Immediately on receipt of the note referred to, vigorous preparations
were made to convey relief to Roderick McLeod. Such provisions as the
party at Jenkins Creek could muster were packed into the smallest
possible space, because the boat, or cobble, which was to convey them
down the gulf was very small--scarcely large enough to hold the party
which meant to embark in it. This party consisted of McLeod senior,
Kenneth, and Flora, it being arranged that Ian and Rooney should remain
to prosecute, as well as to guard, the works at the Creek.
Seeing that there was so little room to spare in the boat, Reginald
Redding decided to hasten down on foot to the Cliff Fort, in order to
see to the comfort of the wrecked men who had been sent there. He,
however, offered the rescue party the services of his man, Le Rue, an
offer which was accepted all the more readily that the Canadian
possessed some knowledge of the coast.
It was very dark when they started, but, fortunately, calm. McLeod had
resolved to travel night and day, if the weather permitted, until he
should reach the scene of the wreck, and to take snatches of rest if
possible in the boat.
There were only two oars in the boat, so that one of its crew was always
idle. This, however, proved to be rather an advantage, for, by
affording frequent relief to each rower, it saved the strength of all,
and at the same time enabled them to relieve the tedium of the journey
to poor Flora.
At first they proceeded along under the deep shade of the ghost-like
cliffs in unbroken silence, the mind of each no doubt being busy with
the wreck of their last remnant of fortune, as well as with the
dangerous condition in which the youthful Roderick lay; but, as the dawn
of day approached, they began to talk a little, and when the sun arose
its gladdening beams appeared to carry hope to each breast, inducing an
almost cheerful state of mind. In the case of Francois Le Rue, the
influence of sunshine was so powerful that a feeling of sympathy and
respect for the McLeods in the calamity which had overtaken them alone
restrained him from breaking out into song!
"Father," said Flora, as her sire, wearied by a long spell at the bow
oar, resigned his seat to Kenneth, and sat down beside her, "that
glorious light brings to my remembrance a very sweet verse, `Weeping may
endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.'"
"True, true, Flo," returned her father, "I wish I had the simple faith
that you seem to possess, but I haven't, so there's no use in pretending
to it. This," he added bitterly, "seems only a pure and unmitigated
disaster. The last remnant of my fortune is wrecked, I am utterly
ruined, and my poor boy is perhaps dying."
Flora did not reply. She felt that in his present state of mind nothing
she could say would comfort him.
At that moment Le Rue suddenly roused himself, and suggested that it was
about time to think of breakfast.
As all the party were of the same mind, the boat was allowed to drift
down the gulf with the tide, while the pork and biscuit-bags were
opened. Little time was allowed for the meal, nevertheless the
mercurial Canadian managed, between mouthfuls, to keep up a running
commentary on things in general. Among other things he referred to the
property which his master had just purchased in Partridge Bay.
"Whereabouts is this property that you talk of?" asked McLeod, becoming
interested at the mention of Partridge Bay.
"About la tete of de village near de house of Monsieur Gambart."
"What like a place is it?" asked McLeod, becoming suddenly much more
interested.
"Oh! one place mos bootiful," replied Le Rue, with enthusiasm; "de house
is superb, de grounds splendeed, et le prospect magnifique, wid plenty
of duck--perhaps sometimes goose, vild vons--in von lac near cliff
immense."
At the mention of the lake and the cliff McLeod's brow darkened, and he
glanced at Flora, who met his glance with a look of surprise.
"Did you happen to hear the name of the place?" asked McLeod.
"Oui, it vas, I tink, Lac Do, or Doo--someting like so."
"The scoundrel!" muttered McLeod between his teeth, while a gleam of
wrath shot from his eyes.
Le Rue looked at him with some surprise, being uncertain as to the
person referred to by this pithy remark, and Flora glanced at him with a
look of anxiety.
After a brief silence he said to Flora in a low tone, as though he were
expressing the continuation of his thoughts, "To think that the fellow
should thus abuse my hospitality by inducing me to speak of our fallen
fortunes, and of our being obliged to part with the old home we had
loved so well, and never to utter a word about his having bought the
place."
"Perhaps," suggested Flora, "you had not mentioned the name of the
place, and so it might not have occurred to him that--"
"Oh yes, I did," interrupted her father, with increasing anger, as his
memory recalled the converse with Redding on the preceding night, "I
remember it well, for he asked the name, and I told it him. It's not
that I care a straw whether the old place was bought by Tom, Dick, or
Harry, but I can't stand his having concealed the fact from me after so
much, I may say, confidential conversation about it and our affairs
generally. When I meet him again the young coxcomb shall have a piece
of my mind."
McLeod was, as we have said, an angry man, and, as the intelligent
reader well knows, angry men are apt to blind themselves and to become
outrageously unreasonable. He was wrong in supposing that he did not
care a straw who should have bought the old place. Without, perhaps,
admitting it to himself, he had entertained a hope that the home which
was intimately associated with his wife, and in which some of the
happiest years of his life had been spent, would remain unsold until he
should manage to scrape together money enough to repurchase it. If it
had been sold to the proverbial Tom, or Dick, or Harry, he would have
been bitterly disappointed; the fact that it was sold to one who had, as
he thought, deceived him while enjoying his hospitality, only served as
a reason for his finding relief to disappointment in indignation.
Flora, who had entertained similar hopes in regard to Loch Dhu, shared
the disappointment, but not the indignation, for, although it did seem
unaccountable that one so evidently candid and truthful as Redding
should conceal the actual state of matters, she felt certain that there
was some satisfactory explanation of the mystery, and in that state of
mind she determined to remain until time should throw further light on
the affair.
Neither she nor her father happened to remember that the truth had
broken on Redding at the moment when the Indian entered the hut at
Jenkins Creek with the news of the wreck, which created such a sudden
excitement there that it banished thoughts of all other things from the
minds of every one.
The elder McLeod was a man of very strong and sensitive feelings, so
that, although possessed of an amiable and kindly disposition, he found
it exceedingly difficult to forget injuries, especially when these were
unprovoked. His native generosity might have prompted him perhaps to
find some excuse for the fur-trader's apparent want of candour, or to
believe that there might be some explanation of it, but, as it was, he
flung into the other scale not only the supposed injury inflicted by
Redding, but all his weighty disappointments at the loss of his old
home, and of course generosity kicked the beam!
Acting on these feelings, he turned the bow of the boat inshore without
uttering a word, and when her keel grated on the gravelly beach, he
looked somewhat sternly at Le Rue, and said:--
"You may jump ashore, and go back to your fort."
"Monsieur?" exclaimed Le Rue, aghast with surprise.
"Jump ashore," repeated McLeod, with a steady, quiet look of
impassibility. "Go, tell your master that I do not require further
assistance from him."
The Canadian felt that McLeod's look and tone admitted of neither
question nor delay. His surprise therefore gave way to a burst of
indignation. He leaped ashore with a degree of energy that sent the
little boat violently off the beach, and the shingles spurted from his
heels as he strode into the forest, renewing his vows of vengeance
against his late friends and old enemies, "de Macklodds!"