useful, too, and it was loaded in both barrels.

“I meant to use it on myself,” said she, as she slipped it into the hand of De Catinat. “But now I am minded to show them that I can die as an Onondaga should die, and that I am worthy to have the blood of their chiefs in my veins. Take it, for I swear that I will not use it myself, unless it be to fire both bullets into that Bastard’s heart.”

A flush of joy shot over De Catinat as his fingers closed round the pistol. Here was indeed a key to unlock the gates of peace. Adele laid her cheek against his shoulder and laughed with pleasure.

“You will forgive me, dear,” he whispered.

“Forgive you! I bless you, and love you with my whole heart and soul.

Clasp me close, darling, and say one prayer before you do it.”

They had sunk on their knees together when three warriors entered the hut and said a few abrupt words to their country-woman. She rose with a smile.

“They are waiting for me,” said she. “You shall see, White Lily, and you also, monsieur, how well I know what is due to my position. Farewell, and remember Onega!”

She smiled again, and walked from the hut amidst the warriors with the quick firm step of a queen who sweeps to a throne.

“Now, Amory!” whispered Adele, closing her eyes, and nestling still closer to him.

He raised the pistol, and then, with a quick sudden intaking of the breath, he dropped it, and knelt with glaring eyes looking up at a tree which faced the open door of the hut.