"Where is he now?"
"I don't know." She waited for a minute, then said again, "I don't know.
When he was free, he came to me, but I--I could not. He thought, too,
that because he had been in gaol, that I wouldn't--be his wife. He
didn't think enough of himself, he didn't urge anything. And I wasn't
ready--no--no--no--how could I be! I didn't care so much about the gaol,
but he had killed John Marcey. The gaol--what was that to me! There was
no real shame in it unless he had done a mean thing. He had been wicked
--not mean. Killing is awful, but not shameful. Think--the difference--
if he had been a thief!"
Pierre nodded. "Then some one should have killed him!" he said.
"Well, after?"
"After--after--ah, he went away for a year. Then he came back; but no,
I was always thinking of that night I walked behind John Marcey's body
to the Fort. So he went away again, and we came here, and here we have
lived."
"He has not come here?"
"No; once from the far north he sent me a letter by an Indian, saying
that he was going with a half-breed to search for a hunting party,
an English gentleman and two men who were lost. The name of one
of the men was Brickney."
Pierre stopped short in a long whiffing of smoke. "Holy!" he said,
"that thief Brickney again. He would steal the broad road to hell if he
could carry it. He once stole the quarters from a dead man's eyes. Mon
Dieu! to save Brickney's life, the courage to do that--like sticking your
face in the mire and eating!--But, pshaw!--go on, p'tite Lucille."
"There is no more. I never heard again."
"How long was that ago?"
"Nine months or more."
"Nothing has been heard of any of them?"
"Nothing at all. The Englishman belonged to the Hudson's Bay Company,
but they have heard nothing down here at Fort Ste. Anne."
"If he saves the Company's man, that will make up the man he lost for
them, eh--you think that, eh?" Pierre's eyes had a curious ironical
light.
"I do not care for the Company," she said. "John Marcey's life was his
own."
"Good!" he added quickly, and his eyes admired her. "That is the thing.
Then, do not forget that Marcey took his life in his hands himself, that
he would have killed Laforce if Laforce hadn't killed him."
"I know, I know," she said, "but I should have felt the same if John
Marcey had killed Stroke Laforce."
"It is a pity to throw your life away," he ventured. He said this for a
purpose. He did not think she was throwing it away.
She was watching a little knot of horsemen coming over a swell of the
prairie far off. She withdrew her eyes and fixed them on Pierre. "Do
you throw your life away if you do what is the only thing you are told
to do?"
She placed her hand on her heart--that had been her one guide.
Pierre got to his feet, came over, and touched her on the shoulder.
"You have the great secret," he said quietly. "The thing may be all
wrong to others, but if it's right to yourself--that's it--mais oui!
If he comes," he added "if he comes back, think of him as well as Marcey.
Marcey is sleeping--what does it matter? If he is awake, he has better
times, for he was a man to make another world sociable. Think of
Laforce, for he has his life to live, and he is a man to make this
world sociable.
'The Scarlet Hunter is sick for home--
(Why should the door be shut?)'"
Her eyes had been following the group of horsemen on the plains. She
again fixed them on Pierre, and stood up.
"It is a beautiful legend--that," she said.
"But?--but?" he asked.
She would not answer him. "You will come again," she said; "you will--
help me?"
"Surely, p'tite Lucille, surely, I will come. But to help--ah,
that would sound funny to the Missionary at the Fort and to others!"
"You understand life," she said, "and I can speak to you."
"It's more to you to understand you than to be good, eh?"
"I guess it's more to any woman," she answered. They both passed out of
the house. She turned towards the broken shutter. Then their eyes met.
A sad little smile hovered at her lips.
"What is the use?" she said, and her eyes fastened on the horsemen.
He knew now that she would never shudder again at the sight of it,
or at the remembrance of Marcey's death.
"But he will come," was the reply to her, and her smile almost settled
and stayed.
They parted, and as he went down the hill he saw far over, coming up,
a woman in black, who walked as if she carried a great weight. "Every
shot that kills ricochets," he said to himself:
"His mother dead--her mother like that!"
He passed into the Fort, renewing acquaintances in the Company's store,
and twenty minutes after he was one to greet the horsemen that Lucille
had seen coming over the hills. They were five, and one had to be helped
from his horse. It was Stroke Laforce, who had been found near dead at
the Metal River by a party of men exploring in the north.
He had rescued the Englishman and his party, but within a day of the
finding the Englishman died, leaving him his watch, a ring, and a cheque
on the H. B. C. at Winnipeg. He and the two survivors, one of whom was
Brickney, started south. One night Brickney robbed him and made to get
away, and on his seizing the thief he was wounded. Then the other man
came to his help and shot Brickney: after that weeks of wandering, and
at last rescue and Fort Ste. Anne.
A half-hour after this Pierre left Laforce on the crest of the hill above
the Fort, and did not turn to go down till he had seen the other pass
within the house with the broken shutter. And later he saw a little
bonfire on the hill. The next evening he came to the house again
himself. Lucille rose to meet him.
"'Why should the door be shut?"' he quoted smiling.
"The door is open," she answered quickly and with a quiet joy.
He turned to the motion of her hand, and saw Laforce asleep on a couch.
Soon afterwards, as he passed from the house, he turned towards the
window. The broken shutter was gone.
He knew now the meaning of the bonfire the night before.