THE HEARTBREAK CAMEO.
"It is a cameo to break one's heart!" said Mrs. Dalliba, as she toyed with the superb jewel. "The cutting is unmistakably Florentine, and yet you have placed it among your Indian curiosities. I do not understand it at all."
Mrs. Dalliba was a connoisseur in gems; she had travelled from one extremity of Europe to the other; had studied the crown jewels of nearly every civilized nation, haunted museums, and was such a frequent visitor at the jewellers' of the Palais Royal, that many of them had come to regard her as an individual who might harbor burglarious intentions. She was a very harmless specialist, however, who, though she loved these stars of the underworld better than any human being, could never have been tempted to make one of them unfairly her own, and she seldom purchased, for she never coveted one unless it was something quite extraordinary, beyond the reach of even her considerable fortune. Meanwhile few of the larger jewelry houses had in their employ lapidaries more skilled than Mrs. Dalliba. She pursued her studies for the mere love of the science, devoting a year in Italy to mosaics, cameos, and intaglios. And yet the Crèvecœur cameo had puzzled wiser heads than Mrs. Dalliba's, adept though she was. It was cut from a solid heart-shaped gem, a layer of pure white, shading down through exquisite gradations into deep green, and represented Aphrodite rising from the sea; the white form rose gracefully, with arms extended, scattering the drops of spray from her hands and her wind-blown hair; the foamy waves were beautifully cut with their intense hollows and snowy crests; it was evidently the work of a cultivated as well as a natural artist; it was not surprising that Mrs. Dalliba should insist that it could not have been executed out of Italy.
But Prof. Stonehenge was right too; it was a stone of the chalcedonic family, resembling sardonyx, except in color; others, similar to it both in a natural state and wrought into arrow-heads, had been found along the shores of Lake Superior. This seemed to have been brought away from its associates by some wandering tribe, for it had been discovered in Central Illinois. The nearest point at which other relics belonging to the same period had been found was the site of Fort Crèvecœur, near Starved Rock, Illinois. After all, the stone only differed from the arrow-heads of Lake Superior in its beautiful carving and unprecedented size—and, ah, yes! there was another difference, the mystery of its discovery. No other skeleton among all the buried braves unearthed by scientific research at Crèvecœur had been found with a gem for a heart—a gem that glittered not on the breast, but within a chest hooped with human bone. Mrs. Dalliba had just remarked that she had never felt so strong a desire to possess and wear any jewel as now; but when Prof. Stonehenge told how the uncanny thing rattled within the white ribs of the skeleton in which it was found, she allowed the gem to slip from her hand, while something of its own pale green flickered in the disgusted expression which quivered about the corners of her mobile mouth. The cameo was a mystery which had baffled geologist, antiquarian, and sculptor alike, for Father Francis Xavier had gone down to his grave with his secret and his cameo hidden in his heart. He had kept both well for two centuries, and when the heart crumbled in dust it took its secret with it, leaving only the cameo to bewilder conjecture.
Its story was, after all, a simple one. On the southern shore of Michillimackinac, in the romantic days of the first exploration of the great lakes by the Courreurs de Bois and pioneer priests, had settled good Père Ignace, a devoted Jesuit missionary. The old man was revered and loved by the Indians among whom he dwelt. His labors blossomed in a little village, called from his patron saint the mission of St. Ignace, that displayed its cluster of white huts and wigwams like the petals of a water-lily on the margin of the lake. Just back of the village was a round knoll which served as a landmark on the lake, for the shore near St. Ignace was remarkably level. On the summit of this mound the good father had reared a great white cross, and at its foot the superstitious Indians often laid votive offerings of strongly incongruous character. Here he had lived and taught for many years, succeeding in instructing his little flock in the French tongue, and in at least an outward semblance of the Catholic religion. Even the rude trappers, who came to trade at regular intervals, revered him, and lived like good Christians while at the mission, so as not to counteract his teaching by their lawless example. Here Père Ignace was growing old, and even this grasshopper of a spiritual charge was becoming a burden. His superior, at Montreal, understood this and sent him an assistant.
Very unlike Father Ignatius was Père François Xavier, a man with all the fire and enthusiasm of youth in his blood—just the one for daring, hazardous enterprises; just the one to undergo all the privation and toil of planting a mission; to undertake plans requiring superhuman efforts, and to carry them through successfully by main force of will. A better assistant for Father Ignatius could not have been found. It was force, will, and intellect in the service of love and meekness; only there was a doubt if the servant might not usurp the place of the master, and the sway of love be not materially advanced by its new ally. Indeed, if the truth had been known, even the Bishop of Montreal had felt that Father Francis Xavier was too ambitious a character to reside safely in too close proximity to himself; and engrossing employment at a distance for him, rather than the expressed solicitude for Father Ignatius, prompted this appointment. The results of the following year approved the arrangement. The mission received a new accession of life; its interests were pushed forward energetically.
Father Francis Xavier devoted himself to an acquisition of the various Indian dialects, and to excursions among the neighboring tribes. Converts were made in astonishing numbers, and they brought liberal gifts to the little church from their simple possessions. Father Ignatius had never thought to barter with the trappers and traders, but his colleague did; large church warehouses were erected, and the mission soon had revenues of importance. Away in the interior Father Xavier had discovered there was a silver mine; but this discovery, for the present, he made no attempt at exploiting. He had secured it to the church by title deed and treaty with the chief who claimed it; had visited it and assured himself that it would some day be very valuable, and he contented himself with this for the present, and even managed to forget its acquisition in his yearly report sent to Montreal. Father Francis Xavier was something of a geologist; his father was a Florentine jeweller, and the son had studied as his apprentice, not having at first been destined for the church. Even after taking holy orders, Father Francis Xavier had labored over precious stones designed for ecclesiastical decoration. His specialty had been that of a gem engraver, and his long white fingers were remarkably skilful and delicate. This northern region, with all its wealth of precious stones, was a great jewel casket for him, and he became at once an enthusiastic collector.
Before the coming of his assistant, Father Ignatius had managed his own simple housekeeping in all its most humble details. Now they had the services of an Indian maid of all work, who had been brought up under the eyes of Father Ignatius, and whom the old man regarded rather as a daughter than as a servant. Her moccasined feet fell as silently as those of spirits as she glided about their lodge. She never sang at her work, and rarely spoke, but she smiled often with a smile so childlike as to be almost silly in expression. Father Ignatius loved the silent smile, and a word from him was always sure to bring it; but it angered Father Francis Xavier more than many a more repulsive thing would have done. It seemed so utterly imbecile and babyish to him, he had got so far away from innocence and smiles and childhood himself, that the sight of them irritated him. The young Indian girl had a long and almost unpronounceable name. Père Ignace had baptized her Marie, and the new name had gradually taken the place of the old.
One day, as she was silently but dexterously putting to order the large upper room, which served Père Francis Xavier as study and dormitory, she paused before his collection of agates and minerals, and stroking the stones, said in her soft French and Indian patois, "Pretty, pretty." Father Xavier was seated at the great open window, looking over the top of his book away across the breezy lake. He heard the words, and knew that she was looking at him from the corner of her eye, but his only reply was a deeper scowl and a lowering of his glance to the printed page. The silly smile which he felt sure was upon her face faded out, but the girl spoke again, and this time more resolutely, determined to attract his attention. "Pretty stones. Marie's father many more, much prettier—much."