"Yes," said Bonhomme Gagnon, rising in his place. "Yes, Madame Giroux, we will assume the responsibility--I, Telesphore Gagnon; you, Nicholas; you other children; you neighbours; everybody. As to Jean Baptiste, forget him, the good-for-nothing. He was too proud, he, and the good God could not endure it. It is the good God who has driven him away, and he is lost, lost."
At this Madame Giroux began to weep, while Father Paradis tried to comfort her, and Brother Nicholas was sending all the people home; when suddenly at the open door appeared a sturdy figure in a brown fishing suit, with a pannier on his back and a lance-wood rod in his hand. It was Monsieur Trudel, the City Man.
"What is this?" he exclaimed. "Is it a funeral, a wake, or what, in the name of God? My brave Jean, where is he? Dead? Gone away? A fugitive, he? Deserter, you say? Failure? Good-for-nothing? Thief? Murderer? Ha! Ha! It is to laugh! Reassure yourself, Madame. It is not in Jean Baptiste to be like that, he who conquered me, the champion of the Province. He will return, most certainly, and soon. Mon Dieu! He is here now. There, do you not see him? There, in the chair! Jean, my brave one! Arise! Show yourself!"
During all that time Jean had sat there speechless, immovable; but now, with a mighty effort, he rose in his place; stretched out his arms and cried, in a strong and joyous voice: "Monsieur, my friends, my mother, I am here!"
Jean advanced with outstretched hands toward his friends; but they shrunk back, pale and terrified, into the dark corners of the room and out of the door; until there was only one left, a slight figure in a brown fishing suit, with pannier, and rod, reddish-golden hair, violet-blue eyes, and a radiant smile.
"Monsieur Trudel," he began, "you have changed much since, since---- Mon Dieu! Gabrielle! It is you, you! Come to me, dear."
But the vision melted away, and Jean awoke to find himself standing alone on the cabin floor in the glimmering dawn of a new day.
"Mon Dieu!" he said to himself. "Was it a dream? I can see them still, when I close my eyes--and hear them, too. They think of me, talk of me, those good friends, whom I had forgotten--almost. They are disappointed in me, it would seem, and with reason. But they had expected too much--more than I could do. What? More than I could do? Oh, Jean Baptiste, it was not that you could not, but that you would not! What is that one cannot do? 'Good-for-nothing? Too proud? The good God does not like it?' How does Bonhomme Gagnon know that? I should like to show him, the old rascal, that the good God will aid me to resume my former work. By Heaven, I will resume!
"I am a dreamer, it would seem. Yes. A coward? No! Afraid of the law? I had not thought of it. The law? Why then? For the killing of Pamphile. But I did it in self-defence. Tom and Paddy will witness. Will they? Dieu! Possibly not. And what then? A trial, a judge, a jury, and I, the accused at the bar. It might be well to remain here, or to go to the Indians of Mistassini or Hudson's Bay. Then I should be a coureur des bois indeed; an exile, fugitive, outlaw. What then could I say to the abuse of Bonhomme Gagnon, Monsieur Laroche, and the rest? Coward--thief--deserter--good-for-nothing--fool--all that and more! Yes, I should deserve it all.
"'And all for the sake of a girl?' Blanchette, that was unjust. It was a combination of circumstances, an accumulation of misfortunes, that drove me away--for a time. O, Blanchette! I have many good excuses, as you must know; yet I will excuse myself no more, for I think I hear you say: 'Qui s'excuse s'accuse!'