XXXVII THE PACKET IS OPENED
With eager curiosity Hugh Beaupre sat watching Monsieur Dubois unwrap themysterious packet. The adventurous journey was over. The ex-members ofOhrante's band, including Monga, had been turned over to the furcompanies to be dealt with. The pelts had been safely delivered to theNew Northwest Company at the Kaministikwia, Jean Beaupre's small debtcancelled, and the rest of the price paid divided between the two boys.The furs had proved of fine quality, and Hugh was well satisfied with hisshare. He had been given a draft on the company's bankers in Montreal,who had paid him in gold. Blaise had chosen to take his half in wintersupplies, and, with Hugh and Baptiste to back him, had won the respect ofthe company's clerk as a shrewd bargainer. At the Kaministikwia, theyounger boy had found his mother with a party of her people, and Hugh,less reluctant than at the beginning of his journey, had made heracquaintance. Regretfully parting with Blaise, the elder brother hadjoined the great canoe fleet returning with the furs. He was able toqualify as a canoeman, and he had remained with the fleet during thewhole trip to Montreal. Of that interesting but strenuous journey thereis no space to tell here.
One of the lad's first acts after reaching the city had been to seek outMonsieur Dubois. Dubois proved to be a prominent man among the Frenchpeople of Montreal, and Hugh had found him without difficulty. Afterexplaining how he had come by the packet, the lad had placed it in theFrenchman's hands. He had learned from this thin, grave, white-haired manthat he, Rene Dubois, had lived in the Indian country for many years.During the first months of Jean Beaupre's life in the wild Superiorregion, Dubois, though considerably older, had been the friend andcompanion of Hugh's father. When an inheritance had come to him, theelder man had been called back to Montreal, where he had since lived.Beaupre, on his infrequent returns to civilization, had made brief callson his old comrade, but they had no common business interests and hadnever corresponded. Monsieur Dubois was, therefore, at a loss tounderstand why Hugh's father had been so anxious that this packet shouldreach him.
He undid the outer wrapping, glanced at his own name on the bark label,cut the cord, broke the seals and removed the doeskin. Several thin whitesheets of birch bark covered with fine writing in the faint, muddy,home-made ink, and a small, flat object wrapped in another thin cover ofdoeskin, were all the packet contained. When his fingers closed on theobject within the skin cover, the man's face paled, then flushed. Hishands trembled as he removed the wrapping. For several moments he satstaring at the little disk of yellow metal, turning it over and over inhis fingers. Why it should affect Monsieur Dubois so strongly Hugh couldnot imagine. It was obvious that the white-haired man was trying tocontrol some strong emotion. Without a word to the boy, he laid the diskdown, and Hugh could see that it was a gold coin. Taking the bark sheetsfrom the table where he had laid them, Dubois scanned them rapidly, thenturned again to the beginning and read them slowly and intently. When heraised his eyes, Hugh was surprised to see that they were glistening withtears. His voice trembled as he spoke.
"You cannot know, Hugh Beaupre, what a great service you have done me. Itis impossible that I can ever repay you. You do not understand, youcannot, until I explain. But first I would ask you a question or two, ifyou will pardon me."
"Of course," replied Hugh wonderingly. "I shall be glad to answeranything that I can, Monsieur Dubois."
"Well then, about that half-brother of yours, what sort of a lad is he?"
"As fine a lad as you will find anywhere, Monsieur," Hugh answeredpromptly. "When I first received his letter, I was prejudiced againsthim, I admit." He flushed and hesitated.
Dubois nodded understandingly. "But now?" he questioned.
"Now I love him as if he were my _whole_ brother," Hugh said warmly. "Wewent through much together, he saved me from a horrible fate, and Ilearned to know him well. A finer, truer-hearted fellow than Blaise neverexisted."
Again Dubois nodded, apparently well satisfied. "And his mother?"
"I was surprised at his mother," Hugh replied with equal frankness. "Sheis Indian, of course, but without doubt a superior sort of Indian. Forone thing she was clean and neatly dressed. She is very good-looking too,her voice is sweet, her manner quiet, and she certainly treated mekindly. She loves Blaise dearly, and,--I think--she really loved myfather."
Once more Monsieur Dubois nodded, a light of pleasure in his dark eyes."I asked," he said abruptly, "because, you see, she is my daughter."
"Your daughter? But she is an Indian!"
"Only half Indian, but no wonder you are surprised. I will explain."
Monsieur Dubois then told the wondering boy how, about thirty-eight yearsbefore, when he was still a young man, he had taken to the woods. It wasin the period between the conquest of Canada by the English and theoutbreak of the American Revolution, long before the formation of theNorthwest Fur Company, when the fur traders in the Upper Lakes regionwere practically all French Canadians and free lances, each doingbusiness for himself. In due time, Rene Dubois, like most of the others,had married an Indian girl. A daughter was born to them, a pretty babywho had found a very warm spot in the heart of her adventurous father.Before she was two years old, however, he lost her. He had left his wifeand child at an Indian village near the south shore of Lake Superior,while he went on one of his trading trips. On his return he found theplace deserted, the signs plain that it had been raided by someunfriendly band. There was no law in the Indian country, and in thatperiod, shortly after the so-called French and Indian War, when theAlgonquin Indians had sided with the French and the Iroquoian with theEnglish, conditions were more than usually unstable. For years Duboistried to trace his wife and daughter or learn their fate, but neversucceeded.
"And now," he concluded, his voice again trembling with feeling, "youbring me proof that my daughter still lives, that she was the wife of myfriend, and that in his son and hers I have a grandson and an heir."Monsieur Dubois took up the gold coin and handed it to Hugh. One face hadbeen filed smooth and on it, cut with some crude tool, were the outlinesof a coat-of-arms. "I did that myself," Dubois explained. "It is the armsof my family. When the child was born, I made that and hung it about herneck on a sinew cord."
"And Blaise's mother still had it?" exclaimed Hugh.
"No, she had lost it, but your father recovered it. Read the letteryourself." He handed Hugh the bark sheets.
It was an amazing letter. Jean Beaupre merely mentioned how he had foundthe Indian girl a captive among the Sioux, had bought her, taken her awayand married her. No doubt he had told all this to Dubois before. Beauprehad not had the slightest suspicion that his wife was other than shebelieved herself to be, a full-blooded Ojibwa. She had been brought up byan Ojibwa couple, but in a Sioux raid her supposed father and mother hadbeen killed and she had been captured. Nearly two years before thewriting of the letter, Beaupre had happened to receive a gold coin forsome service rendered an official of the Northwest Company. His wife hadexamined the coin with interest, and had said that she herself had oncehad one nearly like it, the same on one side, she said, but different onthe other. She had always worn it on a cord around her neck, but when shewas captured, a Sioux squaw had taken it from her. At first Beauprethought that the thing she had possessed had been one of the littlemedals sometimes given by a priest to a baptized child, but she hadinsisted that one side of her medal had been like the coin. Then heremembered that his old comrade Dubois had told of the coin, bearing hiscoat-of-arms, worn by his baby daughter. Jean Beaupre said nothing of hissuspicions to his wife, but he resolved to find out, if he could, whethershe was really the daughter of Rene Dubois. On this quest, he twicevisited the Sioux country west of the Mississippi. The autumn before theopening of this story, he learned of the whereabouts of the very bandthat had held his wife a captive. After sending, by an Indian messenger,a letter to Hugh at the Sault, asking the boy to wait there until hisfather joined him in the spring, Beaupre left at once for the interior.He was fortuna
te enough to find the Sioux band and the chief from whom hehad bought the captive more than fifteen years before. The chief,judiciously bribed and threatened, had sought for the medal and had foundit in the possession of a young girl who said her mother had given it toher. When Beaupre questioned the old squaw, she admitted that she hadtaken the coin from the neck of an Ojibwa captive years before. How theOjibwa couple who had brought the girl up had come by her, Beaupre wasunable to find out, but he had no doubt that she was really the daughterof Rene Dubois. He resolved to send the proof of his wife's parentage toMontreal by his elder son, if Hugh had really come to the Sault and hadwaited there. If Hugh was not there, the elder Beaupre would go to thecity himself. It was plain that he had not received either of the lettersHugh had sent after him, nor had Hugh ever got the one his father hadwritten him. Fearing that if any accident should happen to him, the coinand the story might never reach his old comrade, Beaupre had written downthe tale and prepared the packet. Even in his dying condition heremembered it and told Blaise to go get it. Evidently, when he discoveredhe was in danger of falling into Ohrante's hands, he had feared to keepthe packet with him, so had hidden it with the furs. If he escaped thegiant, he could return for both furs and packet, but if the coin cameinto Ohrante's possession it would be lost forever. The letter, however,said nothing of all that. It had undoubtedly been written before Beaupreset out on his home journey.
With deep emotion Hugh deciphered the fine, faint writing on the barksheets. He was glad from the bottom of his heart that he and Blaise hadbeen able to recover the packet and deliver it to the man to whom itmeant so much. If Hugh had had any dreams of some strange fortune comingto himself through the packet, he forgot them when Monsieur Dubois beganto speak again.
"I shall go to the Kaministikwia at once, if I can find means of reachingthere this autumn. At least I shall go as far as I can and finish thejourney in the spring. Wherever my daughter and my grandson are, I willseek them out. I have no other heirs and Blaise, my grandson, shall takethe place of a son. I will bring them back to Montreal, or, if that doesnot seem best, I will remain in the upper country with them. Whether mygrandson chooses to live his life in civilization or in the wilderness, Ican provide him with the means to make that life both successful anduseful."
The elder brother's heart was glowing with happiness. He knew that hisown mother's people would help him to a start in life, and now hisyounger brother, his half-breed,--no, quarter-breed--brother Blaise wouldhave a chance too. Hugh had no doubt that Blaise Beaupre would make themost of his opportunities.
It only remains to say that when Rene Dubois saw the mother of Blaise,her resemblance to himself and to her own mother thoroughly convinced himthat there had been no mistake. He more than fulfilled to both hisdaughter and his grandson the promises Hugh had heard him make.
THE END
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THE SECRET CACHE, by E. C. Brill
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Clarkville School's basketball team is kidnapped during the game for the State Scholastic Championship. The team's subsequent adventures under the leadership of Captain Charlie Minor as he brings them back to the State College Gymnasium where the two last quarters of the Championship game are played next evening, climaxes twenty-four pulsating hours of adventure and basketball in the FIGHTING FIVE...
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Captured by a band of Malay slavers, Sorak and his friends are wrecked on an island off the coast of Burma in the Mergui Archipelago. Their escape from the island with the Prisoner Queen after a successful revolution brings the fourth book of this series to an exciting and unusual conclusion.
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A golf caddy who has a leaning toward amateur detective work, together with his younger cousin, are accidentally mixed up in the strange loss, or theft, of a valuable diamond, known as Green Fire. It was once the eye of an East Indian idol. To clear his young cousin of suspicion, the older boy undertakes to solve the mystery which deepens when one man disappears and another is found murdered on the golf course. But, by a series of clever moves on the part of the young sleuth, the crime is solved and the diamond found in a most unusual hiding place. A rapidly moving, exciting tale. You will like it.
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NORTHWEST STORIES
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Tom Baley, leaving college goes north into Canada, hoping to join the Northwest Mounted Police. His application is turned down by his own uncle, an officer on the force, but after many thrilling adventures and encounters with the Disk Gang he is able to win the coveted uniform.
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Luke Myers is sent into the Caribou Mountains to solve the mystery of The Shadow, about whom many conflicting stories are told. There are struggles with the outlaws, and finally a great running battle down the fog-obscured mountain trails ... at the end of which the outlaws are captured and the mystery of The Shadow is solved.
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Donald Pierce is sent to solve the mystery of his father's disappearance, into the unmapped barrens where King Stively weaves his web of wickedness, and rules a territory the size of a small empire with a ruthlessness and cunning that baffles the best of the Mounted Police. Behind all is the dread Wolf Cry which causes brave men to shudder....
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Sergeant David Stanlaw, stationed at Spirit River, is puzzled by a local killing, the disappearance of the body, the finding of a code message, and by the mystery of the "Listening Forest," which casts a shadow of dread over the little town of Wiggin's Creek. With the help of Jerry Bartlett they capture the leaders of the gang and solve the mystery of the "Listening Forest."
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_Bomba lived far back in the jungles of the Amazon with a half-dementednaturalist who told the lad nothing of his past. The jungle boy was alover of birds, and hunted animals with a bow and arrow and his trustymachete. He had only a primitive education, and his daring adventureswill be followed with breathless interest by thousands._
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_Every boy who knows the lure of exploring and who loves to rig up hutsand caves and tree-houses to fortify himself against imaginary enemieswill enjoy these books, for they give a vivid chronicle of the doings andinventions of a group of boys who are shipwrecked and have to makethemselves snug and safe in tropical islands where the dangers are tooreal for play._
1. CRUSOE ISLAND
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Their ship and companions perished in tempest at sea, the boys are adrift in a small open boat when they spy a ship. Such a strange vessel!--no hand guiding it, no soul on board,--a derelict
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Modern Pirates, with the ferocity of beasts, attack a lightship crew;--recounting the adventures that befall the survivors of that crew--and--"RETRIBUTION."
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The Canadian Northwest police has the reputation of always getting their man, and Sergeant Dick upholds the tradition in a story of great adventure.
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Transcriber's Notes
--Copyright notice provided as in the original printed text--this e-text is public domain in the country of publication.
--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and dialect unchanged.
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