CHAPTER III.
CHRISMATION.
The day following the duel La Salle was under the hands of thesurgeon--who, in the ignorance of that age, treated his patient forloss of blood by letting yet more--and Roussilac was sending forth menwith the charge to find the hiding-place of the Englishman, and to failnot at their peril. However, they did at that time fail. Not even thecunning hunchback Gaudriole had been able to discover the habitation ofthe mysterious swordsman who had dared to enter the fortress and openlydefy its officers and men.
Even the Indian might have walked behind the scrub of tangledwillow-growth over the cave-dwelling, and known nothing of it, had hiseyes or his nose failed to discern the thread of wood-smoke oftencurling above the blackened crater of a hollow tree which had beeningeniously converted into a chimney. A grass-covered knoll made theroof of the dwelling, the entrance to which only became apparent from astone causeway, shelving gradually between the roots of pine trees, andenclosed by massive logs which banked the eastern front of the burrow.
Upon the threshold of this rude home a brown boy was playing with awolf-hound, while awaiting his father's return from that daring visitto the fortress.
Around him Nature thundered like a great organ. The leaden waters ofthe great discharge roared where the bush made a screen which no eyescould pierce; the falls of the Ouiataniche smoked below. Spray flewabove the scrub, bathing the dog's fur and the strong arms of thechild. The one bayed, the other shouted, to the hard north wind thatswept overhead, lashing the branches, tearing the summits of the pines,snatching the dry wisps of grass and whirling them under the clouds.The dark bush groaned. The great rocks bore their buffetings withhollow protests. Ravens croaked as they swung up and down; diverswailed from the weedy creeks. The boughs chafed, and the plumedfoliage clashed together, loosening a rain of cones and showers of pineneedles.
"I want to grow. I want to be strong," shouted the boy to his pantingcompanion. "I want to wear a sword and fight. I want to be a soldierand shed blood. I want to live!"
The dog broke away barking, and rushed through the scrub. The childran after him, and they met upon the dripping rocks, which made anatural fortification to the cave beyond.
A magnificent spectacle rolled away, as full of sound and motion as abattlefield. Well had the Indians named that place the Region of theLost Waters. Islands heaved out of the raging expanse, small anddensely covered with torn vegetation, every ridge of pine-crested rockmoaning under the north wind, splintered and rough and ragged, scarredlike the duellist's arm. About these islands the separate torrentsthundered, seeking outlets for escape. There were a hundred channels,each striving to be the main, each at war with all others, each leapingwhite-crested down to join its rivals at the stupendous fall. Everyseparate discharge lifted up its voice to drown the combined clamour ofits rivals.
A canoe shot the rapids between two islands, quivering like an arrow inits flight. It swept down, a mere feather upon the water, with only ashell of rough bark between its two occupants and the hereafter. Thesteerer, a handsome and pure-blooded woman of the Cayugas, crouchedlike a figure of bronze against the cross-piece, wielding her paddlewith an easy carelessness which spoke of perfect confidence. By a turnof her wrist the shell of bark swept off a projecting rock; by a deftmotion of her body, almost too subtle for the sight, the canoe glancedfrom a reef where the waves were wild; another, more determined,motion, and the fragile thing pierced a sheet of spray and swept to theshore. The child caught the shell and held fast, while the man who hadconquered the fighting priest jumped nimbly to the sand.
"Brave boy, Richard," he cried. "Your mother and I looked out fromyonder bend between the islands, knowing that our son would be awaitingus. Tell me now, how have you fared during our absence?"
The boy put out his lean arms, already tight with muscle, to greet hismother.
"I have been hunting by the moon," he answered. "Last night I shot adeer, and to-day have cut it up. A portion of the meat is cooking now."
The soldier of fortune reached an arm round the boy's shoulders anddrew him close. "You are a man, my Richard. You shall never know whatit is to lack strength."
Night settled down. The lord of the isles left the cave, and, seatinghimself upon a bank, smoked a long pipe, which he had received as agift from Shuswap, chief of the Cayugas, with whom he had alliedhimself by marriage. Silently he drew the smoke through the paintedstem, then handed the pipe to his wife, and she smoked and passed thequaint object to her son, who smoked also with a strange expression ofsternness upon his child's features.
"Was the meat good, father?" he asked, as he handed back the pipe.
"Somewhat too fresh, my son," the man answered.
"Was the deer well shot?"
"It was well done, Richard."
"It is not easy to shoot straight in the moonlight," the boy said."But I shot no more than once. My arrow went true to the side of theneck, and Blood followed and pulled the creature down."
The great hound looked up with open mouth, and heavily flapped his tail.
The boy spoke both English and Cayuga, the former more perfectly thanthe latter. His father and mother spoke both languages, each havingtaught the other the words of a strange tongue. The woman was tall, ofa type which was soon to grow extinct, her features as regular as thoseof a Greek statue, her eyes and hair a deep black, her skin a trifledarker than fawn-colour. Like all the proud daughters of the Iroquois,she knew well how to handle the axe and bow. Among her own people, inthe days of maidenhood, her name had been Tuschota; but by her Englishhusband she was called Mary.
He, the lord of the isles, was almost mean in stature, with a lean,careworn face marked with decisive lines of character, grey-eyed andthin-lipped. His body was clad in a much mended suit of faded red, anold hat partly covered by a broken feather, with moccasins and leggingsof his wife's make. A short sword swung behind him by a rough belt ofbuckskin, and a hunting-knife, the blade hiding in a beaded sheath,hung closely to his right hip. It was hard to tell his age; he had theeager face of youth under the bleached hair of middle-age. His wifeand only child called him Thomas or Father, as did the neighbouringIndians of the allied Iroquois tribes; but none of them knew him by anyother name, except that of Gitsa, the sun, or, as they intended toconvey, "The strong one who sometimes covers his face."
"Father," young Richard exclaimed nervously, "shall you go awayto-night?"
"Be silent, child," said the mother. "It is not for the young to knowthe father's will."
"Nay, Mary," said the grave man. "I love the lad's spirit. Let himspeak his mind."
Richard came nearer and put out his hand, a flush upon his brow. Hepatted the hound's back, its head, handled the frayed hem of hisfather's cloak, and then his brown fingers passed on to caress the hiltof the sword upon which his eyes had been fixed while his hand wandered.
"Father," he exclaimed, in a burst of boyish passion, "I want to wear asword."
The man's grey eyes kindled as he heard this strong boy speak. Childas he was in years, the father's spirit was in him, and the fatherrejoiced.
"What would you do with a sword?" he said, frowning. "Would you cutyour bread, or make kindling wood for the fire? Have you not your bowand arrows?"
"I can bring you down the bird flying, or the beast running. I canshoot you the salmon in the water. Now I would learn the sword, that Imay go out with you, and fight with you, and--and protect you, myfather."
The man did not smile; but he frowned no more.
"Son," he said, in tones that were still severe, "you are yet overyoung to join the brotherhood of the sword. The same is a mightyweapon, never a servant, but rather a tyrant, who shall destroy hiswearer in the end. Know you that the Master of the world said once,'All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword'? Even asthe tongue is the sword, an unruly member which no man can restrain.It answers an enemy without thought, even as the tongue throws back anangry word. It passes a de
ath sentence lightly, even as the tonguecurses an enemy's soul. It strikes a vulnerable spot in one madmoment; and when the passion sinks, then the hand fails, and the eyeshall close for shame. Only the sword changes not, remaining cold tothe eye, ready to the hand, and responsive to the first evil thought inthe heart. You shall wear the sword some day, my son. Be content tillthen."
"I want to fight Frenchmen," the boy muttered. "Father, let me drawyour sword. Let me see it flash in the moon. Let me feel its point."
The father's hand closed upon that of the boy, pressing the little palmstrongly against the hilt. "Do not draw that sword, child," he said."The virgin hand should hold a virgin blade."
He rose suddenly and disappeared along the white causeway. The motherand son were alone on the knoll, the black pines torn by the windbehind, the spray flying in front. The mother put out her well-shapedarm to the smouldering pipe, and drew at the mouthpiece, watching theexcited boy over the triangular bowl. She spoke in the liquid languageof the Cayugas, "Remember that you are very young, my son."
Richard turned passionately, and fanned away the tobacco smoke whichwreathed itself between their eyes.
"I have lived fifteen years. I am strong. See these arms! See howlong they are, and mark how the muscle swells when I lift my hand. Iam weary of killing fish and birds and beasts. I would kill men."
"You would be a man of blood, son?"
"Even as my father. He has taught me to hunt. But when he goes downto the great river he leaves me here. You he often takes; but I amleft. He goes down to fight. I have watched him when he cleans hissword. There is blood upon his sword. It is the blood of men."
"With whom would you fight?" said the mother, her voice reflecting theboy's passion.
"With the savage Algonquins in the far-away lands, the enemies of theIroquois. And with the Frenchmen whom my father hates."
More the boy would have said, but at that moment the lord of the placereturned with a sheathed sword and a velvet belt. The sword, a shortblade like that which he himself wore, as slight almost as a whip, hetested on the ground, and in his stern manner pointed out a spot uponthe summit of the knoll where the moonlight played free from shadow,saying, "Stand there."
The boy obeyed, stretching out an expectant hand.
His father gave him the virgin sword, fixing him with his stern eye,and suddenly whipped out his own blade, and exclaimed, in a voice whichwas meant to strike terror into the child's heart, "On guard!"
The boy did not wince, but threw up his point like an old soldier, andhis face became wild when along his right arm there thrilled for thefirst time an indescribable strength and joy as the two blades met.
By instinct he caught the point, and parried the edge. By instinct helunged at the vital spots, stepping forward, darting aside, fallingback, never resting upon the wrong foot nor misjudging the distance.His father, who tested him so severely, smiled despite himself, andRichard saw the smile, and, confident that he could pass his father'sguard, stepped out and took up the attack in a reckless endeavour toinflict a wound upon his teacher's arm.
The stern soldier of fortune played with the boy under the rushingnorth wind and the swaying light of the moon, while the mother stoodnear on the slope of the knoll, her eyes flashing, her nostrilsdistended, her bosom heaving with the passion of the sword-play. Shenoted how nobly the boy responded to his blood--the enduring blood ofthe high-bred Cayuga mingled with the fighting strain of theEnglishman. She watched the sureness of his hand, the boldness of hiseye. She saw how readily the use of the sword came to him, and onceshe sighed, because her husband had made her Christian, and sheremembered the warning of the unseen God which her lord had latelyrepeated, "All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword."
A cry broke from her lips. Her husband's sword flashed suddenly acrossher vision, drew back, lowered, and fell like the falcon which had madeits blow, and the point sprinkled a few drops of blood upon thebleached grass.
"Thomas," she exclaimed in her native tongue, "why have you woundedyour son?"
"It is his baptism to the sword," her husband answered.
Maddened, not by the pain in his shoulder, which indeed he scarcelyfelt, nor by the sight of his blood flicked contemptuously at his feet,but at the indignity of the wound, the boy rushed at his father, andhit at him blindly as with a stick; and when the master caught and heldhim, and by the act reminded him that he was yet a child, he began tosob violently with rage.
"You shall pay," he flamed. "I will have your blood for mine. I willfight you again. I will kill you. I will----"
"Peace, child," interrupted his mother. "He is your father."
"Take him and see to him, Mary. I did but prick his shoulder," saidthe father. "So fiercely did he press upon me that I feared he mightthrow himself upon my point. The lesson shall teach him prudence."
"I am dishonoured--wounded," moaned Richard.
The father opened his doublet and displayed his chest, which upon bothsides was marred by many a scar. Richard beheld, and blinked away hisangry tears, as the passion departed from him.
"Must I too be wounded before I am a soldier?" he said.
"Ay, a hundred times," his father answered; and the boy turned awaythen with his former look of pride, and permitted his mother to washand bandage the slight wound upon his shoulder.
Soon they came out together to the knoll where the silent man sat withthe north wind roaring into his ears the song of battle. He looked upwhen they were near, and called, "Richard!"
The boy came, subdued and tired, and stood before his father.
"Kneel."
The boy obeyed. The lord of the isles fastened the velvet sword-beltto his son's waist, secured the coveted sword in its place, then stood,and drew out his own well-tested blade.
With it he struck the boy smartly upon the shoulder exactly over thewound, smiling when the child compressed his lips fiercely but refusedto wince, and loudly called:
"Arise, Sir Richard!"