They turned into a sort of lane that led below the palisades.
"Pani," excitedly, "let us go out on the river. There will be an early moon, and we shall not mind so that we get in by nine. And we need not stop to gossip with people, canoes are not so friendly as woodland paths."
Her laugh was forced and a little bitter.
Pani had hardly recovered from her surprise. She nodded a.s.sent with a feeling that she had been stricken dumb. It was not altogether Louis Marsac"s appearance, he had been expected last summer and had not come.
She had almost forgotten about him. It was Jeanne"s mood that perplexed her so. The two had been such friends and playmates, one might say, only a few years ago. He had been a slave to her pretty whims then. She had decorated his head with feathers and called him Chief of Detroit, or she had twined daisy wreaths and sweet gra.s.ses about his neck. He had bent down the young saplings that she might ride on them, a graceful, fearless child. They had run races,--she was fleet as the wind and he could not always catch her. He had gathered the first ripe wild strawberries, not bigger than the end of her little finger, but, oh, how luscious! She had quarreled with him, too, she had struck him with a feathery hemlock branch, until he begged her pardon for some fancied fault, and nothing had suited him better than to loll under the great oak tree, listening to Pani"s story and all the mysterious suppositions of her coming. Then he told wild legends of the various tribes, talked in a strange, guttural accent, danced a war dance, and was almost as much her attendant as Pani.
But the three years had allowed him to escape from the woman"s memory, as any event they might expect again in their lives. Hugh de Marsac had turned into something of an explorer, beside his profitable connection with the fur company. The copper mines on Lake Superior had stirred up a great interest, and plans were being made to work them to a better advantage than the Indians had ever done. Fortunes were the dream of mankind even then; though this was destined to end in disappointment.
Jeanne chose her canoe and they pushed out. She was in no haste, and few people were going down the river, not many anywhere except on business.
The numerous holy days of the Church, which gave to religion an hour or two in the morning and devoted to pleasure the rest of the day, set the river in a whirl of gayety. Ordinary days were for work.
The air was soft and fragrant. Some sea gulls started from a sandy nook with disturbed cries, then returned as if they knew the girl. A fishhawk darted swiftly down, having seen his prey in the clear water and captured it. There were farms stretching down the river now, with rough log huts quite distinct from the whitewashed or vine-covered cottages of the French. But the fields betrayed a more thrifty cultivation. There were young orchards nodding in the sunshine, great stretches of waving maize fields, and patches of different grains. Little streams danced out here and there and gurgled into the river, as if they were glad to be part of it.
"Pani, do you suppose we could go ever so far down and build a tent or a hut and live there all the rest of the summer?"
"But I thought you liked the woods!"
"I like being far away. I am tired of Detroit."
"Mam"selle, it would hardly be safe. There are still unfriendly Indians.
And--the loneliness of it! For there are some evil spirits about, though Holy Church has banished them from the town."
Occasionally her old beliefs and fears rushed over the Indian woman and shook her in a clutch of terror. She felt safest in her own little nest, under the shadow of the Citadel, with the high, sharp palisades about her, when night came on.
"Art thou afraid of Madame De Ber?" she asked, hesitatingly. "For of a truth she did not want you for her son"s wife."
"I know it. Pierre made them all agree to it. I am sorry for Pierre, and yet he has the blindness of a mole. I am not the kind of wife he wants.
For though there is so much kissing and caressing at first, there are dinners and suppers, and the man is cross sometimes because other things go wrong. And he smells of the skins and oils and paints, and the dirt, too," laughing. "Faugh! I could not endure it. I would rather dwell in the woods all my life. Why, I should come to hate such a man! I should run away or kill myself. And that would be a bitter self-punishment, for I love so to live if I can have my own life. Pani, why do men want one particular woman? Susette is blithe and merry, and Angelique is pretty as a flower, and when she spins she makes a picture like one the schoolmaster told me about. Oh, yes, there are plenty of girls who would be proud and glad to keep Pierre"s house. Why does not the good G.o.d give men the right sense of things?"
Pani turned her head mournfully from side to side, and the shrunken lips made no reply.
Then they glided on and on. The blue, sunlit arch overhead, the waving trees that sent dancing shadows like troops of elfin sprites over the water, the fret in one place where a rock broke the murmurous lapping, the swish somewhere else, where gra.s.ses and weeds and water blooms rooted in the sedge rocked back and forth with the slow tide--how peaceful it all was!
Yet Jeanne Angelot was not at peace. Why, when the woods or the river always soothed her? And it was not Pierre who disturbed the current, who lay at the bottom like some evil spirit, reaching up long, cruel arms to grasp her. Last summer she had put Louis Marsac out of her life with an exultant thrill. He would forget all about her. He would or had married some one up North, and she was glad.
He had come back. She knew now what this look in a man"s eyes meant. She had seen it in a girl"s eyes, too, but the girl had the right, and was offering incense to her betrothed. Oh, perhaps--perhaps some other one might attract him, for he was very handsome, much finer and more manly than when he went away.
Why did not Pani say something about him? Why did she sit there half asleep?
"Wasn"t it queer, Pani, that we should go so near the wharf, when we were trying to run away--"
She ended with a short laugh, in which there was neither pleasure nor mirth.
Pani glanced up with distressful eyes.
"Eh, child!" she cried, with a sort of anguish, "it is a pity thou wert made so beautiful."
"But there are many pretty girls, and great ladies are lovely to look at. Why should I not have some of the charm? It gives one satisfaction."
"There is danger for thee in it. Perhaps, after all, the Recollet house would be best for thee."
"No, no;" with a pa.s.sionate protest. "And, Pani, no man can make me marry him. I would scream and cry until the priest would feel afraid to say a word."
Pani put her thin, brown hand over the plump, dimpled one; and her eyes were large and weird.
"Thou art afraid of Louis Marsac," she said.
"Oh, Pani, I am, I am!" The voice was tremulous, entreating. "Did you see something in his face, a curious resolve, and shall I call it admiration? I hope he has a wife. Oh, I know he has not! Pani, you must help me, guard me."
"There is M. Loisel, who would not have thee marry against thy will. I wish Father Rameau were home--he comes in the autumn."
"I do not want to marry anyone. I am a strange girl. Marie Beeson said some girls were born old maids, and surely I am one. I like the older men who give you fatherly looks, and call you child, and do not press your hand so tight. Yet the young men who can talk are pleasant to meet.
Pani, did you love your husband?"
"Indian girls are different. My father brought a brave to the wigwam and we had a feast and a dance. The next morning I went away with him. He was not cruel, but you see squaws are beasts of burthens. I was only a child as you consider it. Then there came a great war between two tribes and the victors sold their prisoners. It is so long ago that it seems like a story I have heard."
The young wives Jeanne knew were always extolling their husbands, but she thought in spite of their many virtues she would not care to have them. What made her so strange, so obstinate!
"Pani," in a low tone scarce above the ripple of the water, "M. Marsac is very handsome. The Indian blood does not show much in him."
"Yes, child. He is improved. There is--what do you call it?--the grand air about him, like a gentleman, only he was impertinent to thee."
"You will not be persuaded to like him? It was different with Pierre."
Jeanne made this concession with a slight hesitation.
"Oh, little one, I will never take pity on anyone again if you do not care for him! The Holy Mother of G.o.d hears me promise that. I was sorry for Pierre and he is a good lad. He has not learned to drink rum and is reverent to his father. It is a thousand pities that he should love you so."
Pani kissed the hand she held; Jeanne suddenly felt light of heart again.
Down the river they floated and up again when the silver light was flooding everything with a softened glory. Jeanne drew her canoe in gently, there was no one down this end, and they took a longer way around to avoid the drinking shops. The little house was quiet and dark with no one to waylay them.
"You will never leave me alone, Pani," and she laid her head on the woman"s shoulder. "Then when M. St. Armand comes next year--"
She prayed to G.o.d to keep him safely, she even uttered a little prayer to the Virgin. But could the Divine Mother know anything of girls"
troubles?
CHAPTER XIII.
AN UNWELCOME LOVER.
Louis Marsac stood a little dazed as the slim, proudly carried figure turned away from him. He was not much used to such behavior from women.