WHEN Launa, who had a queer, passionate temper, a horror of restraint of
any kind, and a great dislike to being disappointed or thwarted, was
fifteen, she was tall, and slight, all arms and legs, with long thin
fingers, and well-shaped feet. Her skin was tanned, with a tinge of red
in her cheeks, her eyes were brown, as was her hair. She could paddle,
and walk on snowshoes like an Indian, her voice had a low soft richness
in it that reminded Mr. Archer of a squaw—which made him wonder whether
there had been Indian blood in Naomi or not?
But Launa had a stronger look than her mother; she was less of the
dainty French girl, and she possessed a greater desire to rise, to
achieve something, possessing a less sublime acquiescence in fate or
destiny than Naomi, who had been sweeter, more yielding, and fulfilling
Mr. Archer’s preconceived, primeval idea of a woman. Sometimes he feared
for his daughter, and that curious belief in herself, which she
displayed with a half-expressed idea, that she would be able to command
fate, an early sign of her masterful independence.
“When I am big,” Launa said to her father one day, “I shall write a book
about the woods and the Indians; no one writes about them, or seems to
know how.”
Her father smiled.
“You must learn to keep still.”
“The arranging and selecting of ideas must be difficult,” she said, “and
I always come to grief over commas. I love full stops, but Whitey says
my sentences are jerky. It must be difficult to disguise one’s mood when
writing books, to write when one is tired or weary; I could not do it.”
“You will perhaps be glad to do it some day.” Then changing the subject,
he said, “I am going to the Reserve to-day, will you come?”
“What time shall we go?”
“At three,” he answered.
Launa rushed off to order tea to take with them, as well as some tea and
sugar for presents to the Indians.
They drove about six miles to the Reserve. It was a desolate piece of
country, and lay along the side of a large lake, from which ran a little
trout stream. The Indians lived in cottages, poorly built shanties, and
they welcomed the Archers with joy. There was an old grandmother, a
terrible old person in a red flannel bed-jacket, a very short skirt, and
a short pipe, which she smoked with fervour. Her grey hair hung down on
both sides of her brown face, and she waved her long thin fingers as she
related tales of her magic cures, for she was a doctor and made herb
decoctions for anyone who was ailing. She talked in a low mysterious
voice.
“I give him little medicine, yer know,” she said, with a leer and a
drawl, nodding her funny old head with an air of confidence in her
listener’s understanding and belief.
Miss Black was afraid of her, and always felt sure that Mrs. Andrew
would not be too good to omit mixing poison with her medicine, if she
considered it desirable the sick person should not recover.
Launa listened to the old grandmother’s stories with rapt attention,
until Andrew, the witch’s husband, came to say he had lighted a fire by
the lake, and that Abram had launched his canoe to take Launa in it
after tea.
Andrew and Launa caught some trout, which they cooked at the wood fire,
and Launa made tea. She presented Mrs. Andrew with a large parcel of it
to that lady’s joy, though she merely grunted her thanks, and then
offered Launa a cup out of her own tea-pot. But as the Indians seldom or
never empty the tea-pot (they consider it a waste to throw away the old
leaves, and keep on adding a few new ones, which they let boil to get
their full flavour), Launa knew better than to drink it. It was, in
truth, a deadly concoction.
Abram pushed his canoe into the water, and taking a paddle in one hand
started with a little run and then jumped into the end of the canoe,
which shot out into the middle of the lake. It was a wonderful jump, and
Launa never tired of seeing it.
“There is no one who can do that as Abram does,” she said with
admiration. “He is splendid, isn’t he, Andrew? Abram, Abram!” called
Launa. “Take me up to the end of the lake!”
He brought the canoe in again, and she took her paddle and knelt in the
bow. They went off together, her firm figure, with its graceful arm
movement, erect, muscular, and supple. Oh! the joy of those days! The
joy of living and of doing! The rapid, firm strokes, and the movement!
* * * * *
Launa paid her visit to the opera house in New York, whither her father
took her with Miss Black for a winter, and then her dreams were
realised. She heard the “Nibelungenlied,” “The Meistersinger,”
“Tannhauser,” besides selections from “Parsifal”; she also attended
numerous concerts. Music took the place of her out-of-door life, and she
became so absorbed in it that she only occasionally missed and regretted
her former wanderings. It was as if she had experienced its wonderful
power for the first time, and drank from a cup of intoxicating
sweetness.
She went to dances, and discovered that men found her attractive, and
naturally she soon learned how to make herself agreeable. At the same
time she realised that most men love a woman for her bodily charm.
“Men are very animalish, Whitey,” said Launa one day, after having made
a successful appearance at an evening reception.
Miss Black gasped. She had ignored the existence of men as lovers,
except in history and in books, while teaching Launa.
“All men are not alike,” she said vaguely.
“No, of course not. Father is perfect. Few men are like him.”
When they returned to “Solitude,” Launa worked with renewed ardour, and
practised with joy—she wanted to play well. She read all sorts of
books, and after a course of lectures on Greek literature, she turned
with avidity to Plato, to Epictetus. Of German books she read many; to
Miss Black’s regret she had outgrown Marlitt. For a woman who could do
things, who did not fear storm or rain, Miss Black was singularly afraid
of the knowledge of good and evil. Evil belonged especially to the poor
and low, and to men, who gave it up when they put on dress-clothes, and
were in the society of ladies—the humanising influence of ladies! A
dress suit was the veneer that completely covered the brute-beast in a
man.
About this time Launa turned affectionately to her father. She found him
sympathetic, for he understood her, and he never gasped.
“You remind me of your mother,” he said one day to her.
“Tell me about her,” she said, flushing with pleasure.
“She was very sweet—how can I tell you? I loved her; half of me, the
best, the happy half died with her; it was as if I were killed. . . .
And we were so happy.”
“It was terrible,” said Launa. “Life, father, seems sometimes to be
horribly, terribly sad.” She said this with the air of one who has made
a new discovery, and it amused her father.
“Why is it?” she asked.
“I do not know.”
“And what is the good?”
He did not answer.
It dawned upon the small world round “Solitude” that Launa was
attractive, and so the inhabitants came to visit and to criticise. They
all went to Quebec, and they stayed several nights at different houses,
where she enjoyed herself, and where she was admired—especially at one
of the balls she attended.
Among all the men she met, English as well as Canadian, for there was a
garrison in Halifax, a man named Paul Harvey interested her most. He was
a Canadian, who possessed a place about twenty miles from “Solitude.” He
was tall and dark. His skin was tanned from the out-of-door life he led;
he had a peculiarly high forehead, and high cheek bones, and his body
had the lithe look common to men who spend their lives in doing, and who
are never troubled with superfluous flesh. His keen eyes glanced into
one’s inner consciousness, and seemed hard, until he smiled. He walked
with the Indian stride, which is quick and quiet. Of course he could
ride, and he had the strong capable hands of a man who has been brought
up to do things, and who could do them well. Paul Harvey and Launa soon
became firm friends, for they understood each other. They loved the same
things; the witchery of the woods, of the canoe, and of the sea was real
and tangible to them both, and he loved music, as did she. In the long
spring days they often met, and he was full of admiration for this girl,
who was so strong and so fearless.
George Archer frequently invited Paul to “Solitude,” without the least
idea of encouraging any feeling on Paul’s part for Launa, who in her
father’s eyes was still a child; that any man should think of her as a
possible wife never occurred to him, but then Archer’s idea of a wife
(the other man’s wife) was a submissive woman, and Launa was not that.
One day in May Mr. Archer had gone to Chezettcook to fish, and Launa was
anxious to pay him a visit. Paul expressed himself desirous of driving
her down to the river which her father owned.
So the two left “Solitude” at two o’clock on a still day, very sultry
and hot; a haze lay thick over the land, and the sun shone red with a
lurid glare, for the haze was the smoke of fires in the woods.
They drove along very rapidly, not talking much, though occasionally
Paul would look at her and she at him, and they smiled with a sense of
well-being and mutual bliss.
“I think,” said Paul at last, “that the Bible makes a mistake when it
says, ‘Godliness with contentment is great gain’; it should be love.”
“Oh, Paul,” she exclaimed. “The smoke! it is getting so thick.”
Paul was holding his head down.
“Shall we turn back? The fire is crossing the road in front of us. I am
afraid we can’t get through it.”
He turned his horse quickly.
“Launa, it seems as if it were cutting us off.”
They were in a winding road, a crosscut. He started Micmac at a gallop.
If the fire were before them! There was a long hill to climb.
The trap swayed and jolted, for the road was bad. They were tearing
along; the wind was behind them, and they could hear the crackle which
was getting nearer, rising to a hideous roar. A river crossed the road
below the hill—had they time to get to it?
Paul wrapped the rug round his companion, put it over her head, and
covered her mouth.
“Keep it tight,” he exclaimed, “and sit still.”
Then he began to use his whip, having tied his own handkerchief over his
mouth. Micmac was going more slowly in spite of the whip; it seemed as
if he were terrified and paralysed by the pursuing fiend.
“You are not afraid,” said Paul with difficulty, through his
handkerchief.
“No,” gasped Launa, “not with you.”
He put his hand on her shoulder.
“Keep your mouth well covered; the fire is before us. We must go through
it.”
On, on they tore; the smoke almost choked her. It was so terribly thick
that Paul could not see Micmac, though his eyes burnt, and he kept them
open with difficulty. Then the flames ran up a dead pine tree in front
of him, and shed a lurid light through the smoke. The heat was intense;
he shut his smarting eyes, and trusted Micmac would keep the road.
“Oh, if the bridge—a wooden bridge—were not down!” “Were not down!”
repeated itself; “Were not down!”
They were in the midst of the fire now; the roaring was tremendous, and
the trees were flaming and crackling on all sides. Paul covered his eyes
with one hand, and used the whip with the other. It was like the finish
of a race, a race for life, down the hill at a gallop. But the bridge?
It had already caught, and the wood was smoking, when Micmac stopped
with a jerk, and Paul jumped out and took hold of him.
“You must, old boy, you must,” he murmured. “Once over we are pretty
safe. Good horse, good horse!”
The trembling Micmac refused again; the bridge was hot, and frightened
him. Then he went at it with a rush, with Paul still at his head,
half-running, half-dragged by the horse. The river was wide, and the
wind was from the north, blowing the fire down on them over the road,
but not across the stream in the direction in which they were going.
Paul got into the trap quickly, and Micmac galloped on and on and on
until, though the smoke was still thick, they were safe. At last Paul
pulled up, and looked back. The road along which they had come was a
sheet of flame, and he shuddered as he thought of what might have
happened. There were so many pine trees to burn, and to fall burning,
while the side of the river on which they were was covered with alder
bushes and rocks, and the wind, too, was blowing that way.
“Now!” he gasped hoarsely, for his throat was dry and parched. “Now!”
And Launa threw off her rug. Paul was black, his face was flaming and
smutty, his cap had blown off, and his hair stood on end. Her rug was
singed. Micmac had a burn, where a piece of wood had fallen on him, and
he was trembling when Launa got out and patted him, talking while she
did it.
“My darling,” murmured Paul, going up to her, “you are safe; you behaved
like an angel.”
He looked at his hands and did not touch her.
“So did Micmac. Look at him, and you—you are burnt, your hands are
sore. Oh, I am so sorry! Do, do drive back to ‘Solitude,’ and—and—”
“Yes?”
“Oh, drive back!” she said.
They took a short cut across a half made road, and so got behind the
fire. Paul talked very little, and she not at all, though she heard “My
darling” over and over again, and wondered.
Paul stayed at “Solitude,” and after dinner Launa, Whitey, and he sat on
the veranda and watched the fire, still burning in the distance. The
whole sky was in a blaze, but luckily the wind was dying down. They
could see the flames running from tree to tree; they could hear the
roar, but they were quite safe, for the water was between them. In the
dark, Paul silently, secretly took her hand, and they talked to Miss
Black of the annual regatta, and of Canadian ferns. A few stars blazed
high up in the sky, the others were dimmed by the lurid glow, and the
aspen tree quivered in the dying breeze, while the waves of the incoming
tide tapped the boats gently below.
Launa felt in that state of happiness, which says, “_Last, last, last._”
* * * * *
The annual regatta came off that year in July. Everyone knows the St.
Aspenquid Regatta. There were the usual boat races, and excitements and
innocent fooleries; but the best of all was the canoe race for the
championship of Canada. Paul Harvey had entered for it with his friend
Jack Howston.
Before the start they both came to the steam launch, from which Launa
was viewing the races. Harvey, with his strong half-brown, half-white
arms bare above his elbows, looked like work. After a word or two with
Launa, as she leaned down to him, they paddled away to the start. She
heard the pistol shot and the hoarse murmur of the crowd, proclaiming
the race had begun. Far away in the distance the brown canoes could be
seen; Launa watched breathlessly as they came nearer. The paddles
flashed in the sun and on the gleaming dancing water. To Launa, the
long, strong, slow strokes with the absence of haste was maddening; she
stood, not daring to move, watching the white forms as they came nearer,
nearer, the iron muscles in each man showing up as he paddled on and on.
Paul’s canoe was third in the contest.
“Third,” announced Launa. Her voice sounded level, she was just able to
hide her apprehension lest he might fail, and her longing for his
success, which, nevertheless, made her desirous of burying her face in
her hands until the race was over. Her hostess, Mrs. Montmorency, stood
near her, serene, alert, and slight, enjoying her successful party with
a little interest in the races, and a little curiosity as to Launa’s
attitude towards Paul Harvey.
The men ahead were doing their utmost; in the second canoe, too, they
were working hard; but the men in the dark canoe seemed to be dead,
dull—what was it?
The crowd shouted “St. John, St. John!” for the canoe owned by that town
was in front. Disappointment was in the cry. But suddenly the third
canoe gave a spring; it shot forward with a leap, and a bound, and a
swirl through the water, and then on and on. The two men were working,
straining. They passed the second canoe, and the finish was near; the
strong sinews under the arms of the two men showed up clearly. Had they
waited too long? . . . On they crept, and at last with a final, splendid
rush—oh, the ease of it, the seeming lack of effort—the brown canoe
shot ahead of the other. They had won, won. Amid shrieks, cheers, and
waving of handkerchiefs the heroes, the winners paddled away to change.
Launa had been on the verge of tears, caused by excitement, fear,
apprehension, and heaven knows what besides. She was unable to drink her
tea because of a lump in her throat. Paul paddled alone over to her, and
climbed on board the _Lethe_.
“You’ve won,” she said. “I am very glad.”
“And so am I—glad. I am more than glad. It means good luck; it means I
shall win my heart’s desire; it means—” he almost said “You.”
Launa did not answer; she gave him her hand as if they had met for the
first time, and he held it longer than a man does when saying, “How do
you do?” It was like an involuntary childish caress.
He stayed with her until it was time for the single canoe race, for
which he was acting umpire. She was sweet, with a delightful
unexpectedness which fascinated him, as did her varying good looks, her
firm, lithe body.
“I wish they had a ladies’ canoe race,” he said. “You would enter for
it, would you not?”
“Oh yes.”
“They will certainly have one next year, and you will win.”
Launa laughed.
“I must go,” he said with regret. “But I shall soon come back.”
“We shall leave soon now,” said Mrs. Montmorency. “Will you come and
dine at Paradise to-morrow, Paul? We are going over there, and shall
drive home by moonlight. Perhaps you will come and meet us?”
“Thank you,” he replied. “I will.”
Then he got into his canoe, and Launa watched him paddle away with slow
strokes—regretful strokes they seemed to her. His paddling was so
unlike that of the other men, so strong, and his body swayed to the
motion. Mrs. Montmorency brought up a Mr. Evans and introduced him to
Launa. He was a young Englishman, with a respect for the institutions of
his country, a love for his dinner, and for pretty women.
He began by asking whether Launa considered Miss Montmorency pretty, and
whether she liked Wagner. His theories were that a man can tell a
woman’s character most quickly from her ideas on the subject of other
women, as well as from the music she affects.
Near them sat Mr. Archer and the hostess talking. Launa heard a word
here and there as she listened to Mr. Evans’ agreeable remarks, and then
she heard her father say:
“Harvey is a fool or worse. The Indians will not stand it. Peter Joe
came to me about it; he says he would kill him, only that he is sure he
would be hanged for it.”
“You think they will take some quiet revenge,” said Mrs. Montmorency,
“and more deadly.”
“Yes, I do.”
“In their mind a child constitutes marriage?”
“If its father does not want to marry anyone else,” he answered. “They
will be satisfied if he lets things alone, but he won’t.”
“He does want to marry?”
“I think so. Money will considerably improve his house, and pay off some
of the mortgages; he will, I expect, take a wife with money.”
“It is terrible, and such a pity. I always liked Mr. Harvey for his
mother’s sake, and I have ever made him welcome.”
“I advised him to marry her—the squaw,” said Mr. Archer. “It will
finish him socially, but in other ways it will make a man of him. Harvey
is—”
Here they walked away to the bow of the _Lethe_, and Launa’s companion
talked on, and she answered him.
She impressed him with her interest, her air of being fascinated by him,
and all the while she was in torment. Harvey had held her hand! She took
off her pale tan suede glove and threw it into the water. It burnt her;
her hands felt hot.
Her quick action puzzled Mr. Evans.
“Miss Archer, your glove! Is it a challenge? Do you mean me to go after
it?”
“No, no,” she answered. “I hate it; I do not want it. Oh, we are going.”
The _Lethe_ had steam up, and was puffing and moving slowly.
“I am so glad. It is very hot. How cool the air is.”
They passed Paul in his canoe. He waved his hand to Launa, who was
staring into the water, and appeared absorbed in the depths or in her
companion.