“Why, sir, I mean that we have enemies—that it is possible the fort may be attacked; and that, if you are not very vigilant, it may be captured by treachery, if not by force,” answered La Touche.
“You are plain spoken; but you need not be alarmed about our safety. I have not lived among these Red Skins for eight years or more, without knowing their habits and tricks,” answered Mr McDonald. “However, by all means, take your wife and children with you: you can have horses to convey them.”
La Touche, thanking the good-natured factor, set off with his companions and wife and children. His wife, from habit, marked well the way they took; indeed, from constantly accompanying her husband, she knew the country as well as he did. They met on their way natives of two or three of the neighbouring tribes; but, as they were well mounted and armed, no one molested them. They had rivers to ford, and hills to climb, and there were woods through which, occasionally, to save a long round, they had to hew their way.
At length the party reached the hunting-ground to which the factor had directed them. Wigwams were erected—conical shaped, and covered with birch-bark—in a nook of the dense grove of cedars, where they would be sheltered from the icy winds of the north; one for La Touche and his family, the other for their companions. While the men went out hunting, Kamela remained at home to cook their provisions, and to look after her children; she also set cunningly-devised traps in the neighbourhood of the wigwams, over which she could watch. She never failed to have a good supper prepared for the hunters on their return home in the evening. She was one evening employed as usual, now lulling her little girl to sleep as the infant lay in its hammock in the wigwam, now attending to the simmering caldron, her quick ear ever on the watch for the footstep of her husband. Suddenly she started. “That is not Pierre’s footstep,” she muttered; “it is that of a stranger—no; it is Michel’s. Alas! he is wounded.”
Her fears were not unfounded. In another minute, Michel, one of the hunters, staggered into her hut, fearfully wounded. No sooner had he entered, than he sank on the ground gasping for breath.
“Fly!” he said; “they are both dead—your husband and Thomas. The Blackfleet have done it. Take the horses—ride direct to McDonald’s fort—tell him—Oh! this pain! water, good Kamela!”
Before, however, the water reached his lips, the faithful hunter, who had thus exerted his last remaining strength to save, if possible, the life of his friend’s wife and children, fell back, and died.
Kamela lost not a moment in giving way to unavailing grief. Michel’s condition too fearfully corroborated his account to allow her to doubt it. Hurrying out, she caught with much difficulty two of the horses; putting a pack on one and a saddle on the other, she loaded the first with her blankets and two buffalo-robes, with some dried salmon and beaver-flesh and flour, and on the other she mounted with her boy before her and little Kamela at her back, and set off at a rapid rate in the direction of McDonald’s fort.
She rode as she had never before ridden, scarcely daring to look behind lest she should see some of her dreaded enemies in pursuit. Not for herself did she fear—he that had bound her to earth was gone—but she feared for her beloved little ones, who might fall into the hands of her remorseless foes. Night was rapidly drawing on. The ground was covered with snow. It was bitterly cold; but she was afraid to light a fire, lest it might betray her to those who she was persuaded would be on the search for her. With her axe she quickly cut some boughs and stripped off sufficient bark to form a shelter, and wrapping herself and her children in the blankets she had brought, and tethering the horses close to her, she lay down to wait till morning light should enable her to pursue her journey. Sleep did not visit her eyelids, but anxiously she listened the livelong night for any sounds which might indicate the approach of foes. A wandering pack of wolves might have discovered her; and as she had only a long knife, which she had brought away to defend herself, her prospect of escape was small indeed.