Part 36 (2/2)

They spread the blanket about and seated her in the middle. One man took his place behind her, one in front, and each had two ends of the blanket to frustrate any desperate move. Then another stood up to the paddle and steered the canoe swiftly along the stream, which was an arm of a greater river emptying into the lake.

What could they want of her? Jeanne mused. Perhaps a ransom, she had heard such tales, though it was oftener after a battle that a prisoner was released by a ransom. She did not know in what direction they were taking her, everything was strange though she had been on many of the small streams about Detroit. Now the way was narrow, overhung with gloomy trees, here and there a white beech s.h.i.+ning out in a ghostly fas.h.i.+on. The sun dropped down and darkness gathered, broken by the shrill cry of a wild cat or the prolonged howl of a wolf. Here they started a nest of waterfowl that made a great clatter, but they glided swiftly by. It grew darker and darker but they went silently with only a low grunt from one of the Indians now and then.

Presently they reached the main stream. This was much larger, with the sh.o.r.es farther off and clearer, though weird enough in the darkness.

Stars were coming out. Jeanne watched them in the deep magnificent blue, golden, white, greenish and with crimson tints. Was the world beyond the stars as beautiful as this? But she knew no one there. She wondered a little about her mother--was she in that bright sphere? There was another Mother--

”O Mother of G.o.d,” she cried in her soul, ”have pity upon me! I put myself in thy care. Guard me from evil! Restore me to my home!”

For it seemed, amid these rough savages, she sorely needed a mother's tender care. And she thought now there had been no loving woman in her life save Pani. Madame Bellestre had petted her, but she had lost her out of her life so soon. There had been the schoolmaster, that she could still think of with affection for all his queer fatherly interest and kindness; there was M. Loisel; and oh, Monsieur St. Armand, who was coming back in the early summer, and had some plans to lay before her.

Even M. De Ber had been kindly and friendly, but Madame had never approved her. Poor Madame Campeau had come to love her, but often in her wandering moments she called her Berthe.

The quiet, the lapping of the waves, and perhaps a little fatigue overcame her at length. She dropped back against the Indian's knee, and her soft breath rose and fell peacefully. He drew the blanket up over her.

”Ugh! ugh!” he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, but she heard it not. ”The tide is good, we shall make the Point before dawn.”

The others nodded. They lighted their pipes, and presently the Indian at the paddle changed with one of his comrades and they stole on and on, both wind and tide in their favor. Several times their charge stirred but did not wake. Youth and health had overcome even anxiety.

There was dawn in the eastern sky. Jeanne roused.

”Oh, where am I?” she cried in piercing accents; and endeavored to spring up.

”Thou art safe enough and naught has harmed thee,” was the reply. ”Keep quiet, that is all.”

”Oh, where do you mean to take me? I am stiff and cold. Oh, let me change a little!”

She straightened herself and pulled the blanket over her. The same stolid faces that had refused any satisfaction last night met her gaze again in blankness.

There was a broad, open s.p.a.ce of water, no longer the river. She glanced about. A sudden arrow of gold gleamed swiftly across it--then another, and it was a sea of flame with dancing crimson lights.

”It is the lake,” she said. ”Lake Huron.” She had been up the picturesque sh.o.r.es of the St. Clair river.

The Indian nodded.

”You are going north?” A great terror overwhelmed her like a sudden revelation.

The answer was a solemn nod.

”Some one has hired you to do this.”

Not a muscle in any stolid face moved.

”If I guess rightly will you tell me?”

There was a refusal in the shake of the head.

Jeanne Angelot at that moment could have leaped from the boat. Yet she knew it would be of no avail. A chill went through every pulse and turned it to the ice of apprehension.

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