The Story of Tonty Part 15

"If you had ever taken my advice, this miserable end had not come upon you."

"I am not ended," gasped La Salle.

"Oh, my brother," lamented Jean Cavelier, tucking up his ca.s.sock as he bent to the strain, "I have but one consolation in my wretchedness. This is better for you than the marriage you would have made. What business have you to ally yourself with Le Ber? What business have you with marriage at all? For my part, I would object to any marriage you had in view, but Le Ber's daughter was the worst marriage for you in New France."

"Tonty!" gasped La Salle. With the swiftness of an Indian, Tonty was flying across the clearing. The explorer's unwary messenger Jolycoeur he had left behind him bound with hide thongs and lying in Father Hennepin's inner room.

"Yes, yonder comes your Monsieur de Tonty who so easily gave up your post on the Illinois," panted the Abbe Cavelier. "Like all your worthless followers he hath no attachment to your person."

"There is more love in his iron hand," La Salle's paralyzing mouth flung out, "than in any other living heart!"

Needing no explanation from the Abbe, the commandant from Fort St. Louis took strong hold of La Salle and hurried him to the mission house. They faced the wind, and Tonty's cap blew off, his rings of black hair flaring to a fierce uprightness.

The surgeon ran out of the dwelling and met and helped them in, and thus tardily resistance to the poison was begun, but it had found its hardiest victim since the day of Socrates.

Tonty's iron hand brought out of Jolycoeur immediate confession of the poison he had used.

In an age when most cunning and deadly drugs were freely handled, and men who would not shed blood thought it no sin to take enemies neatly off the scene by the magic of a dish, Jolycoeur was not without knowledge of a plant called hemlock, growing ready to the hand of a good poisoner in the New World.

Noon stood in the sky, half shredding vapors, and lighting cool sparkles upon the lake. Afternoon dragged its mute and heavy hours westward.

Men left the mission house and entered it again, carrying wood or water.

The sun set in the lake, parting clouds before his sinking visage and stretching his rays like long arms of fire to smite the heaving water.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "His rings of black hair flaring to a fierce uprightness."--_Page 158._]

Twilight rose out of the earth and crept skyward, blotting all visible sh.o.r.e. Fort Frontenac stood an indistinct ma.s.s beside the Cataraqui, as beside another lake. Stars seemed to run and meet and dive in long ripples. The wash of water up the sand subsided in force as the wind sunk, leaving air s.p.a.ce for that ceaseless tune breathed by a great forest.

Overhead, from a port of cloud, the moon's sail pushed out suddenly, less round than it had been the night before, and owning by such depression that she had begun tacking toward her third quarter. Fort and settlements again found their proportions, and Father Hennepin's cross stood clear and fair, throwing its shadow across the mission house.

Within the silent mission house warmth and redness were diffused from logs piled in the chimney.

The Abbe Cavelier's ca.s.sock rose and fell with that sleep which follows great anxiety and exhaustion. He reclined against the lowest step of a broken ladder-way which once ascended from corner to loft. The men, except one who stood guard outside in the shadow of the house, were asleep in the next room.

La Salle rested before the hearth on some of the skins Tonty had received from his Indian friend and brother. Whenever the explorer opened his eyes he saw Tonty sitting awake on the floor beside him.

"Sleep," urged La Salle.

"I shall not sleep again," said Tonty, "until I see you safely on your way toward France."

"This has been worse than the dose of verdigris I once got."

"Jolycoeur says he used hemlock," responded Tonty. "He accused everybody in New France of setting him on to the deed, but I silenced that."

"I had not yet dismissed him, Tonty. The scoundrel hath claims on me for two years' wages."

"He should have got his wages of me," exclaimed Tonty, "if this proved your death. He should have as many bullets as his body could hold."

"Tonty, untie the fellow and turn him out and discharge his wages for me with some of the skins you have put under me." La Salle rose on his elbow and then sat up. His face was very haggard, but the practical clear eye dominated it. "These fellows cannot balk me. I have lost all that makes life, except my friend. But I shall come back and take the great west yet! A man with a purpose cannot be killed, Tonty. He goes on. He must go on."

Book III.

FORT ST. LOUIS OF THE ILLINOIS.

1687 A. D.

I.

IN AN EAGLE'S NEST.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

"Fort Lewis is in the country of the Illinois and seated on a steep Rock about two hundred Foot high, the River running at the Bottom of it. It is only fortified with Stakes and Palisades, and some Houses advancing to the Edge of the Rock. It has a very s.p.a.cious Esplanade, or Place of Arms. The Place is naturally strong, and might be made so by Art, with little expence. Several of the Natives live in it, in their Huts. I cannot give an Account of the Lat.i.tude it stands in, for want of proper Instruments to take an Observation, but Nothing can be pleasanter; and it may be truly affirmed that the Country of the Illinois enjoys all that can make it accomplished, not only as to Ornament, but also for its plentiful Production of all Things requisite for the Support of human Life.

"The Plain, which is watered by the River, is beautified by two small Hills about half a League distant from the Fort, and those Hills are cover'd with groves of Oaks, Walnut-Trees, and other Sorts I have named elsewhere. The Fields are full of Gra.s.s, growing up very high. On the Sides of the Hills is found a gravelly Sort of Stone, very fit to make Lime for Building. There are also many Clay Pits, fit for making of Earthen Ware, Bricks, and Tiles, and along the River there are Coal Pits, the Coal whereof has been try'd and found very good."[17]

The young man lifted his pen from the paper and stood up beside a box in the storehouse which had served him as table, at the demand of a priestly voice.

"Joutel, what are you writing there?"

"Monsieur the Abbe, I was merely setting down a few words about this Fort St. Louis of the Illinois in which we are sheltered. But my candle is so nearly burned out I will put the leaves aside."

"You were writing nothing else?" insisted La Salle's brother, setting his shoulders against the storehouse door.

"Not a word, monsieur."

The Abbe's ragged ca.s.sock scarcely showed such wear as his face, which the years that had handled him could by no means have cut into such deep grooves or moulded into such ghastly hillocks of features.

"I cannot sleep to-night, Joutel," said the Abbe Cavelier.

"I thought you were made very comfortable in the house," remarked Joutel.

"What can make me comfortable now?"

They stood still, saying nothing, while a candle waved its feeble plume with uncertainty over its marsh of tallow, making their huge shadows stagger over log-wall or floor or across piled merchandise. One side of the room was filled with stacked buffalo hides, on which Joutel, nightly, took the complete rest he had earned by long tramping in southern woods.

He rested his knuckles on the box and looked down. A Norman follower of the Caveliers, he had done La Salle good service, but between the Abbe and him lay a reason for silence.

"Tonty may reach the Rock at any time,"[18] complained the Abbe to the floor, though his voice must reach Joutel's ears. "There is nothing I dread more than meeting Tonty."

"We can leave the Rock before Monsieur de Tonty arrives," said Joutel, repeating a suggestion he had made many times.