A Gentleman of Courage: A Novel of the Wilderness

by James Oliver Curwood

With a desperate little cry she caught his hand. "Something terrible has happened," she whispered. "Something—you should know. But I promised Peter. I promised him I would tell no one—not even you. But I've got to turn that promise into a lie. If I don't——" The words broke on her lips. And then: "Peter's father has come back. He is with Peter now in the cabin near the beaver pond!"

Simon McQuarrie stood back from her, his hands dropping slowly and limply to his sides. Then he raised one of them as if to brush a shadow from his forehead, and his nightcap fell to the floor. "Donald McRae—has come back!" he repeated, and the deep lines in his face softened as Mona looked at him, and joy trembled in his voice when he spoke. "Thank God, Ange! Why do you think it is so terrible? We have waited and hoped for a long time——" He stopped. What he saw in her face and eyes swept a sudden change into his own, and he caught her arm as the gladness died on his lips. "Has anything happened?" he demanded. "Has anything happened—to Peter—or to Donald McRae?"

She began telling him in a low voice, while Simon stared at her with his big hands reaching out as if to grip at something in the space between them.

"I was at the beaver pond when Peter's father staggered out of the willows and almost fell at my feet. I didn't know who the man was, but he was sick and tired and starving—so hungry he ate carrots I had meant for the beavers. I gave him our lunch, and while he was eating I learned he was Peter's father. It made me happy. Peter was coming to join me, and I told Donald McRae. He begged me not to let Peter know he was there. He wanted to hide in the bushes, and look at him without being seen, and then go away again. He said that was why he had come back—just to get a look at his boy. He told me the police were after him again, that they were driving him like a rat from hole to hole, and that his presence could only bring unhappiness and tragedy to Peter. So he hid in the willows, and Peter came."

"And then?"

"In the end Peter's father staggered out of the bushes, and I left them together. Peter called me a little later and I ran back. Donald McRae was on the ground and at first I thought he was dead. Not until then did I realize how terribly sick and weak he was. We were on our knees beside him when he looked up, and there—there—grinning down at us—was the man Peter's father had been running away from. Oh, he was terrible—big and sweaty and leering down at us, almost laughing in his triumph, and—Simon—Simon—it was Aleck Curry!"

Her despair broke in a sobbing cry, and now the bones of Simon's great hands made a snapping sound as he clenched them, and his thin, hard face was gray in the glow of the lamp. "What happened then, Mona?"

"When Aleck went to put the manacles on Peter's father there was a fight—a terrible fight—and Aleck tried to kill Peter with a gun. He shot twice. I helped with a stone, and at last Peter got him into the pond, and almost drowned him. His father was still unconscious when we carried him to the cabin. Then Peter took Aleck down to his boat and to the little rock island two miles out from the shore. He is there now—a prisoner. And—what will happen to Peter? What can the law do to him?"

Simon paced slowly back and forth across the floor. His face was a mask of iron. His long nightgown flapped about his feet, and again his big, hard hands hung limp and straight at his sides.