The Hunters of the Hills by Joseph A. Altsheler (best books under 200 pages txt) 📗

if so we can give him our letters and go. I was glad to come to Quebec, and I'll be equally glad to leave."

"And we can see the lodges of the Hodenosaunee again," said Tayoga, his eyes glistening.

"Yes, Tayoga, and glad I'll be to be once more among your great people, the hunters of the hills."

It was about two o'clock in the morning, when Robert went to bed, and he slept very late. Willet awoke shortly after dawn, dressed himself and went to the window, where he stood, gazing absently at the deepening sunlight on the green hills, although he saw the incidents of the heated night before far more vividly. He was a man who did not favor bloodshed, though it was a hard and stern age, and the slaying of Boucher, who would have added another to his victims, did not trouble him even the morning after. In his mind was the thought, expressed so powerfully, that the mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceeding small. However, his anxiety to be away from Quebec had grown with the hours. The dangers were too thick, and they also had a bad habit of increasing continually.

When Robert awoke he found the hunter and Tayoga awaiting him.

"I've ordered breakfast," said Willet, "and it will be ready for us as soon as you dress. After that I'll have to comply with some formalities, owing to last night's affair, and then if the Governor General arrives this afternoon, we can deliver our letters and depart. It seems strange, Robert, that we should be here such a little while and that both you and I should fight duels. Perhaps it will be Tayoga's turn today, and he too will have to fight."

"Not unless Tandakora seeks me," said the young Onondaga.

"Did you see what became of him last night, Tayoga?" asked Willet.

"I watched him all the time you and the Frenchman were fighting, and I watched also when we came back to the inn. He would willingly have thrown a tomahawk in the dark at the head of any one of us, but he knew I watched and he did not dare."

"And that Ojibway savage is another of our troubles. He's gone clean mad with his hate of us."

Their late breakfast was served by Monsieur Berryer himself with much deference and some awe. The large room also held many more guests than usual at such an hour, but most of them ate little, only an egg or a roll, perhaps, or they dallied over a cup of coffee, reserving most of their attention for Willet, whom they regarded covertly, but with extraordinary interest. The youth with him had shown himself to be a fine swordsman, as Count Jean de Mézy could testify, but the elder man, who had appeared to be a hunter, and who claimed to be one, was such a master of the weapon as had never before appeared in New France. And it was said by the French officers that his equal could not be found in old France either. The interest aroused by his fame was increased by the mystery that enshrouded him, and they gave him an attention that was not at all hostile. In truth, it was strongly compounded with admiration. A man who had removed Pierre Boucher as he had done, was to be regarded with respect. Boucher had given every promise of becoming a public danger in Quebec, and perhaps they owed gratitude to the hunter, Bostonnais though he was.

Late in the afternoon they had word that the Marquis Duquesne had come and would receive them. Again they arrayed themselves with the greatest care, and took their way to the Castle of St. Louis. They found a man very different in appearance and manner from the Intendant, Bigot. Tall, austere, belonging to a race that was reckoned very noble in France, the Marquis Duquesne was not popular in New France. He had none of the geniality and easy generosity of Bigot, as he spent his own money, but he had shown a military energy and foresight which the British governors to the south were far from imitating. While Canada did not love him, it respected him and his boldness, and his daring and foresight had deeply impressed the powerful Indian tribes whose friendship and alliance were so important in the coming war.

The manner of the Marquis was high, when he received the three in his chamber of audience, but it was not deficient in courtesy. He looked intently at each of them in turn.

"You come, so I am told, from the Governor of New York," he said, "and judging from what I have heard he has chosen messengers who are able to make a stir. Two days in Quebec and already you have fought two duels, one of them ending fatally."

"My lord," said Willet, gravely, "they were not of our seeking."

"That also, I hear. They tell me, too, Mr. Willet, that you are an incomparable swordsman, and it must be true, or you would not have been able to defeat Boucher. But that matter is adjusted. You will not be held here because of his death. It seems that the Intendant, Monsieur Bigot himself, does not wish to carry it further. But the letters from the Governor of New York?"

"Mr. Lennox has them," said Willet.

Robert bowed and took from an inner pocket of his waistcoat the letters he had carried through so many dangers. They were contained in a small deerskin pouch, and were only two in number. Bowing again, he handed them to the Governor General, who said:

"Pray be seated, and excuse me for a few minutes while I read them."

He read slowly, stopping at times to consider, and when he had finished he read them over again.

"Do you and Mr. Willet know the contents of these letters?" he said to
Robert.

"We do," replied the youth. "They were read to us by the Governor of New
York before he sealed them. If we were robbed of them on the way to
Quebec, and he knew the way was dangerous, we were to continue our
journey and deliver the message to you verbally."

"Their nature does credit to both the heart and head of the Governor of New York. He makes a personal appeal to me to use all my influence against the war seemingly at hand. He says that England and France have nothing to gain by attacking each other in the American woods, which are large enough to hide whole European kingdoms. But he wishes the letters to be a secret with him and me and you three who have brought them. You understand that?"

Robert bowed once more.

"The second letter explains and amplifies the first, contains, I should say, his afterthoughts. As I said, 'tis a noble act, but what can I do? A war may look to many men like a sudden outburst, but it is nearly always the result of conditions that have been a long time in the growth. Your hunters, your traders and your surveyors pressed forward into the Ohio country, which is ours."

He looked at them as if he expected them to challenge the French claim to the Ohio regions, but they were wisely silent.

"The letters do not demand an immediate reply," he continued. "His Excellency prays me to consider. Perhaps I shall send one later through a trusted messenger by sloop or schooner to New York, and naturally, I shall choose one of my own officers."

"Naturally, my lord," said Robert. "We did not expect to take back the answer."

The Marquis Duquesne looked at him very keenly.

"You speak as if you were relieved at not having the errand," he said. "Perhaps there is something else on your mind which you wish to do and with which such a mission would interfere."

Robert was silent and the Marquis laughed.

"I will not press the question, because I've no right to do so," he said. "But I will let it remain an inference."

Then his eye rested upon Tayoga, at whom he looked long and searchingly, and the eye of the Onondaga met him with an answering gaze, fixed and unfaltering.

"Captain de Galisonnière has told me," said the Marquis, "that you are a young chief, or coming chief, of the Iroquois, that despite your youth you have thought much and have influence with your people. How do the Iroquois feel toward the French who wish them so well?"

"They do not forget that this Quebec is the Stadacona of one of their great warrior nations, the Mohawks," replied Tayoga.

The Marquis started and flushed.

"Quebec is ours," he said slowly, after taking due thought. "You cannot undo what was done two centuries ago."

"The nations of the Hodenosaunee do not forget, what are two centuries to them?"

"When you return to the Long House in the vale of Onondaga, and the fifty sachems meet in council, tell them Onontio has only kindness in his heart for them. The war clouds that hang over England and France grow many and thick, and my children are brave and vigilant. They know the ways of the forest. They travel by day and by night, and they strike hard. The English are not a match for them."

"If I should tell them what Onontio tells to me they would say: 'Go back to Quebec, which is by right the Stadacona of our great warrior nation, the Mohawks, and say to Onontio that his words are like the songs of birds, but we, the Hodenosaunee, do not forget. We remember Frontenac, and we remember Champlain, the first of the white men to come among us with guns, the use of which we did not know, killing our warriors.'"

"Time makes changes, Tayoga, and the Iroquois must change too."

Tayoga, was silent, but his haughty face did not relax a particle. The Marquis was about to say more upon the subject, but he had a penetrating mind and he saw that his words would be wasted.

"We shall see what we shall see," he said. "My master, His Majesty King Louis, keeps his promises. Mr. Lennox, as I take it, still clinging to my inference, it will be some time before you see the Governor of New York again. But, when you do see him, and if my letter has not then reached him, tell him it is coming by ship to New York. As for you and your comrades, I wish you a safe journey whithersoever you go. An aide-de-camp will give the three of you, as you go out, passports which will be your safe conduct until you reach the borders of Canada. Of course, I cannot speak with certainty concerning anything that will happen to you beyond that point. Mr. Willet, I am sorry that a sword such as yours is not French."

Willet bowed, and so did Robert. Then the three withdrew, receiving their safe conducts as they went. At the inn they made hurried preparations for departure, deciding that they would cross at once to the south side of the St. Lawrence and travel on foot through the woods until they reached the Richelieu, where in a secret cove a canoe belonging to Willet lay hidden. The canoe would take them into Lake Champlain and then they could proceed by water to the point they wished.

Robert wrote a note of thanks to the Intendant for his courtesy, expressing their united regrets that the brevity of time would not permit them to pay a formal call, and as it departed in the hands of a messenger, de Galisonnière came to say farewell.

"It's likely," he said, "that if we meet again it will be on the battlefield. I see nothing for it but a war, but if we do meet, Mr. Willet, you must promise that you will not use that sword against me."

"I promise, Captain de Galisonnière," said Willet, smiling, "but if the war does come, and I hope it may not, it will be fought chiefly in the woods, and there will be little need for swords. And now we wish to thank you for your great kindness and help."

He shook hands with them all, showing some emotion, and then left hastily. The three deferred their departure, concluding to spend the night at the inn, but before dawn the next morning they crossed the St. Lawrence and began their journey.

CHAPTER XIII THE BOWMEN

Robert looked back and saw the roofs and spires of Quebec sitting on its mighty rock, and he remembered how much had happened during their short stay there.