The Gun-Brand Read online

  CHAPTER XIII

  LAPIERRE RETURNS FROM THE SOUTH

  When Pierre Lapierre left Chloe Elliston's school after the completionof the buildings, he proceeded at once to his own rendezvous on Lac duMort.

  This shrewdly chosen stronghold was situated on a high, jutting pointthat rose abruptly from the waters of the inland lake, which surroundedit upon three sides. The land side was protected by an enormous blackspruce swamp. This headland terminated in a small, rock-rimmedplateau, perhaps three acres in extent, and was so situated as to bepractically impregnable against the attack of an ordinary force; therim-rocks forming a natural barricade which reduced the necessity forartificial fortification to a minimum. Across the neck of the tinypeninsula, Lapierre had thrown a strong stockade of logs, and from thelake access was had only by means of a narrow, one-man trail thatslanted and twisted among the rocks of the precipitous cliff side.

  The plateau itself was sparsely covered with a growth of stunted spruceand banskian, which served as a screen both for the stockade and thelong, low, fort-like building of logs, which was Lapierre's main cachefor the storing of fur, goods of barter, and contraband whiskey. Thefort was provisioned to withstand a siege, and it was there that thecrafty quarter-breed had succeeded in storing two hundred Mauser riflesand many cases of ammunition. Among Lapierre's followers it was knownas the "Bastile du Mort." A safe haven of refuge for the hard-pressed,and, in event of necessity, the one place in all the North where theymight hope indefinitely to defy their enemies.

  The secret of this fort had been well guarded, and outside ofLapierre's organized band, but one man knew its location--and few evenguessed its existence. There were vague rumours about the Hudson Bayposts, and in the barracks of the Mounted, that Lapierre maintainedsuch a fort, but its location was accredited to one of the numerousislands of the extreme western arm of Great Slave Lake.

  Bob MacNair knew of the fort, and the rifles, and the whiskey. Heknew, also, that Lapierre did not know that he knew, and therein, atthe proper time, would lie his advantage. The Hudson Bay Company hadno vital interest in verifying the rumour, nor had the men of theMounted, for as yet Lapierre had succeeded in avoiding suspicion exceptin the minds of a very few. And these few, realizing that if Lapierrewas an outlaw, he was by far the shrewdest and most dangerous outlawwith whom they had ever been called upon to deal, were very careful tokeep their suspicions to themselves, until such time as they couldcatch him with the goods--after that would come the business oftracking him to his lair. And they knew to a certainty that the menwould not be wanting who could do this--no matter how shrewdly thatlair was concealed.

  Upon arriving at Lac du Mort, Lapierre ordered the canoe-men to loadthe fur, proceed at once to the mouth of Slave River, transfer it tothe scows, and immediately start upon the track-line journey toAthabasca Landing. His own canoe he loaded with rifles and ammunition,and returned to the Yellow Knife. It was then he learned that Chloehad gone to Snare Lake, and while he little relished an incursion intoMacNair's domain, he secreted the rifles in the store-house and set outforthwith to overtake her. Despite the fact that he knew the girl tobe strongly prejudiced against MacNair, Lapierre had no wish for her tosee his colony in its normal condition of peace and prosperity. Andso, pushing his canoemen to the limit of their endurance, he overtookher as she talked with MacNair by the side of his mother's grave.

  Creeping noiselessly through the scrub to the very edge of the tinyclearing, Lapierre satisfied himself that MacNair was unattended by hisIndians. The man's back was turned toward him, and the quarter-breednoticed that, as he talked, he leaned upon his rifle. It was a chancein a thousand. Never before had he caught MacNair unprepared--and theman's blood would be upon his own head. Drawing the revolver from itsholster, he timed his movements to the fraction of a second; anddeliberately snapped a twig, MacNair whirled like a flash, and Lapierrefired. His bullet went an inch too high, and when Chloe insisted uponcarrying the wounded man to the school, Lapierre could but feeblyprotest.

  The journey down the Yellow Knife was a nightmare for thequarter-breed, who momentarily expected an attack from MacNair'sIndians. Upon their safe arrival, however, his black eyes glitteredwickedly--at last MacNair was _his_. Fate had played directly into hishands. He knew the attack was inevitable, and during theexcitement--well, LeFroy could be trusted to attend to MacNair. Withthe rifles in the storehouse, MacNair's Indians would be beaten back,and in the event of an investigation by the Mounted, the responsibilitywould be laid at MacNair's door. But of that MacNair would never know,for MacNair would have passed beyond.

  Knowing that the vengeance of MacNair's Indians would not be longdelayed, Lapierre determined to be well away from the Yellow Knife whenthe attack came. However, he had no wish to leave without firstassuring himself that the shooting of MacNair stood justified in theeyes of the girl, and to that end he had called upon her in her cottage.

  Then it was that chance seemed to offer a safe and certain means ofputting MacNair away, and he dropped the poisonous antiseptic tabletsinto the medicine, only to have his plan frustrated by the unexpectedpresence of Big Lena. He was not sure that the woman had seen hisaction. But he took no chances, and with an apparent awkward movementof his hat, destroyed the evidence, sought out LeFroy, who had alreadybeen warned of the impending attack, and ordered him to place three orfour of his most dependable Indians in the cottage, with instructionsnot only to protect Chloe, but to kill MacNair.

  Then he hastened southward to overtake his scowmen, who were toiling atthe track-lines somewhere among the turbulent rapids of the Slave. Andindeed there was need of haste. The summer was well advanced. Sixhundred miles of track-line and portage lay between Great Slave Lakeand Athabasca Landing. And if he was to return with the manyscow-loads of supplies for Chloe Elliston's store before the water-waybecame ice-locked, he had not a day nor an hour to lose.

  At Point Brule he overtook the fur-laden scows, and at Smith Landing anIndian runner reported the result of the fight, and the escape ofMacNair. Lapierre smothered his rage, and with twenty men at thetrack-line of each scow, bored his way southward.

  A month later the gaunt, hard-bitten outfit tied up at the Landing.Lapierre disposed of his fur, purchased the supplies, and within a weekthe outfit was again upon the river.

  At the mouth of La Biche a half-dozen burlapped pieces were removedfrom a _cache_ in a thicket of balsam and added to the outfit. And atFort Chippewayan the scows with their contents were examined by twoofficers of the Mounted, and allowed to proceed on their way.

  On the Yellow Knife, Chloe Elliston anxiously awaited Lapierre'sreturn. Under LeFroy's supervision the dormitories had been rebuilt,and a few sorry-looking, one-room cabins erected, in which families ofIndians had taken up their abode.

  Through the long days of the late summer and early fall, Indians hadpassed and repassed upon the river, and always, in answer to the girl'squestioning, they spoke of the brutality of MacNair. Of how men weremade to work from daylight to dark in his mines. And of the fact thatno matter how hard they worked, they were always in his debt. Theytold how he plied them with whiskey, and the hunger and misery of thewomen and children. All this the girl learned through her interpreter,LeFroy; and not a few of these Indians remained to take up their abodein dormitories or cabins, until the little settlement boasted somethirty or forty colonists.

  It was hard, discouraging work, this striving to implant the rudimentsof education in the minds of the sullen, apathetic savages, whose chiefambition was to gorge themselves into stupidity with food from thestorehouse. With the adults the case seemed hopeless. And, indeed,the girl attempted little beyond instruction in the simplest principlesof personal and domestic cleanliness and order. Even this met with noresponse, until she established a daily inspection, and it became knownthat the filthy should also go hungry.

  With the children, Chloe made some slight headway, but only at theexpense of unceasing, monotonous repetition, and even she wa
s forced toadmit that the results were far from encouraging. The little savageshad no slightest conception of any pride or interest in their dailytasks, but followed unvaryingly the line of least resistance asdelineated by a simple system of rewards and punishments.

  The men had shown no aptitude for work of any kind, and now when theice skimmed thinly the edges of the lake and rivers, they collectedtheir traps and disappeared into the timber, cheerfully leaving thewomen and children to be fed and cared for at the school. As the daysshortened and the nights grew longer, the girl realized, withbitterness in her heart, that almost the only thing she hadaccomplished along educational lines was the imperfect smattering ofthe Indian tongue that she herself had acquired.

  But her chiefest anxiety was a more material one, and Lapierre'sappearance with the supplies became a matter of the gravest importance,for upon their departure the trappers had drawn heavily upon theslender remaining stores, with a result that the little colony on theYellow Knife was already reduced to half rations, and was entirelydependent upon the scows for the winter's supply of provisions.

  Not since the night of the battle had Chloe heard directly fromMacNair. He had not visited the school, nor had he expressed a word ofregret or apology for the outrage. He ignored her existencecompletely, and the girl guessed that many of the Indians who refusedher invitation to camp in the clearing, as they passed and repassedupon the river, did so in obedience to MacNair's command.

  In spite of her abhorrence for the man, she resented his totaldisregard of her existence. Indeed, she would have welcomed a visitfrom him, if for no other reason than because he was a white man. Shespent many hours in framing bitter denunciations to be used in event ofhis appearance. But he did not appear, and resentment added to theanger in her heart, until in her mind he became the embodiment of allthat was despicable, and brutish, and evil.

  More than once she was upon the point of attempting another visit toSnare Lake, and in all probability would have done so had not Big Lenaflatly refused to accompany her under any circumstances whatever. Andthis attitude the huge Swedish woman stubbornly maintained, preservinga haughty indifference alike to Chloe's taunts of cowardice, promise ofreward, and threats of dismissal. Whereupon Chloe broached the subjectto Harriet Penny, and that valiant soul promptly flew into hysteria, sothat for three days Chloe did double duty in the school. After thatshe nursed her wrath in silence and brooded upon the wrongs ofMacNair's Indians.

  This continued brooding was not without its effect upon the girl, andslowly but surely destroyed her sense of proportion. No longer was theeducation and civilization of the Indians the uppermost thought in hermind. With Lapierre, she came to regard the crushing of MacNair'spower as the most important and altogether desirable undertaking thatcould possibly be consummated.

  While in this frame of mind, just at sunset of a keen October day, thecry of "_la brigade! la brigade!_" reached her ears as she sat alonein her room in the cottage, and rushing to the river bank she joinedthe Indians who swarmed to the water's edge to welcome the huge freightcanoe that had rounded the point below the clearing. Chloe clapped herhands in sheer joy and relief, for there, proud and erect, in the bowof the canoe stood Lapierre, and behind him from bank to bank theYellow Knife fairly swarmed with other full-freighted canoes. Thesupplies had arrived!

  Even as the bow of his canoe scraped the bank, Lapierre was at herside. Chloe felt her hand pressed between his--felt the grip of hisstrong fingers, and flushed deeply as she realized that not alonebecause of the supplies was she glad that he had come. And then, hisvoice was in her ears, and she was listening as he told her how good itwas to stand once more at her side, and look into the face whose imagehad spurred him to almost super-human effort, throughout the days andthe nights of the long river trail.

  Lightly she answered him, and Lapierre's heart bounded at the warmth ofher welcome. He turned with a word to his canoemen, and Chloe notedwith admiration, how one and all they sprang to do his bidding. Shemarvelled at his authority. Why did these men leap to obey hisslightest command, when LeFroy, to obtain even the half-heartedobedience she required of her Indians, was forced to brow-beat andbully them? Her heart warmed to the man as she thought of the slovenlyprogress of her school. Here was one who could help her. One whocould point with the finger of a master of men to the weak spots in hersystem.

  Suddenly her brow clouded. For, as she looked upon Lapierre, the wordsof MacNair flashed through her mind, as he stood weak from his wounds,in the dimness of her fire-lit room. Her eyes hardened, andunconsciously her chin thrust outward, as she realized that before shecould ask this man's aid, there were things he must explain.

  Darkness settled, and at a word from Lapierre, fires flared out on thebeach and in the clearing, and by their light the long line of canoemenconveyed the pieces upon their heads into the wide door of thestorehouse. It was a weird, fantastic scene. The long line ofpack-laden men, toiling up the bank between the rows of flaring fires,to disappear in the storehouse; and the long line returningempty-handed to toil again, to the storehouse. After a time Lapierrecalled LeFroy to his side and uttered a few terse commands. The mannodded, and took Lapierre's place at the head of the steep slope to theriver. The quarter-breed turned to the girl.

  "Come," he said, smiling, "LeFroy can handle them now. May we not goto your cottage? I would hear of your progress--the progress of yourschool. And also," he bowed, "is it not possible that the great, whatdo you call her, Lena, has prepared supper? I've eaten nothing sincemorning."

  "Forgive me!" cried the girl. "I had completely forgotten supper.But, the men? Have they not eaten since morning?"

  Lapierre smiled. "They will eat," he answered, "when their work isdone."

  Supper over, the two seated themselves upon the little veranda. Alongthe beach the fires still flared, and still the men, like a huge,slow-moving endless chain, carried the supplies to the store-house.Lapierre waved his hand toward the scene.

  "You see now," he smiled, "why I built the storehouse so large?"

  Chloe nodded, and regarded him intently. "Yes, I see that," sheanswered gravely, "but there are things I do not see. Of course youhave heard of the attack by MacNair's Indians?"

  Lapierre assented. "At Smith Landing I heard it," he answered, andwaited for her to proceed.

  "Had you expected this attack?"

  Lapierre glanced at her in well-feigned surprise.

  "Had I expected it, Miss Elliston, do you think I would have gone tothe Southward? Would I have left you to the mercy of those brutes?When I thought you were in danger on Snare Lake, did I----"

  The girl interrupted him with a gesture. "No! No! I do not think youanticipated the attack, but----"

  Lapierre finished her sentence. "But, MacNair told you I did, and thatI had timed accurately my trip to the Southward? What else did he tellyou?"

  "He told me," answered Chloe, "that had you not anticipated the attackyou would not have armed my Indians with Mausers. He said that myIndians were armed to kill men, not animals." She paused and lookeddirectly into his eyes. "Mr. Lapierre, where did those rifles comefrom?"

  Lapierre answered without a moment's hesitation. "From my--_cache_ tothe westward." He leaned closer. "I told you once before," he said,"that I could place a hundred guns in the hands of your Indians, andyou forbade me. While I could remain in the North, I bowed to yourwishes. I know the North and its people, and I knew you would be saferwith the rifles than without them. In event of an emergency, the factthat your Indians were armed with guns that would shoot farther, andharder, and faster, than the guns of your enemies, would offset, in agreat measure, their advantage in numbers. It seems that my judgmentwas vindicated. I disobeyed you flatly. But, surely, you will notblame me! Oh! If you knew----"

  Chloe interrupted him.

  "Don't!" she cried sharply. "Please--not that! I--I think Iunderstand. But there are still things I do not understand. Why didone of my own Indians attempt to m
urder MacNair? And how did MacNairknow that he would attempt to murder him? He said you had ordered itso. And the man was one of your Indians--one of those you left withLeFroy."

  Lapierre nodded. "Do you not see, Miss Elliston, that MacNair istrying by every means in his power to discredit me in your eyes?Apatawa, the Indian you--" Chloe shuddered as he paused, and hehastened on--"The Indian who attempted to shoot MacNair, was originallyone of MacNair's own Indians--one of the few who dared to desert him.And, for the wrongs he had suffered, he had sworn to kill MacNair."

  "But, knowing that, why did LeFroy send him to the cottage?"

  "That," answered Lapierre gravely, "is something I do not know. I mustfirst question LeFroy, and if I find that he thus treacherouslyendangered the life of a wounded man, even though that man was MacNair,who is his enemy, and likewise my enemy, I will teach him a lesson hewill not soon forget."

  Chloe heaved a sigh of relief. "I am glad," she breathed softly, "thatyou feel that way."

  "Could you doubt it?" asked the man.

  Chloe hesitated. "Yes," she answered, "I _did_ doubt it. How could Ihelp but doubt, when he warned me what would happen, and it all cameabout as he said? I--I could not help but believe him. And now, onething more. Can you tell me why MacNair's Indians are willing to fightto the death to save him from harm? If the things you tell me aretrue, and I know that they are true, because during the summer I havequestioned many of MacNair's Indians, and they all tell the same story;why do they fight for him?"

  Lapierre considered. "That is one of those things," he answered, "thatmen cannot explain. It is because of his hold upon them. Greatgenerals have had it--this power to sway men--to command them tocertain death, even though those men cursed the very ground theircommanders stood upon. MacNair is a powerful personality. In all theNorth there is not his equal. I cannot explain it. It is apsychological problem none can explain. For, although his Indians hatehim, they make no attempt to free themselves from his yoke, and theywill fight to the death in defense of him."

  "It is hard to believe," answered Chloe, "hard to understand. And yet,I think I do understand. He said of my grandfather, as he looked intothe eyes of his portrait on the wall: 'He was a fighter. He won tovictory over the bodies of his enemies.' That is MacNair's idea ofgreatness."

  Lapierre nodded, and when he looked into the face of the girl he notedthat her eyes flashed with purpose.

  "Tell me," she continued almost sharply, "you are not afraid ofMacNair?"

  For just an instant Lapierre hesitated. "No!" he answered. "I am notafraid."

  Chloe leaned toward him eagerly and placed a hand upon his arm, whileher eyes seemed to search his very thoughts. "Then you will go with meto Snare Lake--to carry our war into the heart of the enemy's country?"

  "To Snare Lake!" gasped the man.

  "Yes, to Snare Lake. I shall never rest now until MacNair's power overthese poor savages is broken forever. Until they are free from theyoke of oppression."

  "But it would be suicide!" objected Lapierre. "No possible good cancome of it! To kill a lion, one does not thrust his head into thelion's mouth in an effort to choke him to death. There are other ways."

  Chloe laughed. "He will not harm us," she answered. "I am not goingto kill him as one would kill a lion. There has been blood enoughspilled already. As you say, there are other ways. We are going toSnare Lake for the purpose of procuring evidence that will convict thisman in the courts."

  "The courts!" cried Lapierre. "Where are the courts north of sixty?"

  "North of sixty, or south of sixty, what matters it? There are courts,and there are prisons awaiting such as he. Will you go with me, ormust I go alone?"

  Lapierre glanced toward the flaring fires, where the endless line ofcanoemen still toiled from the river to the storehouse. Slowly hearose from his chair and extended his hand.

  "I will go with you," he answered simply, "and now I will say goodnight."