"Let us go," she said; "they are calling."
That was all.
Victor lay in the living-room of the fort. A shroud covered all but his face. A little gold crucifix, belonging to Father Chaumonot, lay against his lips. Candles burned at his head and at his feet. There was quiet in his breast, peace on his boyish face.
"Come, Anne," said madame softly.
"Let me watch," said Anne. "I have always loved him."
They buried Victor under the hill, at the foot of a kingly pine where a hawk had builded his eery home. A loving hand had carved upon the tree these words: "Here lies Victor de Saumaise, a brave and gallant Frenchman, a poet, a gentleman, and soldier. He lived honorably and he died well." Close to the shores of the lake they buried the vicomte and the last of the D'Hérouvilles. But only a roll of earth tells where they lie. Thus, a heart of sunshine and two hearts of storm repose in the eternal shadow, in peace, in silence. The same winds whisper mournfully above them, or sing joyously, or breathe in thunder. The heat of summer and the chill of winter pass and repass; the long grasses grow and die; the sun and the moon and the throbbing stars spread light upon these sepulchers. Two hundred and fifty years have come and gone, yet do they lie as on that day. After death, inanimation; only the inanimate is changeless.
CHAPTER XXXIII
HOW GABRIELLE DIANE DE MONTBAZON LOVED
How Brother Jacques, the Chevalier, Madame de Brissac and Anne de Vaudemont, guided by the Black Kettle, reached Quebec late in November, passing through a thousand perils, the bitter cold of nights and the silence of days more terrifying than the wolf's howl or the whine of the panther whose jaws dripped with the water of hunger, is history, as is the final doom of the Onondaga mission, which occurred early the following year. What became of the vicomte's confederates is unknown.