The Foreigner Part 10

"Irma," he said in Russian, "I am going to leave you."

The girl rose, placed the sleeping baby on the bed, and coming to her father's side, stood looking up into his face, her wonderful brown eyes s.h.i.+ning with tears she was too brave to shed.

He drew her to him.

"I am going to leave you," he repeated in Russian. "In one year, if all is well, at most in two, I shall return. You know I cannot stay with you, and you know why." He took the miniature from his pocket and opening it, held it before her face. "Your mother gave her life for her country." For some moments he gazed upon the beautiful face in the miniature. "She was a lady, and feared not death. Ah! ah! such a death!" He struggled fiercely with his emotions.

"She was willing to die. Should not I? You do not grudge that I should leave you, that I should die, if need be?" An anxious, almost wistful tone crept into his voice.

Bravely the little girl looked up into the dark face.

"I remember my mother," she said; "I would be like her."

"Aha!" cried her father, catching her to his breast, "I judged you rightly. You are her daughter, and you will live worthy of her.

Kalman, come hither. Irma, you will care for your brother. He is young. He is a boy. He will need care. Kalman, heart of my life!"

"He does not understand Russian," said Paulina. "Speak in Galician."

"Ha," cried the man, turning sharply upon her as if he had forgotten her existence. "Kalman, my son," he proceeded in Russian, "did you not understand what I said to your sister?"

"Not well, father," said the boy; "a little."

"Alas, that you should have forgotten your mother's speech!"

"I shall learn it again from Irma," said the boy.

"Good," replied the father in Galician. "Listen then. Never forget you are a Russian. This," putting the miniature before him, "was your mother. She was a lady. For her country she gave up rank, wealth, home and at last life. For her country, too, I go back again. When my work is done I shall return."

Through the window came sounds of revelry from the house near by.

"You are not of these cattle," he said, pointing through the window.

"Your mother was a lady. Be worthy of her, boy. Now farewell."

The boy stood without word, without motion, without tear, his light blue eyes fixed upon his father's face, his fair skin white but for a faint spot of red on his cheek.

"Obey your sister, Kalman, and defend her. And listen, boy."

His voice deepened into a harsh snarl, his fingers sank into the boy's shoulder, but the boy winced not. "If any man does her wrong, you will kill him. Say it, boy? What will you do?"

"Kill him," said the boy with fierce prompt.i.tude, speaking in the English tongue.

"Ha! yes," replied his father in English, "you bear your mother's face, her golden hair, her eyes of blue--they are not so beautiful--but you have your father's spirit. You would soon learn to kill in Russia, but in this land you will not kill unless to defend your sister from wrong."

His mood swiftly changed. He paused, looking sadly at his children; then turning to Mrs. Fitzpatrick he said, "They should go to the public school like Simon Ketzel's little girl. They speak not such good English as she. She is very clever."

"Sure, they must go to school," said she. "An' go they will."

"My grat.i.tude will be with you forever. Good-by."

He shook hands with Timothy, then with Mrs. Fitzpatrick, kissing her hand as well. He motioned his children toward him.

"Heart of my heart," he murmured in a broken voice, straining his daughter to his breast. "G.o.d, if G.o.d there be, and all the saints, if saints there be, have you in their keeping. Kalman, my son,"

throwing one arm about him, "Farewell! farewell!" He was fast losing control of himself. The stormy Slavic pa.s.sions were threatening to burst all restraint. "I give you to each other. But you will remember that it was not for my sake, but for Russia's sake, I leave you.

My heart, my heart belongs to you, but my heart's heart is not for me, nor for you, but for Russia, for your mother's land and ours."

By this time tears were streaming down his cheek. Sobs shook his powerful frame. Irma was clinging to him in an abandonment of weeping.

Kalman stood holding tight to his father, rigid, tearless, white.

At length the father tore away their hands and once more crying "Farewell!" made toward the door.

At this the boy broke forth in a loud cry, "Father! My father!

Take me with you! I would not fear! I would not fear to die. Take me to Russia!" The boy ran after his father and clutched him hard.

"Ah, my lad, you are your mother's son and mine. Some day you may go back. Who knows? But--no, no. Canada is your country. Go back."

The lad still clutched him. "Boy," said his father, steadying his voice with great effort and speaking quietly, "with us, in our country, we learn first, obedience."

The lad dropped his hold.

"Good!" said the father. "You are my own son. You will yet be a man.

And now farewell."

He kissed them again. The boy broke into pa.s.sionate sobbing.

Paulina came forward and, kneeling at the father's feet, put her face to the floor.

"I will care for the son of my lord," she murmured.

But with never a look at her, the father strode to the door and pa.s.sed out into the night.

"Be the howly prophet!" cried Tim, wiping his eyes, "it's harrd, it's harrd! An' it's the heart av a paythriot the lad carries inside av him! An' may Hivin be about him!"

CHAPTER VI

THE GRIP OF BRITISH LAW

It was night in Winnipeg, a night of such radiant moonlight as is seen only in northern climates and in winter time. During the early evening a light snow had fallen, not driving fiercely after the Manitoba manner, but gently, and so lay like a fleecy, s.h.i.+mmering mantle over all things.

Under this fleecy mantle, s.h.i.+mmering with myriad gems, lay Winnipeg asleep. Up from five thousand chimneys rose straight into the still frosty air five thousand columns of smoke, in token that, though frost was king outside, the good folk of Winnipeg lay snug and warm in their virtuous beds. Everywhere the white streets lay in silence except for the pa.s.sing of a belated cab with creaking runners and jingling bells, and of a sleighing party returning from Silver Heights, their four-horse team smoking, their sleigh bells ringing out, carrying with them hoa.r.s.e laughter and hoa.r.s.er songs, for the frosty air works mischief with the vocal chords, and leaving behind them silence again.

All through Fort Rouge, lying among its snow-laden trees, across the frost-bound a.s.siniboine, all through the Hudson's Bay Reserve, there was no sign of life, for it was long past midnight. Even Main Street, that most splendid of all Canadian thoroughfares, lay white and spotless and, for the most part, in silence. Here and there men in furs or in frieze coats with collars turned up high, their eyes peering through frost-rimmed eyelashes and over frost-rimmed coat collars, paced comfortably along if in furs, or walked hurriedly if only in frieze, whither their business or their pleasure led.

Near the northern limits of the city the signs of life were more in evidence. At the Canadian Pacific Railway station an engine, h.o.a.ry with frozen steam, puffed contentedly as if conscious of sufficient strength for the duty that lay before it, waiting to hook on to Number Two, nine hours late, and whirl it eastward in full contempt of frost and snow bank and blizzard.

Inside the station a railway porter or two drowsed on the benches.

Behind the wicket where the telegraph instruments kept up an incessant clicking, the agent and his a.s.sistant sat alert, coming forward now and then to answer, with the unwearying courtesy which is part of their equipment and of their training, the oft repeated question from impatient and sleepy travellers, "How is she now?" "An hour,"

"half an hour," finally "fifteen minutes," then "any time now."

At which cheering report the uninitiated brightened up and pa.s.sed out to listen for the rumble of the approaching train. The more experienced, however, settled down for another half hour's sleep.