A BITTER DAY FOR CORRIGAL
Everyone in Fort Bruce knew of the fight in detail before night, just
as it knew, too, that Corrigal had deposed Donald as a post manager and
ordered him to report to the commissioner at Winnipeg. No one talked of
anything else and everywhere opinion was the same.
"I was Millington's second and I'm ashamed of it," Sandy Hay declared
to the group in "Bachelors' Hall" that night. "He was dirty and he was
yellow, just as Norton said he was."
Sandy knew very well Millington lay in his bed within earshot but he
had already told the Englishman exactly what he thought of him while
washing the blood from his face and body and helping him to dress.
"And Donald was as white as any man ever was," Nicol MacKar announced
with a defiant glare about the room.
"Well, rather," drawled Harry Milner of Lynx Head Falls. "He never said
a word when Millington fouled him twice. Kept on fighting as clean as a
thoroughbred."
"I'm only sorry he didn't land that last one when he was ready to,"
Sandy said. "He quit too soon to suit me."
"He was too decent to do it," Nicol protested.
"No," Milner objected, "you're wrong there. I was watching his face.
He waited from the first for that blow. Purposely he left Millington's
left eye open while he marked him up. Then at the last he weakened him
with those body punches but he didn't knock him out because he was
disgusted. I was watching his face. I saw it. He didn't hit him for the
same reason he wouldn't hit a yellow dog that had turned tail."
Only Corrigal remained aloof from the discussion that raged throughout
Fort Bruce that evening. He lived in the dwelling house with the
Layards. After dinner he asked Layard for the details of the fight and
then went up to his room to read, as was his custom.
Janet retired soon afterward, pleading that the sun on the water that
afternoon had given her a headache.
"What did Corrigal say when you told him of the fight?" Evelyn asked
when she and her husband were alone.
"Nothing. He didn't ask a question or make a comment."
"Did you tell him how Donald acted, how cleanly he fought?"
"I laid it on thick and he only grunted and turned away."
"He's carrying this senseless prejudice too far!" Evelyn cried angrily.
"You should go to him, Merton. You should show him how unjust he has
been. After hearing what Millington has been doing for two winters it
is despicable for him to decide against Donald and humble him so."
"I don't think he knows anything about Millington's raids on Donald's
hunters."
"But surely Donald told him."
"That's just the point. Donald wouldn't do it without having Millington
present, and Millington was gone all afternoon. It was something
else--just what I don't know--but I don't think the fur receipts at
Fort James caused all the trouble."
"Didn't you talk to Donald?"
"I couldn't, he was in such a rage. It was no time to get his
confidence."
"But you will see him in the morning, Merton. You must do something.
Donald has gone too far to have this happen to him now."
"I don't know. I'll see." Then he added suddenly, "Have you heard that
Nee-tah-wee-gan has come to Fort Bruce?"
"Nee-tah-wee-gan!" she repeated. "What has she to do with it?"
"Everything, of course. One of the men said he saw an old woman camping
alone down the lake shore. Said she was a stranger and wouldn't talk to
him. That sounds like Nee-tah-wee-gan and I'd like to see her. I'd make
the old hag talk if I had to choke her."
A note of anger, almost of fury, had crept into Merton's voice and
Evelyn stared at him.
"Merton!" she whispered. "You don't mean----"
"I don't know," he interrupted. "Years ago I heard things and I've been
wondering----"
They looked at each other for a moment.
"What a terrible, terrible thing!" Evelyn cried.
"Oh, I don't know that it's true. It's just a guess, but----"
"Merton, you're keeping something back! You do know!"
He shook his head. For twenty-five years she had lived in lonely
posts with this man and she understood his every mood and every phase
thereof. Yet while she felt certain that he was withholding something
she knew nothing would induce him to speak until he was ready.
For a long time Evelyn was silent and then she arose. Out of the
inextricable mess into which the affairs of those she loved best had
been plunged she had emerged with a resolve.
"Merton," she said quietly, "I am going to find out if what you are
thinking is true."
"Don't be foolish," he interrupted quickly. "I have nothing----"
"You have something or you would never suspect it. I am going to learn
the truth and if it is as you suspect, Corrigal can't remain here. I
don't care if he sends us to the worst post in the district. I won't
live in the same house with him."
"Wait until I have talked with Donald in the morning," Merton said.
But when Fort Bruce wakened Donald was gone. No one had seen him go. He
had not bidden anyone good-by. He had not left a message. It was not
until mid-forenoon that it was learned he had departed at dawn in a
canoe with two Indians. But even the Indians' women could not tell in
which direction they had gone.
As soon as Merton had satisfied himself that Donald had left Fort Bruce
he went at once to the office of the district manager.
"Corrigal," he began abruptly, "I may be breaking a confidence but I've
got to tell you something. In the first place, Norton has disappeared,
has gone without a word to anyone."
"I sent him to Winnipeg."
"But you didn't tell him to leave in such a manner."
"No, though I'm not surprised that he did. I had to remove him from
Fort James for inefficiency, and worse. He couldn't stay and face the
music. I knew the Indian would come out. It always does."
"You know nothing about it!" Merton shouted angrily. "He left because
you drove him out."
Corrigal looked at the Fort Bruce manager more in amazement than
resentment.
"Listen to me, Merton," he said. "I understand how you feel. You gave
the boy his chance but you might have known it was useless--that
something like this would happen."
"I knew him well enough to know he would be as fair as he has been.
Nee-tah-wee-gan may be his mother but Donald is white clear through.
He showed yesterday that he is whiter than your pet, Millington, and if
you had given him any sort of chance he would have shown you just how
big a crook Millington is."
Corrigal was aroused at last.
"I won't listen to any more of that, Layard!" he exclaimed. "I'm here
to run this district to the best of my ability and judgment and in my
judgment Norton was going backward as a post manager. Any man who is
part Indian will do that if he goes up too fast. I didn't trust him and
I have noticed, too, that where this thing touches you personally you
take the same stand I do. You wouldn't let him marry your daughter."
"He's never asked to marry her!" Merton retorted with sudden passion.
"And as far as his heritage is concerned, I would rather trust the
Indian blood than the white. His father is the one who has all this to
answer for."
Corrigal glanced up quickly and in his startled expression Merton
believed he read what he had hinted to Evelyn.
As for Corrigal, he believed instantly that Donald had gone to Merton
with the accusation he had made the day before.
"So the dirty cur has been telling you that!" he shouted. "It's a lie.
He knows it's a lie! If I hear of you repeating this----"
Merton, sickened by what he considered to be a revelation of the truth,
turned away.
"You don't have to be afraid I'll do it," he said. "I think too much of
Donald to saddle him with that. And as for his telling me, he has never
mentioned his father in all the years I have known him. If he has been
aware of this, I have not. He has kept his mouth shut and I will too.
"But not because I'm afraid of you, Corrigal. Do you understand that?
I'll keep the secret for Donald's sake, not for yours. I'm not afraid
of you. You've driven out the best post manager in your district and
the commissioner wouldn't like it if he knew why."
"You mean you are going to blackmail me?" Corrigal demanded furiously.
"Blackmail! Listen here." Merton leaned across the desk and in quick,
short sentences outlined what had been happening at Fort James during
the last two winters--how Millington had raided Donald's territory, how
Donald had gathered the proof and was ready to present a perfect case.
"Why didn't he tell me this?" Corrigal demanded.
"You ought to understand that now better than I do," Merton answered.
"I only know that Donald is too fair to do it except in Millington's
presence and that his brigade and witnesses haven't arrived. I'll
tell you another thing. I'm going to get those witnesses in here this
afternoon. I see the boats out on the lake now. You send for Millington
and conduct the investigation yourself."
He turned abruptly and walked out. A half hour later he was returning
from the Indian encampment down the shore as Corrigal left the office
and started toward the dwelling house. Merton was about to speak to
the district manager when he saw an old Indian woman squatting at the
corner of the building. She had lifted her shawl and was looking up at
Corrigal.
"Bo' jou', Red Fox," Layard heard her say in Ojibwa, and he recognized
Nee-tah-wee-gan's voice.
Corrigal stopped and glanced at her. He had not heard that name since
leaving Fort James nearly thirty years before. It had been given to him
by the hunters there because of a reddish tweed coat and cap he wore.
"Red Fox does not remember me," she continued with a sneer. "There was
a time at Fort Bruce when he did not pass without speaking."
"Who are you?" Corrigal demanded.
"Is your memory so short you have forgotten the time you asked me to be
your woman?"
"What nonsense is this?" Corrigal exclaimed.
He turned and saw Layard.
"Tell this woman to keep out of the enclosure," he ordered. "She has no
business here."
As he spoke the apprentice clerks came out of the office to go to
"Bachelors' Hall" for the noon meal. With them were Sandy Hay, Nicol
MacKar and Harry Milner, who had been working on their requisitions.
"It is thirty years since you have seen me," Nee-tah-wee-gan cried
angrily, "and you will not give me a word. But you haven't forgotten
me. You haven't forgotten the time you walked down the shore with me in
the moonlight, that summer soon after you came from Fort James. You
haven't forgotten what you said to me."
She had risen to her feet and was confronting Corrigal. When she
stopped speaking she threw back her head and laughed, a bitter, hoarse
cackle that chilled the men who heard it.
"You haven't forgotten when you said, 'Nee-tah-wee-gan, how would you
like to come to Fort James with me and be my woman?' You may say you
forget but men only try to forget. You have never forgotten and I have
never forgotten, nor do I forget how the white woman came the next day
and you could not see me as we passed.
"Oh, you may say you forget but you don't. And I have never forgotten
and I will never let you forget."
Corrigal, his face white with anger, turned again to Layard.
"Get this woman out of here!" he cried furiously. "You know we never
allow Indians inside the enclosure."
He turned and strode away toward the dwelling house but
Nee-tah-wee-gan, aroused to a blind, unreasonable rage, ran after him,
shrieking Ojibwa invectives. Her voice carried to every part of the
great enclosure and half-breed and Indian employes came running from
all directions.
"Here, you men," Corrigal commanded. "Take this woman outside."
Several men grasped Nee-tah-wee-gan by the arms and started to drag
her away. She fought, biting and scratching, and in that moment of
indignity and humiliation her anger carried her past all restraint. She
suddenly ceased struggling and the men relaxed their hold. Instantly
she burst free and confronted Corrigal.
"Throw me out!" she shrieked. "You can! You have the power! You have
the power to do anything. Only yesterday you threw out a man. You
think it amounted to nothing but you will never forget what you did
yesterday. The man you threw out was your own son, Wen-dah-ban, the one
they call Donald Norton."
The half-breeds, always fearful of the "big trader," rushed forward and
grasped her arms.
"Take her out of here!" Corrigal cried, and as they dragged her back he
turned and went on toward the dwelling house.
But though the men might remove her they could not stop that shrill
voice or repress the vengeful spirit of the Indian woman.
"Your own son!" she shrieked. "Yours! Wen-dah-ban! And you threw him
out! Threw out your own son!"
She burst into laughter as she fought and scratched. The great
enclosure echoed with her shrieks. Everyone in Fort Bruce rushed into
the open and everyone heard.
"Your son! Wen-dah-ban! Donald Norton! He's yours! And you threw him
out! Your own son! Yours! Yours! Yours!"
Corrigal walked on to the dwelling house without looking back. Evelyn
and Janet, attracted by the clamor, had come out onto the verandah and
heard what Nee-tah-wee-gan said. As he came up the steps Evelyn sprang
forward.
"Is that true?" she demanded. "If it is you cannot enter my home."
Corrigal stopped and looked into her angry eyes.
"No," he said quietly, "it is not true."
Evelyn's eyes were the first to waver. She felt somehow that the man
spoke the truth. She was furious with herself for feeling so and yet
she knew she had received a distinct impression of sincerity. Corrigal
waited a moment and then went on into the house.
"Please tell Merton to come to my room," he said.
"Send that woman away from Fort Bruce," the district manager began at
once when Layard appeared, "and hereafter keep the Indians outside the
enclosure."
"That's all right," Merton answered hotly. "I'll do it. But that
doesn't end it with me. I want you to know that I believe what
Nee-tah-wee-gan said."
"Believe her! The woman's mad!"
"But how about the thing I surprised you with this morning? I didn't
intend to make such a charge, though I'll admit I did have a faint
suspicion before--a suspicion for which I had no basis other than
a vague memory. But you thought I had made such a charge and you
answered it at once. You were on the defensive. And from what you said
I understand that Donald knows the same thing." "You mean you don't
believe me?" Corrigal asked.
Layard did not answer. He stood there watching the district manager's
face, knowing full well his silence was more effective than anything he
could say.
Yet there was no retreat in Corrigal's attitude. He stared steadily and
fearlessly at the other and then he said, "Will you please bring your
wife and daughter here? I want to say something to all of you."
Layard hesitated. Firmly as he believed what Nee-tah-wee-gan had
shouted in her fury, he was impressed by the sudden change in
Corrigal's manner. The man was no longer angry, but calm and in deadly
earnest.
"Don't be afraid," Corrigal continued quietly. "There is nothing that
Janet can't hear. And it is only to your family that I will speak."