Chapter XXIII
At Gaspereau Lower Ford
On the following day, being Tuesday, November 16, 1855, and mytwenty-seventh birthday, I went down to Grand Pré. I am thus preciseabout the date, for I felt as I set forth that the issues of life anddeath hung upon my going. Right here, it seemed to me, was a veryknife-edge of a day, which should sever and allot to me for all thefuture my part of joy or ruin. Surely, thought I,—to justify myexpectation of colossal events,—I have not lain these long months dead,that action, once more started, should dribble like a spent stream.
Therefore I went, like a careful strategist, equipped with all theknowledge Grûl could give. I had planned how to reach Father Fafard, andthrough him how to reach Yvonne. And as the day was to be a great one, Ithought well it should be a long one. I set out upon the palest promiseof daybreak.
My strength, under one compelling purpose, had come back; and it seemedto me that I saw events and their chances with radiating clearness. Soup-strung were my nerves that the long tramp seemed over in a fewminutes, and I found myself, almost with surprise, at the lower ford ofthe Gaspereau, just under the hill which backs Grand Pré. Here was thethick wood wherein I planned to lie perdu, in the event of dangerouspassers. In a little while there came in view a woman, heavy-eyed anddishevelled, carrying a basket of new-baked barley bread, very sweet tosmell. It was clear she was one with an interest in the prisoners at thechapel. In such a case I could have no fear of stumbling upon a traitor.I stepped out to her.
“Would that he, too,” said I significantly, “had gone to the woods intime!”
Her eyes ran over with the ready and waiting tears; but she jerked herapron jealously over the loaves, and looked at me with a touch ofresentment, as if to say, “Why had you such foresight, and not he?”
“He went to hear the reading, and they took him,” she moaned. “And whowill keep the little ones from starving in the winter coming on?”
“It is where I, too, would be now—in the chapel prison yonder,” said Igently. “But I lay in the woods, wounded, too sick to go to the reading,so I escaped.”
The resentment faded out. She saw that I was not one of those who shamedher husband’s credulity. I might have been caught too, had I been giventhe same chance.
“For the little ones, I pray you accept this silver, and count it a loanto your husband in his prison,” said I, slipping two broad Spanishpieces into her hand.
She looked grateful and astonished, but had no words ready.
“And do, I beg of you, a kindness to one in bitter need of it,” I wenton. “You know Father Fafard?”
Her face lightened with love.
“He grieves for me, thinking me dead,” said I. “Tell him, I beg of you,that one who loves him waits to see him in the wood by the lower ford.”
Her face clouded with suspicion.
“How shall I know—how shall he know—you are honest?” she asked.
I was troubled.
“_You_ must judge by your woman’s wit,” said I. “And he will come. Hefears no one. But no, tell him Paul Grande waits at the lower ford.”
“The traitor!” she blazed out; and, recoiling, hurled the money in myface. It stung strangely.
“You are wrong,” said I, in a low voice. “But as you will. Tell him, ifyou will, that Paul Grande, the traitor, waits for him at the lowerford. But if you do not tell him, be sure _he_ will not soon forgiveyou. And for the money, he shall keep it for your children—and you willbe sorry to have unjustly accused me.”
She laughed with bitter mockery, and turned away.
“But I will tell him; that can do no harm,” she said. “I’ll tell him thetraitor who loves him waits at the ford.”
I withdrew into the wood, beyond all reason pained at the injustice.
The unpleasant peasant woman was as good as her word, however; for inlittle more than the space of an hour I saw Father Fafard approaching.Plainly he had come hot upon the instant.
“My dear, dear boy! Where have you been, and what suffered?” he cried,catching me hard by the two arms, and looking into my eyes.
“It was Grûl saved me,” said I.
Beyond earshot, deep in the wood, where no wind hindered the noon sunfrom warming a little open glade, I told my story briefly.
“Paul,” said he, when I had finished, “my heart has now the firsthappiness it has known through all these dreadful months. But you mustslip out of this doomed country without an hour’s delay. Quebec, ofcourse! And then, when an end is made here, I will join you. Have youmoney for the journey?”
I laughed softly.
“My plans are not quite formed. I must see Yvonne. Will you fetch her tome?”
He rose in anger—a little forced, I thought.
“No!” said he.
“Then, I beseech you, give her a message from me, that I may see her fora little this very day.”
“Paul,” he cried passionately, “it is a sin to talk of it. She haspledged her troth. She is at peace. I will not have her disturbed.”
“Does she love him?” I asked.
“I—I suppose so. Or she will, doubtless,” he stammered.
“Oh, doubtless!” said I. “And meanwhile, does she show readiness tocarry out her promise? Does she listen kindly to her impatient lover—heranxious father?”
“The Englishman has displeased her, for a time,” said he, “but that willpass. She knows the duty of obedience; she respects the plighted word.There can be but one ending; though you may succeed in making her veryunhappy—for a time.”
“I will make her very happy,” I said quietly, “so long as time enduresfor her and me.”
He flashed round upon me with sharp scorn.
“What can _you_ do for her? You, hiding for your life, the ruinedupholder of a lost cause! Here she is safe, protected, wealth andsecurity before her. And with you?”
“_Life_, I think!” said I, rising too, and stretching out my arms. “Butlisten, father,” I went on more lightly. “I am not so helpless. I havesome little _rentes_ in Montreal, you know. And moreover, I am notplanning to carry her off to-night. By no means anything so finelyirregular. I am not ready. Only, see her I will before I go. If you willnot help me, I will stay about this place, about your house indeed, tillI meet her. That is all. If you dote upon my going, you know the way tospeed me.”
His kind, round face puckered anxiously. But he hit upon a compromise.
“I will have no hand in it,” said he. “But if you are resolved to stay,you may as well find her without loss of time. The house we occupy iscrowded, and she affects a solitary mood. She walks over the hill anddown this way, of an evening, to visit some unhappy ones along by theriver. You may see her, perhaps, to-night.”
I grasped his hand and kissed it, but he drew it away, vexed at himself.
“We will talk of other things now,” I said softly. “But do not be angryif I say I love you, father.”
He smiled with an air of reproach; and thereafter talk we did throughhours, save for a little time when he was absent fetching me a meal. Allthat Grûl had told me of the ruin of the French cause he told me inanother colour, and more besides of the doom of the Acadians—but uponYvonne’s name we touched no more by so much as the lightest breath.
At my cousin Marc’s rashness in going to the chapel he glanced with someseverity, grieving for the sorrow of the young wife at Quebec. But forthe English he had many good words—they were pitiful, he said, in theact of carrying out cruel orders. And they neither robbed norterrorized. Not they, said he, but a wicked priest and the intriguers ofa rotten government at Quebec, were the scourge of Acadie.
When the sun got low over the Gaspereau Ridge he called to mind someduties too long forgotten, and bade me farewell with a lovingwistfulness. I think, however, it was the imminent coming of Yvonne thatdrove him away. He feared lest he should meet her, and in seeming toknow of my purpose seem to sanction it. I could not help believ
ing in myheart that in this matter, perhaps for the first time in his priesthood,the kind curé’s conscience was a little tremulous in its admonitions.
I watched him out of sight; and then, posting myself in a coign ofvantage behind a great willow that overhung the stream, I waited with athumping heart, and with a misgiving that all other organs within myframe had slumped away to nothing but a meagre and contemptible jelly.