The Buffalo Runners Part 44

"Ab-so-lutely unpossible."

"But why? Explain yourself, Fred."

"'Cause it's only a bachelor as can be a best-man to a bachelor--ain't it?"

"I believe so, though I'm no authority in such matters; but surely that is a matter of no importance, for _you_ are a bachelor, you know."

"True, that's what I am to-day, but I won't be that long, for I am goin'

to be married next month, so I won't be available, d'ee see, the month after."

"You--married!--to whom?" exclaimed Dan in amazement.

"Well, that's a point blank shot right between wind an' water.

Hows'ever, I suppose I can't go wrong in tellin' you, Dan, for it's all settled, though not a soul knows about it except Little Bill, an'

yourself, an' her brother."

"But I _don't_ know about it yet," returned Dan. "Who is it?"

"A angel--pure an' unmixed--come straight down from heaven a-purpus to marry poor, unedicated, sea-farin' Fred Jenkins, an' her terrestrial name is Elise Morel!"

Dan laughed while he congratulated the modest seaman, and admitted the strength of his difficulty.

"D'you know, Fred, I've had a suspicion for some time past that you had a leaning in that direction?"

"So have I, Dan, had an uncommon strong suspicion for a very long time past, not only that I had a leanin' that way, but a regular list to port, an' now I'm fairly over on my beam-ends!"

"But, surely, it must have come upon you very sudden at last," said Dan.

"How was it?"

"Sudden! I should just think it did--like a white squall in the Mediterranean, or a hurricane in the China seas. This is how it was.

I'd bin cruisin' about her--off an' on--for a considerable time, tryin'

to make up my mind to go into action, an' screwin' my courage up to the stickin' pint by recallin' all the fine sentiments that has carried Jack-tars through fire an' smoke, shot and sh.e.l.l since the world began--`England expects every man to do his dooty,'--`Never say die,'--`Hookey Bunk.u.m,' an' such like. But it warn't no manner o' use, for I'm an' outrageous coward wi' the gals, Dan. So, in a sort o'

despair, I sailed away this very mornin' into the plantation at the futt o' your garden, intendin' to cool myself an' think over it, when, who should I see almost hull down on my lee bow but the enemy--Elise herself!

"Well, I changed my course at once; bore straight down on her, an' soon overhauled her, but the nearer I came the more did my courage run out, so I gradooally begun to take in sail an drop astarn. At last I got savage, `You're a fool, Jenkins!' says I to myself. `That's a fact!'

says su'thin' inside o' me.

"Now, if that su'thin' had kep' quiet, I do believe that I'd have gone about-s.h.i.+p an' showed her my heels, but that su'thin', whatever it was, set up my dander. `Now then,' says I, `haul taut the main brace! Up wi' the t'gall'nt-s'ls an' sky-sc.r.a.pers! "England expects," etceterer!'

"Afore you could say Jack Robinson, I was along side--grapplin'-irons hove into her riggin', and a broadside fired. The way I gave it her astonished even myself. Nelson himself could scarce ha' done it better!

Well, she struck her colours at the first broadside, an' somehow--I never could make out exactly how--we was sittin' on the stump of a tree with her head on my rough unworthy buzzum. Think o' that! Dan, _her_ head--the head of a Angel! Give us your flipper, mate."

"I congratulate you, Jenkins, with all my heart," said Dan, grasping the seaman's flipper, and giving it a hearty shake. "So now, I must look out for another best-man. Morel will do for me, I think, and you can have my brother Peter, no doubt. But could we not manage to have both weddings on the same day?"

"Impossible," answered the seaman, promptly. "Couldn't wait."

"But we might compromise the matter. I might have mine a little sooner and you could have yours a little later."

Still Jenkins shook his head. "Not fair-play," he said. "All the advantage on your side. However, we might consider it. Hold a sort o'

drum-head court-martial over it, with Elise and Elspie as judges."

When the said court-marital--as Dan called it--was held, the compromise was agreed to, and it was finally fixed that six weeks thereafter the two couples should be united in Ben Nevis Hall.

But the current of these parallel streams of true love was not yet destined to run smooth--as the next chapter will show.

CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR.

A NEW DISASTER.

"I mean to go off to-morrow on a shooting trip to the lake," said Dan Davidson to Archie Sinclair. "I've had a long spell at farming operations of late, and am tired of it. The double wedding, you know, comes off in six weeks. So I want to have one more run in the wilderness in all the freedom of bachelorhood. Will you go with me?"

"`Unpossible,' as Jenkins would say," answered Archie. "Nothing would please me better, but, duty before pleasure! I've promised to spend a week along wi' Little Bill at the Whitehorse Plains. Billie has taken a great fancy to that chief o' the half-breeds, Cuthbert Grant, and we are goin' to visit him. I've no doubt that Little Bill would let me off, but I won't be let off."

"Then I must ask Okematan to go with me," said Dan.

"You needn't trouble yourself, for I heard him say that he was goin' off to see some o' his relations on important business--a great palaver o'

some sort--and Elise told me this morning that she saw him start yesterday."

"Morel is too busy with his new farm to go," rejoined Dan, "and Jenkins is too busy helping Morel. Perhaps Dechamp or Boura.s.sin may be more at leisure. I will go see."

But on search being made, neither Dechamp nor Boura.s.sin was to be found, and our hero was returning home with the intention of taking a small hunting canoe and going off by himself, when he chanced to meet with La Certe.

That worthy seemed unusually depressed, and returned Dan's greeting with very little of his habitual cheerfulness.

"What's wrong with you, Francois?" asked Dan, anxiously.

"Domestic infelicity," answered La Certe, with a sorrowful shake of the head.

"What! surely Slowfoot has not taken to being unkind to you?"

"O no! Slowfoot could not be unkind, but she is unhappy; she has lost her cheerful looks; she does not take everything as she once did; she does not now let everything go anyhow with that cheerful resignation which was once her delightful characteristic. She no longer hands the pipe of peace to our little one--indeed she refuses to let it have the pipe at all, though the poor child cries for it, and comes to me secretly, when Slowfoot is out of the way, to beg for a draw. Then, she scolds me--no, she does not scold. Slowfoot cannot scold. She is too amiable--but she remonstrates, and that is worse than scolding, for it enlists myself against myself. O! I am now miserable. My days of peace are gone!"

"This is all very sad, La Certe," said Dan, in a tone of sympathy.

"What does she remonstrate about?"

"About my laziness! She does it very kindly, very gently--so like her old self!--but she _does_ it. She says, `Husband; we have gone on this way too long. We must change. _You_ must change. You are lazy!'"

"Well, La Certe," said Dan, "I'm afraid that Slowfoot is right."

"I know she is right!" retorted the half-breed, with more of exasperation in his manner than his friend had ever before seen in him.

"When that which is said of one is false, one can afford to smile, but when it is true what can one say? Yet it is hard--very hard. _You_ are full of energy; you love to expend it, and you search for work. It is natural--and what is natural _must_ be right. So, I am full of laziness. I love to indulge it, and I search for repose. That is also natural, and what is natural _must_ be right. Voila!"

"Then I suppose your love for repose," returned Dan, "will oblige you to decline an offer which I thought of making to you."

"What is that?"