"Then you will be frank?" she said, her eyes brightening.
"I swear it. Now this man has conceived a violent passion for you, and I am to press his suit, to alienate your affections from Monsieur Scott, if you entertain such feelings, and to win you over to Monsieur Riel. He is to visit us within a brief period, and when he comes he will expect me to be able to report marked progress. He will make a second visit, and he has sworn that triumph alone will satisfy him then. If things fall not out in this wise, I am promised his vengeance. He declares that our intimacy with young Scott, and the visit paid us by the homme mauvais Mair, who is an unscrupulous agent of the Canadian Government, would justify extreme measures against us; and if I mistake not the man, his intention is to arm hundreds of our people, proclaim a martial law, and establish himself as head and judge. I am certain that he would not hesitate to take the most lawless steps. Indeed, I should not regard as safe either my own life or your honour. Such then being the facts, what are we to do?"
"God is good; let us first of all put our trust in Him. Then let us examine the means which He has given us to meet the evil. Now, my plan is that I shall in the first instance affect to yield with grief to such proposals as you at first make to me. Let there be a surrender of Monsieur Scott—" Here she blushed so deeply that all her sweet-rounded cheek, and her neck, and her delicious little shell-like ears, became a crimson, deep as her bodice—"and a consent to entertain as favourably as I can the suit of M. Riel. Meanwhile we can see what is the next best step. I do not think that we have much to dread by leaving Red River. We can go to your brother who lives across the border, and I am certain that he will be delighted to harbour us till the tempest blows over. I believe that this rising will rage for a brief season only, when it must yield to the arm of the Canadian authorities. M. Riel is a fanatic, and counts not the perilousness of his undertaking. He will succeed at the first, I doubt not. You will hear of slaughtered whites, and others who have incurred his private vengeance. He will lord it over all like a tyrant, till he sees the bayonets from Canada, when he will take good care to get out of the way." Her father saw that her views were sound, and consented to take her advice; but who was to acquaint his brother with their needs, and to learn if he could afford a harbourage?
"Paul can go. He can take the pony and ride the distance in twelve hours." So it was agreed, and Marie busied herself with the linen of her brother, and sewed missing buttons upon his clothes. In the evening, when all were seated at supper, a young half-breed who had long been an intimate friend at the house of Marie's father, and who cast many a languishing eye upon the piquant Violette, came in. There was much concern in his face, and it was some time before he knew how to begin to break the news which he possessed.
"Monsieur Riel was at my father's house to-day, and he talked long there. He is not your friend," looking at Jean. "He declares that you are in league with the enemies of our colony, and has asked my father to keep a strict watch on the doings of every member of your family. I know that he talked in the same strain at every house he visited; and I think there is no threshold in our settlement that he hasn't crossed. About twenty-five young men have declared their willingness to follow him in any exploit. They met upon a field this afternoon and drilled for a couple of hours. One of them told me,"—the speaker now turned his gaze half toward Marie—"not an hour ago that their first business would be to settle affairs with Messieurs Mair and Scott, whom they declare are enemies of Red River, and spies of the Canadian government. I should not wonder if these two men were secured to-night; and if this be so, and I am any judge of human malevolence, Riel will have them shot." The colour had gone out of Marie's cheek, and there was a terrified gleam in her eye.
"Can nothing be done," she asked, "to apprise them of the miscreant's designs?"
"I regret that I can do nothing; you know how gladly I would were it in my power. Every man between twenty-one and sixty years in our settlement, has been called out to attend a meeting to be held during the evening in the school-house, to discuss the situation. One Lepine, a bosom friend of Monsieur Riel, is to tell us what we are to do. I, therefore, will have to be present."
"I shall go," said young Paul. "I can reach Willow grove long before the moon is up, and give warning to Monsieur Scott. But Monsieur Mair has to take care of himself. I would very gladly assist in his capture, or for that matter be well pleased to be one of a firing party to dispatch his insolent, insulting life." The young lad's cheeks were burning with indignation. "I think Monsieur Riel is an impostor, although the cause which he has espoused is a holy one. But this Mair, after receiving our hospitalities turns and holds us up to the ridicule, contempt and pity of the world. Under obligation must we ever remain to Monsieur Scott, but beyond this, he is a true gentleman, and incapable of the remotest sympathy with the mean unmanliness of this Monsieur Mair."
Paul, was a tall, handsome lad, with large, spirited, brown eyes. He was in his eighteenth year, but had the manly address of twenty-one. His sister's gratitude gleamed in her eyes. When he was ready to go out to saddle his pony, she put her arms about him and kissed him.
"Que Dieu benisse, mon bon frere. Bon voyage!" and she watched him, I doubt not praying, though her ruby lips moved not, for him, and for her lover, till the flitting figure of himself and his fleet-limbed pony was lost in the dusk that had already gathered over the plain… That evening when Paul returned he came not alone. Another steed and rider were there, and beyond, in the shadow of a grove of cottonwood stood a party of a dozen horsemen. Marie heard the double tramp, and with some terror drew to the window to see who was approaching. But her apprehensions suddenly vanished, and a flush came over her face.