Part 6 (1/2)
”A sweetheart for you, Pepin. A sweetheart, _mon ami_”
answered the big breed, in a conciliatory voice.
Dorothy nearly sank to the ground in horror when she heard this rude jest.
”Bah!” cried the manikin, ”it is another female you will want to foist off upon me, is it? Eh? What? But no, _coquin_, Pepin has not been the catch of the Saskatchewan all these years without learning wisdom. Who is she--a prisoner? Eh? Is not that so?”
”That is so, Pepin, she is preesonar, and Riel has ordered her to be detained here. Your house is the only quiet one in the town this night, and that is why we came. Tell Antoine to be so good as to stand back.”
Antoine was the bear, which still stood swaying gently from one side to the other with a comical expression of inquiry and gravity on its old-fas.h.i.+oned face.
Pepin surveyed the mob with no friendly scrutiny.
”What you want here, you _canaille, sans-culottes?_” he demanded. And then in no complimentary terms he bade them begone.
The crowd, however, still lingered, with that spirit of curiosity peculiar to most crowds; so the dwarf brought them to their senses. Suddenly poking Antoine in the ribs, he brought him down on all fours, and then, brus.h.i.+ng past Dorothy and her captors, and still leading the bear, he charged the mob with surprising agility, scattering it right and left. It was evident that they stood in wholesome dread of Pepin and his methods. Then, coming back with the bear, he put one hand on his heart, and with a bow of grotesque gallantry, bade Dorothy enter the house. The Indian he promptly sent about his business with a sudden blow over the chest that would probably have injured a white man's bones. The red man looked for a moment as if he meditated reprisals, but Pepin merely blinked at the cudgel, and Man-of-might, with a disgusted ”Ough! ough!” changed his mind and incontinently fled. Dorothy's captor, Pierre La Chene, and Katie, alone entered the dwarf's abode.
It suddenly occurred to Dorothy that this was the Pepin Quesnelle of whom and of whose tame bear Rory was wont to tell tales. Dorothy noticed that Katie had a brief whispered conference with the truculent Pepin before entering. The result of it was somewhat unexpected; the half-breed girl took Dorothy by the arm and led her into a low room, which was scrupulously clean, at the end of the pa.s.sage. There was no one in it. Katie seemed strangely nervous as she shut the door, and the girl wondered what was about to happen. Then the half-breed turned suddenly and looked into her eyes, at the same time placing one hand upon her wrist.
”Listen,” she said, ”I thought I loved you, but you have made me mad--so mad this night! Now tell me true--_verite sans peur_--you shall--you must tell me--do you love Pierre?”
If it had not been for the tragic light in the poor girl's eyes, Dorothy would have laughed in her face at the bare idea. As it was, she answered in such an emphatic way that Katie had no more doubts on that point. Then Dorothy asked the latter to send Pierre to her and to be herself present at the interview.
Katie at first demurred. She was afraid that the interview might prove too much for the susceptible frail one. But she brought him in, and when Dorothy had spoken a few words to him, the fickle swain was only too anxious to make it up with his real love. This satisfactory part of the programme completed, Katie packed him off into the next room, and then, with the emotional and demonstrative nature of her people, literally grovelled in the dust before Dorothy. She stooped and kissed her moccasined feet, and called on the girl to forgive her for her treacherous conduct But Dorothy raised her from the ground and comforted her as best she could. To her she was as a child, although perhaps her pa.s.sion was a revelation that as yet she but imperfectly comprehended.
But Katie was to prove the sincerity of her regret in a practical fas.h.i.+on.
”Where are your friends?” she asked. ”Tell me everything--yes, you can trust me. By the Blessed Virgin, I swear I will serve you faithfully!” She raised her great dark tear-stained eyes to Dorothy's.
The girl instinctively felt that Katie was to be trusted.
The only question was, could she count upon her discretion?
She felt that she could do that also; she knew that in a matter of intrigue the dusky metis have no equals. The chances were that the others had reached the Fort; if so, no more harm could be done. Briefly she told Katie about those who had started out with her to steal through the rebel lines to the English garrison.
”If Jacques and the women went in the direction you say,”
said Katie, ”the chances are they have got to the Fort.
It matters not about the Police and Rory--they can look after themselves. I doubt, however, if your father and the sergeant have got through. You will stay in this house while I go and see. I have many friends among our people; the hearts of some of them not being entirely with Riel, they will help me. I shall take Pierre. Pepin and his mother you need not fear--they are not of the rebels; they have lived too long at Medicine Hat with the whites.”
And then she went on briefly to explain how Pepin was a man renowned for his great wisdom and his cunning, as well as for the bodily strength which had once enabled him to strangle a bear. Still, his one great weakness was conceit of his personal appearance, and his belief that every woman was making a dead set at him. He also prided himself upon his manners, which were either absurdly elaborate or rough to a startling degree, as the mood seized him, and as Dorothy had seen for herself. His mother, whom she would see in the next room, was rather an amiable old soul, whose one providentially overpowering delusion was that Pepin was all that he considered himself to be. She regarded most young unengaged women with suspicion, as she fancied they looked upon her son with matrimonial designs. Katie knew that the old lady was at heart a match-maker, but, with the exception of herself, who, however, was engaged, she had found no one good or beautiful enough to aspire to an alliance with the Quesnelle family.
Dorothy felt vastly relieved at hearing all this. Then Katie took her by the hand, and, telling her to be of good courage, as she had nothing to fear led her into the next room.
”A good daughter for you, mother,” she said smilingly to the dame who sat by the fire.
The old white-haired woman, who was refres.h.i.+ngly clean and tidy, turned her dark eyes sharply upon the new arrival. Whether it was that Dorothy was prepossessed in her favour and showed it, and that the old lady took it as a personal compliment, or that the physical beauty of the girl appealed to her, is immaterial; but the fact remained that she in her turn was favourably impressed.
She motioned to a seat beside herself.
”Sit hyar, honey,” she said. ”I will put the kettle on the fire and give you to eat and drink.”
But the girl smilingly thanked her, and said that she had not long since finished supper. In no way loth to do so, she then went and sat down next the old dame, who regarded her with considerable curiosity and undisguised favour. Katie, seeing that she could safely leave her charge there, spoke a few words in a strange patois of Cree and French to Pepin, and, calling Pierre, left the house.