La Salle had been, as we have said, displeased and disgusted, as well as puzzled, by much which had occurred; but his heart melted when he realized the sorrow and suffering, which, in spite of unusual self-restraint, was thus laid bare before him. He threw one arm around the boy's neck, and gently pressed his hand.
"Forgive me, Regnar, if I have been unkind. I will be your friend if you desire it. Confide in me, and I will try to assist you, if you need aid or counsel."
"You are kind, very kind, Charley; and perhaps I have been wrong in not trusting more in you heretofore. There is no time, however, like the present, and no more secret and fitting place than this burial-grot of the cause of all my sorrow."
Regnar's History.
"My father was a Danish youth of good parentage, whose strange and roving predilections sent him early in manhood to an outlying station in the north of Greenland, where, between his books and the wild life of that savage coast, he passed several years, until his unpleasant relations with the Danish officials made a change desirable, and he sought the Moravian settlements on the Labrador coast.
"He had plenty of money, and soon became well known along the coast, which he searched thoroughly in his trading schooner, doing a brisk business in furs, seal-oil, and skins, and at the same time making frequent metallurgical discoveries and adventurous exploring expeditions. It was said that no man on the coast knew so much of the topography of Labrador, between Hamilton Inlet and the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and a strange adventure opened to him new and startling experiences in the northern central portion of Newfoundland, then, as now, almost a terra incognita.
"Twenty years ago he made his last voyage down the coast, attended by the man who lies yonder, an American, named Perry, a native of Baltimore, who, it afterwards transpired, fled from that city, having killed an opponent in a political quarrel.
"Albert Perry was well educated, bold, and politic, and he formed a friendship with my father which ended only with life, and, as I believe, served him but too faithfully through good and ill, until death broke the bond between two men who were not fitted to lead the comparatively calm, eventless life which the laws of society, and the wants of the many prescribe to all; under penalty of social ostracism to the few who scorn to be fettered by a multitude of social conventionalities.
"With this man as mate, and a crew of four Esquimaux, my father found himself, in July, in one of the little harbors, on the Newfoundland shore, of the Straits of Belle Isle. The night was dark, but calm, and at about ten he retired, to be awakened an hour later by Perry.