“It's the same she showed me last summer,” he said, after a careful examination. “I would know the handwriting of Burns Riley, the missionary, anywhere.”
“Good heavens!” cried the commissioner. “Did Burns Riley write and sign that?” He reached out an agitated hand, and Fitzpatrick passed over the paper.
“Who was this Riley, father?” asked Donald.
“One of the first men to reach the Whale River districts,” was the agitated answer. “When Fitzpatrick and I were your age, he was one of the most famous characters in the Northland, because he carried Christianity in either fist when it was necessary. But he was the squarest man that ever lived, was old Burns.”
“Is he dead now?”
“Yes, these fifteen years. Wait a minute. Let me see this.” He ran his eyes slowly along the faded lines, and read:
This is to certify that on April 17, 1873, I united in marriage Douglas McTavish, fur trader at Fort Miskati, son of Duncan McTavish, pure Scotch, to Maria Seguis, Ojibway Indian. “Whom God hath joined together let no man put asunder.”
BURNS RILEY, Missionary.
That was all. McTavish saw his whole life go down in wreckage and ruin under the weight of those five or six lines of writing. There was no question as to the authorship—he himself recognized Riley's handwriting, though it was many years since he had seen any of it. And Riley's name was the symbol of righteousness and squareness throughout his whole vast parish, and beyond. The date was the spring that he and Maria had separated for the last time. But he was sure that Riley never wrote the certificate as far back as that.
“If I only had an ink-and-writing expert here!” he groaned to himself. “But that writing is Riley's all right,” he admitted aloud.