It was the beginning of August—the Flying-up Moon—when Pierrot returned
from Lac Bain, and in three days more it would be the Willow’s
seventeenth birthday. He brought back with him many things for
Nepeese—ribbons for her hair, real shoes, which she wore at times like
the two Englishwomen at Nelson House, and chief glory of all, some
wonderful red cloth for a dress. In the three winters she had spent at
the Mission these women had made much of Nepeese. They had taught her to
sew as well as to spell and read and pray, and at times there came to
the Willow a compelling desire to do as they did.
So for three days Nepeese worked hard on her new dress and on her
birthday she stood before Pierrot in a fashion that took his breath
away. She had piled her hair in great glowing masses and coils on the
crown of her head, as Yvonne, the younger of the Englishwomen, had
taught her, and in the rich jet of it had half buried a vivid sprig of
the crimson fire-flower. Under this, and the glow in her eyes, and the
red flush of her lips and cheeks came the wonderful red dress, fitted to
the slim and sinuous beauty of her form—as the style had been two
winters ago at Nelson House. And under the dress, which reached just
below the knees—Nepeese had quite forgotten the proper length, or else
her material had run out—came the _coup de maître_ of her toilet, real
stockings and the wonderful shoes with high heels! She was a vision
before which the gods of the forests might have felt their hearts stop
beating. Pierrot turned her round and round without a word, but smiling;
but when she left him, followed by Baree, and limping a little in the
tightness of her shoes, the smile faded from his face, leaving it cold
and staring.
“_Mon Dieu_,” he whispered to himself in French, with a thought that was
like a sharp stab at his heart, “she is not of her mother’s blood—_non_.
It is French. She is—yes—like an angel.”
There was a change in Pierrot. During the three days of her dressmaking
Nepeese had been quite too excited to notice this change, and Pierrot
had tried to keep it from her. He had been away ten days on the trip to
Lac Bain, and he brought back to Nepeese the joyous news that M’sieu
McTaggart was very sick with _pechipoo_—the blood-poison—news that made
the Willow clap her hands and laugh happily. But he knew that the Factor
would get well, and that he would come again to their cabin on the Gray
Loon. And when next time he came——
It was when he was thinking of this that his face grew cold and hard,
and his eyes burned. And he was thinking of it on this her birthday,
even as her laughter floated to him like a song. _Dieu_, in spite of her
seventeen years, she was nothing but a child—a baby! She could not guess
his horrible visions. And the dread of awakening her for all time from
that beautiful childhood kept him from telling her the whole truth so
that she might have understood fully and completely. _Non_, it should
not be that. His soul beat with a great and gentle love. He, Pierrot Du
Quesne, would do the watching. And she should laugh and sing and
play—and have no share in the black forebodings that had come to spoil
his life.
On this day there came up from the south MacDonald, the government
map-maker. He was gray and grizzled, with a great, free laugh and a
clean heart. Two days he remained with Pierrot. He told Nepeese of his
daughters at home, of their mother, whom he worshipped more than
anything else on earth—and before he went on in his quest of the last
timber-line of Banksian pine, he took pictures of the Willow as he had
first seen her on her birthday: her hair piled in glossy coils and
masses, her red dress, the high-heeled shoes. He carried the negatives
on with him, promising Pierrot that he would get a picture back in some
way. Thus fate works in its strange and apparently innocent ways as it
spins its webs of tragedy.
* * * * *
For many weeks after this there followed tranquil days on the Gray Loon.
They were wonderful days for Baree. At first he was suspicious of
Pierrot. After a little he tolerated him, and at last accepted him as a
part of the cabin—and Nepeese. It was the Willow whose shadow he became.
Pierrot noted the attachment with the deepest satisfaction.
“Ah, in a few months more, if he should leap at the throat of M’sieu the
Factor,” he said to himself one day.
In September, when he was six months old, Baree was almost as large as
Gray Wolf—big-boned, long-fanged, with a deep chest, and jaws that could
already crack a bone as if it were a stick. He was with Nepeese whenever
and wherever she moved. They swam together in the two pools—the pool in
the forest and the pool between the chasm walls. At first it alarmed
Baree to see Nepeese dive from the rock wall over which she had pushed
McTaggart, but at the end of a month she had taught him to plunge after
her through that twenty feet of space.
It was late in August when Baree saw the first of his kind outside of
Kazan and Gray Wolf. During the summer Pierrot allowed his dogs to run
at large on a small island in the centre of a lake two or three miles
away, and twice a week he netted fish for them. On one of these trips
Nepeese accompanied him and took Baree with her. Pierrot carried his
long caribou-gut whip. He expected a fight. But there was none. Baree
joined the pack in their rush for fish, and ate with them. This pleased
Pierrot more than ever.
“He will make a great sledge-dog,” he chuckled. “It is best to leave him
for a week with the pack, _ma Nepeese_.”
Reluctantly Nepeese gave her consent. While the dogs were still at their
fish, they started homeward. Their canoe had stolen well out before
Baree discovered the trick they had played on him. Instantly he leaped
into the water and swam after them—and the Willow helped him into the
canoe.
Early in September a passing Indian brought Pierrot word of Bush
McTaggart. The Factor had been very sick. He had almost died from the
blood-poison, but he was well now. With the first exhilarating tang of
autumn in the air a new dread oppressed Pierrot. But at present he said
nothing of what was in his mind to Nepeese. The Willow had almost
forgotten the Factor from Lac Bain, for the glory and thrill of
wilderness autumn was in her blood. She went on long trips with Pierrot,
helping him to blaze out the new trap-lines that would be used when the
first snows came, and on these journeys she was always accompanied by
Baree.
Most of Nepeese’s spare hours she spent in training him for the sledge.
She began with a _babiche_ string and a stick. It was a whole day before
she could induce Baree to drag this stick without turning at every other
step to snap and growl at it. Then she fastened another length of
_babiche_ to him, and made him drag two sticks. Thus little by little
she trained him to the sledge-harness, until at the end of a fortnight
he was tugging heroically at anything she had a mind to fasten him to.
Pierrot brought home two of the dogs from the island, and Baree was put
into training with these, and helped to drag the empty sledge. Nepeese
was delighted. On the day the first light snow fell she clapped her
hands and cried to Pierrot:
“By mid-winter I will have him the finest dog in the pack, _mon père_!”
This was the time for Pierrot to say what was in his mind. He smiled.
_Diantre_—would not that beast the Factor fall into the very devil of a
rage when he found how he had been cheated! And yet——
He tried to make his voice quiet and commonplace.
“I am going to send you down to the school at Nelson House again this
winter, _ma chérie_,” he said. “Baree will help draw you down on the
first good snow.”
The Willow was tying a knot in Baree’s _babiche_, and she rose slowly to
her feet and looked at Pierrot. Her eyes were big and dark and steady.
“I am not going, _mon père_!”
[Illustration: The Willow rose slowly to her feet and looked at Pierrot.
Her eyes were big and dark and steady. “I am not going, _mon père_!”]
It was the first time Nepeese had ever said that to Pierrot—in just that
way. It thrilled him. And he could scarcely face the look in her eyes.
He was not good at bluffing. She saw what was in his face; it seemed to
him that she was reading what was in his mind, and that she grew a
little taller as she stood there. Certainly her breath came quicker, and
he could see the throb of her breast. Nepeese did not wait for him to
gather speech.
“I am not going!” she repeated with even greater finality, and bent
again over Baree.
With a shrug of his shoulders Pierrot watched her. After all, was he not
glad? Would his heart not have turned sick if she had been happy at the
thought of leaving him? He moved to her side and with great gentleness
laid a hand on her glossy head. Up from under it the Willow smiled at
him. Between them they heard the click of Baree’s jaws as he rested his
muzzle on the Willow’s arm. For the first time in weeks the world seemed
suddenly filled with sunshine for Pierrot. When he went back to the
cabin he held his head higher. Nepeese would not leave him! He laughed
softly. He rubbed his hands together. His fear of the Factor from Lac
Bain was gone. From the cabin door he looked back at Nepeese and Baree.
“The Saints be blessed!” he murmured. “Now—now—it is Pierrot Du Quesne
who knows what to do!”