The Buffalo Runners - Robert Michael Ballantyne (read aloud .txt) 📗

you led a storming party against the fort in South America, and was the only one left o' the party, and fought your way all alone in through the breach till the troops came up and carried you on with a rush, and--and--was all about that untrue?"

"Not a bit of it, Billie, though I wouldn't have you think I was boastin' about it. I only gave you the bare facts, which, like bare poles, is as much as a ship can stand sometimes."

"An' that time you jumped overboard in Port Royal among the sharks to save the little girl?"

"That's a fact, if ever there was one," said the seaman quickly, "for the dear child is alive this good day to swear to it if need be."

"Yet you tell me," continued Little Bill, "that you have not the courage to ask a nice little girl to marry you?"

"That's exactly how the matter stands, Billie."

It was now Billie's turn to look perplexed.

"Who is this nice little girl?" he asked abruptly, as if the answer to that question might help to explain the enigma.

"Well--it's Elise Morel; an', mind, not a soul knows about that but you an' me, Little Bill."

"But--but Elise is _not_ a little girl. She's a big woman!"

Jenkins laughed as he explained that seamen sometimes had a habit-- mistaken, it might be--of calling even big women "nice little gals" when they chanced to be fond of them.

"And are you _really_ afraid to ask Elise to marry you?" asked the boy, earnestly.

"I suspect that's what's the matter wi' me," replied the sailor, with a modest look.

"I always thought that nothing could frighten you," said Billie, in a somewhat disappointed tone, for it seemed to him as if one of his idols were shaking on its pedestal. "I can't understand it, for _I_ would not be afraid to ask her--if I wanted her."

At this Jenkins again laughed, and said that he believed him, and that Billie would understand these things better when he was older.

"In the meantime, Little Bill," he continued, "I haven't got the heart of a Mother Carey's chicken. I could stand afore a broadside without winkin', I believe; I think I could blow up a magazine, or fight the French, as easy as I could eat my breakfast a'most, but to ask a pure, beautiful angel like Elise to marry _me_, a common seaman--why, I hasn't got it in me. Yet I'm so fond o' that little gal that I'd strike my colours to _her_ without firin' a single shot--"

"Does Elise want to marry _you_?" asked Billie.

"Oh, that's the very pint!" said the seaman with decision. "If I could only make sure o' that pint, I'd maybe manage to come up to the scratch. Now, that's what I wants you to find out for me, Little Bill, an' I know you're a good little shaver, as'll do a friend a good turn when you can. But you must on no account mention--"

He was going to have said, "You must on no account mention that I was blabbing to you about this, or that I wanted to find out such a thing," when the sudden appearance of Elise's lap-dog announced the fact that its mistress was approaching.

With a flushed face the bold seaman sprang up and darted out, as if to attack one of those pirates of the Java seas who had made so powerful an impression on Little Bill's mind. But his object was escape--not attack. Lightly vaulting the garden fence, he disappeared into the same thicket which, on another occasion, had afforded opportune refuge to Kateegoose. A few moments later Elise turned into the walk, and stood before the summer-house.

"You here, Little Bill!" she exclaimed on entering, "I am very glad to find you, for I have been alone all the morning. Everybody is away--in the fields, I suppose--and I don't like being alone."

"Was you ever in love, Elise?" asked the boy with a solemn countenance.

The girl laughed heartily, and blushed a little.

"What a strange question, Billie," she said; "why do you ask?"

"Well, it's not easy to explain all at once; but--but I want to know if you want to be married?"

Elise laughed again, and, then, becoming suddenly grave, asked seriously why Billie put such foolish questions.

"Because," said Little Bill, slowly, and with an earnest look, "Jenkins is _very_ anxious to know if you are fond of him, and he actually says that he's afraid to ask you to marry him! Isn't that funny? I said that even _I_ would not be afraid to ask you, if I wanted you--How red you are, Elise! Have you been running?"

"O no," replied the girl, sheltering herself under another laugh; "and what did he say to that?"

"He said a great many things. I will try to remember them. Let me see--he said: `I haven't got the heart of a Mother Carey's chicken,'--(he didn't tell me who Mother Carey is, but that's no matter, for it was only one of her chickens he was speaking of);--`I could stand afore a broadside without winkin','--(I give you his very words, Elise, for I don't quite understand them myself);--`I could blow up a magazine,' he went on, `or fight the French, as easy as I could eat my breakfast, a'most, but to ask a pure an' beautiful angel like Elise'-- yes, indeed, you needn't shake your head; he said these very words exactly--`a pure an' beautiful angel like Elise to marry _me_, a common seaman, why, I hasn't got it in me. Yet I'm so fond o' that little gal that I'd strike my colours to her without firin' a single shot.' Now, do you understand all that, Elise? for I don't understand the half of it."

"O yes, I understand a good deal of it, though some of it is indeed puzzling, as you say. But how did you come to recollect it all so well, Little Bill?"

"Because he said he wanted me to help him, and to find out if you wanted to marry him, so I paid particular attention to what he said, and--"

"Did he tell you to tell me all this?" asked Elise abruptly, and with sudden gravity.

"O dear, no; but as he wanted me to find it out for him, and said that not a soul knew about the matter but me, I thought the simplest way would be to tell you all he said, and then ask you straight. He was going to tell me something more, very particularly, for he was just saying, in a very solemn tone, `You must on no account mention--' when your little dog bounced in and Jenkins bounced out, leaving the rest of it unsaid."

"Then he has just left you?" said Elise.

"Just a moment or two before you came up. I think he must have seen some sort of beast in the wood, and gone in chase of it, he bolted in such a hurry, so I don't know yet what I was not to mention."

"Now, Little Bill," said Elise with great seriousness of tone and manner, "you must not tell Mr Jenkins one word of the conversation that you and I have had just now."

"What! not a single word?"

"Not one. You understand?"

"Yes, but, if he asks me, I must answer something, you know, and I must not tell lies."

"Quite true, Billie. You must not tell lies on any account whatever. Now, listen. If he asks you about our conversation this morning, you must say that I told you you were never to open your lips about the subject again either to me or to him or to anybody. Mr Jenkins is an honourable man, and will not ask you a single question after that."

"Then I'm not to tell him whether you want to marry him?"

"How can you tell him what you don't know?"

"Well, but, I mean that you're not going to tell me, so that I might tell him?"

"Certainly not."

"Not a word to him and not a word to you--nor to anybody! Not even to Archie!"

"Yes. That is exactly what you must promise me."

"This is a very unpleasant state of things," said Little Bill, with a sad and puzzled countenance, "but of course I promise, for it is your affair, you know."

It was a notable fact, which Little Bill did not fail to note--but did not dare to mention--that after that date there was a distinct change of demeanour in Elise Morel towards the handsome sailor--whether in his favour or otherwise it was impossible to tell.

Meanwhile, events were pending which were destined to exercise a very powerful influence over the fortunes of the Red River Colony, and, indeed, over the condition of the whole of Rupert's Land.


CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.


THE FISHERY DISASTERS.

One fine day, when summer had merged into autumn, and things in Red River appeared to be advancing favourably, and Dan Davidson had recovered his strength, and Little Bill was fairly well, it occurred to Okematan that he would like to go to Lake Winnipeg, and see how the settlers who had gone to the fishery there, were getting on.

You see, the Cree chief was an observant savage, and, before returning to his tribe, had made up his mind to see all the phases in the life of the new Palefaces who had thus come to take possession of the land.

He was a remarkably independent fellow, and as he served the Davidsons for nothing except his food--which he did not count, as he could easily have supplied himself with victuals by means of his line, bow, and gun-- he did not deem it necessary to ask leave of absence. He merely went to the house one morning, and announced his intention of going to Lake Winnipeg to fish.

"I will go with you," said Dan, to whom the announcement was made.

"An' so will I," said Fred Jenkins, who chanced to be conversing with Dan at the time--"that is, if they can spare me just now."

"The canoe of Okematan," said the chief, "holds no more than three. He wishes to take with him Arch-ee and Leetil Bill."

"Very well," returned Dan, "there's no objection to that, for there is not much doing on the farm at this moment, and Archie has worked hard all the summer, so he deserves a holiday. We will just make up the same party that started last time, only that Fergus and I will take a somewhat bigger canoe so as to accommodate you, Jenkins."

"Thankee. Though I am big--unfort'nitly--I can stow myself away in small compass, an' I've larned how, when there ain't overmuch grub, to git along fairly well on short allowance. When d'ee trip your anchor?-- I mean, when do ye start?"

"When to-morrow's sun touches the tree-tops in the east," said the Indian chief.

"All right, Okematan, I'm your man--after layin' in a breakfast-cargo."

According to this arrangement the two canoes pushed off at daybreak the following morning, from the wharf at the foot of the garden of Prairie Cottage, and began the descent of the Red River, which, after flowing between twenty and thirty miles northward, enters the mighty bosom of Lake Winnipeg.