The Gun-Brand, James B. Hendryx [i read a book TXT] 📗

friend of the Indians, and a terror to those who looked upon the red man as their natural prey.

Step by step, the events that had been the milestones of this man's life recurred to his mind as he tramped tirelessly through the scrub growth of the barrens toward a spot upon the shore of the lake—the only grass plot within a radius of five hundred miles. Throwing himself down beside a low, sodded mound in the centre of the plot, he idly watched the great flocks of water fowls disport themselves upon the surface of the lake.

How long he lay there, he had no means of knowing, when suddenly his ears detected the soft swish of paddles. He leaped to his feet and, peering toward the water, saw, close to the shore, a canoe manned by four stalwart paddlers. He looked closer, scarcely able to credit his eyes. And at the same moment, in response to a low-voiced order, the canoe swung abruptly shoreward and grated upon the shingle of the beach. Two figures stepped out, and Chloe Elliston, followed by Big Lena, advanced boldly toward him. MacNair's jaw closed with a snap as the girl approached smiling. For in the smile was no hint of friendliness—only defiance, not unmingled with contempt.

"You see, Mr. Brute MacNair," she said, "I have kept my word. I told you I would invade your kingdom—and here I am."

MacNair did not reply, but stood leaning upon his rifle. His attitude angered her.

"Well," she said, "what are you going to do about it?" Still the man did not answer, and, stooping, plucked a tiny weed from among the blades of grass. The girl's eyes followed his movements. She started and looked searchingly into his face. For the first time she noticed that the mound was a grave.

CHAPTER X AN INTERVIEW

"Oh, forgive me!" Chloe cried, "I—I did not know that I was intruding upon—sacred ground!" There was real concern in her voice, and the lines of Bob MacNair's face softened.

"It is no matter," he said. "She who sleeps here will not be disturbed."

The unlooked for gentleness of the man's tone, the simple dignity of his words, went straight to Chloe Elliston's heart. She felt suddenly ashamed of her air of flippant defiance, felt mean, and small, and self-conscious. She forgot for the moment that this big, quiet man who stood before her was rough, even boorish in his manner, and that he was the oppressor and debaucher of Indians.

"A—a woman's grave?" faltered the girl.

"My mother's."

"Did she live here, on Snare Lake?" Chloe asked in surprise, as her glance swept the barren cliffs of its shore.

MacNair answered with the same softness of tone that somehow dispelled all thought of his uncouthness. "No. She lived at Fort Norman, over on the Mackenzie—that is, she died there. Her home, I think, was in the Southland. My father used to tell me how she feared the North—-its snows and bitter cold, its roaring, foaming rivers, its wild, fierce storms, and its wind-lashed lakes. She hated its rugged cliffs and hills, its treeless barrens and its mean, scrubby timber. She loved the warm, long summers, and the cities and people, and—" he paused, knitting his brows—"and whatever there is to love in your land of civilization. But she loved my father more than these—more than she feared the North. My father was the factor at Fort Norman, so she stayed in the North—and the North killed her. To live in the North, one must love the North. She died calling for the green grass of her Southland."

He ceased speaking and unconsciously stooped and plucked a few spears of grass which he held in his palm and examined intently.

"Why should one die calling for the sight of grass?" he asked abruptly, gazing into Chloe's eyes with a puzzled look.

The girl gazed directly, searchingly into MacNair's eyes. The naive frankness of him—his utter simplicity—astounded her.

"Oh!" she cried, impulsively stepping forward. "It wasn't the grass—it was—oh! can't you see?" The man regarded her wonderingly and shook his head.

"No," he answered gravely. "I can not see."

"It was—everything! Life—friends—home! The grass was only the symbol—the tangible emblem that stood for life!" MacNair nodded, but, by the look in his eye, Chloe knew that he did not understand and that pride and a certain natural reserve sealed his lips from further questioning.

"It is far to the Mackenzie," ventured the girl.

"Aye, far. After my father died I brought her here."

"You! Brought her here!" she exclaimed, staring in surprise into the strong emotionless face.

The man nodded slowly. "In the winter it was—and I came alone—dragging her body upon a sled——"

"But why——"

"Because I think she would have wished it so. If one hated the wild, rugged cliffs and the rock-tossed rapids, would one wish to lie upon a cliff with the rapids roaring, for ever and ever? I do not think that, so I brought her here—away from the grey hills and the ceaseless roar of the rapids."

"But the grass?"

"I brought that from the Southland. I failed many times before I found a kind that would grow. It is little I can do for her, and she does not know, but, somehow, it has made me feel—easier—I cannot tell you exactly. I come here often."

"I think she does know," said Chloe softly, and brushed hot tears from her eyes. Could this be the man whose crimes against the poor, ignorant savages were the common knowledge of the North? Could this be he whom men called Brute—this simple-spoken, straightforward, boyish man who had endured hardships and spared no effort, that the mother he had never known might lie in her eternal rest beneath the green sod of her native land, far from the sights, and sounds that, in life, had become a torture to her soul, and worn her, at last, to the grave?

"Mr.—MacNair." The hard note—the note of uncompromising antagonism—had gone from her voice, and the man looked at her in surprise. It was the first time she had addressed him without prefixing the name Brute and emphasizing the prefix. He stood, regarding her calmly, waiting for her to proceed. Somehow, Chloe found that it had become very difficult for her to speak; to say the things to this man that she had intended to say. "I cannot understand you—your viewpoint."

"Why should you try? I ask no one to understand me. I care not what people think."

"About the Indians, I mean——"

"The Indians? What do you know of my viewpoint in regard to the Indians?" The man's face had hardened at her mention of the Indians.

"I know this!" exclaimed the girl. "That you are trading them whiskey! With my own eyes I saw Mr. Lapierre smash your kegs—the kegs that were cunningly disguised as bales of freight and marked with your name, and I saw the whiskey spilled out upon the ground."

She paused, expecting a denial, but MacNair remained silent and again she saw the peculiar twinkle in his eye as he waited for her to proceed. "And I—you, yourself told me that you would kill some of Mr. Lapierre's Indians! Do you call that justice—to kill men because they happen to be in the employ of a rival trader—one who has as much right to trade in the Northland as you have?"

Again she paused, but the man ignored her question.

"Go on," he said shortly.

"And you told me your Indians had to work so hard they had no time for book-learning, and that the souls of the Indians were black as—as hell."

"And I told you, also, that I have never owned any whiskey. Why do you believe me in some things and not in others? It would seem more consistent, Miss Chloe Elliston, for you either to believe or to disbelieve me."

"But, I saw the whiskey. And as for what you, yourself, told me—a man will scarcely make himself out worse than he is."

"At least, I can scarcely make myself out worse than you believe me to be." The twinkle was gone from MacNair's eyes now, and he spoke more gruffly. "Of what use is all this talk? You are firmly convinced of my character. Your opinion of me concerns me not at all. Even if I were to attempt to make my position clear to you, you would not believe anything I should tell you."

"What defence can there be to conduct such as yours?"

"Defence! Do you imagine I would stoop to defend my conduct to you—to one who is, either wittingly or unwittingly, hand in glove with Pierre Lapierre?"

The unconcealed scorn of the man's words stung Chloe to the quick.

"Pierre Lapierre is a man!" she cried with flashing eyes. "He is neither afraid nor ashamed to declare his principles. He is the friend of the Indians—and God knows they need a friend—living as they do by sufferance of such men as you, and the men of the Hudson Bay Company!"

"You believe that, I think," MacNair said quietly. "I wonder if you are really such a fool, or do you know Lapierre for what he is?"

"Yes!" exclaimed the girl, her face flushed. "I do know him for what he is! He is a man! He knows the North. I am learning the North, and together we will drive you and your kind out of the North."

"You cannot do that," he said. "Lapierre, I will crush as I would crush a snake. I bear you no ill will. As you say, you will learn the North—for you will remain in the North. I told you once that you would soon tire of your experiment, but I was wrong. Your eyes are the eyes of a fighting man."

"Thank you, Mr.—MacNair——"

"Why not Brute MacNair?"

Chloe shook her head. "No," she said. "Not that—not after—I think I shall call you Bob MacNair."

The man looked perplexed. "Women are not like men," he said, simply. "I do not understand you at times. Tell me—why did you come into the North?"

"I thought I had made that plain. I came to bring education to the Indians. To do what I can to lighten their burden and to make it possible for them to compete with the white man on the white man's terms when this country shall bow before the inevitable advance of civilization; when it has ceased to be the land beyond the outposts."

"We are working together then," answered, MacNair. "When you have learned the North we shall be—friends."

"Never! I——"

"Because you will have learned," he continued, ignoring her protest, "that education is the last thing the Indians need. If you can make better trappers and hunters of them; teach them to work in mines, timber, on the rivers, you will come nearer to solving their problem than by giving them all the education in the world. No, Miss Chloe Elliston, they can't play the white man's game—with the white man's chips."

"But they can! In the States we——"

"Why didn't you stay in the States?"

"Because the government looks after the education of the Indians—provides schools and universities, and——"

"And what do they turn out?"

"They turn out lawyers and doctors and engineers and ministers of the gospel, and educated men in all walks of life. We have Indians in Congress!"

"How many? And how many are lawyers and doctors and engineers and ministers of the gospel? And how many can truthfully be said to be 'educated men in all walks of life'? A mere handful! Where one succeeds, a hundred fail! And the others return to their reservation, dissolute, dissatisfied, to live on the bounty of your government; you, yourself, will admit that when an Indian does rise into a profession for which his education has fitted him, he is an object of wonder—a man to be written about in your newspapers and talked about in your homes. And then your sentimentalists—your fools—hold him up as a type! Not your educated Indians are reaping the benefit of your government's belated attention, but those who are following the calling for which nature has fitted them—stock-raising and small farming on their allotted reservations.