DONALD TASTES DEFEAT
The picnic party, laughing and shouting, a gaily colored procession as
it streamed across the great, green clearing, left at eleven o'clock.
From a window Donald watched it depart in a fleet of huge freight
canoes manned by a score of Indians and half-breeds.
He was still torn with the strain of his visit to the Layard home, the
tumult of reawakened emotions, and now with this joyous scene before
him and the deserted assembly room of "Bachelors' Hall" at his back
there was pictured more vividly than in any of his brooding visions
of the winter exactly what life held for him. Janet was there in that
gay crowd, and Evelyn and Merton, Sandy Hay and Nicol MacKar and Harry
Milner, all the post managers, Millington among them, and all the
apprentice clerks and the people of the missions.
Gayety and laughter in their hearts, no black shadows hovering in the
background, these people would always parade thus before him while he
watched from dark corners. They had accepted him, had made him feel
one of them, and then because he had dared to put forth his hand the
invisible and unsurmountable barrier had been raised.
It was the moment of his greatest bitterness. Never had
Nee-tah-wee-gan's prophecy flashed into his mind with such blinding,
scorching significance, never had despair gripped him with such
crushing, numbing force. He saw himself an outcast forever, destined
to go on through solitary, dismal years without hope, without a future
elevated in any way above the despairful present.
For a long time after the picnic party left Donald sat at the window.
Mrs. Jamison's social activities had practically depopulated Fort
Bruce that afternoon. He even remembered that only the half-breed and
Indian employes were left, that like them he was cut off from all close
association with what he had once believed was his own.
This thought remained with him throughout luncheon and afterwards as he
again sat at the window and looked across the great enclosure, waiting
until he saw John Corrigal walking from the dwelling house to his
office.
At once Donald recalled their three days together at Fort James the
previous winter, how he had caught a glimpse of the lonely soul of
this man, and there came to him again that feeling of a kinship of
spirit. Here, he knew, was one who had fought through to success
despite a great and gnawing emptiness and in his desperation and
loneliness he longed to talk to him, to derive if possible some shred
of inspiration. He arose and walked quickly to the district office.
Corrigal was seated at his desk and he looked up in surprise when he
saw Donald enter.
"I thought everyone had gone for the day," he said. "But I wanted to
see you, Norton. I have just read your reports."
It was not what Donald had come for. The anguish in his own heart cried
out for something that he felt this man could give.
"You have fallen off more this year than last," Corrigal continued.
"What's the reason?"
"I can't tell you until----" Donald began.
"Can't tell me!" Corrigal interrupted sharply. "Do you mean to say that
this has been going on for two years and you haven't stopped it or
found out who is doing it?"
"I have known from the first who was doing it but----" Donald began.
"What! And you have let the company lose ten thousand dollars' worth of
fur because you haven't acted?"
Donald was about to retort that the company had lost nothing, but he
saw that Corrigal's sharp questions and his own short answers were
leading in the wrong direction. For a moment he was silent as he
considered what he should do. He had wanted to have Millington present
when he made his charges and presented his proof. It was not only fair
but it would be more conclusive. Further, his brigade had not arrived
and his witnesses were with it.
But that momentary silence was fatal. When Corrigal left Fort James the
previous winter he had decided that he would not act in Donald's case
until he had learned how the fur raids were handled. He had been amazed
by what he had seen of Donald's competency but his policy in regard to
men of mixed blood had not been changed.
After leaving Fort James he had written to Millington, telling him what
was happening and instructing him to keep a sharp watch on Collinge
and report anything that indicated the sending of trippers outside
the territory. Millington, quick to see his opportunity, had made a
convincing and detailed statement of raids by Philip's trippers and as
soon as Corrigal had glanced over the Fort James statements he knew how
he would act. For him the matter had been settled automatically.
Thus, while his decision had already been reached, a sense of fairness
had demanded that Donald be permitted to explain. But the young man's
answers to questions, which he construed as being evasive, and now his
silence, served only to confirm Corrigal's opinion.
"Norton!" he exclaimed with sudden passion, "you've sold out the
Hudson's Bay! To help this squaw man, this weakling who isn't able
to handle even his own private affairs, you've let him raid your
territory, get fur that should go to the company and demoralize
faithful hunters.
"It's the most astounding thing I ever heard of. What happened while
you were at Whitefish Lake, I don't know. I do know what has been
happening at Fort James for the last two years. It's nothing less than
theft. The company has done everything for you, and if there were an
ounce of gratitude or of decency in you, you could not have done this."
Donald forgot Millington and his own defense, forgot the bitterness
and the anguish that had sent him to Corrigal's office. He knew only
that after years of faithful service he had been accused of disloyalty
to the Hudson's Bay Company--to the one thing in the world to which he
could cling--and he was conscious of nothing except a consuming anger.
He strode forward to the desk and leaned across it.
"You lie!" he cried. "No man can say that to me."
"Never mind the heroics," Corrigal said coldly. "They don't count.
Nothing counts but the fur receipts and protection of the company's
interests. I am satisfied that you have failed in both."
Donald recognized instantly what he faced--what he had faced since
Corrigal's coming. Proof of Millington's duplicity became a minor
matter. He felt that this man had planned from the first to oust him
because of a prejudice.
"That's not what counts!" he cried savagely. "The only thing that
counts with you is the question of my parentage."
Corrigal straightened in his chair.
"That will do!" he shouted. "I have been fair with you. I gave you a
chance to prove yourself and you haven't done it. You are relieved of
the managership of Fort James and Millington will take your place. He
will end the difficulty there without trouble and without delay.
"And you can start to Winnipeg at once. I will give you a letter to the
commissioner. He will send you to whichever district he sees fit, if he
retains you in the service. That is all."
For a moment Donald was too stunned to speak or move. Gradually he
understood that he had been deposed as a post manager in the Fort
Bruce district, that he was to go out to Winnipeg under a cloud, that,
discredited and distrusted, he would be sent to some lonely, distant
spot, perhaps far down the Mackenzie River, among strange people, among
strange Indians whose language and ways he did not know.
His thoughts flashed back to the time when he had talked to Merton
Layard across the counter in the Kenogami trade shop, to the dream that
had come to him in his fasting wigwam, to the prophecy Nee-tah-wee-gan
had uttered. They swept on through the years of struggle and growing
success, to the wonderful expanding years with Philip, to the coming of
Janet.
Donald knew he had been successful, that he had been a faithful,
efficient servant of the Hudson's Bay. He never had denied that
Nee-tah-wee-gan was his mother, had never tried to hide that fact, and
yet now, even when the Layards and Corrigal had turned against him,
when he knew defeat was due solely to the blind prejudice of these
three, he was more certain than ever that he was all white. He felt it.
In that moment the thing he had dreamed became real.
Courage returned in a rushing flood. It brought coolness and an
understanding of the situation. He even found time to extract a grim
humor from it, for he was confident that once he had presented his case
to Corrigal he would be reinstated at Fort James and his integrity
and efficiency established. He remembered, too, how he had bested the
district manager during those three storm-bound days and he knew he
could do so again.
"Am I to understand that you are throwing me out of this district?" he
asked quietly.
"Yes."
"Why?"
"I've told you. You have been more than negligent. You have defrauded
the company to help a free trader--this renegade friend of yours."
The contempt in Corrigal's tone threw Donald off his balance and drove
him to passionate revolt.
"You know that's a lie!" he cried. "You know it is only an excuse. You
know you are not capable of fairness. You know I can explain when my
brigade gets in and I have the man who really is to blame here to face
me. You know one of your idols will fall when I do explain. But most of
all you are trying to ruin me for the simple reason that my mother's
name isn't Mrs. Smith or Mrs. Brown or Mrs. Mac-something-or-other but
just plain Nee-tah-wee-gan."
Corrigal had started to rise from his chair, his face white with anger,
but at the mention of that last name he sank back and stared. Donald,
gathering himself for a fresh onslaught, for his rage had been released
at last, was about to rush on when Corrigal spoke.
"Nee-tah-wee-gan?"
He said it slowly as if a sudden thought, vague but compelling, had
come to him. Donald saw the change in expression and his own thoughts
rushed back to his boyhood in Pe-tah-bo's wigwam. He remembered how
the hunter had often joked Nee-tah-wee-gan about his unknown father,
he remembered the names mentioned and suddenly it occurred to him that
among them was that of Corrigal.
"Yes!" he cried. "Nee-tah-wee-gan! You knew her here at Fort Bruce.
Thirty years or more ago, before I was----"
He stopped. Anger had driven him to what he had said, blindly and
heedlessly, and then his own words became revealing.
"_So it was you!_"
He could not speak above a whisper, so astounded was he by the thought,
and then a rage more compelling than any he had ever known swept over
him.
"You!" he cried hoarsely. "You, the man who has no faith in a
half-breed! You, the righteous servant of the Hudson's Bay! You, who
would kick a man to hell because his mother was a squaw, and all the
time it was you, you who are responsible, you who are my father!"
The very ferocity of Donald's attack had driven Corrigal back but the
last words brought him to his feet.
"That is not true!" he shouted. "I knew the Indian would show in you
sometime. It always does. But you can't beat me that way. You can't
blackmail me into keeping you. I'm not your father and you can't make
anyone believe----"
He faltered in the last four words and then stopped, for he saw what he
faced. Corrigal had always been a fighter, but in Donald's charge he
recognized something he could never fight, something that would rise
against him like a thick mist, elusive and unescapable, and his voice
had betrayed his fear.
Donald instantly accepted it as an admission.
"Don't make a mistake, Corrigal," he retorted contemptuously. "No one
will ever hear of it through me. Do you think I would boast that I am
your son? Do you think I would take any pride in claiming you as a
father? I'm only thankful it isn't known. Though Nee-tah-wee-gan is my
mother, I never made an excuse or tried to evade the fact. I saw that I
had to forget parentage and stand on my own two feet. I felt white and
I considered myself so.
"And I won out. Duncan Mactavish knew I was a faithful servant of the
company. Others knew it. I know I am a good post manager. My record
proves it. And until this moment I have gone through life without shame
or regret. But to claim you as a father! You, a hypocrite, a liar, a
coward! You----"
He stopped, choked by anger, and in that moment of blind passion he
thought only of vengeance.
"I know what you are now!" he rushed on. "You've fooled the north but
you won't much longer. If I never do anything else so long as I live
I'll show fur land exactly what you are. I haven't anything else to
do--nothing else to live for. You are responsible for my being born.
You have no one else to blame for the manner in which I am going to
make you pay."
He turned abruptly and rushed from the office. Once outside he started
across to "Bachelors' Hall" but a dry, cackling chuckle stopped him. He
whirled to see Nee-tah-wee-gan huddled against the building.
Donald started back toward her. He had been certain Corrigal was his
father and then the very desire that it be not true compelled the
question he had never asked.
"Who was my father?" he demanded in Ojibwa.
Nee-tah-wee-gan stared inscrutably and he turned away.
"Did you think it was the 'big trader'?" she called after him.
"Do you mean it _was_ Corrigal?"
Her black eyes glittered and then a cracked and twisted smile spread
over her ugly face. With a sweeping gesture she drew her shawl over
her head. Donald saw her shoulders shake and then, sick, beaten, he
stumbled blindly toward "Bachelors' Hall."
He had gone only a little way when he heard the familiar hiss: "_Keen
nish-e-na-be!_"