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Updated: July 27, 2025
Open earth and swallow me!" he almost screamed, and I heard the sound of two persons coming in violent collision at the entrance. "The babe, as I live! The rascally young broth of a babe! Ye rogue, ye!" burred the deep bass tones of the trader whom I had met over Louis Laplante. "What are ye doin' here?" "Oh, is it only you? Thank fortune!" ejaculated the boy, dodging back.
Then I knew the quarrel on the beach was at its height; and Louis Laplante was still foiling the Sioux's approach to Miriam's wigwam like a deft fencer. "Follow me, Little Fellow," I commanded. "Have your knife ready," and I had not finished speaking when three shrill whistles came from Louis. 'Twas his old-time signal of danger.
This afternoon my resignation shall be in the hands of the Speaker, and I shall then be free to state publicly the sentiments I entertain towards all violators of their word, and by the aid of this victim of duplicity, to expose your perfidious treatment of one of your hitherto most faithful supporters. My arguments, my entreaties, my threats prevailed, and Madame Laplante that day entered the service of her country, which she continues to adorn!
"The priest, the Irish priest in the fort, he say to me: 'Wicked fellow, you be tortured forever and ever in the furnace, if you not undo what you did in the gorge! What care Louis Laplante for the fire? Pah! What care Louis for wounds and cuts and threats? Pah! The fire not half so hot as the hell inside!
"Come on, slugs, sloths, laggards," commanded Laplante impatiently, and we dashed into the thick of the woods, leaving the white figure alone against the shadowy thicket. She called out something, of which I heard only two words, "Miriam" and "Rufus"; but I knew those names were uttered in supplication and they filled my heart with daring hope.
But while Louis Laplante gulped down his rum, becoming drunker and more communicative, the tempter threw glass after glass over his shoulder and remained sober. The Nor'-Wester motioned me to keep behind the Frenchman and I heard his drunken lips mumbling my own name. "Rufush prig stuck-up prig serve him tam right! Hamilton's sh sh prig too sho's his wife. Serve 'em all tam right!"
Louis Laplante, contrary to the priest's orders, also rose and disappeared in the woods. Little Fellow still lay by me, but I could not rely on him for intelligent action, and there came over me that sense of aloneness in danger, which I knew so well in the Mandane country. The child's slightest cry might alarm the camp, and I shivered when he breathed heavily, or turned in his sleep.
I have heard my Uncle Jack MacKenzie say that vice and liquor and folly are best frustrated by flight; and all three seemed to be embodied in Louis Laplante that night. A stupid sort of curiosity made me dally with the mischief brewing in him, just as the fly plays with the spider-web, or the fish with a baited hook.
I was sitting with a group of men squatted before my fatherly Indian's lodge, when somebody walked up behind us and gave a long, low whistle. "Mon Dieu! Mine frien', the enemy! Sacredie! 'Tis he! Thou cock-brained idiot! Ho ho! Alone among the Sioux!" came the astonished, half-breathless exclamation of Louis Laplante, mixing his English and French as he was wont, when off guard.
I saw Louis Laplante come limping out, leaning on the arm of the red-faced man, whose eye quailed when it met mine. Poor Louis looked sadly battered, with his head in a white bandage, one arm in a sling, and a dejected stoop to his shoulders that was unusual with him. "This is too bad, Louis," said I, hurrying forward. "I forgot to send word about you.
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