Sunset came at last and twilight. The last morsels of the maple sugar and the soaked corn made up the evening meal. Blaise slipped through the woods once more, and reported the outer bay and strait empty of all life except a pair of fish ducks. Then he and Hugh pushed off the bateau and crossed the pond. No more peaceful spot could be imagined. The still water reflected the motionless trees and the soft colors of the sky. From the woods came the clear, plaintive notes of a thrush.
Landing, the lads went directly to the old birch, and were relieved to find no signs that anyone had been near it. Blaise climbed the tree and let himself down into the hole. Hugh then followed him up, received the bales the younger boy handed him and lowered them to the ground. Squirrels or wood-mice had nibbled the outer wrappings, but had not penetrated to the pelts. When all the packages were out of the tree, the two carried them to the shore and stowed them in the boat. Once more they paddled across the lake and took the sail aboard. They did not set up the mast, as they wished to push the boat under the fallen cedar. Beaching the bateau close to the end of the barrier, they set to work to cut a way through.
They had only the one little axe, and Hugh wielded that, climbing out on the tree to reach the limbs he wished to cut. Blaise, standing in the shallow water, trimmed off smaller branches with his stout knife. Working with skill and speed, they soon had the lower limbs cleared away from the under side of the trunk. There appeared to be room enough to push the bateau through, but the water at that spot was very shallow. The boat grounded on the rock bottom. The lads unloaded most of the furs, and succeeded in dragging the lightened bateau over the shallows. Then they had to carry the bales through the woods, and reload. All this work they were forced to do as quietly as possible. The blows of the axe could not be muffled, but the two made no noise they could avoid. They did not dare light a torch, but the sky was clear and the northern twilight long. Darkness had settled down, however, by the time they were ready to leave their island of refuge.
In that sheltered place, they were unable to tell whether there was breeze enough to aid or hinder them, but they had made up their minds to leave the Bay of Spirits. If possible they would start for the mainland, by sail if they could, by paddle if they must. If the wind was so strong against them that they could not cross, they would go on in the other direction, and find some temporary hiding place farther from the camp of the Chief of Minong.
Straight out through the quiet water of the narrower channel, shadowed by the black, wooded masses of the islands to right and left, they paddled. Darkness and still water made the shallows treacherous, but they had noted the channel on their way in that morning, and made their way out again without accident.
Suddenly Blaise in the bow gave a quick, low hiss. Hugh knew that the alarmed warning meant, not mere shallow water ahead, but some graver danger. He obeyed the signal and steered into the deep shadow of the island close by. The boat scraped the rocks and came to a stop. Looking out from the protecting gloom, across the moonlit lake, Hugh caught sight of the cause of his brother’s alarm. A canoe, paddled swiftly, was crossing the open water beyond the islands, going north. Would it turn up the bay? Hugh sat motionless, his paddle handle gripped tightly. Then he drew a breath of relief. The canoe had not turned. It went straight on and disappeared from sight.
Hugh moved forward to speak to Blaise. “The fellows who were after us,” he whispered, “going back to camp. They have given up the chase.”
“I could make out but two men,” Blaise replied.
“You couldn’t be certain there weren’t three,” Hugh argued, “unless you can see much better at night than I can.”
Blaise shook his head doubtfully. “The canoe was headed for the long point. They must be some of Ohrante’s men.”
“None of them was big enough to be Ohrante himself. We could see them well enough to make sure of that.”
The brothers waited in the shadow for several minutes, then ventured on. As they came out from the shelter of the islands, a light southeast breeze, that barely rippled the water, struck them.
“A favorable enough wind, if we want to go direct to the Kaministikwia,” remarked Hugh, “but do we?”
“It is at the Kaministikwia where we must sell the furs.”
“But how about our revenge on Ohrante? Are we to let him meet those reinforcements at his Torture Island, and then go on capturing innocent people and putting them to death for his own pleasure? Ohrante is a menace to both white men and Ojibwas, Blaise.”
“Yes, I know that,” the younger lad replied slowly, “but what can you and I alone do against him and his band and the new braves who come to join him? I am as eager as you to see Ohrante destroyed. I long to avenge my father by doing the deed with my own hands, but we must plan cautiously. If we are over rash, we shall fail.”
“What would you do then, Blaise?”
“I would go quickly to the Kaministikwia, leave the furs there, and find other men to go with us to the Isle of Torture.”
“That will take a long time,” Hugh objected. “We may be too late.”
“Then we will cross to Minong again. We know where his camp is. Oh, we can find men eager to seek out Ohrante and his wolf pack wherever they may be, and destroy them like the wolves they are. The X Y agent will help us to raise a party. Ohrante was brought into this country by the Old Company. He is a skillful hunter and took to them many pelts.”
“True. The New Company will be glad to help capture the fellow no doubt,” Hugh agreed.
“But you and I, as our father’s sons, will claim the right to deal with him.” There was a hard, fierce note in the lad’s voice. Jean Beaupré had not been a mild man, yet it was not so much the hot-tempered French father that spoke now in the son, as the fierce, implacable savage. Bitterly as Hugh hated the giant Mohawk, he sensed something different and alien in his half-brother’s passion. Through the weeks of constant association with Blaise, Hugh had ceased ordinarily to think of him as Indian, but now, for the moment, he was not Blaise Beaupré, but Attekonse, Ojibwa. Yet it was the white boy who was the most impatient at the thought of delay in dealing with Ohrante.
The wind, however, had apparently settled the question. The breeze would carry the boat northwest to Thunder Bay, but would be more hindrance than help in going southwest to Grand Portage. In the lee of an island, the brothers raised their mast and ran up their sail. As they paddled out from shelter, the breeze caught the canvas and they were off across the lake.
Clouds had covered the moon, and it was too dark to sight Thunder Cape. The boys could do nothing but run before the wind and trust to it to carry them somewhere near their destination. At any rate they were leaving Minong and putting the miles between themselves and the cruel, self-appointed chief of the island. That wonderful and beautiful island, which the white men had appropriately called Royale, deserved a better king, and the first step in the right direction was to depose the present usurper, thought Hugh with grim humor.
In the light breeze the bateau sailed but slowly, and the boys, in their impatience, strove to increase speed by helping with the paddles. As they went farther out, however, the wind increased, and before long they laid aside the blades, satisfied that they were making fairly good progress.
Overhead the stars shone dimly. To the south and east, the sky was banked with masses of cloud. Hugh, glancing that way, felt uneasy. A rain-storm coming down upon the heavily loaded, open bateau would be unpleasant if not disastrous. From the behavior of the sail, he knew that the wind was less steady. During the past two months he had learned something of the moods of Lake Superior, and he understood that he must be ready for a sudden shift. He had been handling both sheet and tiller, but now he turned the steering over to his brother.
The change of wind came suddenly and with force. For a few moments Hugh had his hands full. Blaise obeyed orders on the instant, sail and boat were swung about, and were soon running freely before the wind again.
“We may not reach the Kaministikwia so soon as we hoped,” Hugh commented, when the momentary danger was past. “The wind seems to be taking us where it chooses. As near as I can tell we must be running almost directly west now instead of northwest.”
Blaise looked up at the only patch of clear sky visible. “Yes, I think we go west. If the wind holds steady we shall reach the shore somewhere between the Kaministikwia and the Grand Portage. If it shifts again——” He broke off with a shrug.
“If it shifts again,” Hugh took up the words, “we shall reach somewhere sometime, unless we go to the bottom. Even that would be a better fate than falling into Ohrante’s hands.”
The breeze was increasing in force, the waves running ever higher. Hugh and Blaise were kept busy and alert. Before the wind, the bateau was sailing swiftly enough so that there was little danger of following seas actually swamping it, but, heavily laden, it rode low, with little buoyancy. Every time it pitched down into the trough of the waves it shipped water. Those were the dangerous moments. With the utmost care in handling sail and rudder, the brothers could do little to insure against disaster. To keep straight before the wind, not to lose control of sail or rudder, and to take the chances with coolness and composure was about all there was to do. As they drove on in the darkness, now riding high on the summit of a wave, now pitching down between walls of water, they lost all count of time.
The waves seemed to be flattening out a little. Surely they were less high and long, yet they were even more troublesome, for they had grown choppy and uneven. When Blaise steered straight with them, Hugh found the sail swinging around. When he sailed directly before the wind, the boat pitched at an angle with the waves.
“The wind has shifted again,” he said anxiously.
“It comes from the northeast now,” Blaise returned.
Both were too busy and anxious to talk. Hugh confined his speech to sharply given orders and Blaise to answering grunts. The spray of breaking waves soaked them both, time and again. The boat was shipping a good deal of water, but bailing was impossible. The elder brother had his hands full with the sail, the younger was compelled to give all his attention to steering.
Gradually conditions improved. The wind steadied and the waves obeyed it. Once more the bateau could ride them straight, while running directly before the breeze. The clouds were broken now, moving swiftly across the sky, covering and uncovering the moon and stars. Whenever the boys dared to take their eyes from sail and water, they glanced upward. When enough sky had been blown clean to show them the position of the moon and principal stars, both lads were surprised to learn that dawn was not nearer. It seemed to them that they had been pitching about in the waves for a very long time, yet the day was still hours away.
The wind continued strong, the waves were higher than ever, but the brothers had gained more confidence in the sailing qualities of the boat and in their own ability to handle it. Less water was being shipped, and by bailing when they had a chance, they managed to keep it from rising too high. Now that the sky was clearing and there was more light on the lake, they could see farther across it. As the boat rose to the top of a wave, Blaise said suddenly, “L’isle du Paté.”
Hugh looked quickly and, before the bateau pitched down between the waves, he caught a glimpse of a compact, abrupt, black mass towering from the water not many miles to his right. There seemed to be no chance of reaching the mouth of the Kaministikwia though. To turn and run in past the south side of Pie Island was out of the question. The square sail would be worse than useless, and the laden bateau would inevitably be swamped in the trough of the waves.
The stars were waning in the paling sky. The short summer night was drawing to a close and dawn was approaching. South and west of Pie Island and nearer at hand, lower lines of shore appeared, the chain of islands from one of which the adventurers had set out for the Isle Royale. Those islands, across several miles of heaving water, were still too far away to be reached. Wind and waves were carrying the bateau by. The sun, coming up in an almost clear sky, found the boat still running southwest on a course almost parallel with the unattainable chain of islands.
As the hours passed, the boys were encouraged to discover that they were drawing gradually nearer and nearer to the islands on the right. What was still better, they were bearing straight towards land ahead, continuous, high land they knew must be the main shore. It seemed that they must reach the mainland not many miles to the southwest of the place where the chain of islands diverged from it. Hugh had long since ceased to be particular where he landed, if it was only in some spot where food might be obtained. Rations the day before had been very scanty, and he was exceedingly hungry.
The wind was strong but steady, the waves long and high. The bateau, as it plunged down into the trough, continued to ship a little water, but the boys kept it down by bailing when a hand and arm could be spared. They were borne nearer and nearer to the land. As they ran past a group of small islets not more than a half mile distant, with a larger and higher island showing beyond them, Hugh glanced that way and considered trying to turn.
Blaise guessed his brother’s thought. “The mainland is not far now,” he said, “and we go straight towards it. Let us go on until we can land without danger to the furs. There will be more chance to find food on the mainland also.”
Both of the younger boy’s arguments had weight with Hugh. He gave up the idea of attempting to turn, and they went on with wind and waves. At the end of another hour they were bearing down upon an irregular, rocky point.
“Is that island or mainland, do you think?” Hugh inquired.
“Mainland,” was the unhesitating reply. “I remember the place. Have I not passed it three times in the last two moons?”
Hugh made no answer. He himself must have passed that spot twice within two months, but there were so many rocky points along the shore. Hugh was observing enough in the white man’s way, but he did not see how Blaise could remember all those places and tell them apart.
The bateau ran close to the point. When a bay came into view, Hugh expected Blaise to steer in, but the latter made no move to do so.
“It is steep and rocky there,” he explained, with a nod towards the abrupt-shored cove. “Beyond yet a little way is a better place, shallow and well protected.”
Past another point and along a steep rock shore they sailed. Here they were in much calmer water, for the points broke the force of wind and waves. As they approached a group of small islands, Blaise remarked, “It is best to take down the sail. We can paddle in.”
Accordingly Hugh lowered the sail and took up his paddle, while Blaise steered the bateau in among the islets. In a few moments the haven lay revealed, an almost round bay, its entrance nearly closed by islets. The islands and the points on either side were rocky, but the shores of the bay were low and densely wooded with tamarack, cedar and black spruce. The water was almost calm, and the boys made a landing on a bit of beach on the inner side and under the high land of the right hand point.
Hugh had not realized that he was particularly tired. The strain of the dangerous voyage had kept him alert, but he had had no sleep for two nights. Now, suddenly, an overpowering weariness and weakness came over him. His legs almost collapsed under him. He dropped down on the beach, too utterly exhausted to move. He was on solid land again, but he could scarcely realize it. His head was dizzy, and the moment his eyes closed he seemed to be heaving up and down again.
When Hugh woke, the dizziness and sense of swaying up and down were gone. He sat up, feeling strangely weak and hollow, and looked about him. The bateau was drawn up on the beach, but Blaise was nowhere in sight. From the shadows Hugh could tell that the sun was on its downward journey. He had slept several hours. He was just gathering up his courage to get up, when he heard a stone rattling down the rock hill behind him. Turning his head, he saw Blaise descending. The boy was carrying several fish strung on a withe. Hugh eyed those fish with hungry eyes. He could almost eat them raw, he thought. He got to his feet and looked around for fuel. Not until he had a fire kindled, and,—too impatient to let it burn down to coals or to wait for water to heat,—was holding a piece of fish on a crotched stick before the blaze, did he ask his younger brother where he had been.
“I slept for a while,” Blaise admitted, “but not for long. My hunger was too great. I took my gun and my line and climbed to the top of the point. I went along the steep cliff, but I found no game and no tracks. Then I came to that rocky bay. The shores are steep there and the water clear. I climbed out upon a rock and caught these fish. They are not big, but they are better than no food.”
“They certainly are,” Hugh agreed whole-heartedly.
The elder brother’s pride in his own strength and endurance was humbled. He had slept, exhausted, for hours, while the half-breed boy, nearly three years younger than himself, had walked two or three miles in search of food.
When no eatable morsel of the fish remained, the brothers’ thoughts turned to their next move.
“We are far nearer the Grand Portage than the Kaministikwia,” Hugh said thoughtfully. “We had better follow my first plan and go down the shore instead of up. We can surely find others at the Portage willing to go with us against Ohrante.”
“It is all we can do,” Blaise assented, “unless we wait here for the wind to change. It is almost from the north now. We must go against it if we go up the Bay of Thunder. The other way, the shore will shelter us. But we cannot start yet. We must wait a little for the waves to go down.”
“And in the meantime we will seek more food,” Hugh added. “Why not try fishing among those little islands?”
The channels among the islets proved good fishing ground. By sunset the lads had plenty of trout to insure against any danger of starvation for another day at least. The waves had gone down enough to permit travel in the shelter of the shore. Sailing was out of the question, and paddling the laden bateau would be slow work, but Hugh was too impatient to delay longer, and Blaise more than willing to go on.
After half an hour of slow progress, the younger brother made a suggestion. “We are not far from the Rivière aux Tourtres now.” He used the French name for the Pigeon River, a name which seems to mean “river of turtles.” The wordtourtresdoubtless referred to turtle doves or pigeons. “To paddle this bateau,” Blaise went on, “is very slow, and to reach Wauswaugoning by water we must go far out into the waves around that long point below the river mouth. But along the south bank of the river is an Ojibwa trail. At a bend the trail leaves the river and goes on across the point to Wauswaugoning. We shall save time if we go that way, by land.”
“What about the boat and the furs?”
“We will leave them behind. There is a little cove near the river mouth where the bateau will be safe. The furs we can hide among the rocks. We shall not be gone many days if all goes well. No white man I think and few Ojibwas go that way. An Ojibwa will not disturb a cache,” Blaise added confidently.
“Yet I don’t like the idea of leaving the furs,” Hugh protested.
“They will be safer there than at the Grand Portage, where the men of the Old Company might find them.”
“Why not turn them over to the X Y clerk at the Portage?” Hugh questioned.
“No, no. If our father had wanted them taken there he would have said so. Again and again he said to take them to the New Company at the Kaministikwia. He had a debt there, a small one, and he did not like the man in charge at the Grand Portage. There was some trouble between them, I know not what.”
Blaise was usually willing to yield to his elder brother’s judgment, but this time he proved obstinate. Jean Beaupré’s commands must be carried out to the letter. His younger son would not consent to the slightest modification.
Darkness had come when the two reached the mouth of the Pigeon River, but the moon was bright and Blaise had no difficulty steering into the little cove. Alders growing down to the water concealed the boat when it was pulled up among them. Blaise assured Hugh that, even in daylight, it could not be seen from the narrow entrance to the cove. The mast was taken down and the sail spread over the bottom of a hollow in the rocks. On the canvas the bales of furs were piled, and a blanket was thrown over the heap. The boys cut several poles, laid them across the hole, the ends resting on the rock rim, and covered them with sheets of birch bark, stripped from an old, half-dead tree. The crude roof, weighted down with stones, would serve to keep out small animals as well as to shed rain. All this work was done rapidly by the light of the moon.
The cache completed, Blaise led Hugh to the opening of the trail at the river mouth. The trail, the boy said, had been used by the Ojibwas for many years. A narrow, rough, but distinct path had been trodden by the many moccasined feet that had travelled over it. The moonlight filtered through the trees, and Blaise, who had been that way before, followed the track readily. With them the brothers carried the remaining blanket, the gun, ammunition, kettle and the rest of their fish. As Blaise had said, the trail ran along the south bank until a bend was reached, then, leaving the river, went on in the same westerly direction across the point of land between the mouth of the Pigeon River and Wauswaugoning Bay. The whole distance was not more than three miles, and the boys made good time.
Hugh thought they must be nearing the end of the path, when Blaise stopped suddenly with a low exclamation. The elder brother looked over the younger’s shoulder. Among the trees ahead glowed the yellow light of a small fire.
“Wait here a moment,” Blaise whispered. And he slipped forward among the trees.
In a few minutes he was back again. “There are three men,” he said, “sleeping by a fire, a white man and two Ojibwas. One of the Ojibwas I know and he knew our father. We need not fear, but because of the white man, we will say nothing of the furs.”
The two went forward almost noiselessly, but, in spite of their quiet approach, when they came out of the woods by the fire, one of the Indians woke and sat up.
“Bo-jou,” remarked Blaise.
The second Indian was awake now. “Bo-jou, bo-jou,” both replied, gazing at the newcomers.
The white man rolled over, but before he could speak, Hugh sprang towards him with a cry of pleasure. “Baptiste, it is good to see you! How come you here?”
“Eh lá, Hugh Beaupré, and I might ask that of you yourself,” returned the astonished Frenchman. “I inquired for you at the Grand Portage, but the men at the fort knew nothing of you. When I said you were with your brother Attekonse, one man remembered seeing him with a white man. That was all I could learn. I was sore afraid some evil had befallen you. You are long in returning to the Sault.”
“Yes,” Hugh replied with some hesitation. “I have stayed longer than I intended. Is theOtterat the Grand Portage, Baptiste?”
“No, she has returned to the New Fort. I came on her to the Grand Portage. We brought supplies for the post and for the northmen going inland to winter. There was a man at the Portage, a Canadian like myself, who wanted sorely to go to the Kaministikwia. He has wife and child there, and the mate of the sloop brought him word that the child was very sick. So as I have neither wife nor child and am in no haste, I let him have my place. Now I am returning by canoe, with Manihik and Keneu here.”
At the mention of their names, the two Indians nodded gravely towards Hugh and repeated their “Bo-jou, bo-jou.”
“We camp here until the wind goes down,” Baptiste concluded.
During the Frenchman’s explanation, Hugh had been doing some rapid thinking and had come to a decision. He knew Baptiste for a simple, honest, true-hearted fellow. In one of his Indian companions Blaise had already expressed confidence.
“Baptiste,” Hugh asked abruptly, “have you ever heard of Ohrante, the Iroquois hunter?”
There was a fierce grunt from one of the Indians. The black eyes of both were fixed on Hugh.
“Truly I have,” Baptiste replied promptly. “As great a villain as ever went unhanged.”
“Would you like to help get him hanged?”
Keneu sprang to his feet. It was evident he had understood something of what Hugh had said. “I go,” he cried fiercely in bad French. “Where is the Iroquois wolf?”
“There is an island down the shore,” Hugh went on, “the Island of Torture, Ohrante calls it, where he and his band take their prisoners and torture them to death. Sometime soon he is to hold a sort of council there.”
“How know you that?” Baptiste interrupted.
“I shall have to tell you the whole story.” Hugh turned to his half-brother. “Blaise, shall we tell them all? Baptiste I can trust, I know.”
“As you think best, my brother.”
Sitting on a log by the fire at the edge of the woods, while the moonlight flooded the bay beyond, Hugh related his strange tale to the amazed and excited Canadian and the intent, fierce-eyed Keneu, the “War Eagle.” The other Indian also watched and listened, but it was evident from his face that he understood little or nothing of what was said. Hugh made few concealments. Frankly he told the story of the search for the hidden furs, the encounters with Ohrante and his band, the capture and escape, and what Blaise had learned from overhearing the conversations between Monga and the Indian with the red head band. Hugh did not mention, however, the packet he carried under his shirt, nor did he say definitely where he and Blaise had left the bateau and the furs. Those details were not essential to the story, and might as well be omitted.
“We know now it was through Ohrante father was killed,” the boy concluded, “and we, Blaise and I, intend that the Iroquois shall pay the penalty for his crime. He has other evil deeds to pay for as well, and that isn’t all. As long as he is at liberty, he is a menace to white man and peaceable Indian alike. He calls himself Chief of Minong, and he has an ambition to be a sort of savage king. He is swollen with vanity and belief in his own greatness, and he seems to be a natural leader of men, with a sort of uncanny influence over those he draws about him. One moment you think him ridiculous, but the next you are not sure he is not a great man. If he succeeds in gathering a really strong band he can do serious harm.”
Keneu gave a grunt of assent, and Baptiste nodded emphatically. “He must be taken,” the latter said.
“Taken or destroyed, like the wolf he is,” Hugh replied grimly. “We have a plan, Blaise and I.”
For nearly an hour longer, the five sat by the fire discussing, in English, French and Ojibwa, Hugh’s plan. Then, a decision reached, each rolled himself in his blanket for a few hours’ sleep.
Baptiste’s canoe was large enough to accommodate Hugh and Blaise, and the party were up and away early. The lake was no longer rough, so they made good time through Wauswaugoning Bay and around the point to the Grand Portage. Though Baptiste had been employed, in one capacity or another, by the Old Northwest Company, he was under no contract. An independent spirited fellow, who came and went much as he pleased, he did not feel under any obligation to the Old Company and was not an ardent partisan of that organization, so he made no objection when Hugh proposed that they try the X Y post for help in their undertaking. The men of either company would be glad no doubt to lay hands on the rascally Iroquois but the X Y men’s grievance was the stronger, since Ohrante had been in the employ of the Old Company when he committed his first crime. The white man he had slain was an independent trapper, affiliated with neither company, but Jean Beaupré had been under contract, for the one season at least, to the New Company. To learn that he too had come to his death through the Giant Mohawk would add fuel to the flame of the X Y men’s anger.
Shunning the Old Company’s dock, the party crossed the bay to the X Y landing. At the post Hugh and Blaise told as much of their story as was essential to prove that they had really encountered Ohrante, had learned his plans and knew where to lay hands on him. The time for the annual meeting of the New Northwest Company, still held at the Grand Portage post, was approaching. None of the partners or leading men had yet arrived, but most of the northmen, as the men who wintered inland west of the lake, were called, had come with their furs, and a considerable number of Indians were gathered at the post. The agent in charge could not leave, but in a very few minutes the boys had recruited a dozen men, half-breeds and Indians, with one white man, a Scotchman, to lead them.
It would not do to approach the Island of Torture in too great force. Hugh and Blaise, with Baptiste and the two Indians, were to go first, find out whether Ohrante’s recruits had assembled and watch for the coming of the chief himself. The men from the Grand Portage, in two canoes, would start later. Hugh had a very simple plan, which promised to be effective, to prevent Ohrante from leaving his council island before the Grand Portage party arrived.
The plan of campaign arranged, the scouts got under way at once. As they rounded the high point to the south and west of the Grand Portage Bay, they noticed, coming from the open lake, a large canoe with only two men. It was headed straight for the land, but suddenly swung about and turned down shore. Blaise, who was second from the bow, raised his paddle for a moment, while he gazed intently at the other canoe.
Turning his head, he called back to Hugh and Baptiste, “Red Band! We must catch them. It is Red Band and I think Monga.”
“Vite!Make speed!” ordered Baptiste. “We will separate those two from the rest of Ohrante’s rascals.”
He scarcely needed to give the command. Keneu, in the bow, had already quickened his powerful stroke. The others followed his lead and the five blades dipped and rose with vigorous, rapid rhythm. The Indians ahead did their best, bending to their paddles with desperate energy, but their canoe was fully as large as Baptiste’s and they were two paddles to five. The pursuers gained steadily. They must certainly overtake the fugitives.
Suddenly the fleeing canoe swerved towards the land. Keneu saw in an instant what the two men were trying to do. They intended to beach their boat and take to the woods, trusting to lose their pursuers in the thick growth. The Indian bow-man gave a sharp order. Baptiste’s canoe swung in towards shore. It must cut off the fugitives, get between them and the land. The shore was steep and rocky, and there was no good place to beach a boat. Yet so great was the panic of Monga and Red Band that they kept straight on. Despairing of escape by water, they were ready to smash their canoe on the rocks and take a chance of reaching land.
They did not even get near to the shore. In their panic haste, they failed to notice a warning ripple and eddy ahead. Their canoe struck full on the jagged edge of a rock just below the surface. The pursuers were close enough to hear the ripping sound, as the sharp rock tore a great gash in the thin bark. The water rushed in. Red Band sprang from the bow, but Monga remained where he was in the stern, the canoe settling under him.
The pursuers bent to their paddles and shot towards the wrecked boat. They reached the spot just as Monga was going down, but they did not intend to let him escape them by drowning. Keneu reached out a sinewy arm and seized the sinking man by the neck of his deerskin shirt, while the others threw their bodies the other way and backed water to hold the canoe steady and keep it off the sharp rock.
The sensation of going down in that cold water must have instilled in Monga a dread greater than his fear of capture, for he made no struggle to free himself. As if the fellow had been a fish too large to be landed, his captors passed him back from hand to hand until he came into the keeping of the other Indian in the stern. The captive could not be pulled aboard, so Manihik ordered him to hold to the rim. Kneeling face towards the stern, he held Monga by the shoulders, and towed him behind the canoe till Keneu found a landing place.
Red Band had disappeared. Blaise, who had watched, felt sure Monga’s companion had not reached shore. He had gone down and had not come up. Either he was unable to swim or had struck his head on a rock. Whatever had happened, there was no sign of him.
When shallow water was reached, Manihik took good care that his dripping prisoner should not escape. Monga was towed ashore and his wrists and ankles bound with rawhide rope. He said not a word, his broad face sullen and set.
Not until Blaise had asked him several questions in Ojibwa, did the captive deign to speak. Even then he answered with reluctance, a word or two at a time in sullen grunts. Then a question suddenly loosed his tongue, and he poured out a torrent of guttural speech. The other two Indians and Baptiste, who understood a little Ojibwa, listened intently, but Hugh could make out no word, except the names Ohrante and Minong.
When Monga paused, Blaise, his hazel eyes shining, turned to his brother. “We have not so many enemies to oppose us as we thought. Ohrante has only five of his old men left. The young Iroquois who captured you is dead.”
“That fellow dead?” Hugh exclaimed. “Are you sure Monga isn’t lying?”
“He speaks the truth, I am certain,” Blaise replied confidently. “When Ohrante found you had escaped, he was in a great rage. He held the young Iroquois, Monga and Red Band to blame, and threatened all three with death, unless they found you and brought you back. Because the small canoe was gone, they believed you had escaped by water. We hoped the empty canoe might drift up the bay, but they found it not. The Iroquois thought you might have gone into the Bay of Manitos. Monga had no wish to go there. He was afraid of the giant manitos, he says, but he was desperate and at last agreed. They found our fire on the stones at the end of that island. Monga believed you had crossed the mouth of the bay and had gone on the other side of Minong, but the Iroquois wished to go up the narrow channel. They went up the channel, as we know, to what they believed to be the end. The shallow water and the fallen cedar deceived them. So they turned back and went on across the mouth of the Bay of Manitos.”
“What were Ohrante and the others doing all that time?”
“They searched the western side of Minong. Monga says Ohrante would not go into the Bay of Manitos himself.”
“Then he evidently didn’t suspect our trick.”
“No, but I think perhaps the young Iroquois suspected, and that was why he wished to search the bay.” Blaise went on with his tale. “Monga and Red Band were in despair when they could not find you. They proposed that the three of them should run away to the mainland, but the Iroquois was too proud to be a coward. He wished to go on with the search or go back to take the punishment. So Monga pretended he could see the end of a canoe among the trees on an island. They landed, and Monga and Red Band murdered the Iroquois and left him there. Then they started for the mainland.”
“They were the ones we saw when we were going out of the bay.”
“Yes, they went around the long point, past that bay, and along the northwest side of Minong, but the wind came up and they could not cross. This morning they have crossed over.”
“We should have nothing further to fear from Monga then, even if we had not captured him.”
Blaise shrugged contemptuously. “Monga is a coward and a fool. He says he was angry because the traders sold him a bad musket. It exploded when he tried to fire it and blew off his little finger. So he joined the Mohawk wolf who boasted that he would drive the white men away. Monga thought Ohrante was a great chief and a powerful medicine man, but when he proposed to go to Minong, Monga was afraid. Then Ohrante told him that Minong was a wonderful place where they would grow rich and mighty and have everything they wished. He said he was such a great medicine man that the spirits of the island would do his bidding.”
“And they didn’t,” put in Hugh with a grin.
The swift, flashing smile like his father’s crossed the younger boy’s face. “Monga was disappointed to find Minong little different from the mainland. When he heard the spirits threatening Ohrante and saw the chief frightened, he began to lose faith in him. You escaped, and Ohrante’s medicine was not strong enough to find you and bring you back. He would not even go to the Bay of Manitos to seek you. So Monga knew the Chief of Minong was just a man like other men. He has run away and wants no more of Ohrante.”
“Just the same I think we had better keep an eye on him,” Hugh decided. “We’ll take him with us.”
Blaise nodded. “There is still much Monga has not told us,” he replied.
It was finally settled that Baptiste and the two Indians should take the prisoner with them, while Hugh and Blaise went on ahead in the captured canoe. It was their plan to approach the Island of Torture under cover of darkness. Conditions being good, the two boys paddled steadily. Late in the afternoon they paused for a meal. They had not many more miles to go, and would wait until nightfall. Before they had finished their supper, Baptiste’s canoe came in sight. Monga had expressed willingness to wield a paddle, but Baptiste did not trust him. The “Loon” rode as a compulsory passenger, wrists and ankles still bound. At Hugh’s signal, Baptiste ran in to shore to wait with the others for darkness.
During the enforced wait for nightfall, Blaise put more questions to the Indian prisoner. Monga, anxious to ingratiate himself with his captors, talked freely.
Ohrante, the captive said, after his first crime, capture and escape, had fled with Monga and the other Ojibwa who had helped him to get away. At the lake shore they had come across two Iroquois hunters, the tall fellow with the malicious grin and another. When Ohrante proposed to take refuge on Minong, the Ojibwas held back. The Mohawk, however, told them a long story about how his mother, a captive among the Iroquois, had been a direct descendant of the ancient tribe or clan who had once lived on Minong and had mined copper there. Her ancestors had been chieftains of that powerful people, Ohrante asserted, and he himself was hereditary Chief of Minong. From his mother’s people and also from his father, who was a Mohawk medicine man, the giant claimed to have inherited marvellous magic powers. He had further increased those powers by going through various mysterious experiences and ordeals. The manitos of Minong, he said, awaited his coming. He had had a dream, several moons before, in which the spirits, in the forms of birds and beasts, had appeared to him and begged him to come and rule over them. They would do his bidding and aid him to destroy his enemies and to become chief of all the tribes about the Upper Lakes. He would unite those tribes into a powerful nation and drive the white men from the country.
Persuaded by Ohrante’s arguments, the four Indians accompanied him to Minong. Their first camp was made on the southwestern end of the island. There Ohrante and the two Ojibwas, secure from pursuit, remained while the others crossed again to the mainland and brought back more recruits, an Ojibwa, a Cree and another Iroquois hunter. The band of eight roamed about the western side of the island by land and water. Most of the winter they spent in a long, narrow bay, where, according to Monga, they found many pieces of copper. In the spring, in search of the wonders their chief had promised them, they reached the northeastern end of the island. Then came a hard storm of wind, rain and snow, accompanied by fog. Three days after the storm, when the waves had gone down, the band entered, for the first time, the bay west of the long point. There they found and captured Jean Beaupré and Black Thunder. It was evident from Monga’s tale that he knew nothing of the hidden furs. Ohrante had accepted the story Jean Beaupré had told of having lost everything in the storm, when his bateau, driven out of its course, had been dashed into a rift in the rocks of the long point. Undoubtedly Beaupré must have had some warning of the approach of the Indians, for he had had time, as the boys knew, to secrete the furs. The fact that Black Thunder had suffered an injury to one leg, when the boat was wrecked, might account for the failure of the two to dodge the giant and his band.