OB AND AZURE.
After that complete repulse of the Iroquois tribes the French found themselves so weak as to be practically at the mercy of a foe. Another resolute attack must have driven them from their position. But the Iroquois bands were completely disorganised; the few English scattered about the maritime provinces, including that remnant of Scots in the east, who had settled Newfoundland and Nova Scotia only to see their territories wrested from them, were entirely inadequate even in combination to menace the supremacy of the House of Bourbon; and it may be questioned whether, at that time, any Scotsman would have stood to fight side by side with the English. Soon another ship would arrive from Marseilles, bringing, not only provisions and ammunition, but a reinforcement of men, prepared to till the ground as settlers should, but far more ready to continue the French error of attempting to colonise with the sword. On the heels of the discovery of two Dutch bodies among the Indian slain, La Salle returned, and conveyed to Roussilac the information that an English spy was escaping south. Gaudriole also announced that Van Vuren and his company were bearing in that same direction. Roussilac's hand was forced. If these men escaped him the fortress might be called upon to resist, not only an English, but possibly a Dutch invasion also. He sent out twenty men immediately to cut off the Hollanders, leaving the garrison depleted to no more than fifty men available for defence; and the commandant made haste to reward Oskelano for his services as suitably as his resources would permit, and sent him home, fearful lest the treacherous Algonquin might discover, and take advantage of, his weakness.
When La Salle stood before him, and announced that the English spy was the guest of one Madame Labroquerie, a widow living with her daughter in the country to the south, the commandant refused to betray himself, but replied that he would accompany the priest and be a witness to the hanging of the Englishman. At the same time, he considered, he might keep the oath which he had sworn to his dead cousin. Having given the order for a troop of men to attend upon his person, he abandoned the subject which awoke in him unpleasant memories, and bowing haughtily to La Salle—for he and the priest were in a manner rivals—congratulated him upon his appointment to the governorship of Acadie, the confirmation of which, signed by the Cardinal himself, had lately been delivered by the hand of the master of the St. Wenceslas.
"This fortress will be the weaker for your loss, Sir Priest," he said, feigning a sorrow which he could not feel. "May I seek to know when you propose to set forth to the undertaking of your new responsibilities?"
"If my work here be finished what time the St. Wenceslas sails homeward I shall depart with her," La Salle replied, flashing a disdainful glance upon Roussilac. "But I have yet to rid this land of its English vermin."
With that implied scorn of the governor, and suggestion of his own superiority, La Salle departed to make his preparations; and an hour later a troop of horsemen rode forth, Roussilac at the head, and beside him Gaudriole jesting for his chief's amusement; on the other side the two priests—for Laroche accompanied his senior—and behind six soldiers, riding two abreast on bright bay ponies, their weapons flashing in the sunlight.
There had been war in the grove. An angry scene passed between mother and daughter when Madeleine returned after seeing her lover upon his way. For the first time in her life the girl lost her sweet patience, and returned word for word so hotly that Madame at length became afraid, and backed away, yet muttering:
"Men shall stay your pride, girl, if a weak woman may not."
"They also shall find that a resolute mind is not quickly broken," Madeleine returned.
"The law against heresy is still in being," Madame threatened, made still more bitter by the knowledge that her daughter and Geoffrey had together outwitted her. "I have borne with you, because you are my child. Our Lady punishes me for my lack of devotion. I had speech but recently with a holy priest. We shall see, when that priest returns. We shall see!"
"Drive me from you with that bitter tongue, as you drove out Jean-Marie," cried Madeleine, her fair throat swelling like a bird in song. "So shall you die without son or daughter at your side, and none but an Indian shall see you to your grave."
At that Madame put up her hand with a superstitious gesture, and limped away, her yellow face wrinkled with rage; nor did she speak again to her daughter until the Indian servant entered the cabin to announce the coming of a warlike band. Then she croaked at Madeleine: "'Tis the holy priest. Know you not, girl, how those are punished who conspire to aid an enemy of their country?" Then she hasted away to don the cap and gown which she had kept against the coming of a change of fortune.
There came a sound of voices, the troop rode into the grove, and Madeleine, as she stood trembling at the door, was greeted by Gaudriole, who bowed and grinned as he announced his Excellency the Commandant to visit the Madame Labroquerie and the fair lady her daughter.
"I am Madeleine Labroquerie," stammered the girl, frightened for a moment by the brave show of mounted men.
"Cousin," cried a half-familiar voice, "hast put a friend and relative out of memory?"
Dazzled by the sunlight after the gloom of the cabin, Madeleine shaded her eyes. She saw before her a tall man, sallow and dark, his hair falling in snaky lines to his shoulders, the golden fleur-de-lys worked upon his blue surcoat making his face the more sickly by comparison. Before she could return his salutation he had dropped to his knee and kissed her hand.
"Years have passed since we parted, cousin," he said. "The present finds me with position, and you with beauty. I knew not that you were here until your brother told me."
"Arnaud!" she exclaimed, giddy with amazement at finding the boy who had been the autocrat of childhood's games grown into a man of power. Then, because her heart was so tender to all that breathed, she forgot the character of the man who was looking down upon her with increasing wonder to find how the plain child with the tangle of flaming hair had blossomed into this lovely creature, and asked quickly: "Jean-Marie—what of him?"
Roussilac was not a man to tell ill-news gently. Wasting neither words nor sentiment, he replied: "Your brother died but recently of fever, calling upon your name with his last breath."
His final words were intended to show her that he had been by the sick man's side until the end.
Madeleine turned white and tottered. Then, as her strong heart recovered, she said:
"Let me call my mother. My father has long been dead. We have remained poor, Arnaud," she added defiantly. "But if you have ascended, we have at least not descended."
"To what higher pinnacle can a woman wish to attain than that of perfect beauty?" he replied gallantly; but he noticed that she left him with a frown.
"Had I but known that she had grown so fair!" he muttered.
Gaudriole was grinning at his side. The dwarf put up his red hand and showed his chief a dead butterfly, its bright plumage well-nigh worn away, its wings crushed and wet.
"Short-lived beauty, Excellency," he leered, with the jester's privilege. "Yesterday shining in the sun. To-day!" He laughed hoarsely and dropped the ruined insect. "'Tis a world of change and contrast," he chuckled. "Mark this philosophy, my captain. When old age sends me white hairs and a reverend aspect you shall perchance call me beautiful, if you look not too closely at my hump; but when the bloom of yonder beauteous lady turns to seed——"
"Off, Bossu!" cried Roussilac angrily. "Learn to turn your jesting with a better judgment, or your tongue shall be slit and your back whipped."
"My faith!" the dwarf chuckled. "I have no back. I am like the frog, but shoulders and legs."
Madame herself appeared in a fresh white cap and an antique gown. It was not her way to be gracious, nor were her recollections of her nephew's fidelity of the happiest; so she did but greet him coldly, asking why he had now come since he had tarried so long.
"Good aunt," came the reply, "I would have sought you earlier, had I known you were in this land. I have not long held command, and my hands have been filled in crushing the strength of the Iroquois. I entreat you both to return with me now and take up your abode at the fortress, not indeed as my guests, but as an honoured mother and sister."
"Pretty talk," sniffed Madame. "I said in the old days you would make a courtier. So you, the governor of the land, knew nothing of this home of your poor relations a paltry two days' journey beyond the river. There is no man so blind as he who makes a living by that infirmity. This girl tells me that my son is dead. Died he in the faith of the Church?"
"Surely," said Roussilac. "But tell me I pray, good aunt, is it true, as this Indian says, that the English spy has already escaped?"
"Yes, he has gone," cried Madeleine, flushing warmly. "He has gone, Arnaud, to—to the west."
Her deceit was so transparent that even Roussilac could not restrain a smile.
"And why, fair cousin," he asked, addressing her with marked deference, "why should this Englishman seek the unknown west, where it is believed none dwell save Indians? Would he not rather turn towards the south, and seek New England and his own people?"
"Indeed I know not why he should seek the west," Madeleine replied, between tears and laughter. "But I do assure you he has gone in that direction——"
"Peace, girl," her mother cried. "The fool lies to you, Arnaud. She is a heretic, shame though it be, and her master is the father of lies. 'Tis true the English spy escaped in the early morning, but he knows not the land, and may yet be secured. I am surrounded all my life long by wickedness," the bitter woman continued. "My husband was perverted by the sin of science. Jean-Marie was but a knave. He left me here. Madeleine is a heretic, and she has threatened to leave me also. Well, I will come with you, Arnaud, but see that you give me a scented pillow for my head and a cup of warm wine at evening. Stand not there, nephew, like a wooden stock, but command one of yonder evil-faced rogues to bring up a horse fitted for the age and dignity of the first lady in this thrice-accursed land."
An evil smile curved the thin line of Roussilac's mouth. His aunt had indeed not changed; but she had yet to learn that he had advanced. He turned to where the priests were talking loudly in the shade of the grove, noting La Salle's anger at the failure of his mission, and a few paces beyond his troopers jesting in the sun. Then he looked upon the fair face of Madeleine and smiled again.
"Tamalan," he called, dividing his attention between the soldier he was addressing and his aunt, "prepare your pony for the use of the first lady in this great colony of France—the lady Madeleine Labroquerie."
He bowed slightly towards the silent girl.
For one instant Madame appeared to stifle. Then she drew back her lips and snarled at her nephew, yet without uttering a word.
"This is not Normandy, Madame," said Roussilac calmly. "And you have not here the boy whose cheeks you would smite when the angry fit was on you. This is the New World, and I am the Representative of his most sacred Majesty, King Louis the Thirteenth."
Madame started forward, two passionate red spots upon her cheeks, her bony hand uplifted; but Roussilac indicated the golden fleur-de-lys upon his breast and said, in the quiet consciousness of power: "Remember!"
The little woman stood for a moment motionless, grinding her teeth, her black eyes starting from a ghastly countenance, then flung herself back into the cabin, tearing at her hair and cap in the madness of her anger. Roussilac watched with the same quiet smile, and when she had gone turned to Madeleine and said:
"My aunt forgets that time may work a change."
"Pardon her," murmured the girl. "This solitude has touched her brain."
Then La Salle strode up with angry questionings: "Shall we tarry here all the day, Sir Commandant, while the heretic escapes? Know you not that New England swarms with Puritans, who, if they but hear of our weakness, shall fill this land and compel us forth by their numbers?"
"You speak truly, Sir Priest," Roussilac answered. "We do but waste our time."
Crossing to the men, he selected the five strongest ponies and the five most trustworthy soldiers, and charged the latter to ride out, secure the Englishman, and hang him out of hand. These men set forth immediately, while Roussilac turned himself to the task of soothing La Salle, and to the pleasure of flattering the fair lady his cousin.