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[ THE SUNDAY CALL. ite_and blood, y of feeling. this was Mademotselle d the er of the re past middle age. ue showed the most reproachfully by her ood laughing. nglish girl—and I father!” monsieur the swollen wrists— u wish to make 2 you have got She should not the shops to obey inertia ago was _ur ized the ne gazi Eagle? exclaimed He does not tell his e swollen ankles, sob- 2. The boy seemed un- lous of this homage. Such exagger- of her own tenderness made her my father, Cousin Phil- ppe glanced cautio around the y. h girl at the head Navarre it with salute heard the ro uns fired for him?” afraid of him. omes afoot, with that her such a good m—how can she resist lake is human.’ is not our dauph- d! Both my father ied he Temple er replaced the erently and rose, back- r King, Eagle,” the old ced to his child. “Louis Lc XVI and Marie this wreck. How ed from pri o not know. of his fa o have often cannot fail to iden- he is by the past s life. nwinking before his s. Two of them house, even to his at top and without the bottom where they the jaw. France had been the of his country’ {ler, who cut his e ith 2 blow nocked him e sli noted ears, which were fu any indentation met the sweep down on t htest pr , the child had been forced to drown memory in fiery liguor, month after month. During six worse months, which might have been tettered by e uch a Jailer, hid from the light in_an airless dungeon. covered with rags which were never changed, and w th and vermin which daily accu- mulated, having his food passed to him through a slit the door, hearing no buman voice ing no human face, his Joints swelling w died in everythi ity and was breathing cor that this corps ‘The heir of a fined and bur While the eléer De Ferrier shed nervous tesrs, the younger looked on with eyes which had seen the drollery of the French tion h I knew the man who has played this clever trick, and whether honest men or the rabble are behind it.” “Let us find him and embrace him!” I would rather embrace his prospects when the House of Bourbon comes again to the throne of France. Who is that fel- Jow at the gate? He looks as if he had ness here.” man came on among the tomb- , showing a full presence and pros- n tages, such ut in the Smithfield t merely a r as proclaimed had ceased to breathe. g line of Kings was cof- alehouse. Instead of being smooth shaven, he wore' a very long mustache which dropped its ends below his chin. A court pai attached to his patrons, ought to have fallen into straits during Rey on. Philippe exclaimed with s Bellenger! Look at hi took off his cap and made a reverence. uncle is weeping over the dead Bellenger said Philippe. “It 1 to tears to see how make ®o such complaint renchmen in these days, mon- e court painter answered. “I ve my young charge here, en- gravestones with you—a pleas- after th unmarked trenches \\u}l your permi on I will ing of France take him a “Have 1 the honor, Monsieur Bellenger, of saluting the man who brought the King out of prison?” the old man in- ired. Again Bellenger made the Marquis a deep reverence, which modestly dis- ciaimed any exploit. ';\\'n(n was this done? Who were your belpers? Where are you taking him?’ Bellenger lifted his eyebrows at the fa- natical royalist. “I wish T had had a hand in it,” spoki Phillipe de Ferrier. e I am taking this boy to America, Mon- sieur the Marquis,” the painter quietly answered. “B why not to one of his royal un- .UHis royal uncles,” repeated Bellenger. “Pardon, Monsieur the Marquis, but did I say he had any royal uncle _ “Come!” spoke Philippe de Ferrier. “No jokes with us, ‘ellenger. Honest men of every degree should stand together in these times.” Hagle sat down on a flat gravestone, and looked at the boy who seemed to be an object of dispute between the men of her family and the other man, He neither saw nor heard what passed. She said to herself— “It would make no difference to me! It ls the same, whether he is the King or Bellenger's eyes half closed their lids as if for protection from the sun. ““Monsieur de Ferrier may rest agsured that I am not at present occupled with Jokes. It will again ask permisssion to take my charge away.” “You may not go until you have an- swered some questions.” 'hat I will do as far as I am permit- te “Do Monsieur and his brother know that the King is here?” inquired the elder De Ferrier, taking the lead. “What reason have you to believe,” re- sponded Bellenger, “that the Count de Provence and the Count @'Artols ha any interest in this boy?” Philippe laughed and kicked the turf. vele have seen him many a time at sailles, my friend. - Yersaine en; ou are very mys “Have his enemies, or his friends set him free?” demanded the old Frenchman. i 'l'l'l:gxat.” said Bellenger, “I may not ell. M‘{;Yhen do you sall, and in what ves- ““These matters, also, T may not tell.” ““This man is a kidnaper!’” the old no- ble cried, bringing out his sword with & hiss. But Philippe held his arm., “Among things permitted to you,” sald Philippe, “‘perhaps you will take oath the ‘boy is not a Bourbon?'” Bellenger shrugged, and waved his You admit that he is?”, 1T admit nothing, monsteur. days in which we save our hea as we can, and admit nothing.” “If we had never seen the dauphin we should infer that this is no common child you are carrying away so ucretlf', bound by so many pledges. A man like you, trusted with an important mission, na- turally magnifies it. You refuse to let us know anything about this affair?” I am simply obeying _orders, mon- sieur,” said Bellenger humbly. *“It is not my affair.” i " . You are better dressed, more at ease with the world than any other refugee 1 have seen since we came out of France. Scmebody who has money is paying to liave the child placed in safety. Very well. Any country but his own is a good country for him now. My uncle and I will not interfere. We do not under- stand. But liberty of any kind {s better than imprisonment and death. You can of course evade us, but I give you notice I‘Shall look for this boy in America, and if you take him elsewhere I shall prob- ably find it out.” ‘America is a large country,” said Bel- lenger, smiling. He took the boy by the hand and made his adieus. The old De Ferrier deeply saluted the boy and slightly saluted his gvardian. The other De Ferrier nodded. ‘We are making a mistake, Philippe!” said the uncle, “Let him go,” said the nephew. “He will probably slip away at once out of St. Bartholohew’s. We can do nothing until we are certain of the powers be- hind him, Endless disaster to the child himself might result from our interfer- ence. If France wers ready now to take back her king, would she accept an im- becile?” The old De Ferrier groaned aloud. -‘Bellenger s not a bad man,” added Philippe, Eagle watched her playmate until the closing gate hid him from sight. She re- membered having once implored her nurse for a small plaster image displayed in a shop. It could not speak, nor move, ror love her in return. But she cried se. cretly all night to have it in her arms, ashamed of the unreasonable desire, but conscious that she could not be appeased by anything else. That glaster image de- nied to her symbolized the strongest pas- sion of her life. The pigeons wheeled ll‘&)und St. Bat's tower, or strutted burnished on the wall. The bell, which she had forgotten since sitting with the boy in front of the black- smith shop, again boomed out its record of time; though it seemed to Eagle that g long, lonesome perfod like eternity had egun. BOOK L AWAKING. I remember poising naked upon a rock, ready to dive into Lake George. This memory stands at the end of a diminish- ing vista; the extreme point of coherent recollection. My body and muscular limbs reflected in the water filled me with savage pride, I knew, as the beast knows its herd, that my 'mother Marlanne was hangin; the pot over the fir pit In the center o our lodge; the children were playing with other papooses; and my father was hunt- ing down the lake. The hunting and fish- ing were good, and we had plenty of meat. Skenedonk, whom I considered a person belonging to myself, was strip- ping more slowly on the rock behind me, ‘We were heated with wood ranging. Aboriginal life, primeval and vigor-giv- ing, lay behind me when I plunged e: pecting to strike out under the delicious forest shadow. ‘When I came ug the sun had vanished, the woods and their shadow were gone. So were the Indian children playing on the shore, and the shore with them. My mother Marianne might still be hang- ing her F‘fl in the lodge. But all the hunting lodges of our ple were as completely lost as if I had entered an- other world. My head was bandaged, as I discovered when I turned it to look around. The walls were not the log walls of our lodge, chinked with moss and topped by a bark roof. On the contrary they were grander than the inside of St. Regis church whers 1 took my first communion, though that was bullt of stone. These walls wers paneled, as I learned afterward to call that noble finishing, and ornamented with pictures, and crystal sockets wad evident, for one shaded wax light burned near me. The ceiling was not eomposed of wooden beams like some Canadian houses, but di- vided itself into panels also, reflecting the light with a dark rosy shining. e work finer than a priest's white garments fluttered at the windows. I had dived early in the afternoon, and it was night. Instead of findin 12 still stripped for swimming, I had & loose robe around me, and a coverlet drawn up to my armpits. The couch under me was by no means of hemlock twigs and skins, like our bunks at home; but soft and rich. I wondered if I had died and gons to heaven; and just then the Virgin moved past my head and stood looking down at me. I started to jump. out of a window, but felt so little power to move that 1 only twitched and pretended to be asleep, and watched her as we sighted game, with eyes nearly shut. She had a oppet of a child on one arm that sat up nstead of leaning against her shoulder, and looked at me, too. The poppet had a cap on its head, and was dressed In lace, and she wore a Wwhite dress that let her neck and arms out, but covered her to the ground. This was remarkable, as the Indian women covered their necks and arms, and wore thelr pet- ticoats short. I could see this image breathe, which was a marvel, and the color moving under her white skin. Her eyes seemed to go through you and search all the veins, sending a shiver of pleasure down your back. Now I knew after the first start that she was a living girl holding a living baby, and when my father, Thomas Wil- liams, appeared at the door of the room it was certain I could not be in heaven. It came over me like a flash that I myself was_changed. In spite of the bandages my head was as clear as if al] its facul- ties were washed and newly arranged. I could look back into my life and perceive things that I had only sensed as a dumb brute. A fish thawed out after being frozen and reanimated through every sparkling scale and tremulous fin could not have felt its resurrection more keenly. My head gave me no trouble at all. The girl and baby disappeared as soon as I saw my father; which was not sur- prising, for he could not be called a pre- possessing half-breed. His lower lip pro- truded and hung sullenly. He had heavy brows and a shaggy thatch of hair. Our St. Regis Iroquois kept to the buckskins, though they often had hunting shirts of fulled flannel; and my father’'s buckskins were very dirty. A little man that I did not know was in the room shuffled across the floor to keep my father from entering. Around the base of his head he had a thin curtain of hair scarcely reaching his shoulders. His nose pointed upward. Its tip was the shape of a candle extingulsher. He wore horn spectacles, and ~knee breeches, ‘walstcoat and coat of black like the ink which fades to brown in a drying ink horn. He put his hands together and took them apart uncertainly and shot out his lip and frowned, as if he had a universal grudge and dared not vent it. He said something In a language I did not understand and my father ve no answer. Then he began a kind of Anglo- French, worse than the patols we u at £t. Regis when we did not speak Iro- quois. I made out the talk between the t:vo understanding each without hesita- tio ‘Sir, who are you?” “The chief, Thomas Williams,” answer- ed my father. “Pardon me, sir; but you are unmistak- ably an Indian. “Iroquois chief,” sald my father. “Mo- hawk.” “That belng the case, what autherity have you for calling yourself Thomas Wil- liams?”’ challenged the little man. 'Thomas Williams is my name.” “Impossible, sir; Skenedonk, the Oneida, does not assume so much. He 1.;- no claims to Willlam Jones or John Smith, or some other honest British name.” The chief maintained silent dignity. “Come, sir, let me have your name! I can hear it if I cannot repeat it.” Silently, contemptuously, my father turned toward me. “‘Stop, sir!” the man In the horn spee- tacles cried. “What do you want?” “I want my boy."” “Your boy? This lad is white.” “My grandmother was white,’ scended the chief. “A_white from Deerfield. Eunice Willlams. eonde- prisoner “I see, sir. You get your Williams from the Yankees. And is this lad's mother white, too?"” *“No. Mohawk.” “Why, man, his body is like milk! 1s no son of yours.' The chief marched toward me. * A “Let him alone! If (ou try to drag him out of the manor I will appeal to the au- thority of Le Ray de Chaumont.” m)lry“fnher spoke to me with sharp au- “What do you call him?" the little mag inguired, ambling besids the chief. “Eleazar Willlams i{s his name. But in the lodges at St. Regls, everywhere, it is Lazarre.” “How old is he?” “About 18 years. *“Well, Thomas Willlams,” said my fret- ful guard: his antagonism melting to patronage, “I will tell you who I am and then you can féel no anxiety. I .am Dr. Chmtrg‘h»h{llch-u to the Count de Chau- mont. e lad cut his head upon a rock diving in the lake and has remalned un- consclous ever since. This is'partly due to an oplate I have administered to insure complete quiet and he will not awake for several hours yet. He received the best surgery as soon as he was brought here and placed in my hands by the educated Oneida, Skenedonk.” “] was not near the lodge,” sald my father. “I was down the lake fishing.” “T have bled him once and shall bleed him again; though the rock did that pretty effectually. But thess strapping {x;un’ creatures need frequent blood-let- g The chief gave him no thanks and 1 resolved to knock the little doo- myself ;oraownuhnamomrmvm;a ‘s, “In the absence of Count de Chaumeon ey o mli'llnck you to go and knock on the cook’s door and ask for something to eat befors you o home.” stay here,” responded my father. “There i3 not the l&lm of any- body’s watching beside the lad te-night I was about to retire when you wers per- El{ttetd,_to enter. He is sleeping like an ant. ‘He bel: to ' the chis e olones to. el PRSIEIS sake, shut up and go am ¥ It was like one of the little dogs in camp snapping at the patriarch nfl . from & mfihx‘x" & all and recolling father’s hand was on his hunting but he grunted and sald nothing. Dr. Chantry himself withdrew from the room and_left the Indian in possession. Weak as I was I felt my insides quake with laughter. My very first observation of the whimsical being tickled me with a kind of foreknowledge of all his weak fretfulness. My father sat down on the floor at the foot of my couch, where the wax light threw his shadow, exaggerating its un- moving profile. I noticed one of the chairs he disdained as useless, though when eating or drinking with te men he sat at table with them. The chair 1 saw was one that I faintly recognized as furniture of some previous experience, slim-legged, gracefully curved and bro- caded. Brocaded was the word. I studied it _until I fell asleep. The sun, shining through the protected yindows thstead of glaring into our lodge door, showed my father sitting in the same position when I woke, and Skene- donk at my side. I liked the educated Iroquois. He was about ten years my se- nior. He had been taken to France when a stripling and was much bound to the whites, though living with his own tribe, Skenedonk had the mildest brown eyes 1 ever saw outside a deer's head. He was a bald Indian with one small scalplock. But the just and pexfect dome to which his close-lying ears were attached needed no hair to adorn it. You felt glad that nothing shadéd the benevolence of his all- over forehead. By contrast he emphasized the sullenness of my fatRer; yet when occasion had pressed there never was a readier hand than Skenedonk’s to kill. 1 tossed the cover back to spring oy of bed with a whoop.” But a woman & a high cap with ribbons hanging down tg her heels, and a dress short enough ta show her toes, stepped into the room and made a courtesy. Her face fell ecasily into creases when she talked and gave you the feeling that it was too .soft of flesh. Indeed, her eyes were cushioned all around. She spoke, and Skenedonk answered her in French. The meaning of every word broke through my mind as fire breaks through paper. ““Madame de Ferrier sent me. to inquire how.the young gentleman & Skenedonk lessened the rims around his eyes. My father grunted. "Dia Madame de Ferrier say ‘the young gentleman’?” Skenedonk inquired. “I was told to inquire. I am her ser vant Ernestine,” said the woman, her face creased with the anxlety of respond- ing to questions. ““Tell Madame de Ferrier that the young gentleman is much better and will g¢ ome to the lodges to-day.” “She sald I was to walt upon him and lve him his breakfast under the doctor’s rection.” “Say, with thanks to Madame de Fer rier, that I wait upon him.” Ernestine again courtesied and made way for Dr. Chantry. He came in “quite good-natured and greeted all of ul‘ his _inferiors, with a humility ] hought touching, but learned after- ward to distrust. My head already fell the healing blood, and I was ravenous for food. He bound it with fresh bandages, and opened a box full of glittering knives