“Dying? Wait till we get you to a doctor. We will make a good run tomorrow.”
“You will not promise? There is Tanna.”
“God means us to go through. I know He does.” The Calvinist in him forbade despair. He had the sense of being somehow included in the plan of the eternal decrees. Nothing could kill that conviction. And hence he would, he must follow his gleam so far as it led.
“Promise me, Paul,” pleaded the Indian woman with passionate intensity. “Death has spoken to me. I have heard his voice. Soon, soon, a few weeks at most, I go with him. Why should the young die for me?”
“I promise to do the best for them,” said Paul solemnly. “And if the choice comes at last you will choose that they shall live?”
“Yes, I will promise.”
“Good! You will not fail. You have never been anything but true, Paul. Your God will not fail you.”
“Your God, too, Onawata,” said Paul gently.
“Ah, there is only One—the Great Spirit, the Great Father. Perhaps He will let a poor and evil child creep in at His feet. Ah-yah-i-yah—” wailed the woman. “The light had gone out, the dark filled my soul, I saw no way, I made my way, it was the way of death, death to him also who deserved death, and death to me—and death—ah-yah-i-yah—death to all I love—perhaps——”
“Hush, hush, Mammy!” said Paul, soothing her as he might a child. “God is good, He forgives, He forgives. Never fear Him. And I know we shall get through. Now rest. We start again at dawn.”