Part 20 (2/2)

A grand banquet was given the Major in town by his friends, many of whom came miles to attend this farewell supper, for he was a great favorite with all. A large crowd gathered about the stage-coach to shake hands with him as he said good-bye to one and all.

That same evening there were a number of his friends in the neighboring town of Leighton to see him off at the little railroad station. The night was dark, and as he stood in the circle of friends, he excused himself for a moment and stepped aside. There in the gloom stood an Indian woman with her boy, looking on and weeping. It was Napiake and her child who had come a distance of thirty miles to get a last glimpse of him. Faithful to the last, there she stood, weeping disconsolately.

The Major was touched by this evidence of her devotion to him, but as he strove to comfort her the conductor shouted, ”All aboard!” the engine whistled, and the Major, placing a sum of money in the hands of each, kissed them both, sprang upon the train, and was gone. Napiake and the boy watched the retreating train until it disappeared in the darkness, and then sadly retraced their way to the camp.

”I'll give you two horses for her,” said Pinakwaiem.

”Two horses are not enough. She is a good worker, and she is young, and you know she can talk English, and is a good housekeeper, for she was the wife of the white chief.”

”The wife of the white chief! And that's the reason she is not worth so much. I'll give you the two horses.”

”All right, you can have her.”

Napiake, after waiting patiently for two years for the return of her white chief, had become the wife of an old Indian, sold for two horses and destined to slavery. Pinakwaiem led Napiake and her son to his lodge. Not a word escaped from the patient woman. As a sheep led to the slaughter she was dumb, submissively following the man who had bought her, for she was now his wife according to the Indian custom.

There were three women already in the lodge to which she was going who were recognized as wives, and Napiake as the latest addition held a good position for a while amongst them. The old man then treated them well, and she seemed to have a hold upon his affections. She did her work faithfully, uttering no word of complaint. But in a few months the novelty of the new life wore off, and Pinakwaiem began to treat her harshly. It was not hard for him to see that her heart was not with him. Napiake never smiled, and seldom spoke. Her life was sad and hard. She carried the wood from the bush on her back, the burden bending her almost in two, and bore large pails full of water a long distance from the stream. Her little boy seemed to be always in the way; he was scolded, but never struck, for the customs of the natives frown upon the harsh treatment of children.

The old life and the new were in strange contrast. She had become the drudge of the lodge and the most despised of the wives of the old man.

Doomed as she now was to a life of sadness, toil and oppression, all hope died out of her heart and she had no delight in any of the amus.e.m.e.nts of the camp.

Sometimes the name of the white chief was mentioned in her presence as a taunt, and stung with the remembrance of her former treatment, Napiake sought peace in the solitude of the bush or by the river, where she sat for hours with her little boy by her side. She gave not railing for railing. The sweet and beautiful countenance of the former days had fled, and given place to a haggard expression which made her appear to be an old woman, as she dragged her wearied limbs through the camp. Some of the Indians jeered at her, but others pitied her in her loneliness and grief. The thought of her boy alone sustained her, and by a great effort she determined to live for him.

She could not flee to another camp, there was no place for her among the white people, divorce there was none, and she hoped that some day her Indian husband might sell her to another Indian who might treat her more humanely. But the seeds of disease were sown in her system, and she was already doomed to fall a victim to the curse of the Indians, that fell destroyer, consumption.

The medicine drum was beaten night after night, and the song and prayers of the medicine-man sounded through the camp. But all was of no avail; Napiake's life was slowly ebbing away.

Late one night there entered the lodge a white man, dignified and grave. The Indians gave him the seat of honor in the lodge. He knelt beside the sick woman, beautiful now as ever in the days of health.

The haggard looks had disappeared, and a peaceful contentment rested upon her face. The visitor spoke in a low tone, and Napiake listened, attentively answering his questions. Her father and friends leaned forward to catch her faintly expressed words. After some quiet conversation, raising herself in a state of excitement and looking the missionary in the face, Napiake inquired:

”Shall we see each other there?”

”Yes, in the land of G.o.d, we shall see each other.”

”Shall we know each other?” eagerly asked the woman upon whose countenance the shadow of the death-angel had fallen.

”Yes,” was the simple answer of the man.

”I shall see him! I shall see him! Shall we live there always?”

”Yes, we shall, never to be parted again!”

Napiake fell back upon her couch, saying, ”I'm satisfied, I'm satisfied! G.o.d is just.”

A few heavings of the breast and the hands fell by her side. Napiake, the beautiful Blackfoot woman, was at rest.

In a large and busy manufacturing town in the west of England, a merchant sat in his office reading his letters. At the door stood a coach with a pair of handsome horses; seated in it a lady with a babe upon her knee.

”Tell your master that I am waiting,” said she to the footman, who promptly obeyed the command.

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