The Road to Frontenac. Merwin Samuel
dawn. This was a chill morning. A low, heavy fog lay on the river, thinning, at a yard above the water, into a light mist which veiled what colour may have been in the east.
While Guerin and Perrot were patching the canoe under Menard’s eye, Danton found some dry logs under the brush, and built up the dying fire, which was in a rocky hollow, not visible from the river. Then he and the maid sat on the rocks above it, where they could get the warmth, and yet could see the river. Menard and his men, though only a few rods away, were but blurred forms as they moved about the canoe, gumming the new seams.
The maid, save for an occasional heavy hour in the late evenings, had settled into a cheerful frame of mind. The novelty, and the many exciting moments of the journey, as well as the kindness of the three men, kept her thoughts occupied. Danton, once he had shaken off his sulky fits, was good company. They sat side by side on the rock, looking down at the struggling fire, or at the figures moving about the canoe, or out into the white mystery of the river, talking easily in low tones of themselves and their lives and hopes.
The mist, instead of rising, seemed to settle closer to the water, as the broad daylight came across the upper air. The maid and Danton fell into silence as the picture brightened. Danton was less sensitive than she to the whims of nature, and tiring of the scene, he was gazing down into the fire when the maid, without a word, touched his arm. He looked up at her; then, seeing that her eyes were fixed on the river, followed her gaze. Not more than a score of yards from the shore, moving silently through the mist, were the heads of three Indians. Their profiles stood out clearly against the white background; their shoulders seemed to dissolve into the fog. They passed slowly on up the stream, looking straight ahead, without a twitch of the eyelids, like a vision from the happy hunting-ground.
Danton slipped down from the rock, and stepped lightly to Menard, pointing out the three heads just as they were fading into the whiteness about them. Menard motioned to Guerin and Perrot to get the newly patched canoe into the water, took three muskets, and in a moment pushed off, leaving Danton with the maid and the priest, who had retired a short distance for his morning prayers. For a minute the heads of the three white men were in sight above the fog, then they too were swallowed up.
“I wonder what Menard thinks about them?” said Danton, going back toward the maid.
She was still looking at the mist, and did not hear him, so he took a seat at the foot of the rock and rubbed the hammer of his musket, which had been rusted by the damp. After a time the maid looked toward him.
“What does it mean?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” Danton replied. “They were going up-stream in a canoe, I suppose. Probably he thinks they can give us some information.”
In a few minutes, during which the mist was clearing under the rays of the sun, the two canoes together came around a wooded point and beached. The Indians walked silently to the fire. They appeared not to see Danton and the maid. Menard paused to look over his canoe. It was leaking badly, and before joining the group at the fire, he set the canoemen at work making a new patch.
“Danton,” he said, in a low tone, when he reached the fire, “find the Father.”
Danton hurried away, and Menard turned to the largest of the three Indians, who wore the brightest blanket, and had a peculiar wampum collar, decorated in mosaic-like beadwork.
“You are travellers, like ourselves,” he said, in the Iroquois tongue. “We cannot let you pass without a word of greeting. I see that you are of the Onondagas, my brothers. It may be that you are from the Mission at the Sault St. Francis Xavier?”
The Indian bowed. “We go from Three Rivers to Montreal.”
“I, too, am taking my party to Montreal.” Menard thought it wise to withhold the further facts of his journey. “Have you brothers at Three Rivers?”
“No,” replied the Indian. “We have been sent with a paper from the Superior at Sault St. Francis Xavier to the good fathers at Three Rivers. Now we are on our return to the Mission.”
“Have my brothers eaten?” Menard motioned toward the fire. “It is still early in the day.”
The three bowed. “We are travelling fast,” said the spokesman, “for the Superior awaits our return. We ate before the light. It will soon be time for us to go on our journey.”
Menard saw Father Claude and Danton approaching, and waited for them. The face of the large Indian seemed like some other face that had had a place in his memory. It was not unlikely that he had known this warrior during his captivity, when half a thousand braves had been to him as brothers. The Indian was apparently of middle age, and had lines of dignity and authority in his face that made it hard to accept him as a subdued resident at the Mission. But Menard knew that no sign of doubt or suspicion must appear in his face, so he waited for the priest. The Indians sat with their knees drawn up and their blankets wrapped about them, looking stolidly at the fire.
Father Claude came quietly into the group, and with a smile extended his hand to the smallest of the three, an older man, with a wrinkled face. “I did not look for you here, Teganouan. Have you gone back to the Mission?”
Teganouan returned the smile, and bowed.
“My brother has told the white man of our errand?”
“Yes,” said Menard, “they have been sent to Three Rivers by the Superior, and are now returning. I have told them that we, too, are going to Montreal.”
The priest took the hint. “We shall meet you and your brothers again, Teganouan. They are newcomers at the Mission, I believe. They had not come when I left.”
“No, Father. They have but last week become Christians. The Long Arrow” (inclining his head toward the large Indian) “has lost a son, and through his suffering was led to take the faith.”
The Long Arrow, who had seemed to lose interest in the conversation as soon as he had finished speaking, here rose.
“My brothers and the good Father will give us their blessing? The end of the journey is yet three days away. I had hoped that we might be permitted to accept the protection of the son of Onontio,”–he looked at Menard,–“but I see that his canoe will not be ready for the journey before the sun is high.” He looked gravely from Menard to the priest, then walked to the shore, followed by the others. They pushed off, and shortly disappeared around the point of land.
Menard gave them no attention, but as soon as they were gone from sight, he turned to the priest.
“Well, Father, what do you make of that?”
Father Claude shook his head.
“Nothing, as yet, M’sieu. Do you know who the large man is?”
“No; but I seem to remember him. And what is more to the point, he certainly remembers me.”
“Are you sure?”
“He recognized me on the river. He came back with me so willingly because he wanted to know more about us. That was plain. It would be well, Father, to enquire at the Mission. We should know more of them and their errand at Three Rivers.”
Menard called Danton, and walked with him a little way into the wood.
“Danton,” he said, “you are going through this journey with us, and I intend that you shall know about such matters as this meeting with the Onondagas.”
“Oh, they were Onondagas?”
“Yes. They claim to be Mission Indians, but neither the Father nor I altogether believe them.” In a few sentences Menard outlined the conversation. “Now, Danton, this may or may not be an important incident. I want you to know the necessity for keeping our own counsel in all such matters, dropping no careless words, and letting no emotions show. I wish you would make a point of learning the Iroquois language. Father Claude will help you. You are to act as my right-hand man, and you may as well begin now to learn to draw your own conclusions from an Indian’s words.”
Danton took eagerly to the lessons with Father Claude, for they seemed another definite step toward the excitement that surely, to his mind, lay in