Despite his great weight, and the burden which encumbered him, he was the first to reach the derrick—although the crowd had been close behind him when he began to run. He had deftly thrown the end of the rope over the arm of the derrick, and was about to hoist Shuter into mid-air, when the crowd was upon him. The rope was wrenched from his hands, and the noose unloosened from the man's throat. "For heaven's sake, what does all this mean?" asked a foreman, turning toward Joe.
Before he could reply Shuter gasped, "He's mad, he's mad; he ran into my tent, and without a word wound that rope about my neck and then tried to hang me." As he looked at his implacable enemy he edged towards the foreman.
"He pretends," began Joe, in a compressed voice, "that he don't know why I was going to hang him; he's a liar; yes, a million times worse than a liar—he's a murderer! I thought I'd save you the trouble of helping me to string him up, for when you hear what he's done you'll riddle him full of holes and string him up as well!"
The crowd had now gathered about the speaker, and were gazing at him with growing excitement. "There's a lot of you," Joe went on, "who saw him last night, in that gambling whiskey dive of his, try to draw his knife on Harry Langdon, and heard him shout after me that he'd have a reckoning some other time with that cub of mine; and, boys, he's kept his word, for Harry lies in his tent there, dead, stabbed to the heart, in the dead of night, through the folds of the tent, by that cuss there that you were so afraid I'd string up."
Angry exclamations followed this fierce tirade, and a rush was made for Shuter.
"It's a lie! I swear it's a lie! I never stabbed the lad!"
But his words were cut short by the rope, which was again being wound around his throat. As they dragged him towards the derrick Nellie once more threw herself across her father's body and begged piteously for mercy. The sight of the girl's intense grief somewhat cooled the unreasoning rage which had been kindled in their hearts by Joe's rude eloquence, and they hesitated as though they hardly knew what to do.
"Let's see the body before we string him up, anyway," cried a voice.
The fairness of the proposition appealed to the men—more especially as they had begun to realize that they had acted impulsively. There was a general move toward the tent where the body lay.
In the rush none of them noticed the rapid approach of the Indian girl, who so prodigally, and unasked, had given her heart to the murdered boy. As they entered the tent she was close behind Joe, whose huge body hid Shuter and his daughter, who were in front of him, from her view.
As Joe stepped forward to remove the coat he had thrown across the dead face, a low cry, full of the keenest apprehension and fear, sounded behind him. Turning, his eyes fell upon the Indian girl, who was crouching close at his feet, her palsied hands raised as though to guard off some deadly apparition or danger, while her eyes, full of the most intense fear and horror, were fixed on Nellie Shuter.
Joe's temper had been sorely tried, and laying his hand heavily on her shoulder, he said fiercely, "What's the meaning of this?"
Instead of trying to escape from his grasp, she caught him hysterically by the arm, and pointing at Nellie, said wildly, in her queer broken English, "See, see, de Great Spirit send her back to me! She's dead."
As Nellie stood and continued to gaze in amazement at her, the insane terror of the Indian girl rose to an ungovernable height, and burying her face in the grass, she screamed to Joe to send her away. The deep superstition in her nature—bred by her people—had been stronger than the love of revenge or the fear of punishment. Joe was the first to read the meaning of her superstitious horror, knowing as he did her hatred of Nellie and her love for Harry. And suddenly pointing at the grovelling figure, he said in a shocked voice: "Boys, I see it all now; she's the murderer. She meant to stab Nellie, her rival, and would have done it if we hadn't in the darkness last night pitched our tent next to Nellie's. The tents are alike, and she mistook ours for hers."
The mention of Harry's name brought a gleam of reason to the distracted girl's face, and springing to her feet—apparently now forgetful of Nellie's presence—she begged Joe to take her from the tent to Harry. Not for a moment did she appear to realize the dreadful mistake she had made.
"He's there!" said Joe, pitilessly, pointing to the stretcher. Thinking in her half-crazed manner that he was sleeping through it all, she ran to the stretcher, and tore away the sheet that covered the face she loved. It was not till she had caught the dear head to her bosom and pressed her face to his, that the truth broke upon her clouded mind. They had been drawing near her; but as she let his head fall back, they all—except Joe—drew away from her; the heart-broken, insane look on her face was more than they could bear. As she stood, wildly pressing her hands to her forehead, Joe pointed at the gash in the tent and then at the blood-stained clothing at Harry's side. Then with fascinated gaze they watched the rapid changes which sped across her face, for reason had not yet altogether flown, and they saw that she was recalling the fearful mistake she had made. Suddenly her hands slid to her side, and in doing so encountered the handle of the knife which lay concealed beneath her blanket. That was the connecting link which brought home to her the whole truth of the tragedy, and with a cry that haunted many of them for years afterwards, she drew the knife, gave one glance at the stained blade that had robbed her of him for whom she would willingly have died, stabbed again and again the fatal gash in the canvas, and then throwing away the knife, caught up the lifeless body in her arms and began madly to chant a wild, weird song which her people sang when they had triumphed over their enemies.
She was so violently insane when she reached Winnipeg that they decided a trial was unnecessary, so she was placed at once in an asylum.
After they had buried his little mate on the great silent prairie, Joe tried to forget and to do his work as usual; but the odor of the newly-severed sod, the cracking of the drivers' whips, the shouting to the stubborn mules, the stampede over the prairie at noon, the hateful sight of Shuter and his daughter—in fact, everything around him—made the longing for the company of his little driver so keen that he could not bear it, and a week after his death he drew his wages and slipped away, none knew whither.
It had been a severe Canadian winter, but the bright spring sunshine was now honeycombing the great snow-heap, which all winter had beset farmer Frechette's farm-house, and which, on this early March morning, was still banked almost as high as the kitchen window.
Glinting through the old-fashioned narrow panes, the generous rays fell upon the white bowed head of farmer Frechette, who sat warming himself at the square box wood-stove, gazing the while with furrowed brow at the roystering wood sparks, as at short intervals they shot aggressively from the partly open door.
Suddenly there floated through the raised window the joyous chimes of church bells. With an angry exclamation the old man sprang to his feet, hurried to the window, and violently drew it down. His extreme weakness made the anger that convulsed his thin, wrinkled face painful to see. Straightening up his bent frame, he shook his hand at the church, which he could see in the distance, and uttered anathemas against it. As he did so, the door leading from the little bedroom at the back of the kitchen was burst open, and his wife, a woman many years younger than he, ran over to his side, dragged down his still uplifted arm, and led him over to his seat. She then sat down beside him, and burying her face in her hands, began to cry.
Her distress moved him and he told her somewhat doggedly, but not unkindly, to cease. "Do you know what the bells are ringing for?" he asked cynically, after a short pause.
"Why worry about it? We must submit," she answered, trying to keep out of her voice the discontent that assailed her.
"They are ringing," he went on in a hard voice, "for farmer Cadieux's daughter, who is to take her life vows to-day. Already he has one daughter a nun, and his honor among French-Canadians will increase. I have lived in St. Jerome all my life, and have neither daughter nor son in the Church; they pity me. It was only yesterday we received the letter from Quebec telling us of the honor that had come to my brother through his daughter taking the veil. None of our neighbors were more passionately attached to their children than we; yet death passed by their doors, came to ours, and took them all. Continued disappointment has made me weary of life. The sound of the church bells, which I have heard so often sing honor for others, drives me to outbursts of shameful anger. At times I think I shall go mad. As for the Church, I have nearly lost all faith in it."
As he ceased, his wife rose, kissed his cheek and said, with a little break in her voice, "We have suffered much, Hormisdas; would to the Virgin we had not been so sorely afflicted."
"Such affliction is nothing but cruelty," he went on, scornfully. "It was cruel when death took all our little ones in childhood. But it was still more cruel, when we had grown old and were striving to be content and kiss the rod, for the Virgin to give us another daughter; to let us keep her till she had grown into womanhood; till we had given her an education which would have fitted her to be the superioress of a convent, and then strike her with a fatal illness just as she was about to take the veil, and once more ruthlessly crush out all our hopes."
"So long as Adele lives there is hope," said his wife, trying to be brave.
"Doctor Prenoveau says she will die," he answered fiercely.
"She was resting easier when I came down to you. I cannot get the idea out of my mind, that if we got Doctor Chalmers from Montreal, he would cure her. They say, although he is young, he is very clever. As for Doctor Prenoveau, you know people say he is too old to practise now."
"When Doctor Prenoveau said the others would die, they died," he replied, looking at her as though he feared she would no longer argue with him.
With a hopeful ring in her voice the brave mother said, "That is true, but this time he may be mistaken; Doctor Chalmers would know."
"If we only dared hope," he said under his breath.
"Doctor Chalmers would know," she repeated eagerly.
"Send for him," he replied, turning his face away.
The sun had hardly sunk behind the Laurentian range of mountains, which for hundreds of miles towers above the great St. Lawrence River, and dictates its course to the Gulf, when the wind from the north, bringing with it flurries of fine snow, began to blow cold and strong. Doctor Chalmers drew the buffalo robes tighter about him, and settled back in a corner of the sleigh; he had three miles yet to drive before he reached farmer Frechette's house. "Had I known it was going to be this cold I would have arranged for some other doctor to take up the case," he muttered. Had he only done so, how different his life would have been!
"We were afraid you would not come to-day," said Madame Frechette as she led him into the kitchen, where the stove was throwing out a genial heat.
"Had the message been less urgent, I should not have done so," he replied, stooping and warming his benumbed hands. Farmer Frechette sat facing the doctor at the opposite side of the stove, furtively glancing at the young physician, dissatisfaction imprinted on every line of his face; he was bitterly disappointed. "He is little better than a boy," the old man repeated to himself, over and over again.
"This is the doctor from Montreal, Adele," said the mother, bending over her sick daughter. Doctor Chalmers drew near the bed, and as the light from the coal-oil lamp fell across Adele's face, he could not help but think how beautiful she was even in her illness.
For a long time nothing could be heard in the kitchen but the loud ticking of the yellow-faced clock, hung high above the old deal table, and the occasional murmur of voices in the sick girl's room. Unable any longer to sit and endure the suspense, the farmer rose, and began, fretfully, to walk to and fro. Finally he stopped at the window, and his gaze travelled across the great expanse of white, beautified by the pale light of the early moon, to the tin-clad church tower in the distance, which shone like burnished silver as the moon's rays fell upon it.
"If she dies there is no Virgin and the priests have deceived us," he said, looking steadily at the tower; "but if she lives"—and he straightened out his bent figure—"I shall die happy in the faith. I will leave money to help build the new church which Father Sauvalle so long has wished to have built." Hearing a slight noise behind him, he turned quickly. His wife, followed by the doctor, was entering the room.
"Well?" he queried, in a peculiar tone, looking at the doctor as though he knew he would tell him there was no hope.
"She certainly is very ill, but I cannot agree with Doctor Prenoveau, if he says there is no hope." The words were kindly spoken, for he had noticed how the old man trembled and how poorly assumed was his air of defiance.
"You really think she may not die, doctor?" he asked, almost incredulously.
"I really think not."
Farmer Frechette sank heavily on his chair. "I am beginning to feel old, very old, doctor," he said weakly.
Never before had Doctor Chalmers taken so keen an interest in a case. Inch by inch he contested with death for the life of the young girl upon whose recovery was founded so many hopes.
It was a beautiful June day when, for the first time since Adele's illness, she ventured out of the house, supported on the young doctor's arm, and walked as far as the little garden at the back of the house. Very lovely she looked in her light-colored, soft, clinging dress, large brimmed straw hat, the health color struggling back to her cheeks, her sweet lips parted, and her heavily fringed dark eyes lighted up with hope and happiness.
Among his friends, Doctor Chalmers was known as a man not prone to many words. Could they but have heard him this afternoon as he sat by her side on the quaint garden seat, they simply would have been astounded.
It had come so gradually, this love of his, that before he was quite aware, it had taken possession of his heart so that no reasoning could have forced it to withdraw. He saw no reason, indeed, why he should wish to banish it; besides being beautiful and winning, she had received an excellent education, and was in every way fitted to be his wife. Of Adele's dedication to the Church from her birth, he knew nothing, so that no misgivings assailed him. Little wonder then that his heart should be light, and that the primitive garden should appear to him the most beautiful spot he had ever seen.
After this little walk and chat in the garden, life seemed to come back to her with strides. By the end of August Adele was quite strong again. The change in her health made a new man of her father; from the day Doctor Prenoveau had said she would not recover, until the day Doctor Chalmers had pronounced her out of danger, he had not entered the doors of the church. Now all was different; twice a week he went to confession, and almost every day knelt before the altar and asked forgiveness for the dreadful sins of the past. It had never struck him as being strange that Doctor Chalmers should continue to visit his house after she had recovered. He had a hazy idea that the doctor's triumph over his daughter's disease was the cause of the interest he took in her. The preposterous thought that anyone should want to marry Adele no more entered his imagination than would the idea of anyone wanting to marry one of the dark-robed nuns at the convent.
Everyone in St. Jerome knew that she was to take the veil. If his wife at times had fears, she never mentioned them to him.
And Adele? She was very happy. Like most French-Canadian women, she was passionately attached to the Church. At times her happiness was dimmed by the thought that she was not looking forward to taking the veil with that eagerness that she had felt before her illness. She comforted herself with the thought that the change, somehow, was the result of her illness, and that by and by the old longings would surely return. Why her heart should beat so when Doctor Chalmers called, and what the meaning was of her looking so eagerly forward to his visiting days, she never stopped to think.
The time of her awakening was at hand!
Had Adele's thoughts been less engrossed one afternoon, as she sat on the porch, she would have noticed approaching the house, in the middle of the narrow, dusty road that ran to the church, Father Sauvalle, with his arm linked in that of her father's, both talking eagerly. The priest's hand was on the latch of the gate before she raised her head; her face lighted up, and she ran to meet them. The aged priest had known her all her life, and patted her head with fatherly affection. As they walked toward the house, he told her, impressively, that his visit this time was solely on her account.
"Yes, solely on your account, solely on your account, blessed be the Virgin!" broke in her father with strange ecstasy. She could not account for the unhappy feeling which swept over her.
They went into the little parlor, where hung the great carved wooden crucifix, which was said to be the most costly in the town, with the exception of the one in the church.
Scarcely were they seated, when her father began to tell her the great news. With eyes beaming with religious enthusiasm and pride, he told her how Father Sauvalle had received a letter from the bishop, stating that when the daughter of Hormisdas Frechette had taken the veil at the convent at St. Jerome, the honor should be bestowed upon her of being removed to the convent of the Sacred Heart at Montreal. Father Sauvalle was to be thanked for this.
Very proudly and with much solemnity the priest took a letter from the folds of his robe, and as he opened it, impressively told her the letter he held was the very one which had brought the great news. As he read it to her, his face beamed with smiles. Little wonder they were pleased, for it was an honor indeed to the little town of St. Jerome to be able to say that one of its daughters had been admitted to this convent, noted as it was for its exclusiveness and the severity of its discipline.
"The convent!" she exclaimed falteringly.
They noticed how pale her face had suddenly grown. They were not surprised; it was meet that the sudden news of the honor in store for her should cause some emotion.
"We have talked the matter over," continued the priest, graciously, "and have decided that, as you already have served your novitiate, you may as well return to the convent in a few days. In a month or so later you will be ready to take your final vows. Your father is an old man now and has been sorely tried, and has sinned deeply—yea, even uttered anathemas against the Church. But the Blessed Mother heard the prayers of the Church for your recovery, and so his soul was saved from—"
"He anathematised the Church because of me?" Adele interrupted, fear gleaming in her eyes.
For a few moments no one spoke. The painful silence was broken by her father struggling to his feet. Beseechingly he looked at the great crucifix, made the sign of the cross on his bosom, and then turned his wavering gaze on his daughter, who had shrunk back in her chair and covered her eyes, as though she dared not look at him.
"I had not meant you to know this," he said, tightly clutching the arm of his chair for support. "I think I must have been mad when I did it; I had set my heart so on having a daughter in the Church, and had been disappointed so often. When they said your illness was fatal, I said, in my misery, that there was no Virgin, or she would not let such suffering fall upon me. Even now, wrong as I know it to be, I fear if anything should happen that you did not take the veil, I should drift back again into unbelief."
"Cease, cease! Hormisdas," cried the priest, raising his hand authoritatively.
The old man walked weakly over to his wife. The priest turned his attention to Adele, and said to her soothingly, "There is nothing to fear now; all will be well with him. It is a great honor to you that your life was spared in order that your father's soul might be saved. The bishop knows of this, and is greatly pleased. Already many of the parish priests have been told of your miraculous recovery, and have repeated it to those whose faith was weak, and they have been blessed. You have been honored above most women. In time, I believe you will rise to be the superioress of a convent."
As he turned from her, Adele rose and left the room. As the door was closing behind her she turned and looked back. Before the crucifix, on their knees, were her aged father and mother, while towering above them, with hands outstretched toward the cross, was the white-haired priest, invoking blessings on those bowed at his feet. She knew it was her duty to be by their side. Stifling the choking tears, she was about to re-enter the room, when the haunting refrain of a song that she had heard Doctor Chalmers sing, rang in her ears:
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life,Or be crushed in its ruins to die."
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life,Or be crushed in its ruins to die."
The words seemed sacrilegious to her, when compared with the supplicating tone of the priest's voice. With all her might she strove to banish them. Twice she stretched out her hand to turn the handle of the door, but the sound of the voice that had sung the words seemed to grow more distinct instead of vanishing, and her hand fell to her side. At last, with a stifled cry of despair, she fled from the house into the little garden, shocked at the wickedness of her heart.
For a long time she sat with closed eyes, her little ivory prayer-beads in her hands. She pleaded for pardon for not being able to fix her attention on holy things, and asked grace to cease thinking of him who had taken from her the love for the life of seclusion to which she had been taught to look forward.
At last she heard the clang of the garden gate, and knew the priest had gone. She did not return to the house, but continued battling with her sins. Suddenly her supplications ceased; she sprang to her feet and looked along the road. She had not been mistaken; away in the distance was a light buggy, rapidly approaching. Doctor Chalmers had said he might be down that day! Her heart seemed to stop beating; she would have run into the house had not her strength failed. Had the evil one been approaching, she could not have begun to pray more earnestly for aid.
When the vehicle, covered with dust, reached farmer Frechette's house, the rattle of wheels ceased.
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life."
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life."
She heard him whistling his favorite refrain as he swung up the gravel walk. He had seen her white dress, and was walking straight toward her. She heard him coming, and her treacherous heart began to beat joyously. With an exclamation of despair, she sank to her knees by the side of the garden seat, deeming herself the very chief of sinners.
For a few moments he stood and looked down at her in utter amazement, then stooped quickly and raised her. When he saw how white her face was, he was sure she was seriously ill, and held out his arm to support her to the house.
With averted face, Adele told him that she was only a little nervous and unstrung, but she would be herself again. Her pathetic face and helplessness appealed strongly to him, and his heart went out to her, as a man's will to the woman he loves, and whose sufferings are his. As he sat down by her side, he could scarcely refrain from gathering her in his arms and comforting her.
Her clamoring conscience caused her involuntarily to draw away from him to the end of the seat. Her strange manner caused an uneasy feeling to sweep over him, yet accentuated the keen longing to win her. Almost before he was aware of it, he was by her side again, and was telling her the story that is ever new, though so very old. She would have given the world to have let her heart run riot, as the loving words came pouring from his lips. She learned how she had first grown dear to him, as he had fought with the great reaper for her life, and how the sight of health returning to her dear face had been sweeter to him than he could ever tell her. He told her, too, he was positive that he would never have been called to play the important part in her life which he had done, had it not been ordained from the beginning that his life was to be knit with hers.
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life."
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life."
The haunting words were still ringing in Adele's ears, and made it ten-fold harder for her to tell him that he was not to prevail in the cause dearer than life, as it was to him.
As she sat, with face buried in her cold hands, and listened and tried to fight down the singing of her heart, she knew that nothing he could say could make her deny the Church and imperil the soul of her father once more.
"Or be crushed in its ruins to die."
"Or be crushed in its ruins to die."
"Marie, pity us! for that is the answer I have for him," she whispered. Ah! how she wished Doctor Prenoveau had been a true prophet, and that she had died.
As he ceased, she took the little silver crucifix which hung around her neck, pressed it tightly to her bosom, and turning her woe-begone face to him, said, as she rose, "You do not know, or you would not say such things to me."
He had expected something so different. "I—I do not understand," he said, wonderingly, rising and walking toward her.
She clutched the cross tighter and stepped back as he approached. He was sorely perplexed and apprehensive, and she saw it, and her heart ached for him.
"I am going," she began weakly, "to be a nun. I have been in the convent before, and shall return in a few days. In less than two months I shall take the veil."
Dear heart! Fight as she would for conscience' sake, she could not keep out of her eyes the pity and love for him, as she saw the look of amazement and misery which flashed into his face, and noted how unsteadily his hand sought the back of the garden bench.
Suddenly their eyes met, and then he knew, and hope flew back, and with a glad ring in his voice he said, "You love me, Adele!" He started forward and imprisoned the hand with the crucifix in his own. His apprehension had all vanished now, and boldly he told her that if she loved him she had no right to sacrifice their happiness. Then his tone changed, and he pleaded with her; and as she looked into his eager eyes, listened, and saw how dear she was to him, her rejoicing heart deadened the lashings of her conscience; she forgot all about her promise to Father Sauvalle and to her parents; forgot all about the convent of the Sacred Heart; yea, even forgot the anathemas uttered by her father against the Church, in this, the first great happiness of her life.
He thought he had won her, and raising her head, looked teasingly into her face and said softly, yet triumphantly:
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life,Or—"
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life,Or—"
Adele wrenched her hand from him and started back. Her face was ghastly pale, while her eyes dilated and shone with terror. "If I do not enter the convent," she said fearfully, "I shall be responsible for the loss of my father's soul!"
For a space he looked at her as though he thought her mind was affected. She read his look, and remembering that he did not understand, told him all her father's dread story, how he had told her, not an hour ago, that if anything should happen that she did not take the veil, it would be impossible for him to believe.
She told him, too, that even were her parents willing she should marry him, she could never be perfectly happy. Her conscience would never cease to upbraid her; from her childhood she had been taught to look forward to being a nun. She kissed the cross passionately as she ceased.
He noted the religious light in her eyes, and something told him that it was useless to argue; that nothing he could say would break down her strong religious convictions. The sudden revulsion from great happiness to despair was bitter indeed, and sitting down he buried his face in his hands.
Adele walked rapidly away a few steps, then turned and looked back. His dejected attitude smote her sorely. Again she turned, as though she would leave him, but turned again and looked at him pityingly. Well she knew that in the long quiet years which were to come, that lonely figure in the quaint garden would haunt her, and that the memory of his great sorrow would be the heavy cross she would have to bear as long as life lasted.
So quietly did she steal behind him, that he was not aware she had returned. Her lips moved as though she were about to speak to him, but no sound came from them. It was so hard not to lean forward and rest her hand on the thick dark hair, and tell him how much easier it would be for her to bear her lot if he would only say he forgave her and would try and think kindly of her. It came to her at last how, perhaps, she might ease his sorrows. She unclasped the little silver crucifix from around her neck, kissed it, and then gently slipped it into the pocket of his coat, which hung over the side of the bench. She then turned and fled along the grass to the house.
Once more the sound of church bells floated into the little cottage and fell upon the expectant ears of farmer Frechette and his wife, while a proud look lit up their faces.
"At last!" said the old man, exultantly, going to the window and looking at the church and the convent nestling at its side. The bells no longer mocked him, and he had ceased to hate them. Once more he stretched his gaunt arm toward the glistening tower. "The Church has not deceived us," he said humbly. Then he turned to his wife, who was waiting for him at the door.
Very slowly, arm in arm, with heads erect and graciously acknowledging the bows of the neighbors, Hormisdas Frechette and his wife walked down the narrow crooked road leading to the church.
The overcast sky looked burdened with snow, and the leaves rustled complainingly as they were ground beneath the feet of those hurrying to witness the honor about to fall upon the house of Hormisdas Frechette. Sweet to the old man was the moaning of the wind as it jostled the barren trees, while the ungarnished landscape seemed fairer to him this day than ever before even in harvest time.
As the aged couple entered the church, with its many pictures of saints and its gorgeous towering altar, the organ began to play softly. Presently the narrow door near the altar slowly opened, and four nuns, in black array, with clasped hands and bowed heads, repeating a psalm of renunciation, entered the church. Following them, arrayed in a spotless white veil which fell to her feet, came she who had saved a soul from unbelief. Eagerly the congregation bent forward, anxious to catch a glimpse of her whom the bishop had promised to honor. To be a sister of the convent of the Sacred Heart! She knew not how many envied her.
With closed eyes and radiant face sat farmer Frechette, repeating prayers of thanksgiving. She who had given birth to such a daughter praised the Virgin that she had known the pangs of motherhood.
The sweet face had lost all its roses. Her eyes were downcast as she walked up to the altar; but that was as it should be, with one who was about to renounce the pleasures of the world, and whose eyes evermore must humbly seek the earth.
Just as she was repeating her final vows, one who had told himself a thousand times that he would not witness the ceremony, drove rapidly down the road, and halted some little distance from the church near the convent. Just as he reached the door of the church he saw Father Sauvalle solemnly raise both hands and bless her.
With set lips he went back to the buggy, and stood behind the horse in a position which he thought would prevent him from being seen. Eagerly he watched the door, and his heart beat furiously as he saw the four dark-robed nuns step from the church and wait for their new sister. At last she came, with hands clasped and head bowed so very, very low. The nuns divided, formed around her, and then began the walk to the convent, near where the silent figure still waited, screened by the horse.
Just as she was about to enter the convent yard, her attention was attracted by the white feet of the horse, and instantly she knew to whom it belonged. Wrong as she knew it to be, she could not help raising her head. Their eyes met:
"Or be crush'd in its ruins to die!"
"Or be crush'd in its ruins to die!"
The words came to them both at the same moment. One of the nuns put out her hand as she saw her falter; but she recovered herself and entered the yard. The rusty hinges creaked weirdly as the door closed behind her. A moment later, he heard the metallic click of the lock.
The snow began to fall in great flakes, and the boisterous wind drove them violently into the faces of the sightseers as they hurried from the church. None of them saw the horse on the far side of the road; the snow was blinding.
As he heard their voices die away in the distance, Dr. Chalmers' head drooped till it rested on the animal's mane. Patiently the beast whisked away the snow and tried to hide its head from the vicious wind.
It was growing rapidly dark, but he did not notice it: he was thinking of the fight he had made for her life, and of the love that had come to him in the summer days when health came back to her to make amends.
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life!"
"To prevail in the cause that is dearer than life!"
The mocking refrain seemed to have been shouted into his ears; he started as though he had been struck, seized the reins, and dashed into the gathering storm.
It is not because I am unduly sensitive of my altered appearance that I have told so few the story of the ugly scar that disfigures my face, but on account of the horror that I yet experience when recalling the terrible incidents that led to my receiving it. How many lives were saved by that wound I shall never know.
The great Canadian Pacific Railway, which to-day connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific, was in the year 1882 built only about two hundred miles west of Winnipeg, leaving a huge gap of several hundred miles of untouched prairie before one of the world's wonders, the famed Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, was reached.
Such was the rapidity with which the rails were laid and telegraph offices erected, that when winter set in, fifty telegraph operators were needed to take charge of the empty stations.
The management found it hard to induce men to go out and bury themselves for the winter in the vast prairie, which was only then being opened up. To-day, men are only too happy to make homes in this wonderful country, which has very aptly been termed the future granary of the world.
Money is a loadstone that few men can resist, and when I heard that $80 a month was being paid out there for operators, I resigned my position in Montreal, and with $20 and a pass in my pocket started for Manitoba.
On reaching Winnipeg, I was at once sent out to Elkhorn, a bit of a station 150 miles farther west. When I took charge, in November, four inches of snow already hid the earth, which did not see the sun again till March.
Two passenger trains a day, and an occasional construction train, formed the only break in the monotonous life which I led. It was a dreadfully solitary existence. I was alone in the station, and as December began to wane, and the dread blizzards commenced their wild revelry, heaping the snow into such huge mounds on the tracks that the trains were delayed for days, I got as homesick and nervous as a girl of fourteen instead of a young man of twenty.
Christmas eve ushered in bitter weather. All day it had been snowing and storming. At 1 a.m. the glass showed twenty-two below zero. The storm had risen and risen until it was blowing a perfect blizzard from the west. The riotous wind, as it swept along the vast prairie, unobstructed for scores of miles by houses or trees, caught up the newly-fallen snow in its mad embrace, and drove it with amazing force against the little telegraph office which sheltered me from its deathly embrace, as though enraged against this earnest of approaching civilization. So fierce, at times, was the onslaught that the tense telegraph wires could be heard humming even above the demoniacal glee of the storm.
I knew it was unmanly, but I could not help it: the tears would start to my eyes. It was Christmas, and I was spending it in such a queer manner! My thoughts had been with mother and dear old London, where I had left her two years before to try my fortune in Montreal. I knew she was thinking of her eldest born.
"Christians, awake, salute the happy morn."
"Christians, awake, salute the happy morn."
All I had to do was to close my eyes, and I could hear my companions singing that grand old hymn in the greatest city in the world.
It was a relief to hear the telegraph instrument, which had been quiet for hours, call my office. Both passenger trains were nearly ten hours late, and were slowly struggling towards my station. It was just 2 a.m. when I received the order from the dispatcher at Winnipeg to detain the east-bound train at my station when she arrived, till the west-bound express crossed her—double tracks are yet unknown out there.
I replied back that I understood the order, and was just about to let the red lantern swing round from the station and face the track, when I was startled by hearing a tremendous kicking and howling at the door. In my surprise, I forgot to turn the lamp which was to signal the engineer to stop at the station for orders.
Little wonder I was agitated. The nearest house was seven miles away, and no white man could have walked a tenth of that distance in such a blizzard and have lived. Had the shouting and kicking been less imperative, I might have been superstitious. With trembling hands I drew the bolt. Before I could step aside the door was thrown violently open, and to my dismay two stalwart Cree Indians burst into the little office. It was the manner of the savages in entering that made me feel nervous. It was no uncommon thing for me to have Indians drop into the station at night, and to see roaming bands of them pass the station at all hours; but two drunken Cree Indians, even a native scout might have been pardoned for fearing had he been unarmed and placed in my position.
Without appearing to notice me, the braves walked over to the glowing wood stove and began to warm themselves. I wanted to show that I trusted them, and brought two chairs and asked them to be seated. As I spoke they both turned their wicked, black eyes on me, but did not deign to speak. Kicking the chairs to one side they began taking off their great skin-coats and caps and red-and-white blankets.
As the taller of the two petulantly threw his wraps down, something hard struck the floor heavily. He gave a cry of greedy exultation, felt in the pocket of the coat, drew out a bottle of whiskey, and proceeded without delay to break off the neck on the stove. It was contrary to the law to sell liquor to Indians, but that did not matter much, they always managed to get it.
Just as he was about to raise the ragged mouth of the bottle to his lips, the telegraph instrument began to work. It had the effect that I feared. Both the Indians, with superstitious dread in their eyes, involuntarily took a couple of steps back toward the wall, where I was sitting, devoutly hoping they would wrap themselves up in their blankets and go off to sleep. No such good fortune.
The room was about ten feet wide and fifteen feet long. In the centre was the stove, and near the door, about six feet to the right, was the instrument. I was sitting facing the door at the opposite side of the room. Pretending that I thought they were going to back up against me, I rose and calmly began to walk toward the instrument.
I had not passed them two feet when they both caught me violently by the shoulders, and in excited, guttural tones, began in a threatening manner to say something to me. Seeing that I did not understand, the tall brave, pointing the bottle, which he still tightly clutched in his left hand, at the talkative instrument, said fiercely, "No go there! no go there!"
I quickly understood what they meant; the Indian's fear of telegraph instruments, and his inability to understand electricity, were known to every operator west of Winnipeg.
In their drunken fear they imagined that if I got possession of the wires I would have it in my power to do them an injury.
As easily as I could have lifted an infant, the great savage with his unengaged hand swung me from my feet, and contemptuously dropped me on my chair again, after which he took a long draught out of the bottle, and then handed it to his companion. The effect of the liquor upon their savage natures showed itself almost immediately; they began to yell and shout, and putting their hands around their mouths uttered cries like prairie wolves. I shrank closer to the wall.
In ten minutes they had finished the bottle, and were become nothing better than howling maniacs. They joined hands and capered round the stove, stamping the floor viciously with their moccasined feet. Again, they would wave their long arms about their heads in the most grotesque manner, uttering at the same time the most blood-curdling war-whoops.
In their eyes was the baleful light of the wild beast. The coal-oil light, which but dimly lit up the room, threw a yellow shade upon their dark, brutal faces, making them look like emissaries from the evil one, dancing in fiendish glee over some evil deed. The storm, as though in sympathy with the savage scene, had risen to a hurricane, shrieking like a mad thing, and through the casement and ill-constructed door piled up miniature snow-banks.
Every moment I expected my unwelcome visitors would seize me, and in their insane glee practise upon me some savage torture. Would they never cease? For nearly thirty minutes I sat still as death, where they had flung me. Safety lay in not attracting their attention; but a dreadful ordeal was in store for me.
The instrument, which had been silent for a time, again awoke to life. The dispatcher was calling my office. Like a flash the order to detain the down express that he had sent came back to my memory, and with a thrill of horror I remembered that I had omitted to turn the red lamp. The dispatcher, I knew, wanted to ask me if the train had arrived. Involuntarily I started to my feet.
The only sounds now to be heard were the ticking of the instrument and the ceaseless cries of the storm. The Indians, the instant they heard the former, ceased their uncivilized mirth, again looked apprehensively at the mysterious instrument, and hurriedly glanced at me. Their treacherous, suspicious natures were thoroughly aroused on seeing me looking eagerly toward the instrument. I knew not how near the train might be; act I must. I thought of the fearful loss of life which would surely occur unless I could reach the cord that hung above the instrument, and with one pull swing round the red lamp and let it beam across the track. I had received the order to expose the light, and unless I did so I knew full well the Company would hold me responsible for any accident that might occur. I had written the order in the order-book when receiving it.
All this passed through my mind like a flash. I did not dread the Company, but I could not let scores of lives be sacrificed in order to save my own. I had always thought I was not the stuff brave men are made of, but when put to the test I gloried in finding that I was not a coward.
I was quite calm as I began carelessly to walk over to the instrument. The drunken savages were upon me almost immediately. As they felled me to the floor, my ears caught the distant rumbling of the east-bound locomotive. The Indians also had heard the noise, and as they turned to listen I once more sprang to my feet and dashed past them. One of them I passed in safety, but as I dodged the big brave he struck viciously at me with the broken bottle.
His aim was but too true; the ragged mouth of the bottle opened my face like a conical bullet. I had only a few more steps to go. Before I fell I knew that I had turned the light.
The conductor put me on the train and took me to Winnipeg, where I remained in the hospital for three weeks.
The Indians had gone when he entered the station. He had seen the order in the book, and had waited the arrival of the west-bound express, which arrived five minutes later. Had he not seen the red light he would have gone on, and the trains would have met about two miles east of the station.
The detectives tried to trace the two brutal savages, but did not succeed.
Yes, as long as I live I shall remember that Christmas when I was employed in the far west by the great Canadian Pacific Railway.
The fear of it is killing me, Baptiste, for it is on my mind all the time. Think of it: for seven long years he has neither been to confession nor partaken of the blessed sacrament, and he is drinking and growing wickeder every day. This is the last night of the seventh year, and the curse may fall upon him now at any moment. She buried her wrinkled, fear-stricken face in her thin trembling hands, and wept as though her heart was breaking. "O Marie, blessed Virgin!" she whispered, "save our son, our Pierre; let not the fate of the loup-garou fall upon him." A thin stream of light shone through an ancient crack in the old-fashioned box-stove, and fell caressingly across the bowed head, making its silvery hair look pathetically thin. The bent shoulders of the sorrowing mother shook convulsively.
Baptiste gazed with a troubled look at the bar of light on his wife's head, and his heart went out to her as only a husband's can to a wife who for half a century has borne with him the joys and trials of the passing years. As he looked at the thin white hair, memory drifted back to the time when it was as black as a raven's wing, and fell in great glossy folds far below her waist. A tender smile stole into his face as he remembered how, on account of the waywardness of the beautiful hair and its rebellion against imprisonment, he had more than once heard her chide it; yes, and at times when more than usually arrogant, threaten to use the shears upon it. He observed, too, how round her shoulders had grown, and noted many other signs of old age which the glow from the stove made so cruelly apparent. It had taken sixty years of life just to streak her hair with grey; but the past seven years had remorselessly thinned and whitened it, and now not even one black hair was to be seen. All these things and many more he thought of as he gazed upon his sorrowing wife.
Distressfully the old man put his hand to his forehead, and then thought reverted to himself, and he recalled the days when his head was subject to his will and did not, with painful persistency, nod and tremble the long day through. The infirmity of age was strong upon him; seventy years is a long time to have lived and toiled as French-Canadian farmers toil in eastern Canada. He thought, too, how much he had aged the last seven years, and of the one who had caused those years to be fraught with so much suffering to them both. He realized, indeed, that sorrow ages more quickly than years!
"Pierre, Pierre, my son!" he muttered brokenly, "better that you had never been born, than after reaching manhood's estate to have forgotten all our teachings and become a drunkard and an outcast from the Church." A stifled sob from his wife again changed his rambling thoughts, and painfully rising he walked over to her side. Gently he laid his hand on the hair that he so dearly loved, although so much changed, and bending tenderly down said, bravely, trying to check the tremor in his voice, "There, wife, don't fret." And then he drew her head to his shoulder in a way he used to do when they were both in the noonday of life. She remembered, and her grief grew less. "The Virgin is good, wife, and we have prayed so much to Her about him. Surely She will hear us, and not let what you fear fall upon our Pierre. Father Benoit has been praying to Her all these years, and we are told that the Virgin sooner or later answers the prayers of the priests of our Church. Then special prayers will be offered for our son to-night by the priest, for he knows how you feared for him because this was the last night of the seventh year."
A shudder ran through her frame as the anxious mother started to her feet and said fearfully:
"Yes, in another hour a new day will dawn, and then seven years will have passed since our son went to confession, and then the curse may fall at any time."
Dropping his voice almost to a whisper, and looking with superstitious dread out of the window into the moonlight, which made the newly fallen snow glisten on the road with almost supernatural whiteness, and trying to speak in a tone of conviction, her husband said:
"Perhaps the priest may be right, wife, and this about loup-garou may not be true. He told us that he did not believe in it, and that the Church had uttered no such curse against those who for seven years did not confess; although if they died in that sinful state there was no hope of salvation for them. As for the devil, you remember the priest said that he had not the power to change a man into a wolf or an animal of any kind, and—"
"Speak not like that, Baptiste," broke in his wife with fear in her eyes; "the evil one may hear what you say, and out of mockery to the Church, cause the evil to fall upon him." With piteous haste she made the sign of the cross on her bosom, and instinctively her husband did the same.
Although it was near midnight they had not lit the lamp, for the moon that poured in at the window made the cottage almost as light as noonday.
"Husband," she went on in a tone of conviction, "why should we try to deceive ourselves? for we know that it is true. Father Benoit is sorry for us and would give us comfort. It may be that the curse is not from the Church, but the devil knows when human beings are forsaken by the blessed Church, and if he can change them into animals and keep them so till death, then he is sure of their souls; even the blessed Mother then can do nothing for them."
Baptiste raised his hand beseechingly, as though he would fain have her cease, but she only drew still closer to him and continued quickly:
"Have we not known it since we were children? Did not our parents believe in it? Even if we had not been told these things, we know it is true. Have you forgotten Arsene Bolduc, Baptiste?"
Again he raised his hand, mutely protesting, but she did not heed him.
"It is only three years ago that it happened to Arsene. He, like our boy, had not partaken of the blessed sacrament for seven years. You know how he blasphemed and drank, and grew wickeder every year, till finally the very last night of the seventh year came, and just a few minutes before twelve he became possessed of the devil, and beat his mother, and then ran out of the house and was never seen again. And why was he never seen again, Baptiste?" She was getting strangely excited, and her voice was rising.
"For the love of the Virgin, cease, wife?"
But she was now far too excited for him to have control over her, and went on:
"When Arsene did not come back, his father thought the evil one had turned him into a wolf; but his mother said she believed he had been changed into a bull, and we know she was right, for a few days later you helped, with the other men, to drag out of the river the bull that was found drowned. Did not all the village folk talk about it, and regret that someone had not met the beast before it was drowned, and drawn blood from it so as to release Arsene? Has he ever been seen since? We have known of others like him who have disappeared and have never been seen again. How can we deceive ourselves and say there is no loup-garou? There is; and we must not sleep this night till our son returns. This night above all others he should not have been out late. He must be drinking heavily in the village. We do not know what may happen, Baptiste. I fear some evil is about to befall him, for my heart is full of fear."
Her voice had a pitiful break in it as she concluded.
"Let us pray the good God to protect him this night, wife," answered Baptiste, no longer pretending that he did not believe in this strange legend, in which nearly all his race in his station in life have faith.
While they were on their knees praying, the yellow-faced clock behind the stove struck the hour of midnight.
"Mon Dieu!twelve o'clock!"
The anxious mother sprang to her feet, ran to the door, opened it, and standing on the steps shaded her eyes with her hand, and looked earnestly down the long snow-clad road in the direction of the little village of St. Pascal. Behind her stood Baptiste, also shading his weak eyes and looking. Not a human being was in sight. The zinc-covered spire of the little village church, nearly half a mile away, glittered and shone in the fairy light like burnished silver. The quaint whitewashed cottages that dotted the road to the village looked far different from what they did in the daytime; somehow the charitable moon had forgotten to reveal the cracks and stains that time in its relentless march had made. The lines, too, that age and care had made on the two eager watching faces were also, by the great ruler of the night, tenderly smoothed out.
"I cannot see him, Baptiste," she said presently, lowering her hand from her eyes.
"Neither can I, wife; neither can I. Let us go into the house and wait." He laid his hand persuasively on her shoulder. As she turned the moon shone full in her face. She stopped and looked at it for a few moments like one fascinated, then slowly raised her hand and pointed at it.
"Baptiste," she said in an awed voice, with the superstitious light again in her eyes, "do you remember once before when it was as bright as this?"
He tried to draw her toward the door, but she resisted, and looking hurriedly up into his face, said:
"Ah; I see you, too, remember! It was the night Arsene Bolduc went out never to return. The devil is surely abroad this night, and our Pierre is not yet home."
"Talk not of the evil one while the moon shines full in your face, wife, for it is an evil omen."
Quickly he drew down her hand, which was still pointing upward, then put his hand over her eyes to shut out the sight of the moon, made the sign of the cross, drew her into the house and shut the door.
Once more they seated themselves near the stove and began their anxious wait for the erring one. For nearly half an hour they sat without speaking, but at short intervals glanced at the clock, whose loud ticking broke the stillness of the night with painful distinctness. Every relentless tick jarred on the nerves of the aged watchers. Suddenly they started to their feet with blanched faces, looked at each other, and apprehensively bent their heads in a listening attitude. Again there came floating on the still air the mournful sound that had startled them—the weird wail of a dog! A marvellous change came over the mother as she listened; the look of fear vanished and was succeeded by one of intense determination. The change in her was so great that one would surely have thought that she had partaken of the fabled elixir of life; her bent shoulders seemed to grow straight once more, while her steps, as she ran to the door and wrenched it open, were as firm and elastic as those of a young woman. For a moment she stood in the open door and looked: One glance was sufficient—coming toward the house across the field was a large hound, which was baying the moon. Firmly she picked up a knife from the kitchen table, thrust another into the hand of Baptiste, and drew him to the door.
"See, Baptiste!" she said, standing erect and pointing the knife at the dog, "I am right; the curse has fallen, as I feared it would. The devil has turned our Pierre into a hound, and the beast is coming this way. Even a scratch, if it draws blood, will be sufficient to release him from the curse and restore him to us again. The dog must not escape us; if it does, our son is lost to us forever. Pray the holy Mother to help us now, husband."
She made a weird picture as she stood in the open door, with her thin white hair streaming about her face, grasping the knife, which glittered ominously in the moonlight.
The huge hound, which was still coming direct toward the house, was now only a field away. Separating the field from the road was a stone wall about three and a half feet in height. Anyone crouching behind it, on the side of the road, could not be seen from the field. The one, and only chance of intercepting the animal, flashed across her mind, and calling Baptiste to follow her she ran across the road and crouched behind the portion of the wall over which the animal must jump, unless it quickly altered its course. Baptiste made a pitiful effort to follow her, but his weary limbs were unable to bear the strain any longer, and he fell unconscious to the floor.
As she ran across the road, had she glanced down it toward the village she would have seen a man, only a few rods distant, walking somewhat unsteadily toward the house. He stopped abruptly and raised his hand in amazement as he saw the woman, knife in hand, hurry across the road and crouch behind the wall. He ran toward her calling "Mother!" but the baying of the hound drowned his voice. Before he could reach her she sprang to her feet just as the dog rose into the air from the opposite side of the wall. She was exactly in front of it. The beast uttered a howl of terror as the strange apparition so unexpectedly rose up before it. Bravely she seized with her left hand one of the paws of the animal, and as it fell, the knife in her right hand gleamed again and was buried deep in the shoulder of the dog. As she fell, the enraged animal turned upon her and buried its teeth in her arm. She did not feel the bite; the crisis had passed—the unnatural strength born of intense excitement had now deserted her. Just as unconsciousness was dimming her eyes, she saw a man towering above her; she saw the stick in his hand fall with fearful force on the head of the animal, which rolled over on its side without uttering a sound. Then the figure, which was growing more and more indistinct, caught her up in his arms, and a voice that she knew and loved so well called "Mother, mother!" She opened her eyes wearily and looked into the face of the man, and a smile, very beautiful to see, passed over her face.
"My Pierre; my son," she murmured. "I said I would release you. I saw the blood on the knife, then I saw you spring up before me, and now I am in your arms."
Her lips grew very white and her head fell back on his shoulder. As he ran into the house with her he saw his father lying near the door, and he uttered a cry so full of remorse and sorrow that it entered the dulled ears of Baptiste and restored him to consciousness, and he followed his son into the little bedroom, where Pierre laid the brave little mother on the bed. Tenderly the old man put his arms around his son's neck and kissed him, and then the wayward one knew that he was once more forgiven, and that the past would be remembered against him by his father no more.
They thought she had only fainted, and while Baptiste administered simple remedies to her, Pierre, the erring one, knelt by the bedside with his face buried in the hand that had held the knife so firmly and that had struck the brute, lying so quietly out there in the moonlight, so fierce a blow. Tears, the first that had fallen from his eyes since he was a boy, fell and trickled through the fingers that were now so wan and thin and that had toiled so hard for him. How she had longed to see tears in his eyes and hear penitent words from his lips, and now his tears were drenching her fingers, and he was telling her in a choked voice how bitterly he repented of his drunkenness and his disregard of the Church, and all his evil ways, and how he would reform and be a son to her indeed; yet she heard him not.
So deep was his grief that he did not raise his head, or he would have noticed how deathly pale her face was and how very light her breathing had become. Suddenly his grief ceased; a great fear had entered his heart—What caused the hand that his face was hid in to be so clammy and cold? It had not been so when he first pressed it to his face. "She is dead," whispered his heart brutally. "It is a lie, a wicked lie! she is not dead," he muttered. "Raise your head and see, raise your head and see," reiterated his heart monotonously. He had no reply to make to such an answer as this. Slowly he raised his shaking hands to his face, still not daring to look up, and again took her hand in his. A chill seemed to emanate from it which reached his very heart. Slowly his head began to rise. From the foot of the bed his eyes gradually crept up and up, past her feet, past her knees, past the bosom that had nourished him; inch by inch, higher and higher, till at last they rested on her face, and then he uttered a great cry and started to his feet.
As he stood and looked, his father entered the room, in one hand a medicine bottle, in the other a bowl of water. He, too, saw the change that had come over her since he had left the room to get the simple remedies, and forgetting all about the things he was carrying, opened his hands and stretched them out toward her, and would have fallen had not Pierre caught him and led him over to the bed.
"Wife, wife!" he cried; but the quiet expression of her face did not change.
The sight of his father's sorrow recalled Pierre out of the dazed condition into which he had fallen.
"She is dead, father," he whispered falteringly.
"No, no, Pierre, she has only fainted!" he shouted fiercely. "You do not know what death is. Quick, Pierre; quick, son, bring me the medicine, the hot water; quick, quick, the—the—"
Poor old Baptiste! he could go no further. He ceased rubbing her hands, staggered over to Pierre, who was standing with averted face in the middle of the room, buried his head in his bosom and said brokenly:
"No, Pierre, don't go for the medicine, nor for the water, nor for anything now, for what you said is true.Mon Dieu, true, too true!" And Pierre, erring Pierre, folded his arms around his father and tried to comfort him like one would a sorrowing child. It was while his arms were yet around him that her eyes slowly opened, and she saw the precious sight. The dying embers of life, which so often flash up before they expire forever, were burning in her now.
"Pierre,mon garcon; Baptiste, husband," she whispered.
For a moment they hesitated as though one from the dead had spoken to them, then with glad cries they hurried to her side. With infinite tenderness Pierre put his strong arms around her and bent his head to catch the last words her lips would ever form. Baptiste, prayer-beads in hand, knelt by his son's side, saying prayers for the dying.
"My son; my Pierre."
"Mother!"
"Oh, I am so happy that I released you from the spell the evil one threw over you. For my sake, Pierre, return to the Church and be forgiven."
"Before the sun sets, mother, I will go to confession and partake of the blessed sacrament; and I will cease my evil ways and be a son to my father. It was so noble of you, mother, to release me from the spell as you did."
He would rather have had his tongue cut out than to let her know that the great sacrifice she had made for him had been a sad, sad mistake.
And now the end was very near. "Baptiste?" she asked faintly.
He laid her in his father's arms and turned away. He did not hear what she said to his father, but he heard him reply in a voice that sounded strangely far away and weak, "Yes, soon; very soon, wife."
Then all was silent. With his back still turned to them he waited for his father to call him; but the seconds sped on and the silence continued. At last he turned. His father was kneeling on the floor with his arms around her and his head lying on the pillow close to hers.
"Come, father," he said softly, as he tried to raise him. There was no reply. He bent over and peered into the two quiet faces. The legend of the loup-garou had no place in the land they had entered.