"Yes; she is dead. M"seur, shall I tell you how she died?"
Croisset sprang to his feet, his eyes flashing, his lithe body twitching like a wolf"s as he stood for an instant half leaning over the engineer.
"Shall I tell you how she died, M"seur?" he repeated, falling back on his stool, his long arms stretched over the table. "It happened like this, sixteen years ago, when the little Meleese was four years old and the oldest of the three sons was fourteen. That winter a man and his boy came up from Churchill. He had letters from the Factor at the Bay, and our Factor and his wife opened their doors to him and to his son, and gave them all that it was in their power to give.
"_Mon Dieu_, this man was from that glorious civilization of yours, M"seur--from that land to the south where they say that Christ"s temples stand on every four corners, but he could not understand the strange G.o.d and the strange laws of our people! For months he had been away from the companionship of women, and in this great wilderness the Factor"s wife came into his life as the flower blossoms in the desert. Ah, M"seur, I can see now how his wicked heart strove to accomplish the things, and how he failed because the glory of our womanhood up here has come straight down from Heaven. And in failing he went mad--mad with that pa.s.sion of the race I have seen in Montreal, and then--ah, the Great G.o.d, M"seur, do you not understand what happened next?"
Croisset lifted his head, his face twisted in a torture that was half grief, half madness, and stared at Howland, with quivering nostrils and heaving chest. In his companion"s face he saw only a dead white pallor of waiting, of half comprehension. He leaned over the table again, controlling himself by a mighty effort.
"It was at that time when most of us were out among the trappers, just before our big spring caribou roast, when the forest people came in with their furs, M"seur. The post was almost deserted. Do you understand? The woman was alone in her cabin with the little Meleese--and when we came back at night she was dead. Yes, M"seur, she killed herself, leaving a few written words to the Factor telling him what had happened.
"The man and the boy escaped on a sledge after the crime. _Mon Dieu_, how the forest people leaped in pursuit! Runners carried the word over the mountains and through the swamps, and a hundred sledge parties searched the forest trails for the man-fiend and his son. It was the Factor himself and his youngest boy who found them, far out on the Churchill trail. And what happened then, M"seur? Just this: While the man-fiend urged on his dogs the son fired back with a rifle, and one of his bullets went straight through the heart of the pursuing Factor, so that in the s.p.a.ce of one day and one night the little Meleese was made both motherless and fatherless by these two whom the devil had sent to destroy the most beautiful thing we have ever known in this North. Ah, M"seur, you turn white! Does it bring a vision to you now? Do you hear the crack of that rifle? Can you see--"
"My G.o.d!" gasped Howland. Even now he understood nothing of what this tragedy might mean to him--forgot everything but that he was listening to the terrible tragedy that had come to the woman who was the mother of the girl he loved. He half rose from his seat as Croisset paused; his eyes glittered, his death-white face was set in tense fierce lines, his finger-nails dug into the board table, as he demanded, "What happened then, Croisset?"
Jean was eying him like an animal. His voice was low.
"They escaped, M"seur."
With a deep breath Howland sank back. In a moment he leaned again toward Jean as he saw come into the Frenchman"s eyes a slumbering fire that a few seconds later blazed into vengeful malignity when he drew slowly from an inside pocket of his coat a small parcel wrapped and tied in soft buckskin.
"They have sent you this, M"seur," he said. ""At the very last," they told me, "let him read this.""
With his eyes on the parcel, scarcely breathing, Howland waited while with exasperating slowness Croisset"s brown fingers untied the cord that secured it.
"First you must understand what this meant to us in the North, M"seur,"
said Jean, his hands covering the parcel after he had finished with the cord. "We are different who live up here--different from those who live in Montreal, and beyond. With us a lifetime is not too long to spend in avenging a cruel wrong. It is our honor of the North. I was fifteen then, and had been fostered by the Factor and his wife since the day my mother died of the smallpox and I dragged myself into the post, almost dead of starvation. So it happened that I was like a brother to Meleese and the other three. The years pa.s.sed, and the desire for vengeance grew in us as we became older, until it was the one thing that we most desired in life, even filling the gentle heart of Meleese, whom we sent to school in Montreal when she was eleven, M"seur. It was three years later--while she was still in Montreal--that I went on one of my wandering searches to a post at the head of the Great Slave, and there, M"seur--there--"
Croisset had risen. His long arms were stretched high, his head thrown back, his upturned face aflame with a pa.s.sion that was almost that of prayer.
"M"seur, I thank the great G.o.d in Heaven that it was given to Jean Croisset to meet one of those whom we had pledged our lives to find--and I slew him!"
He stood silent, eyes partly closed, still as if in prayer. When he sank into his chair again the look of hatred had gone from his face.
"It was the father, and I killed him, M"seur--killed him slowly, telling him of what he had done as I choked the life from him; and then, a little at a time, I let the life back into him, forcing him to tell me where I would find his son, the slayer of Meleese"s father. And after that I closed on his throat until he was dead, and my dogs dragged his body through three hundred miles of snow that the others might look on him and know that he was dead. That was six years ago, M"seur."
Howland was scarcely breathing.
"And the other--the son--" he whispered densely. "You found him, Croisset? You killed him?"
"What would you have done, M"seur?"
Howland"s hands gripped those that guarded the little parcel.
"I would have killed him, Jean."
He spoke slowly, deliberately.
"I would have killed him," he repeated.
"I am glad of that, M"seur."
Jean was unwrapping the buckskin, fold after fold of it, until at last there was revealed a roll of paper, soiled and yellow along the edges.
"These pages are taken from the day-book at the post where the woman lived," he explained softly, smoothing them under his hands. "Each day the Factor of a post keeps a reckoning of incidents as they pa.s.s, as I have heard that sea captains do on shipboard. It has been a company law for hundreds of years. We have kept these pages to ourselves, M"seur.
They tell of what happened at our post sixteen years ago this winter."
As he spoke the half-breed came to Howland"s side, smoothing the first page on the table in front of him, his slim forefinger pointing to the first few lines.
"They came on this day," he said, his breath close to the engineer"s ear. "These are their names, M"seur--the names of the two who destroyed the paradise that our Blessed Lady gave to us many years ago."
In an instant Howland had read the lines. His blood seemed to dry in his veins and his heart to stand still. For these were the words he read: "On this day there came to our post, from the Churchill way, John Howland and his son."
With a sharp cry he sprang to his feet, overturning the stool, facing Croisset, his hands clenched, his body bent as if about to spring. Jean stood calmly, his white teeth agleam. Then, slowly, he stretched out a hand.
"M"seur John Howland, will you read what happened to the father and mother of the little Meleese sixteen years ago? Will you read, and understand why your life was sought on the Great North Trail, why you were placed on a case of dynamite in the Wekusko coyote, and why, with the coming of this morning"s dawn--at six--"
He paused, shivering. Howland seemed not to notice the tremendous effort Croisset was making to control himself. With the dazed speechlessness of one recovering from a sudden blow he turned to the table and bent over the papers that the Frenchman had laid out before him. Five minutes later he raised his head. His face was as white as chalk. Deep lines had settled about his mouth. As a sick man might, he lifted his hand and pa.s.sed it over his face and through his hair. But his eyes were afire.
Involuntarily Jean"s body gathered itself as if to meet attack.
"I have read it," he said huskily, as though the speaking of the words caused him a great effort. "I understand now. My name is John Howland.
And my father"s name was John Howland. I understand."
There was silence, in which the eyes of the two men met.
"I understand," repeated the engineer, advancing a step. "And you, Jean Croisset--do you believe that I am _that_ John Howland--the John Howland--the son who--"
He stopped, waiting for Jean to comprehend, to speak.
"M"seur, it makes no difference what I believe now. I have but one other thing to tell you here--and one thing to give to you," replied Jean.
"Those who have tried to kill you are the three brothers. Meleese is their sister. Ours is a strange country, M"seur, governed since the beginning of our time by laws which we have made ourselves. To those who are waiting above no torture is too great for you. They have condemned you to death. This morning, exactly as the minute hand of your watch counts off the hour of six, you will be shot to death through one of these holes in the dungeon walls. And this--this note from Meleese--is the last thing I have to give you."
He dropped a folded bit of paper on the table. Mechanically Howland reached for it. Stunned and speechless, cold with the horror of his death sentence, he smoothed out the note. There were only a few words, apparently written in great haste.
"I have been praying for you all night. If G.o.d fails to answer my prayers I will still do as I have promised--and follow you."
"Meleese."
He heard a movement and lifted his eyes. Jean was gone. The door was swinging slowly inward. He heard the wooden bolt slip into place, and after that there was not even the sound of a moccasined foot stealing through the outer darkness.
CHAPTER XVII
MELEESE
For many minutes Howland stood waiting as if life had left him. His eyes were on the door, but unseeing. He made no sound, no movement again toward the aperture in the wall. Fate had dealt him the final blow, and when at last he roused himself from its first terrible effect there remained no glimmering of hope in his breast, no thought of the battle he had been making for freedom a short time before. The note fluttered from his fingers and he drew his watch from his pocket and placed it on the table. It was a quarter after five. There still remained forty-five minutes.