THE DWARF AND THE BEAR
Dorothy noticed that there was a light in the windows of
this house, and wondered how it was that the occupants
seemed to be quietly staying at home while evidently all
the half-breed inhabitants of the town were making a
night of it. She also noticed that when her guides had
knocked they drew somewhat back from the doorway, and
that the motley crowd which had been pressing close behind
followed their example. They also ceased their noisy talk
and laughter while they waited for the door to be opened.
Only Katie, the flouted belle who had been following them
up, did not seem to possess the same diffidence as the
others, but stood with one hand on the door, listening.
Dorothy became strangely curious as to the inmates of
this isolated house.
A strange shuffling and peculiar deep breathing were
heard in the passage; a bolt was withdrawn, Katie drew
quickly back, and next moment the door was thrown open.
A flood of light streamed out, and two weird and startling
figures were outlined sharply against it. Instinctively
Dorothy shrank backwards with a sense of wonder and fear.
Standing on its hind legs in the doorway was a bear, and
by its side a dwarf with an immense head covered with a
great crop of hair, and with long arms and a broad chest
which indicated great strength.
"Whur-r! What you want here and at this hour of night,
you cut-throats, you?" asked the outspoken manikin in a
voice of sufficient volume to have equipped half-a-dozen
men.
"A sweetheart for you, Pepin. A sweetheart, _mon ami_"
answered the big breed, in a conciliatory voice.
Dorothy nearly sank to the ground in horror when she
heard this rude jest.
"Bah!" cried the manikin, "it is another female you will
want to foist off upon me, is it? Eh? What? But no,
_coquin_, Pepin has not been the catch of the Saskatchewan
all these years without learning wisdom. Who is she--a
prisoner? Eh? Is not that so?"
"That is so, Pepin, she is preesonar, and Riel has ordered
her to be detained here. Your house is the only quiet
one in the town this night, and that is why we came. Tell
Antoine to be so good as to stand back."
Antoine was the bear, which still stood swaying gently
from one side to the other with a comical expression of
inquiry and gravity on its old-fashioned face.
Pepin surveyed the mob with no friendly scrutiny.
"What you want here, you _canaille, sans-culottes?_" he
demanded. And then in no complimentary terms he bade them
begone.
The crowd, however, still lingered, with that spirit of
curiosity peculiar to most crowds; so the dwarf brought
them to their senses. Suddenly poking Antoine in the
ribs, he brought him down on all fours, and then, brushing
past Dorothy and her captors, and still leading the bear,
he charged the mob with surprising agility, scattering
it right and left. It was evident that they stood in
wholesome dread of Pepin and his methods. Then, coming
back with the bear, he put one hand on his heart, and
with a bow of grotesque gallantry, bade Dorothy enter
the house. The Indian he promptly sent about his business
with a sudden blow over the chest that would probably
have injured a white man's bones. The red man looked
for a moment as if he meditated reprisals, but Pepin
merely blinked at the cudgel, and Man-of-might, with a
disgusted "Ough! ough!" changed his mind and incontinently
fled. Dorothy's captor, Pierre La Chene, and Katie, alone
entered the dwarf's abode.
It suddenly occurred to Dorothy that this was the Pepin
Quesnelle of whom and of whose tame bear Rory was wont
to tell tales. Dorothy noticed that Katie had a brief
whispered conference with the truculent Pepin before
entering. The result of it was somewhat unexpected; the
half-breed girl took Dorothy by the arm and led her into
a low room, which was scrupulously clean, at the end of
the passage. There was no one in it. Katie seemed strangely
nervous as she shut the door, and the girl wondered what
was about to happen. Then the half-breed turned suddenly
and looked into her eyes, at the same time placing one
hand upon her wrist.
"Listen," she said, "I thought I loved you, but you have
made me mad--so mad this night! Now tell me true--_verite
sans peur_--you shall--you must tell me--do you love
Pierre?"
If it had not been for the tragic light in the poor girl's
eyes, Dorothy would have laughed in her face at the bare
idea. As it was, she answered in such an emphatic way
that Katie had no more doubts on that point. Then Dorothy
asked the latter to send Pierre to her and to be herself
present at the interview.
Katie at first demurred. She was afraid that the interview
might prove too much for the susceptible frail one. But
she brought him in, and when Dorothy had spoken a few
words to him, the fickle swain was only too anxious to
make it up with his real love. This satisfactory part
of the programme completed, Katie packed him off into
the next room, and then, with the emotional and
demonstrative nature of her people, literally grovelled
in the dust before Dorothy. She stooped and kissed her
moccasined feet, and called on the girl to forgive her
for her treacherous conduct But Dorothy raised her from
the ground and comforted her as best she could. To her
she was as a child, although perhaps her passion was a
revelation that as yet she but imperfectly comprehended.
But Katie was to prove the sincerity of her regret in a
practical fashion.
"Where are your friends?" she asked. "Tell me
everything--yes, you can trust me. By the Blessed Virgin,
I swear I will serve you faithfully!" She raised her
great dark tear-stained eyes to Dorothy's.
The girl instinctively felt that Katie was to be trusted.
The only question was, could she count upon her discretion?
She felt that she could do that also; she knew that in
a matter of intrigue the dusky metis have no equals. The
chances were that the others had reached the Fort; if
so, no more harm could be done. Briefly she told Katie
about those who had started out with her to steal through
the rebel lines to the English garrison.
"If Jacques and the women went in the direction you say,"
said Katie, "the chances are they have got to the Fort.
It matters not about the Police and Rory--they can look
after themselves. I doubt, however, if your father and
the sergeant have got through. You will stay in this
house while I go and see. I have many friends among our
people; the hearts of some of them not being entirely
with Riel, they will help me. I shall take Pierre. Pepin
and his mother you need not fear--they are not of the
rebels; they have lived too long at Medicine Hat with
the whites."
And then she went on briefly to explain how Pepin was a
man renowned for his great wisdom and his cunning, as
well as for the bodily strength which had once enabled
him to strangle a bear. Still, his one great weakness
was conceit of his personal appearance, and his belief
that every woman was making a dead set at him. He also
prided himself upon his manners, which were either absurdly
elaborate or rough to a startling degree, as the mood
seized him, and as Dorothy had seen for herself. His
mother, whom she would see in the next room, was rather
an amiable old soul, whose one providentially overpowering
delusion was that Pepin was all that he considered himself
to be. She regarded most young unengaged women with
suspicion, as she fancied they looked upon her son with
matrimonial designs. Katie knew that the old lady was
at heart a match-maker, but, with the exception of herself,
who, however, was engaged, she had found no one good or
beautiful enough to aspire to an alliance with the
Quesnelle family.
Dorothy felt vastly relieved at hearing all this. Then
Katie took her by the hand, and, telling her to be of
good courage, as she had nothing to fear led her into
the next room.
"A good daughter for you, mother," she said smilingly to
the dame who sat by the fire.
The old white-haired woman, who was refreshingly clean
and tidy, turned her dark eyes sharply upon the new
arrival. Whether it was that Dorothy was prepossessed in
her favour and showed it, and that the old lady took it
as a personal compliment, or that the physical beauty of
the girl appealed to her, is immaterial; but the fact
remained that she in her turn was favourably impressed.
She motioned to a seat beside herself.
"Sit hyar, honey," she said. "I will put the kettle on
the fire and give you to eat and drink."
But the girl smilingly thanked her, and said that she
had not long since finished supper. In no way loth to do
so, she then went and sat down next the old dame, who
regarded her with considerable curiosity and undisguised
favour. Katie, seeing that she could safely leave her
charge there, spoke a few words in a strange patois of
Cree and French to Pepin, and, calling Pierre, left the
house.
Dorothy glanced in wonder round the common sitting-room
of this singular family. It was a picturesque interior,
decorated with all kinds of odds and ends. There were
curios in the way of Indian war weapons, scalping knives,
gorgeously beaded moccasins and tobacco pouches, barbaric
plumed head-dresses, stuffed birds and rattlesnakes,
butterflies, strings of birds' eggs, and grinning and
truly hideous Indian masks for use in devil and give-away
dances. At the far end of the room was a rude cobbler's
bench and all the paraphernalia of one who works in boots,
moccasins, and harness. Thus was betrayed the calling
of Pepin Quesnelle.
But it was the man himself, with his extraordinary
personality, who fascinated Dorothy. He was standing with
his hands behind his back and his legs apart, talking to
the sulky, uncompromising half-breed who had brought her
there. He was not more than three feet in height, and he
seemed all head and body. His arms were abnormally long
and muscular. He had a dark shock head of hair, and his
little black moustache was carefully waxed. His forehead
was low and broad, and his aquiline nose, like his
jet-black, almond-shaped eyes, betrayed an Indian ancestor.
His face betokened intelligence, conceit, and a keen
sense of sardonic humour; still, there was nothing in it
positively forbidding. To those whom he took a fancy to,
he was doubtless loyal and kind, albeit his temperament
was of a fiery and volatile nature. In this he showed
the Gallic side of his origin. It was very evident that,
despite his inconsiderable size, his hulking and sulky
neighbour stood in considerable awe of him.
"Pshaw! Idiot! Pudding-head!" he was saying. "But it is
like to as many Muskymote dogs you are--let one get down
and all the others attack him. What, I ask, did your
Riel do for you in '70? Did he not show the soles of the
moccasins he had not paid for as soon as he heard that
the red-coats were close to Fort Garry, and make for the
States? Bah, you fools, and he will do so again--if he
gets the chance! But he will not, mark my words, Bastien
Lagrange; this time the red-coats will catch him, and he
and you--yes, you, you chuckle-head--will hang all in a
row at the end of long ropes in the square at Regina
until you are dead, dead, dead! Think of it, Lagrange,
what a great big ugly bloated corpse you'll make hanging
by the neck after your toes have stopped twitching,
twitching, and your face is a beautiful blue. Eh? _Bien!_
is not that so, blockhead?"
And the dwarf grinned and chuckled in such a bloodthirsty
and anticipating fashion that the girl shuddered.
Bastien Lagrange did not seem to relish the prospect,
and his shifty eyes roamed round the walls.
"But the red-coats, how can they come?" he weakly asked.
"Where are they, the soldiers of the Great Mother? Riel
has said that those stories of the cities over seas and
the many red-coats are all lies, and that the Lord will
smite the Police and those that are in the country with
the anthrax that kills the cattle in the spring. Riel
swears to that, for St. Peter appeared to him and told
him so. He said so himself!"
"Bah, idiot!" retorted Pepin, "if it is that Riel is on
such friendly terms with St. Peter, and the Lord is going
to do such wonderful things for him, why does not the
Saint give his messengers enough in advance for them to
pay the poor men who make for them the moccasins they
wear? Why does he suffer them to steal from their own
people? Pshaw, it is the same old tale, the same old game
from all time, from Mahomet to the present down-at-heel!
But courage, _mon cher_ Bastien! I will come and see you
ch-chk, ch-chk!"--he elongated and twisted his neck, at
the same time turning his eyes upwards in a horrible
fashion--"while your feet go so ... so,"--he described
a species of _pas-seul_ with his toes. "Is that not so,
Antoine? Eh?--you beauty, you?" and here he gave the
great bear, that had been gravely sitting on its haunches
watching him like an attendant spirit, a sudden and
affectionate kick.
To Dorothy's horror the great brute made a quick snap at
him, which, however, only served to intensely amuse Pepin,
for he skilfully evaded it, and, seizing his stick, at
once began to dance up and down. The cunning little black
eyes of the beast watched him apprehensively and
resentfully.
"Aha, Antoine!" he cried. "Git up, you lazy one, and
dance! Houp-la!"--the huge brute stood up on its hind
legs--"Now, then, Bastien, pick up that fiddle and play.
That's it, piff-poum--piff-poum! Houp-la! piff-poum!"
and in another minute the man and the bear were dancing
opposite each other. It was a weird and uncanny sight,
the grotesque dwarf, with his face flushed and his hair
on end, capering about and kicking with his pigmy legs,
and the bear with uncouth waddles waltzing round and
round, its movements every now and again being accelerated
by a judicious dig in the ribs from Pepin's stick.
Bastien Lagrange fiddled away as if for dear life, and
the old dame, her face beaming with pride and admiration,
clapped her hands in time to the music. Every minute or
two she would glance from her son to Dorothy's face to
note what impression such a gallant sight had made.
"Is it not _magnifique?_ Is he not splendid?" she asked
the girl.
"He is indeed wonderful," replied Dorothy, truthfully
enough.
Despite the suggestion of weirdness the goblin-like scene
created in her mind, the grimaces and antics of the
manikin, and the sulkily responsive movements of the
bear, were too absurd for anything. She thought of Rory's
story of how the "b'ar" resented being left out of its
share in Pepin's castor-oil; and was so tickled by the
contrast of their present occupation that, despite herself,
she broke out into a fit of laughter. Fearful of betraying
the reason of it, she began to clap her hands like the
old lady, which action, being attributed by the others
to her undisguised admiration, at once found favour in
their eyes. Dorothy began to imagine she was getting on
famously.
"Honey," cried the old lady, raising her voice and stooping
towards the girl, "I like yer face. Barrin' Katie, you're
the only gal I'd like for Pepin. I reckon we'll just stow
you away quietly like, and then afterwards you kin be
his wife."
But the prospect so alarmed Dorothy that her heart seemed
to stop beating again. At the same moment Pepin showed
signs of fatigue, and the music stopped abruptly. Antoine,
however, in a fit of absent-mindedness, kept on waltzing
around on his own account, until Pepin gave him a crack
over the head and brought him to his senses.
"Come hyar, Pepin," cried the old dame. "Mam'selle is
took wid you. I think she'd make you a good wife, my
sweet one."
Dorothy grew hot and cold at the very thought of it. She
really did not know what these people were capable of.
Pepin approached her with what he evidently intended to
be dignified strides. For the first time he honoured her
with a searching scrutiny. Poor Dorothy felt as if the
black eyes of this self-important dwarf were reading her
inmost thoughts. She became sick with apprehension, and
her eyes fell before his, In another minute the oracle
spoke.
"No, _ma mere_, <no," he said. "She is a nice girl upon
the whole; her hair, her figure, and her skin are good,
but her nose stops short too soon, and is inclined to be
saucy. Though her ways are sleek like a cotton-tail's,
I see devilry lurking away back in her eyes. Moreover,
her ways are those of a _grande dame_, and not our
ways--she would expect too much of us. She is a good girl
enough, but she will not do. _Voila tout!_" And with a
not unkindly bow the _petit maitre_ turned his attention
to Antoine, who, during the examination, had taken the
opportunity of seizing its master's cudgel and breaking
it into innumerable little bits.
Dorothy breathed again, but, true to the nature of her
sex, she resented the disparaging allusions to her nose
and eyes--even from Pepin. What a conceited little freak
he was, to be sure! And to tell her that she _would not
do!_ At the same time she felt vastly relieved to think
that the dwarf had resolved not to annex her. The only
danger was that he might change his mind. His mother had
taken his decision with praiseworthy resignation, and
tried in a kindly fashion to lighten what she considered
must be the girl's disappointment. Meanwhile Lagrange,
judging by his lugubrious countenance, was evidently
pondering over the pleasant prospect Pepin had predicted
for him. The dwarf himself was engaged in trying to
force the fragments of the stick down Antoine's throat,
and the latter was angrily resenting the liberty.
Dorothy was becoming sleepy, what with the fatigue she
had undergone during the day and the heat of the fire,
when suddenly there came three distinct taps at one of
the windows.