The Buffalo Runners: A Tale of the Red River Plains

“I see—all right,” returned Billie; “though I wonder at such a man as you wanting advice from the like of me. But I’ll do what I can for you, Jenkins, and perhaps I know more about the thing that troubles you than you think.”

“I’m afraid not,” returned the seaman, with a humorous twinkle in his eye. “You see, Billie, you never wanted to get spliced, did you?”

“Spliced! What’s that?”

“Well, I should have said married.”

“O no! I don’t think the thought of that ever did occur to me. I’m sorry, Jenkins, but I really cannot give you advice on that subject.”

“H’m! I’m not so sure o’ that, Little Bill. You’re such a practical little chap that I do believe if you was put to it you’d be able to—see, now. If you happened to want to marry a nice little gal, what would you do?”

“I would ask her,” said Little Bill, promptly.

“Jus’ so; but that is what I have not got courage to do.”

Jenkins laughed at the expression of blazing surprise with which the boy received this statement.

“Have not got courage!” he repeated; and then, after a pause—“Have all the stories you have told me, then, been nothing but lies!”

“What stories, Billie?”

“Why, such as that one about the pirates in the Java seas, when ten of them attacked you and you were obliged to kill four, and all the rest ran away?”

“No, Billie—that was no lie: it was quite true. But, then, these blackguards were cowards at bottom, and they saw that I’d got a brace o’ double-barrelled pistols in my belt, and was pretty well up in the cutlass exercise.”

“And that time when you led a storming party against the fort in South America, and was the only one left o’ the party, and fought your way all alone in through the breach till the troops came up and carried you on with a rush, and—and—was all about that untrue?”

“Not a bit of it, Billie, though I wouldn’t have you think I was boastin’ about it. I only gave you the bare facts, which, like bare poles, is as much as a ship can stand sometimes.”

“An’ that time you jumped overboard in Port Royal among the sharks to save the little girl?”

“That’s a fact, if ever there was one,” said the seaman quickly, “for the dear child is alive this good day to swear to it if need be.”

“Yet you tell me,” continued Little Bill, “that you have not the courage to ask a nice little girl to marry you?”

“That’s exactly how the matter stands, Billie.”

It was now Billie’s turn to look perplexed.

“Who is this nice little girl?” he asked abruptly, as if the answer to that question might help to explain the enigma.

“Well—it’s Elise Morel; an’, mind, not a soul knows about that but you an’ me, Little Bill.”

“But—but Elise is not a little girl. She’s a big woman!”

Jenkins laughed as he explained that seamen sometimes had a habit—mistaken, it might be—of calling even big women “nice little gals” when they chanced to be fond of them.

“And are you really afraid to ask Elise to marry you?” asked the boy, earnestly.

“I suspect that’s what’s the matter wi’ me,” replied the sailor, with a modest look.

“I always thought that nothing could frighten you,” said Billie, in a somewhat disappointed tone, for it seemed to him as if one of his idols were shaking on its pedestal. “I can’t understand it, for I would not be afraid to ask her—if I wanted her.”

At this Jenkins again laughed, and said that he believed him, and that Billie would understand these things better when he was older.

“In the meantime, Little Bill,” he continued, “I haven’t got the heart of a Mother Carey’s chicken. I could stand afore a broadside without winkin’, I believe; I think I could blow up a magazine, or fight the French, as easy as I could eat my breakfast a’most, but to ask a pure, beautiful angel like Elise to marry me, a common seaman—why, I hasn’t got it in me. Yet I’m so fond o’ that little gal that I’d strike my colours to her without firin’ a single shot—”

“Does Elise want to marry you?” asked Billie.

“Oh, that’s the very pint!” said the seaman with decision. “If I could only make sure o’ that pint, I’d maybe manage to come up to the scratch. Now, that’s what I wants you to find out for me, Little Bill, an’ I know you’re a good little shaver, as’ll do a friend a good turn when you can. But you must on no account mention—”

He was going to have said, “You must on no account mention that I was blabbing to you about this, or that I wanted to find out such a thing,” when the sudden appearance of Elise’s lap-dog announced the fact that its mistress was approaching.

With a flushed face the bold seaman sprang up and darted out, as if to attack one of those pirates of the Java seas who had made so powerful an impression on Little Bill’s mind. But his object was escape—not attack. Lightly vaulting the garden fence, he disappeared into the same thicket which, on another occasion, had afforded opportune refuge to Kateegoose. A few moments later Elise turned into the walk, and stood before the summer-house.

“You here, Little Bill!” she exclaimed on entering, “I am very glad to find you, for I have been alone all the morning. Everybody is away—in the fields, I suppose—and I don’t like being alone.”

“Was you ever in love, Elise?” asked the boy with a solemn countenance.

The girl laughed heartily, and blushed a little.

“What a strange question, Billie,” she said; “why do you ask?”

“Well, it’s not easy to explain all at once; but—but I want to know if you want to be married?”

Elise laughed again, and, then, becoming suddenly grave, asked seriously why Billie put such foolish questions.

“Because,” said Little Bill, slowly, and with an earnest look, “Jenkins is very anxious to know if you are fond of him, and he actually says that he’s afraid to ask you to marry him! Isn’t that funny? I said that even I would not be afraid to ask you, if I wanted you—How red you are, Elise! Have you been running?”

“O no,” replied the girl, sheltering herself under another laugh; “and what did he say to that?”

“He said a great many things. I will try to remember them. Let me see—he said: ‘I haven’t got the heart of a Mother Carey’s chicken,’—(he didn’t tell me who Mother Carey is, but that’s no matter, for it was only one of her chickens he was speaking of);—‘I could stand afore a broadside without winkin’,’—(I give you his very words, Elise, for I don’t quite understand them myself);—‘I could blow up a magazine,’ he went on, ‘or fight the French, as easy as I could eat my breakfast, a’most, but to ask a pure an’ beautiful angel like Elise’—yes, indeed, you needn’t shake your head; he said these very words exactly—‘a pure an’ beautiful angel like Elise to marry me, a common seaman, why, I hasn’t got it in me. Yet I’m so fond o’ that little gal that I’d strike my colours to her without firin’ a single shot.’ Now, do you understand all that, Elise? for I don’t understand the half of it.”

“O yes, I understand a good deal of it, though some of it is indeed puzzling, as you say. But how did you come to recollect it all so well, Little Bill?”

“Because he said he wanted me to help him, and to find out if you wanted to marry him, so I paid particular attention to what he said, and—”

“Did he tell you to tell me all this?” asked Elise abruptly, and with sudden gravity.

“O dear, no; but as he wanted me to find it out for him, and said that not a soul knew about the matter but me, I thought the simplest way would be to tell you all he said, and then ask you straight. He was going to tell me something more, very particularly, for he was just saying, in a very solemn tone, ‘You must on no account mention—’ when your little dog bounced in and Jenkins bounced out, leaving the rest of it unsaid.”

“Then he has just left you?” said Elise.

“Just a moment or two before you came up. I think he must have seen some sort of beast in the wood, and gone in chase of it, he bolted in such a hurry, so I don’t know yet what I was not to mention.”

“Now, Little Bill,” said Elise with great seriousness of tone and manner, “you must not tell Mr Jenkins one word of the conversation that you and I have had just now.”

“What! not a single word?”

“Not one. You understand?”

“Yes, but, if he asks me, I must answer something, you know, and I must not tell lies.”

“Quite true, Billie. You must not tell lies on any account whatever. Now, listen. If he asks you about our conversation this morning, you must say that I told you you were never to open your lips about the subject again either to me or to him or to anybody. Mr Jenkins is an honourable man, and will not ask you a single question after that.”

“Then I’m not to tell him whether you want to marry him?”

“How can you tell him what you don’t know?”

“Well, but, I mean that you’re not going to tell me, so that I might tell him?”

“Certainly not.”

“Not a word to him and not a word to you—nor to anybody! Not even to Archie!”

“Yes. That is exactly what you must promise me.”

“This is a very unpleasant state of things,” said Little Bill, with a sad and puzzled countenance, “but of course I promise, for it is your affair, you know.”

It was a notable fact, which Little Bill did not fail to note—but did not dare to mention—that after that date there was a distinct change of demeanour in Elise Morel towards the handsome sailor—whether in his favour or otherwise it was impossible to tell.

Meanwhile, events were pending which were destined to exercise a very powerful influence over the fortunes of the Red River Colony, and, indeed, over the condition of the whole of Rupert’s Land.

Chapter Twenty Nine.

The Fishery Disasters

One fine day, when summer had merged into autumn, and things in Red River appeared to be advancing favourably, and Dan Davidson had recovered his strength, and Little Bill was fairly well, it occurred to Okématan that he would like to go to Lake Winnipeg, and see how the settlers who had gone to the fishery there, were getting on.

You see, the Cree chief was an observant savage, and, before returning to his tribe, had made up his mind to see all the phases in the life of the new Palefaces who had thus come to take possession of the land.

He was a remarkably independent fellow, and as he served the Davidsons for nothing except his food—which he did not count, as he could easily have supplied himself with victuals by means of his line, bow, and gun—he did not deem it necessary to ask leave of absence. He merely went to the house one morning, and announced his intention of going to Lake Winnipeg to fish.

“I will go with you,” said Dan, to whom the announcement was made.

“An’ so will I,” said Fred Jenkins, who chanced to be conversing with Dan at the time—“that is, if they can spare me just now.”

“The canoe of Okématan,” said the chief, “holds no more than three. He wishes to take with him Arch-ee and Leetil Bill.”

“Very well,” returned Dan, “there’s no objection to that, for there is not much doing on the farm at this moment, and Archie has worked hard all the summer, so he deserves a holiday. We will just make up the same party that started last time, only that Fergus and I will take a somewhat bigger canoe so as to accommodate you, Jenkins.”

“Thankee. Though I am big—unfort’nitly—I can stow myself away in small compass, an’ I’ve larned how, when there ain’t overmuch grub, to git along fairly well on short allowance. When d’ee trip your anchor?—I mean, when do ye start?”

“When to-morrow’s sun touches the tree-tops in the east,” said the Indian chief.

“All right, Okématan, I’m your man—after layin’ in a breakfast-cargo.”

According to this arrangement the two canoes pushed off at daybreak the following morning, from the wharf at the foot of the garden of Prairie Cottage, and began the descent of the Red River, which, after flowing between twenty and thirty miles northward, enters the mighty bosom of Lake Winnipeg. Okématan and Archie occupied their old places in the stern and bow of the chief’s canoe, with Little Bill in the middle—this time using a paddle, for his strength had greatly increased. The other canoe was steered by Dan; Fergus acted bowman, and Jenkins sat between them, also wielding a paddle.

That night they encamped on the banks of the river, for their progress had been slow, owing to sundry visits which had to be paid to settlers on the way down.

“Well, now,” observed the sailor, as he stood by the camp-fire smoking his pipe contemplatively, “I find that as circumstances change about in this world men’s minds are apt to go ’bout-ship along wi’ them.”

“That sounds a terribly profound speech, Fred,” said Archie, who was busy at his very usual occupation of whittling an arrow for his brother. “Did your father teach it you, or did you crib it from a copy-book?”

“No, I raither think,” retorted the seaman quietly, “that I got it from your grandmother by the father’s side.”

“What may be the circumstance that has caused your mind to go about-ship just now?” asked Dan, stirring the fire under the robbiboo-kettle.

“Well, it’s in regard to them there canoe-paddles. Although they do seem small, compared with oars, I find they’re quite big enough to do the work, and although I’ve bin trained from a youngster to handle the oar, an’ go like a crab with my back the way I’m pullin’, it do seem more sensible-like to sit wi’ one’s face to the front and drive ahead;—anyhow, it’s more comfortable and satisfactory.”

“Look out, Jenkins!” exclaimed Little Bill, “else your duck won’t be satisfactory—it’s burnin’ now.”

“O, never mind,” remarked Fergus, lighting his pipe. “It iss havin’ it well done he would be fond of.”

“Ay, but not over-done,” cried the seaman, snatching the duck in question from before the blaze and turning its other side—for they used no spits in the Nor’-West in those days, but cooked one side at a time—nay, even carved off and ate part of the cooked side while the other side was roasting.

Next day they came out on the ocean-like expanse of the great lake, and steered along its western shores until they reached the fishery, where numbers of rudely-constructed wigwams and a few tents sheltered the fishing community.

They had just returned from a successful visit to the nets when the visitors arrived, and all was animation and rejoicing at the successful take. Jacques Bourassin was the first man they met on landing, and he was enthusiastic about the prospects before them. Slowfoot was the first woman, and she was quite satisfied—in that amiable state of mental and physical felicity in which it is so easy to believe that “all is for the best.” Her husband soon after appeared. He, of course, was also greatly pleased. He had joined the fishers because he believed that plenty of food, tea, and tobacco would be going amongst them. He was not mistaken.

“You will come to my tent,” he said, in the wealth of his hospitality; “we have plenty of good fish, a very little meat, some tobacco, and oceans of tea!”

The six visitors accepted the invitation, and were soon made acquainted with all the gossip of the community.

“Does it always smoke?” whispered Little Bill to his brother.

The “it” referred to was Baby La Certe, which had, as usual, possessed itself of its father’s pipe when the mother was not watching.

“I’m not sure, Little Bill, but I think that it does its best.”

It was observed, especially by Fred Jenkins, that the tea-drinking which went on at this place was something marvellous.

“There’s that squaw sittin’ there,” he said, “she’s bin an’ swigged three pannikins o’ tea while I’ve bin looking at her—an’ it’s as black as ink. What’s that brown stuff they put into it, does any one know?”

“That? Why, it is maple sugar,” answered Archie, “an’ capital stuff it is to eat too.”

“Ah, I know that, for I’ve ate it in lump, but it can’t be so good in tea, I fancy, as or’nary brown or white sugar; but it’s better than fat, anyhow.”

“Fat!” exclaimed Little Bill, “surely you never heard of any one taking fat in tea, did you?”

“Ay, that I did. Men that move about the world see strange things. Far stranger things than people invent out o’ their own brains. Why, there was one tribe that I saw in the East who putt fat in the tea, an’ another putt salt, and after they’d swallowed this queer kind of tea-soup, they divided the leaves among themselves an’ chawed ’em up like baccy.”

The evident delight with which these half-breeds and more than half-Indians swallowed cup after cup of the blackest and bitterest tea, proved beyond question their appreciation of the article, and afforded presumptive evidence at least that tea is not in their case as poisonous as we are taught to believe.

But it was not, as Jenkins remarked, all fair weather, fun, and tea at the fishery. After the six visitors had been there for a week, shooting and assisting in the canoes, and at the nets, there came a night when the forces of Nature declared war against the half-breeds and those settlers who had cast in their lot with them at that time.

Jenkins, Okématan, and Archie had been out with their guns that day—the last having been promoted to the use of the dangerous weapon—and in their wanderings had about nightfall come upon a family of half-breeds named Dobelle, a good-natured set, who lived, like La Certe, on the laissez faire principle; who dwelt in a little log-hut of their own construction within the margin of the forest, not far from the shore of the great lake.

This family, though claiming to be Christian and civilised, was little better than vagrant and savage. They were to some extent as independent as the brute creation around them—though of course they betrayed the inherent weakness of mankind in being unable to exist happily without tea, sugar, and tobacco. For the rest, their wants were few and easily satisfied. Snares provided willow-grouse and rabbits; traps gave them furs and the means of purchasing guns and powder. Their log-hut was only an occasional residence. Wherever night overtook them they were at home. They camped on the open plains, in the woods, among the rocks, and on the margins of rivers and lakes. Healthy, happy, and heedless, the Dobelle family cared for nothing apparently, but the comfort of the passing hour; regarded the past as a convenient magazine from which to draw subjects for gossip and amusement, and left the future to look after itself.

There were in the hut, when the three visitors entered, old Dobelle, his wife, a daughter of eighteen, another of four, and two sons of twenty and twenty-two respectively.

“It looks like dirty weather,” said Jenkins on entering; “will you let us come to an anchor here for a bit?”

“Give us shelter?” explained Archie, who doubted old Dobelle’s ability to understand nautical language.

“You are welcome,” said the half-breed, making way politely, and pointing to places on the floor where the visitors were expected to squat. For there was no furniture in that mansion; the fire was kindled in the middle of its one room; the family sat around it on deer and buffalo skins, and the smoke alike of pipe and fire found egress at the crevices in the roof.

With kind hospitality Madame Dobelle poured some black tea into cups of birch-bark, and, on plates of the same material, spread before them the remains of a feast of roasted fish.

While eating this, various questions were put as to the success of the fishery.

“Yes—we have been very successful,” said old Dobelle. “No bad weather to speak of, and plenty of fish. Our good fortune is great.”

“But it won’t last long,” said the eldest son, who seemed to be the only growler in the family.

“N’importe—we will enjoy it while it lasts,” said the younger son.

“Yes, truly we will,” remarked Madame Dobelle. Whereupon the daughter of eighteen smiled, and the daughter of four giggled.

“What does Okématan think?” asked the host.

Thus appealed to, the chief gave it as his opinion that something was going to happen, for the sky in the nor’-west looked uncommonly black. Having given utterance to this cautious remark he relapsed into silence.

As if to justify his opinion, a tremendous clap of thunder seemed to rend the heavens at that moment, and, a few minutes later, a heavy shower of rain fell.

“Well that we got inside before that came on,” said Archie. “I hope it won’t come on to blow, else we shall be storm-stayed here.”

The weather seemed to be in a lively mood that night, for as the thunder had promptly answered to Okématan’s observation, so now the wind replied to Archie’s remark, by rushing up the natural avenue which extended from the hut to the lake and almost bursting in the door.

“See to the ropes, boys,” said old Dobelle, glancing uneasily at the roof.

The young men arose, went out, regardless of weather, and secured with additional care a couple of stout ropes with which the tendency of the roof to fly away was restrained.

“Did it ever come off?” asked Archie with some curiosity, as the young men returned and resumed their pipes.

“Yes—twice, and both times it was night,” answered Madame Dobelle, “and we were flooded out and had to camp under the trees.”

“Which was not comfortable,” added the old man. Another clap of thunder seemed to corroborate what he said, and a blast of wind followed, which caused the whole fabric of the hut to shudder. Jenkins looked inquiringly at the roof.

“No fear of it,” said old Dobelle; “the ropes are strong.”

Thus assured, the visitors continued their meal with equanimity, regardless of the storm that soon began to rage with great fury, insomuch that the door required a prop to keep it up and rain began to trickle in through crevices in the roof and drop here and there upon the party. When one such drop chanced to fall on old Dobelle’s nose, his younger son arose, and, fastening a piece of birch-bark to the rafters, caught the drop and trained it with its followers to flow towards an unoccupied place in one corner, which, being accidentally lower than the rest of the floor, formed a convenient receptacle for superfluous water.

At the same time Madame Dobelle made a shakedown of pine-branches in another corner for her visitors, for it was obvious that they would have to spend the night there, even although their own tent was not far-distant.

By that time the storm was raging with unwonted violence. Nevertheless the Dobelle family smoked on in placid contentment. When the time for repose arrived, Madame Dobelle and her eldest girl retired to a box-bed in a corner of the hut which was screened off—not very effectually—by a curtain of birch-bark. The two brothers lay down in another corner. The three visitors disposed themselves in the third, and, as the fourth was monopolised by the rain-rivulet, old Dobelle lay down on one side of the fire in the centre of the room, while the four-year-old girl reposed on the other.

During the night the accumulation of tobacco-smoke with fire-smoke produced a suffocating effect, but no one was capable of suffocation apparently, for they all smoked on—except Archie, who, as we have said, had not acquired the habit. Even the four-year-old girl, like Baby La Certe, had a pull now and then at its father’s pipe, and, from sundry white emanations from the crevices in the bark curtains, it was evident that the ladies behind these were enjoying themselves in the same way during the intervals of repose.

Next morning was fine, and the three sportsmen returned to the fishery to find that the storm had made an almost clean sweep of the nets. It had carried most of them away; torn others to pieces, and almost ruined the whole colony of fishermen; the ruin being all the more complete that most of the nets had been received on credit, and were to be paid for chiefly by the results of the autumn fishery.

La Certe was one of the chief sufferers; nevertheless, to judge from his looks, La Certe did not suffer much! He had brought a considerable amount of provision with him, as we have said, and, finding that one of his nets had been washed ashore, he proceeded very leisurely to mend it, while he smoked and assisted Slowfoot to consume pemmican and tea.

About this time a mysterious message was sent to Dan Davidson from Red River by an Indian, requiring his immediate return. The sender of the message was Elspie McKay; the summons was therefore obeyed at once.