Shadows on the Rock (11 page)

“You will see them when we go home. There are fine old orange-trees growing under glass in our own parish, and they are
brought out into the courtyards in summer.”

“But couldn’t we possibly grow one here in Quebec? The Jesuits have such great warm cellars; I am sure they could, if
they tried.”

Her father laughed as he carried her back to bed. “I am afraid not even the Jesuits could do that! Now I am going to
leave you for a little while. I will put a card on the door announcing that we are closed until noon. You are so much
better, that I can make my visit to the Hôtel Dieu this morning.”

“And on your way, Papa, will you stop and tell Monseigneur l’Ancien that our swallow has come? For his book, you
know.”

Ever since he first came out to Canada, old Bishop Laval had kept a brief weather record, noting down the date of the
first snowfall, when the river froze over, the nights of excessive cold, the storms and the great thaws. And for nearly
forty years now he had faithfully recorded the return of the swallow.

It was the first day of June. Before dawn a wild calling and twittering of birds in the bushes on the cliff-side above
the apothecary’s back door announced clear weather. When the sun came up over the Île d’Orléans, the rock of Kebec stood
gleaming above the river like an altar with many candles, or like a holy city in an old legend, shriven, sinless, washed in
gold. The quickening of all life and hope which had come to France in May had reached the far North at last. That morning
the Auclairs drank their chocolate with all the doors and windows open.

Euclide was at his desk, making up little packets of saffron flowers to flavour fish soups, when a slender man in
buckskins, with a quick swinging step, crossed the threshold and embraced him before he had time to rise. He was not a big
fellow, this Pierre Charron, hero of the fur trade and the coureurs de bois, not above medium height, but quick as an otter
and always sure of himself. When Auclair, after returning his embrace with delight, drew back to look at him and asked him
how he was, he threw up his chin and answered:

“Je me porte bien, comme toujours.”

“And have you had a good winter, Pierre?”

“But yes. I always have a good winter, monsieur. I see to it.”

“And how do you happen to be down so early?”

Charron’s face changed. He frowned. “That is not so good. My mother was ailing. They brought me word, out to
Michilimackinac, so I returned to Montreal in March. She was better; the Sisters of the Congregation had been taking care of
her. But I did not leave her again. No one can nurse her so well as I. I stayed at home and let the other fellows have my
spring trade this year. I can afford it.”

“But I must hear about your mother’s ailment, my son; and first let me call Cécile. She will not want to lose even a
minute of your visit.”

Auclair went back to the kitchen, and Cécile ran in without stopping to take off her tablier. It flashed across Pierre
that she was perhaps growing too tall to be kissed. But she was quicker than his thought, threw her arms about his neck, and
gave him the glad kiss of welcome.

“Oh, Pierre Charron, I am delighted at you, Pierre Charron!”

He stood laughing, holding both her hands and swinging them back and forth in a rhythm of some sort, so that though they
were standing still, they seemed to be dancing. Cécile was laughing, too, as children do where they never have been afraid
or uncertain. “Oh, Pierre, have you been to the great falls again, and Michilimackinac?”

“Everywhere, everywhere!” He swung her hands faster and faster.

“And you will tell me about the big beaver towns?”

“Gently, Cécile,” her father interposed. “Pierre’s mother has been ill, and he will tell us first about her. What was it
like this time, my boy, a return of her old complaint?” The one long journey Auclair had ever made away from Quebec since he
landed here was to go up to Montreal in Pierre’s shallop to examine and prescribe for Madame Charron.

From his first meeting with him, Auclair had loved this restless boy (he was a boy then) who shot up and down the swift
rivers of Canada in his canoe; who was now at Niagara, now at the head of Lake Ontario, now at the Sault Sainte Marie on his
way into the fathomless forbidding waters of Lake Superior. To both Auclair and Madame Auclair, Pierre Charron had seemed
the type they had come so far to find; more than anyone else he realized the romantic picture of the free Frenchman of the
great forests which they had formed at home on the bank of the Seine. He had the good manners of the Old World, the dash and
daring of the New. He was proud, he was vain, he was relentless when he hated, and quickly prejudiced; but he had the old
ideals of clan-loyalty, and in friendship he never counted the cost. His goods and his life were at the disposal of the man
he loved or the leader he admired. Though his figure was still boyish, his face was full of experience and sagacity; a fine
bold nose, a restless, rather mischievous mouth, white teeth, very strong and even, sparkling hazel eyes with a kind of
living flash in them, like the sunbeams on the bright rapids upon which he was so skilful.

Pierre’s father, a soldier of fortune from Languedoc, had done well in the fur trade and built himself a comfortable
dwelling in Montreal, on Saint Paul street, next the house of Jacques Le Ber. Pierre was almost exactly the same age as Le
Ber’s daughter, Jeanne; the two children had been playmates and had learned their catechism together. After Pierre’s father
was drowned in a storm on Lake Ontario, Jacques Le Ber took the son into his employ to train him for the fur business. Of
all the suitors for Mademoiselle Le Ber’s hand Pierre was thought to have the best chance of success, and the merchant would
have liked him for a son-inlaw. At the time when Mademoiselle Le Ber, then fifteen, came home from her schooling in Quebec,
Pierre was her father’s clerk and was often at the house. She had seemed favourably disposed toward him. It was an old story
in Montreal that after Jeanne took her first vow and immured herself in her father’s house, disappointment had driven young
Charron into the woods. He had learned the Indian languages as a child, and the Indians liked and trusted him, as they had
liked his father. All along the Great Lakes, as far as Michilimackinac, he had a name among them for courage and fair
dealing, for a loyal friend and a relentless enemy. Every year he gave half the profits of his ventures to his mother; the
rest he squandered on drink and women and new guns, as his comrades did. But in Montreal his behaviour was always exemplary,
out of respect to his mother.

After accepting Auclair’s invitation to come to supper that evening, Charron said he must go to Noël Pommier to order a
pair of hard boots, — he was wearing moccasins. “And will you come along, little monkey?” he asked, making a face. When
Cécile was little, he had always called her his petit singe.

She glanced eagerly at her father. He nodded. “Run along, and give my respects to Madame Pommier.”

Cécile slipped her hand into Charron’s, and they went out into the street. Across the way, they saw Monseigneur de
Saint–Vallier in his garden, directing some workmen who were apparently building an arbour for him.

“I see your grand neighbour has come home,” Pierre observed.

“Oh yes, last September. But you must have heard? People say he brought such beautiful things for his house; furniture
and paintings and tapestry and silver dishes. Wouldn’t you love to see the inside of his Palace?”

“Not a bit! He is too French for me.” Charron threw up his chin.

Cécile laughed. “But my father is French, and so is Father Hector; you like them.”

“Oh, that is different. But the man over there goes against me. He smells of Versailles. The old man is my Bishop. But I
could do without any of them.”

“Hush, Pierre Charron! You are foolish to quarrel with the priests. I love Father Hector. You can’t say he isn’t a brave
man.”

Pierre shrugged. “Oh, he is brave enough. All the same, he’s a little too Frenchified for me. You and I are Canadians,
monkey. We were born here.”

“Why, I wasn’t at all! You know that.”

“Well, if you weren’t, you couldn’t help it. You got here early. You were very little when I first saw you with your
mother. Cécile, every autumn, before I start for the woods, I have a mass said at the paroisse in Ville–Marie for madame
your mother.”

Cécile pressed his hand softly and drew closer to him. Whenever Charron spoke of her mother, or of his own, his voice
lost its tone of banter; he became respectful, serious, simple. It was clear enough that for him the family was the first
and final thing in the human lot; and it was so engrafted with religion that he could only say: “Very well; religion for the
fireside, freedom for the woods.”

As they passed the end of the long Seminary building, the door of the garden stood open, and within they saw Bishop
Laval, walking up and down the sanded paths, his breviary open in his hand. It was a very small garden; a grass plot in the
centre, a row of Lombardy poplars along the wall, some lilac bushes, now in bloom, a wooden seat with no back under a
crooked quince-tree. The old man caught sight of Pierre, though he walked so noiselessly, — beckoned to him and called out
his name. The Bishop knew everyone along the river so well that it was said he could recognize a lost child by the family
look in its face.

Pierre snatched off his cap and they went inside the garden door. Monseigneur inquired after the health of Madame
Charron, and of the aged nun Marguerite Bourgeoys. And had Pierre heard whether Mademoiselle Le Ber was in health?

Not directly. He supposed she was as usual; he had heard nothing to the contrary.

The Bishop breathed heavily, like a tired horse. “All the sinners of Ville–Marie may yet be saved by the prayers of that
devoted girl,” he said with a certain meaning in his tone. “And you, my son, have you been to your confessor since your
return from the woods?”

Pierre said respectfully that he had. The Bishop then turned to Cécile and placed his hand upon her head, with the rare
smile which always seemed a little sad on his grim features.

“And here we have a child who borrows money, — and of a poor priest, too! Why did you never come to pay me back my twenty
sous?”

“But Monseigneur l’Ancien, I gave them to Houssart, the very day after!”

“I know you did, my child, but I should have liked it better if you had come to me when you paid your debt. You are not
afraid of me?”

“Oh, no, Monseigneur! But you are always occupied, and I did not know whether you liked to have children come.”

“I do. I like it very much. Make me a visit here in my garden some morning at this hour, and I will share my lilacs with
you; they are coming on now. Bring the little boy, if you like. I hear from the Pommiers that you and your father are making
a good boy of him, and that is very commendable in you.”

During the rest of the short walk to the cobbler’s, Pierre asked what the Bishop meant by the twenty sous, but he seemed
to pay little attention to the story; he was rather overcast, indeed. It was not until he greeted Madame Pommier that he
recovered his high spirits.

For Charron, that evening, the apothecary brought up from his cellar some fiery Bordeaux, proper for a son of Languedoc,
and the hours flew by. After Cécile had said good-night and gone upstairs to her summer bed-room, the two men talked on
until after midnight; of the woods, of the state of the fur trade, of the results of the Count’s last Indian campaign, and
the ingratitude of the King, who had rewarded his services so inadequately.

Pierre lost his reserve after a bottle or two of fine Gaillac, and the conversation presently took a very personal turn.
Auclair, in speaking of Madame Charron’s illness, remarked that it was fortunate she had such nurses at hand as the Sisters
of the Congregation.

“Oh, yes, they took good care of her, to be sure,” Pierre admitted. “And why not? By Heaven, they owe me something, those
women! Fifty thousand gold écus, perhaps!”

“Charron,” said his host reprovingly, “you do yourself wrong to pretend that you are chagrined at having lost that dowry.
You are not a mean-spirited man. You have never cared much about money.”

“Perhaps not, but I care about defeat. If the venerable Bourgeoys had not got hold of that girl in her childhood and
overstrained her with fasts and penances, she would be a happy mother today, not sleeping in a stone cell like a prisoner.
There are plenty of girls, ugly, poor, stupid, awkward, who are made for such a life. It was bad enough when she was shut up
in her father’s house; but now she is no better than dead. Worse.”

“Still, if it is the life she desires, and if her father can bear it — ”

“Oh, her father, poor man! I do not like to meet him on the street, — and he does not like to meet me. I recall to him
the days when she first came home from Quebec and used to be at her mother’s side, at the head of a long table full of good
company, always looking out for everyone, saying the right thing to everyone. It did his eyes good to look at her. He was
never the same man after she shut herself away. I was in his employ then, and I know. He used to talk to me and say: ‘It is
like a fever; it will burn itself out in time. We shall all be happy again.’ This went on three years, and he was always
hoping. But not I. I saw her before I broke away to the woods, though. I made sure.”

Pierre took out a pouch of strong Indian tobacco, pulverized it in his brown palm, and put it into his pipe. He drew the
smoke in deep, like a man overwrought. Auclair had meant to bring out some old brandy to flavour their talk, but he thought:
“No, better not.” Aloud he said:

“You mean that you had an interview with Mademoiselle Le Ber after she went into retreat?”

“Call it an interview. I made sure.” Charron took the pipe out of his mouth and spoke rapidly. “It was in the fourth year
of her retreat. I had lost hope, but I wanted to know. She always went out of the house to early mass. One morning in the
spring, when it gets light early, I went to the narrow allée between her garden and the church and waited there under an
apple-tree that hung over the wall. When she came along with her old servant, I stepped out in front of her and spoke. Ah,
that was a beautiful moment for me! She had not changed. She did not shrink away from me or reproach me. She was gracious
and gentle, as always, and at her ease. She put back her grey veil as we talked, and looked me in the eyes. There was still
colour in her cheeks, — not rosy as she used to be, but her face was fresh and soft, like the apple blossoms on that tree
where we stood. She had no hard word for me. She said she was glad of a chance to see me again and to bid me farewell; she
meant to renew her vows when the five years were over, and we should never meet again. When I began to cry, — I was young
then, — and knelt down before her, she put her hand on my head; she did not fear me or the few people who hurried past us
into the church, — they seemed frightened enough at such a sight, but she was calm. She told me it would be better if I left
her father, and that I must marry. I will always pray for you, she said, and when you have children, I will pray for them.
As long as we are both in this world, you may know I pray for you every day; that God may preserve you from sudden death
without repentance, and that we may meet in heaven.”

Charron sat silent for a moment, then bent over the candle and lit his pipe, which had gone out. “You know, monsieur,
three times in the woods my comrades have thought it was all over with me; a powder explosion, my canoe going down under me
in the rapids, and then the gunshot wound I had in the Count’s last campaign. I have remembered that promise; for I have
certainly been delivered from sudden death. I remember, too, her voice when she said those words, — it was still her own
voice, which made people love to go to her father’s house, and one felt gay if she but spoke one’s name. And now it is harsh
and hollow like an old crow’s — terrible to hear!”

Auclair began to wonder whether Pierre might have had anything to drink before he came to dinner. “Now you are talking
wildly, my boy. We cannot know what her voice is like now.”

“I know,” said Charron sullenly. He crossed the room to the door of the enclosed staircase, and examined it to see that
it was shut. “The little one cannot hear, up there? No?” He sat down and leaned forward, his elbows on the table. “I know. I
have heard her. I have seen her.”

“Pierre, you have not done anything irreverent, that the nuns will never forgive?” Auclair was alarmed by the very
thought that the sad solitaire, who asked for nothing on this earth but solitude, had perhaps been startled.

Charron was too much excited and too sorry for himself at that moment to notice his friend’s apprehensions.

“It was like this,” he went on presently. “You know, because of my mother, this year I got back to Montreal early, months
before my time. There is not much to do there, God knows, except to be a pig, and I never behave like dirt in my mother’s
town. We live so near the chapel of the Congregation that I can never get the recluse out of my mind. You remember there
were two weeks of terrible cold in March, and it made me wretched to think of her walled up there. No, don’t misunderstand
me!” Charron’s eyes came back from their far-away point of vision and fixed intently, distrustfully, on his friend’s face.
“All that is over; one does not love a woman who has been dead for nearly twenty years. But there is such a thing as
kindness; one wouldn’t like to think of a dog that had been one’s playfellow, much less a little girl, suffering from cold
those bitter nights. You see, there are all those early memories; one cannot get another set; one has but those.” Pierre’s
voice choked, because something had come out by chance, thus, that he had never said to himself before. The candles blurred
before Auclair a little, too. God was a witness, he murmured, that he knew the truth of Pierre’s remark only too well.

After he had relit his pipe and smoked a little, Charron continued. “You know she goes into the church to pray before the
altar at midnight. Well, I hid myself in the church and saw her. It is not difficult for a man who has lived among the
Indians; you slide into the chapel when an old sacristan is locking up after vespers, and stay there behind a pillar as long
as you choose. It was a long wait. I had my fur jacket on and a flask of brandy in my pocket, and I needed both. God’s Name,
is there any place so cold as churches? I had to move about to keep from aching all over, — but, of course, I made no noise.
There was only the sanctuary lamp burning, until the moon came round and threw some light in at the windows. I knew when it
must be near midnight, you get to have a sense of time in the woods. I hid myself behind a pillar at the back of the church.
I felt a little nervous, sorry I had come, perhaps. — At last I heard a latch lift, — you could have heard a rabbit breathe
in that place. The iron grille beside the altar began to move outward. She came in, carrying a candle. She wore a grey gown,
and a black scarf on her head, but no veil. The candle shone up into her face. It was like a stone face; it had been through
every sorrow.” Charron stopped and crossed himself. He shut his eyes and dropped his head in his hands. “My friend, I could
remember a face! — I could remember Jeanne in her little white furs, when I used to pull her on my sled. Jacques Le Ber
would have burned Montreal down to keep her warm. He meant to give her every joy in the world, and she has thrown the world
away. . . . She put down her candle and went toward the high altar. She walked very slowly, with great dignity. At first she
prayed aloud, but I scarcely understood her. My mind was confused; her voice was so changed, — hoarse, hollow, with the
sound of despair in it. Why is she unhappy, I ask you? She is, I know it! When she prayed in silence, such sighs broke from
her. And once a groan, such as I have never heard; such despair — such resignation and despair! It froze everything in me. I
felt that I would never be the same man again. I only wanted to die and forget that I had ever hoped for anything in this
world.

“After she had bowed herself for the last time, she took up her candle and walked toward that door, standing open. I lost
my head and betrayed myself. I was well hidden, but she heard me sob.

“She was not startled. She stood still, with her hand on the latch of the grille, and turned her head, half-facing me.
After a moment she spoke.

“Poor sinner, she said, poor sinner, whoever you are, may God have mercy upon you! I will pray for you. And do you pray
for me also.

“She walked on and shut the grille behind her. I turned the key in the church door and let myself out. No man was ever
more miserable than I was that night.”