Produced by Ted Garvin, Leah Moser and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team
[Illustration]
1894
The waiting April woods, sensitive in every leafless twig to spring,stood in silence and dim nightfall around a lodge. Wherever a humandwelling is set in the wilderness, it becomes, by the very humility ofits proportions, a prominent and aggressive point. But this lodgeof bark and poles was the color of the woods, and nearly escapedintruding as man's work. A glow lighted the top, revealing the faintazure of smoke which rose straight upward in the cool, clear air.
Such a habitation usually resounded at nightfall with Indian noises,especially if the day's hunting had been good. The mossy rocks lyingaround, were not more silent than the inmates of this lodge. You couldhear the Penobscot River foaming along its uneasy bed half a mileeastward. The poles showed freshly cut disks of yellow at the top; andthough the bark coverings were such movables as any Indian householdcarried, they were newly fastened to their present support. This wasplainly the night encampment of a traveling party, and two Frenchhunters and their attendant Abenaquis recognized that, as it barredtheir trail to the river. An odor of roasted meat was wafted out likean invitation to them.
"Excellent, Saint-Castin," pronounced the older Frenchman. "Hereis another of your wilderness surprises. No wonder you prefer anenchanted land to the rough mountains around Béarn. I shall never goback to France myself."
"Stop, La Hontan!" The young man restrained his guest from plunginginto the wigwam with a headlong gesture recently learned and practicedwith delight. "I never saw this lodge before."
"Did you not have it set up here for the night?"
"No; it is not mine. Our Abenaquis are going to build one for usnearer the river."
"I stay here," observed La Hontan. "Supper is ready, and adventuresare in the air."
"But this is not a hunter's lodge. You see that our very dogsunderstand they have no business here. Come on."
"Come on, without seeing who is hid herein? No. I begin to think it issomething thou wouldst conceal from me. I go in; and if it be a beartrap, I cheerfully perish."
The young Frenchman stood resting the end of his gun on sodden leaves.He felt vexed at La Hontan. But that inquisitive nobleman stoopedto lift the tent flap, and the young man turned toward his waitingIndians and talked a moment in Abenaqui, when they went on in thedirection of the river, carrying game and camp luggage. They thought,as he did, that this might be a lodge with which no man ought tomeddle. The daughter of Madockawando, the chief, was known to becoming from her winter retreat. Every Abenaqui in the tribe stoodin awe of the maid. She did not rule them as a wise woman, but livedapart from them as a superior spirit.
Baron La Hontan, on all fours, intruded his gay face on the inmates ofthe lodge. There were three of them. His palms encountered a carpetof hemlock twigs, which spread around a central fire to the circularwall, and was made sweetly odorous by the heat. A thick couch of thetwigs was piled up beyond the fire, and there sat an Abenaqui girl inher winter dress