CHAPTER XI.
IN THE VILLAGES OF THE CREES.
What happened after that was of little interest to me. I have brief, fitful memories of things that occurred at intervals, for as I later learned from Ruth, my hurts were very sore indeed, and more than once they had given me up for dead. But for The Keeper and for Radisson himself, who searched through the woods for healing simples and herbs at each camping-place, I had been in sorry plight.
I mind me of many days of travel, during no small part of which I was lashed tightly enough to the canoe. At times Ruth's face would be above me, her fingers sweeping my brow, and at times Radisson's kindly white beard would bend over me and his fingers, for all their sinewy strength, were as tender as those of Ruth.
That was a dour and terrible journey. Even now, as I sit writing and gazing over the moors that roll upland beyond Ayrby, I can feel the throbs of pain across my ribs, and the hurt of the thwart against my back. And in the damp weather the feeling is no mere imagination, either.
I remember, after many days of flickering lights and shadows, there came one time when Ruth's tears fell on my cheeks and irritated me strangely. Perhaps the lass did not know I was conscious, for I could speak no word. I heard Radisson attempt to cheer her, and it seemed that he, too, had lost his heartiness. Then they died away into blackness once more, and the next memory is of the Crees.
Queer men they were, queer people, moving like the veriest devils through my half-sensed dreams, although they were our firmest friends. Radisson to them was a deity, and the two Mohawks were little less. They were great hunters and fighters, however, and when my mind came back to me somewhat I never lacked for meat and broth, while skins of the richest were ours in plenty.
When I came to learn of the journey, after I had been injured, it was a tale of hardship and suffering—incurred for the most part on my account. To move a helpless man across the wilderness is a task for the mightiest, and our little party had been sore put to it ere a party of the Crees found us and aided us to their villages.
I came to my clear senses one day, at last, to find a great weight lying upon me, and all dark around. I put up my hand to remove the weight and found that it was the skin of some beast, yet I could not so much as lift it. By this I knew I must be very sick and weak, and for a space the knowledge frighted me oddly.
Suddenly light appeared to one side, and I saw I was lying in a conical shelter, like a tent, and that Ruth stood in the doorway. I called to her weakly enough.
"Eh, lassie! Come and help me."