VI.—THE DREAM.
The clock in the salon had just struck one. Mme. Baby and her daughter were seated sewing in the deep recess of an open window, with a little work-table in front of them. M. Baby had gone away that morning, to look after some land that he had just bought on the other side of the river. The streets were deserted; nearly all the inhabitants of the fort were at work in the fields in the vicinity. The heat was intense. Not a breath agitated the trees in the garden, whose motionless branches drooped languidly toward the earth, as if imploring a refreshing breath or a drop of dew. A negro servant was spreading some linen out to dry on the bushes, and put to flight, in her perambulations, some chickens that were panting with the heat under the sheltering foliage of the trees and shrubs. The silence was only broken by the buzzing of insects, and the noisy whirr of the grasshopper as it danced through the sunlight. The open window, filled with bouquets, looked into the garden, and the pale, melancholy face of Mlle. Baby could be seen between them, bending over an open flower which imaged her loveliness in its fragrant corolla. “Mamma,” said she at last, raising her head, “do you think papa will be away a long time?”
“I think he will be back in four or five days at the latest,” replied her mother. “But why do you ask such a question?”
“Oh! because I am so anxious to have him back again. I want him to take us immediately to Quebec, instead of waiting until next month. The trip will divert my thoughts; for, since those Indians were here the other day with that poor girl they had captured, I have not had a moment’s piece of mind. She is always before my eyes. I see her everywhere; she follows me everywhere. I even saw her in my dream last night. I thought I was sitting in the midst of a gloomy and immense forest, near a wild, rushing river that dashed over a precipice into a bottomless chasm a few steps from me. On the opposite bank, which was covered with flowers, and charming to behold, stood the young captive, pale and tranquil, in a halo of soft, transparent light. She seemed to be in another world. She held in her hands an open book, and, bending towards me, she slowly turned over the leaves. She turned at least sixteen; then she stopped and looked at me with an expression of the greatest sorrow and distress, and made a sign to some one, who then seemed to be standing near me, to cross the torrent. At the signal, all his limbs trembled; his knees knocked together, and his eyes dilated, his mouth gasped with terror, and a cold perspiration stood upon his forehead. He tried to draw back, but an invincible power drew him toward the abyss. He turned toward me, and besought my help most piteously. I experienced the greatest commiseration for him, and tried in vain to extend my hands to help him; invisible cords bound all my limbs, and prevented any movement whatsoever. Vainly he tried to cling to the cliffs along the shore; a relentless force impelled him towards the abyss. He had already reached the middle of the stream, whose deep and foaming waters roared around him, as if impatient to swallow him up. He tottered at every step, and came near losing his equilibrium; but, rallying his strength, he struggled on. At last a great wave broke over him, and he lost his balance. His feet slipped; he looked toward me with a glance of the most inexpressible anguish, and fell. In an instant, he was borne to the brink of the precipice; he threw out his hands, and grasped at a piece of rock that jutted out of the water, burying his fingers in the green and slimy moss which covered it. For an instant, he hung on with the strength of despair; his body, stopped suddenly in its precipitate course, appeared for an instant above the waves. The foam and spray enveloped it like a cloud, and the wind from the fall blew through his dank and dripping hair. His dilated eyes were fastened on the rock, which little by little receded from his convulsive grasp. Finally, with a terrible shriek, he disappeared in the yawning gulf below. Transfixed with agony and horror, I looked across at the young captive; but she, without uttering a word, wiped away a tear, and silently pointed to the last page in the book, which seemed to me to be covered with blood. I screamed aloud with fright, and awoke with a start. My God! will it be a page in my life?”