The Gun-Brand Part 13

Follow the great trade rivers! From source to mouth, their banks are lined with the Indians who have come into contact with your civilization!

"Go to any mission centre! Do you find that the Indian has taken kindly to the doctrines it teaches? Do you find them happy, G.o.d-fearing Indians who embraced Christianity and are living in accord with its precepts? You do not! Except in a very few isolated cases, like your lawyers and doctors of the states, you will find at the very gates of the missions, be their denomination what they may, debauchery and rascality in its most vicious forms. Read your answer there in the vice-marked, ragged, emaciated hangers-on of the missions.

"I do not say that this harm is wrought wilfully--on the contrary, I know it is not. They are n.o.ble and well-meaning men and women who carry the gospel into the North. Many of them I know and respect and admire--Father Desplaines, Father Crossett, the good Father O'Reiley, and Duncan Fitzgilbert, of my mother's faith. These men are good men; n.o.ble men, and the true friends of the Indians; in health and in sickness, in plague, famine, and adversity these men shoulder the red man's burden, feed, clothe, and doctor him, and nurse him back to health--or bury him. With these I have no quarrel, nor with the religion they teach--in its theory. It is not bad. It is good. These men are my friends. They visit me, and are welcome whenever they come.

"Each of these has begged me to allow him to establish a mission among my Indians. And my answer is always the same--'_No!_' And I point to the mission centres already established. It is then they tell me that the deplorable condition exists, not because of the mission, but _despite_ it." He paused with a gesture of impatience. "_Because_!

_Despite_! A quibble of words! If the _fact_ remains, what difference does it make whether it is _because_ or _despite_? It must be a great comfort to the unfortunate one who is degraded, diseased, d.a.m.ned, to know that his degradation, disease, and d.a.m.nation, were wrought not _because_, but _despite_. I think G.o.d laughs--even as he pities. But, in spite of all they can do, the _fact_ remains. I do not ask you to believe me. Go and see it with your own eyes, and then if you _dare_, come back and establish another plague spot in G.o.d's own wilderness.

The Indian rapidly acquires all the white man's vices--and but few of his virtues.

"Stop and think what it means to experiment with the future of a people. To overthrow their traditions: to confute their beliefs and superst.i.tions, and to subvert their G.o.ds! And what do you offer them in return? Other traditions; other beliefs; another G.o.d--and education! Do you dare to a.s.sume the responsibility? Do you dare to implant in the minds of these people an education--a culture--that will render them for ever dissatisfied with their lot, and send many of them to the land of the white man to engage in a feeble and hopeless struggle after that which is, for them, unattainable?"

"But it is _not_ unattainable! They----"

"I know your sophisms; your fabrication of theory!" MacNair interrupted her almost fiercely. "The _facts_! I have seen the rum-sodden wrecks, the debauched and soul-warped men and women who hang about your frontier towns, diseased in body and mind, and whose greatest misfortune is that they live. These, Miss Chloe Elliston, are the real monuments to your education. Do you dare to drive one hundred to certain degradation that is worse than fiery h.e.l.l, that you may point with pride to one who shall attain to the white man's standard of success?"

"That is not the truth! I do not believe it! I _will_ not believe it!"

The steel-grey eyes of the man bored deep into the s.h.i.+ning eyes of brown. "I know that you do not believe it. But you are wrong when you say that you _will_ not believe it. You are honest and unafraid, and, therefore, you will learn, and now, one thing further.

"We will say that you succeed in keeping your school, or post, or mission, from this condition of debauchery--which you will not. What then? Suppose you educate your Indians? There are no employers in the North. None who buy education. The men who pay out money in the waste places pay it for bone and brawn, not for brains; they have brains--or something that answers the purpose--therefore, your educated Indian must do one of two things--he must go where he can use his education or he must remain where he is. In either event he will be the loser. If he seeks the land of the white man, he must compete with the white man on the white man's terms. He cannot do it. If he stays here in the North he must continue to hunt, or trap, or work on the river, or in the mines, or the timber, and he is ever afterward dissatisfied with his lot. More, he has wasted the time he spent in filling his brain with useless knowledge."

MacNair spoke rapidly and earnestly, and Chloe realized that he spoke from his heart and also that he spoke from a certain knowledge of his subject. She was at a loss for a reply. She could not dispute him, for he had told her not to believe him; to go see for herself. She did not believe MacNair, but in spite of herself she was impressed.

"The missionaries _are_ doing good! Their reports show----"

"Their reports show! Of course their reports show! Why shouldn't they? Where do their reports go? To the people who pay them their salaries! Do not understand me to say that in all cases these reports are falsely made. They are not--that is, they are literally true. A mission reports so many converts to Christianity during a certain period of time. Well and good; the converts are there--they can produce them. The Indians are not fools. If the white men want them to profess Christianity, why they will profess Christianity--or Hinduism or Mohammedanism. They will wors.h.i.+p any G.o.d the white man suggests--for a fancy waistcoat or a piece of salt pork. The white man gives many gifts of clothing, and sometimes of food--to his converts.

Therefore, he shall not want for converts--while the clothing holds out!"

"And _your_ Indians? Have they not suffered from their contact with you?"

"No. They have not suffered. I know them, their needs and requirements, and their virtues and failings. And they know me."

"Where is your fort?"

"Some distance above here on the sh.o.r.e of this lake."

"Will you take me there? Show me these Indians, that I may see for myself that you have spoken the truth?"

"No. I told you you were to have nothing to do with my Indians. I also warned my Indians against you--and your partner Lapierre. I cannot warn them against you and then take you among them."

"Very well. I shall go myself, then. I came up here to see your fort and the condition of your Indians. You knew I would come."

"No. I did not know that. I had not seen the fighting spirit in your eyes then. Now I know that you will come--but not while I am here.

And when you do come you will be taken back to your own school. You will not be harmed, for you are honest in your purpose. But you will, nevertheless, be prevented from coming into contact with my Indians. I will have none of Lapierre's spies hanging about, to the injury of my people."

"Lapierre's spies! Do you think I am a spy? Lapierre's?"

"Not consciously, perhaps--but a spy, nevertheless. Lapierre may even now be lurking near for the furtherance of some evil design."

Chloe suddenly realized that MacNair's boring, steel-grey eyes were fixed upon her with a new intentness--as if to probe into the very thoughts of her brain.

"Mr. Lapierre is far to the Southward," she said--and then, upon the edge of the tiny clearing, a twig snapped. The man whirled, his rifle jerked into position, there was a loud report, and Bob MacNair sank slowly down upon the gra.s.s mound that was his mother's grave.

CHAPTER XI

BACK ON THE YELLOW KNIFE

The whole affair had been so sudden that Chloe scarcely realized what had happened before a man stepped quickly into the clearing, at the same time slipping a revolver into its holster. The girl gazed at him in amazement. It was Pierre Lapierre. He stepped forward, hat in hand. Chloe glanced swiftly from the dark, handsome features to the face of the man on the ground. The grey eyes opened for a second, and then closed; but in that brief, fleeting glance the girl read distrust, contempt, and silent reproach. The man's lips moved, but no sound came--and with a laboured, fluttering sigh, he sank into unconsciousness.

"Once more, it seems, my dear Miss Elliston, I have arrived just in time."

A sudden repulsion for this cruel, suave killer of men flashed into the girl's brain. "Get some water," she cried, and dropping to her knees began to unb.u.t.ton MacNair's flannel s.h.i.+rt.

"But--" objected Lapierre.

"Will you get some water? This is no time to argue! You can explain later!" Lapierre turned and without a word, walked to the lake and, taking a pail from the canoe, filled it with water. When he returned, Chloe was tearing white bandages from a garment essentially feminine, while Big Lena endeavoured to stanch the flow of blood from a small wound high on the man's left breast, and another, more ragged wound where the bullet had torn through the thick muscles of his back.

The two women worked swiftly and capably, while Lapierre waited, frowning.

"Better hurry, Miss Elliston," he said, when the last of the bandages was in place. "This is no place for us to be found if some of MacNair's Indians happen along. Your canoe is ready. Mine is farther down the lake."

"But, this man--surely----"

"Leave him there. You have done all you can do for him. His Indians will find him."

"What!" cried Chloe. "Leave a wounded man to die in the bus.h.!.+"

Lapierre stepped closer. "What would you do ?" he asked. "Surely you cannot remain here. His Indians would kill you as they would kill a _carcajo_." The man's face softened. "It is the way of the North," he said sadly. "I would gladly have spared him--even though he is my enemy. But when he whirled with his rifle upon my heart, his finger upon the trigger, and murder in his eye, I had no alternative. It was his life or mine. I am glad I did not kill him." The words and the tone rea.s.sured Chloe, and when she answered, it was to speak calmly.

"We will take him with us," she said. "The Indians could not care for him properly even if they found him. At home I have everything necessary for the handling of just such cases."

"But, my dear Miss Elliston--think of the portages and the added burden. His Indians----"

The girl interrupted him--"I am not asking you to help. I have a canoe here. If you are afraid of MacNair's Indians you need not remain."

The note of scorn in the girl's voice was not lost upon Lapierre. He flushed and answered with the quiet dignity that well became him: "I came here, Miss Elliston, with only three canoemen. I returned unexpectedly to your school, and when I learned that you had gone to Snare Lake, I followed--to save you, if possible, from the hand of the Brute."

Chloe interrupted him. "You came here for that?"

The man bowed low. "Knowing what you do of Brute MacNair, and of his hatred of me, you surely do not believe I came here for business--or pleasure." He drew closer, his black eyes glowing with suppressed pa.s.sion. "There is one thing a man values more than life--the life and the safety of the woman he loves!"

Chloe's eyes dropped. "Forgive me!" she faltered. "I--I did not know--I--Oh! don't you see? It was all so sudden. I have had no time to think! I know you are not afraid. But, we can't leave him here--like this."

"As you please," answered Lapierre, gently.

"It is not the way of the North; but----"