A Sister to Evangeline
Page 22
Chapter XXI
Beauséjour, and After
Now, while I was arranging in my mind a fresh and voluminous series ofinterrogations, my singular host arose abruptly and went off without aword, leaving me to rebuild a new image of him out of the shatteredfragments of the old.
I saw that he was not mad, but possessed. One intolerably dominantpurpose of revenge making all else little in his eyes, he was mad but inrelation to a world of complex impulses; in relation to his great aim,sane, and ultimately effective, I could not doubt. But the madgrotesquerie of the part he had assumed had come to cling to him asanother self, no longer to be quite sloughed off at will. To play hispart well he had resolved to be it; and he was it, with reservation.Just now, Acadie fallen and his enemy for the time in eclipse, Iconcluded that he found his occupation gone. Therefore, after solitaryand tongue-tied years, his speech flowed freely to me, as a streambroken loose. That he had a purpose with me, I divined, would excuse himin his own sight for descending to the long unwonted relief of directand simple utterance. I expected to find out from him many things ofgrave import during the few days of inaction that yet lay ahead of me.Then I would be able to act—without, perhaps, the follies of the past.Meanwhile this tender, icy, extravagant, colossal, all but omniscientcharacter had bound me to him with the irrefragable bonds of mystery,gratitude, and trust. I was Yvonne’s first, but next I felt myself fastin leash to the posturing madman Grûl.
Returning soon to my couch, I dozed and mused away the morning. At nooncame no sign of my host, so I went to the niche in the wall, found food,and made my meal alone, feeling myself hourly growing in strength.Toward sunset Grûl strode in, wafted, as my convalescent nostrilsaverred, upon a most savoury smell. It proved to be a still steamingcollop of roast venison, and after that feast I know the blood ranredder and swifter in my pulses.
“O best physician!” said I, leaning back. “And now, I beg you, assuage alittle the itching of my ears.”
He sat, his mantle and wizard wand flung by, upon a billet of woodagainst the wall, and looked not all unlike familiar mortals of thefinest. Leaning his chin in his long, clutching hands, as if to makegesture impossible, he leaped straight into the story:
“That fighting fire in your Anderson, when he killed the savage with hishands, died out. He is still the Quaker farmer. He went to Grand Pré,and cleared your name, and told how you had saved him for Mademoisellede Lamourie. With some inconsequence, Mademoiselle was thereupon austerewith him because he had not in turn saved _you_ for her. He went toHalifax and did deeds with the council—for he secured further andgreater grants of land for himself and further and greater grants ofland for Giles de Lamourie, with compensations for the burnings whichEnglish rule should have prevented, and with, last of all, an Englishguard for Grand Pré, in order that scalps of English inclination mightbe secure upon their owners’ heads. All this was wise, and indeed plainsense—better than fighting. And he remains at Grand Pré, and waits uponMademoiselle de Lamourie, patient on crumbs.
“In June things happened, while you slept here. The English came inships, sailing up Chignecto water and startling the slow fools atBeauséjour. The English landed on their own side of the Missiguash. Theblack ruins of Beaubassin cried out to them for vengeance on La Garne.”(The name, upon his lips, snarled like a wolf.)
“Vergor, the public thief, called in the men of the villages to help hisgarrison. Beauséjour was a nest of beavers mending the walls—but nottill the torrent was already tearing through. The invaders, wading thedeep mud, forced the Missiguash, and drove back the white-coatregiments. They seized the long ridge behind the fort, and set up theirbatteries. Fort guns and field guns bowled at each other across themeadows.
“Meanwhile the English governor at Halifax sent for the heads of thevillages, the householders of Piziquid, Grand Pré, Annapolis. He saidthe time was come, the final time, and they must swear fealty to KingGeorge of England. He bade them choose between that oath, with peace, ora fate he did not name. A few, wise like Giles de Lamourie, took oath.The rest feared La Garne, trusted France, and accounted England an oldwoman. They refused, and went home.
“The siege went on, and many balls were wasted. The English were all onone side of the fort, so those of the garrison who got tired of beingbesieged walked out the other side and went home. These were thephilosophers. Vergor lived in his bomb-proof casemate, and was at ease.But one morning while he sat at breakfast with other officers a shellcame through the roof and killed certain of them.
“That ended it. If the bomb-proof was not bomb-proof, Vergor might gethurt. He capitulated. His officers broke their swords, but in vain. LaGarne spat upon him.”
Here he stopped, his eyes veered, and his face twisted. In a strangevoice he went on:
“In La Garne yet flickers one spark of good—his courage. Till that iseaten out by his sins he lives, not being fully ripe for the finalhell.”
He stopped again, moistening his lips with his tongue.
I put my hand to my head.
“Give me a drink of water, I pray you!” said I to divert him, fearinglest that swift and succinct narrative had come to an end.
He gave it to me, and in a moment began again.
“So Beauséjour fell,” said he. “La Garne left early, for him the Englishwanted to hang. The rest marched out with honours of war. The Englishfound them an inconvenience as prisoners, and sent them to Louisbourg.And Beauséjour is now Fort Cumberland.”
“So fades the glory of France from Acadie—forever!” I murmured, weigheddown with prescience.
“Just as it was fading,” continued Grûl, with a hint of the cynic in hisvoice, “your cousin, Marc de Mer, came from Quebec with despatches. Thegarrison was marching out. He, being already out, judged it unnecessaryto go in. He took boat down Chignecto water, and up through Minas toGrand Pré. Here he busied himself with your uncle’s affairs, layingaside his uniform and passing unmolested as a villager.
“For a little there was stillness. Then the great doom fell.
“To every settlement went English battalions. What I saw at Grand Pré iswhat others saw at Annapolis, Piziquid, Baie Verte. An English colonel,one Winslow, smooth and round and rosy of countenance, angry andanxious, little in love with his enterprise, summoned the men of GrandPré to meet him in the chapel and hear the last orders of the king.There had been “last orders” before, and they had exploded harmlesslyenough. The men of Grand Pré went—and your cousin Marc, having arestless curiosity, went with them. Thereupon the doors were shut. Theywere as rats in a trap, a ring of fire about them.
“They learned the king’s decree clearly enough. They were to be put onships,—they, their families, such household gear as there might be placefor,—and carried very far from their native fields, and scattered amongstrangers of an alien speech and faith.
“Well, the mountains had fallen upon them. Who could move? They lay inthe chapel, and their hearts sweat blood. Daily their weeping women,their wide-eyed children, came bringing food. But the ships were notready. The agony has dragged all summer. At last two small ship-loadsare gone; the crowd is less in the chapel; some houses stand empty inthe village, waiting to burn. The year grows old; the task is nearlydone.”
There was a dark silence.
“Has my cousin Marc gone yet?” I asked heavily.
“He waits and wastes in the chapel.”
“And my almost-father, Father Fafard?”
“No,” said Grûl, “his trouble is but for others. He has ever counselledmen to keep their oaths. He has opposed a face of steel to Quebecintrigue. The English reverence him. He blesses those who are takenaway. He comforts those who wait.”
Of Yvonne I had no excuse for asking more. What more I would know I mustgo and learn. To go and learn I must get strong. To get strong I mustsleep. I turned my face to the wall.