Chapter XII Le F?ret at the Ferry

From the curé’s I cut across the fields to escape further delay, and so, avoiding the westerly skirts of the village, came out upon the Canard trail. I made the utmost haste, for the afternoon was already on the wane. For some three miles beyond the village the road runs through a piece of old woods, mostly of beech, birch, and maple, whose young greenery exhaled a most pleasant smell on the fresh June air. By the wayside grew the flowers of later spring, purple wake-robins, the pink and white wild honeysuckle, the solitary painted triangle of the trillium, and the tender pink bells of the linn?a, revealed by their perfume. Once I frightened a scurrying covey of young partridges. As for the squirrels, chipmunks, and rabbits, so pert were they in their fearless curiosity that I was ready to pretend they were the same as those which of old in my boyish vagabondings I had taught to be unafraid of my approach. With the one half of 88my soul I was a boy again, retraversing these dear familiar woods; the other half of me, meanwhile, was bowed with a presentiment of disaster. The confidence in the priest’s tone still thrilled me with fear. But under whatever alternations of hope and despair, deep down in my heart where the great resolves take form deliberately my purpose settled into the shape which does not change. By the time I emerged from the wood I was ready to laugh at Father Fafard or anyone else who should tell me that success would not be mine at the last.

“She may not know it yet herself, but she is mine,” I declared to the open marshes, as I set foot out upon the raised way which led over to the Habitants Ferry.

The ferry-boat which crosses the deep and turbid tide of the Habitants is a clumsy scow propelled by a single oar thrust out from the stern. The river is hardly passable save for an hour on either side of full flood. The rest of the time it is a shrinking yet ever-turbulent stream which roars along between precipitous banks of red engulfing slime. When I reached the shore of this unstable water it lacked but a few minutes of flood. The scow was just putting off for the opposite shore, with one passenger. I recognized the ferryman, yellow Ba’tiste Chouan, ever a friend to me in the dear old days. I shouted for him to wait.

89The scow was already some half score feet from land, but Ba’tiste, seeing the prospect of more silver, stopped and made as if to turn back. At once, however, his passenger interfered, with vehement gestures, and eager speech which I could not hear. Eying him closely, I perceived that it was none other than that ruffian of Vaurin’s whom I had so incontinently discomfited at the forge. His haste I could now well understand, and I saw him urging it with such effective silvern argument that Ba’tiste began to yield.

“Ba’tiste,” I cried sharply, “don’t you know me? Take a good look at me; my haste is urgent.”

My voice caught him. “Tiens! It’s Master Paul,” he cried, and straightway thrust back to shore, calmly ignoring threats and bribes alike.

As I sprang aboard and grasped Ba’tiste’s gaunt claw I expected nothing less than a second bout with my adversary of the morning. But he, while I talked with the ferryman of this and that, according to the wont of old acquaintances long apart, kept a discreet silence at the other end of the scow, where, as I casually noted, he stood with folded arms looking out over the water. A scarlet feather stuck foppishly in his dark cap became him very well; and I could not but account him a proper figure of a man, though somewhat short.

Presently, at a pause in our talk, he turned and 90approached us. To my astonishment he wore a civil smile.

“I was in the wrong this morning, Monsieur Grande,” he said, in a hearty, frank voice such as I like, though well I know it is no certificate of an honest heart. “I interfered in a gentleman’s private business; and though your rebuke was something more sharp than I could have wished, I deserved it. Allow me to make my apologies.”

Now it is one of my weaknesses that I can scarce resist the devil himself if he speaks me fair and seeks to make amends.

“Well,” said I reluctantly, “we will forget the incident, monsieur, if it please you. I cannot but honour a brave man always; and you could not but speak up for your captain, he not being by to speak for himself. My opinion of him I will keep behind my teeth out of deference to your presence.”

“That’s fair, monsieur,” said he, apparently quite content. “And I will keep my nose out of another gentleman’s business. My way lies to Canard. May I hope for the honour of your company on the road—since fate, however rudely, has thrown us together?”

Another weakness of mine is to be uselessly frank—to resent even politic concealment. Here was one whom I knew for an enemy. I spoke him the plain truth with a childish carelessness.

91“I have affairs both at Canard and at Pereau,” said I. “But I know not if I shall get so far as the latter to-night.”

“Ah!” said he, “I might have known as much. Father La Garne will lie at Pereau to-night, and I am to meet Captain Vaurin there.”

I turned upon him fiercely, but his face was so devoid of malice that my resentment somehow stuck in my throat. Seeing it in my face, however, he made haste to apologize.

“Pardon me, monsieur, if I imply too much, or again trespass upon your private matters,” he exclaimed courteously. “But you will surely allow that, in view of your late visit to Piziquid, my mistake is a not unnatural one.”

I was forced to acknowledge the justice of this.

“But be pleased to remember that it is none the less a mistake,” said I with emphasis, “and one that is peculiarly distasteful to me.”

“Assuredly, monsieur,” he assented most civilly. And by this we were at the landing. As we stepped off I turned for a final word with Ba’tiste; and he, while giving me account of a new road to the Canard, shorter than the old trail, managed to convey a whispered warning that my companion was not to be trusted.

“It is Le F?ret,” he said, as if that explained.

“That’s all right, my friend,” I laughed confidently. “I know all about that.”

92Then I turned up the new road, striding amicably by the side of my late antagonist, and busily wondering how I was to be rid of him without a rudeness.

But I might have spared myself this foolish solicitude; for presently, coming to a little lane which led up to a fair house behind some willows, he remarked:

“I will call here, monsieur, while you are visiting at Machault’s yonder; and will join you, if I may, the other side of the pasture.”

With the word he had bowed himself off, leaving me wondering mightily how he knew I was bound for Simon Machault’s—as in truth I was, on matters pertaining to my uncle’s rents. I was sure I had made no mention of Machault, and I was nettled that the fellow should so appear to divine my affairs. I made up my mind to question him sharply on the matter when he should rejoin me.

But I was to see no more of him that day. After a pleasant interview with Machault, whence I departed with my pockets the heavier for some rentals paid ungrudgingly to the Sieur de Briart, I continued my way alone, my mind altogether at ease as to the house of De Lamourie, since I had learned that the Black Abbé and the blacker Vaurin would lie that night at Pereau. Then suddenly, as I was about to turn into the yard of another farmhouse, one of those strange things 93happened which we puzzle over for a time and afterward set down among the unaccountable. Some force, within or without, turned me sharp about and faced me back toward Grand Pré. Before I realized at all what I was up to, I was retracing my steps toward the ferry. But with an effort I stopped to take counsel with myself.