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"An Indian attack. The Iroquois are burning the settlement, and murdering our people. To arms! to arms!" There had been no Indian raid for a long while. Destournier had tried to fortify the back of his plantation. There were Montagnais and Algonquins of the better type living there peaceably. It was not altogether cupidity.
M. Destournier is willing to go at last, and I shall see that he never returns to this dreary hole." "It can hardly be called a hole, when there are so many heights all about," laughed the girl. "It is a wretched place. And you will soon like France, and wonder how people are content to stay here. You see the Governor's wife had enough of it. She had good sense."
Miladi was in her glory ordering it, and Savignon paid her some compliments that quite savored of old times in her native land. She was fond of admiration, and here there was but small allowance of it. He was to restore the young brave to his tribe, and Destournier was to accompany him. He saw that with trade open to rivals there must be some stations.
"But you must be merry for M. Destournier. He wishes you to be happy, and has asked me to be a mother to you. Why, I fell in love with you long ago, when you were so ill. And surely you have not forgotten when I found you on the gallery, in a dead faint. You were grateful for everything then." Had she loved miladi so much? Why did she not love her now?
Miladi belonged wholly to Laurent Giffard now. The tie that bound her to M. Destournier was broken, and it was as if it had never been. She remembered he had once said he would relinquish her in that other country. She had simply been given to him in her sorrow, to care for a brief while. And how grandly he had done it.
Various bands of Hurons and Algonquins came to meet the great white Sagamore, and he secured much trade for the coming season. But the fur business was being greatly scattered, and Demont's finances were at a rather low ebb, so there could not be the necessary branching out. Destournier had some schemes as well.
M. Hébert was busy with his young fruit trees. Every year he sent for some hardy kind, and had quite a variety. He was a colonist, which so few of the emigrants were. After a walk about the garden, they went in to see Madame Hébert and Thérèse, who was making lace. Then M. Destournier preferred his request that they would take Rose for a while. He did not hint at any disagreement.
There were bits of old history, a volume of Terence, another of Virgil, and out of what he knew and read he reconstructed stories that charmed her. Most of all she liked to hear about the King. The romances of Henry of Navarre fired her rapidly-awakening imagination. Destournier took several little excursions with the intrepid explorer before the severest of the winter set in.
At the mention of books Rose had glanced up eagerly at Destournier. Then there was a sudden rush without. Both Indian boys were racing and yelling in their broken language. "They are coming; they are coming! The canoes are in," and both began to caper about. Mère Dubray took down a leathern thong and laid it about them; but they were like eels and glided out of her reach.
M. Destournier had to be journeying about a good deal. She could read so delightfully when the nights were long, tiresome, and sleepless. Even Wanamee could not arrange her hair with such deft touches, and it really appeared as if she could take off the burthen of years by some delicate manipulations. Yes, she would miss her very much. But it would be a grand match for a foundling.
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