The Trapper's Daughter Part 26

The squatter walked in with outstretched neck, and eye and ear on the watch, when suddenly a hand was laid on his shoulder, and a hoa.r.s.e laugh smote his ear. He turned with surprise, but this surprise was converted into terror at the sight of the man who, standing before him with arms folded on his chest, was regarding him with a look of mockery.

"Fray Ambrosio!" he exclaimed, as he fell back a step.

"Halloh, gossip," the latter said; "on my soul, you must be hard of hearing: I called you a dozen times, and you did not deign to answer me.

_Satanas!_ I was obliged to touch you before you would see that somebody wanted you."

"What is your business with me?" the squatter asked in an icy tone.

"What I want, gossip? That's a strange question: don't you know it as well as I do?"

"I do not understand you," Red Cedar said, still perfectly calm; "so explain yourself, if you please."

"I will do so, my master," the monk answered, with a mocking smile.

"But make haste, for I warn you that I am in a hurry."

"Can it be possible! Well, I have plenty of time, so you must find some to listen to me."

The squatter gave a pa.s.sionate start, which he, however, immediately checked.

"Yes, it is so," the monk said coolly; "I have been looking for you a long time."

"Come, a truce to talking! Here I am, explain yourself in two words. I say again, I am in a hurry."

"And I repeat that I do not care if you are. Oh! You may frown, gossip, but you must listen to me."

Red Cedar stamped his foot angrily, taking one step to the monk, he laid his hand on his shoulder, and looked fiercely in his face.

"Why, master," he said in a short, harsh voice, "I fancy, on my side, that we are changing parts, and that you treat me very curtly; take care, I am not patient, as you know, and if you do not mind, my patience might soon fail me."

"That is possible," the monk answered impudently; "but if we have changed our parts, whose fault is it, pray, mine or yours? Your sons are right in saying that you have turned monk, and are no longer fit for anything."

"Villain!" the squatter shouted, and raising his hand--

"That will do! Insults now! Don't be bashful: I like you better that way, at least I recognise you. Hum! what a change! I must confess that those French missionaries are real sorcerers: what a misfortune that since the independence the inquisition no longer exists!"

Red Cedar looked at the monk, who fixed on him his fierce eye with a diabolical expression; the squatter was suffering from one of those bursts of cold pa.s.sion, which are the more terrible, because they are concentrated. He felt an extraordinary itching to crush the scoundrel who was mocking him, and made impotent efforts to repress the anger which was beginning to get the mastery of him. The monk was not so much at his ease as he pretended to be. He saw the squatter's frown grow deeper, his face become livid; all this foreboded a storm which he was not anxious to see burst to his presence.

"Come," he said, in a softer key, "why should old friends quarrel? _Con mil demonios_--I am only here with a good intent, and to do you a service."

The squatter laughed contemptuously.

"You do not believe me," the monk continued, with an air of beat.i.tude; "that does not surprise me, it is always so. Good intentions are misunderstood, and a man believes his enemies in preference to his friends."

"A truce to your nonsense," the squatter said, impatiently; "I have listened to you too long already; let me pa.s.s, and you can go to the devil."

"Thanks for the proposition you make me," the monk said with a laugh; "but if you have no objection, I will not take advantage of it, at least for the present. But, jesting apart, there are two persons close by anxious to see you, and whom I am sure you will be delighted to meet."

"Whom do you mean? I suppose they are rogues of your own sort."

"Probably," the monk said; "however you shall judge for yourself, gossip."

And, not waiting for the squatter's answer, the monk imitated thrice the hiss of the coral snake. At the third time a slight movement took place in the shrubs a short distance off, and two men leaped into the defile.

The squatter uttered a cry of surprise, almost of terror, on seeing them: he had recognised his two sons, Nathan and Sutter. The young men walked up quickly to their father, whom they saluted with a respect mingled with irony, which did not escape his notice.

"Ah, there you are, father," Sutter, said, roughly, as he banged the b.u.t.t of his rifle on the ground, and rested his hands on the muzzle; "a man has a hard run before he can catch you up."

"It seems that since our separation father has turned Quaker; his new religion, probably, orders him not to frequent such bad company as ours."

"Silence, you villains!" the squatter shouted, stamping his foot; "I do what I please, and no one that I know of has a right to interfere."

"You are mistaken, father," Sutter, said drily; "I, for instance, consider your conduct unworthy of a man."

"Not mentioning," the monk supported him, "that you place your confederates in a fix, which is not right."

"That is not the question," Nathan said; "if father likes to turn Puritan, that is his business, and I will not find, fault with him; but there is a time for everything. To my mind, when a man is surrounded by enemies and tracked like a wild beast, he ought not to put on a sheepskin, and pretend to be harmless."

"What do you mean?" the squatter asked impatiently; "Explain yourself, once for all, and let us make an end of this."

"I will do so," Nathan went on; "while you are sleeping in a deceitful security, your enemies are watching and constantly weaving the web in which they have hopes of enfolding you shortly. Do you fancy that we have not known your retreat for a long time? Who can hope to escape discovery in the desert? We did not wish, however, to disturb your repose till the moment arrived for doing so, and that is why you did not see us before today."

"Yes," the monk remarked; "but at present time presses: while you trust to the fine words of the French missionary, who cured you and lulls you to sleep, in order always to keep you under his thumb, your enemies are silently preparing to attack you, and finish with you once for all."

The squatter gave a start of amazement.

"Why, that man saved my life," he said.

The three men burst into a laugh.

"What use is experience?" the monk said, turning to the young men with a significant shrug of his shoulders. "Here is your father, a man whose whole life has been spent in the desert, who forgets at once its most sacred law, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, and will not understand that this man, who, he says, saved his life, merely cured him to torture him at a later date, and have the pleasure of depriving him of that life when he is in rude health, instead of the miserable amount left him when they met."

"Oh, no," the squatter shouted, "you lie! That is impossible!"

"That is impossible!" the monk replied, with pity; "Oh, how blind men are! Come, reflect, gossip; had not this priest an insult to avenge?"

"It is true," Red Cedar muttered with a sigh; "but he forgave me."

"Forgave you! Do you ever forgive anybody? Nonsense, you are mad, gossip! I see there is nothing to be got out of you. Do what you like--we leave you."

"Yes," said the squatter, "leave me; there is nothing I wish more."

The monk and his comrades went away a few paces, but Fray Ambrosio suddenly returned. Red Cedar was still standing at the same spot with hanging head and frowning brow. The monk saw the squatter was shaken, and the moment had arrived to deal the great blow.

"Gossip," he said, "a parting word, or, if you prefer, a last piece of advice."

"What is there now?" Red Cedar said, nervously.

"Watch over Ellen!"