Rose à Charlitte

by Marshall Saunders

  CHAPTER XII.

  AN UNHAPPY RIVER.

  "Pools and shadows merge Beneath the branches, where the rushes lean And stumble prone; and sad along the verge The marsh-hen totters. Strange the branches play Above the snake-roots in the dark and wet, Adown the hueless trunks, this summer day. Strange things the willows whisper."

  J. F. H.

  "There is a story among the old people," said Agapit, "that a band ofAcadiens, who evaded the English at the time of the expulsion, sailedinto this Bay in a schooner. They anchored opposite Sleeping Water, andsome of the men came ashore in a boat. Not knowing that an English shiplay up yonder, hidden by a point of land, they pressed back into thewoods towards Sleeping Water Lake. Some of the English, also, were ontheir way to this lake, for it is historic. The Acadiens found traces ofthem and turned towards the shore, but the English pursued over themarshes by the river, which at last the Acadiens must cross. They threwaside their guns and jumped in, and, as one head rose after another,the English, standing on the bank, shot until all but one were killed.This one was a Le Blanc, a descendant of Rene Le Blanc, that one readsof in 'Evangeline.' Rising up on the bank, he found himself alone.Figure the anguish of his heart,--his brothers and friends were dead. Hewould never see them again, and he turned and stretched out a hand in asupreme adieu. The English, who would not trouble to swim, fired at him,and called, 'Go to sleep with your comrades in the river.'

  "'They sleep,' he cried, 'but they will rise again in their children,'and, quite untouched by their fire, he ran to his boat, and, reachingthe ship, set sail to New Brunswick; and in later years his children andthe children of the murdered ones came back to the Bay, and began tocall the river Sleeping Water, and, in time, the lake, which was QueenAnne's Lake, was also changed to Sleeping Water Lake."

  "And the soldiers?"

  "Ah! you look for vengeance, but does vengeance always come? Rememberthe Persian distich:

  "'They came, conquered, and burned, Pillaged, murdered, and went.'"

  "I do not understand this question thoroughly," said Vesper, withirritation, "yet from your conversation it seems not so barbarous athing that the Acadiens should have been transported as that those whoremained should have been so persecuted."

  "Now is your time to read 'Richard.' I have long been waiting for yourhealth to be restored, for it is exciting."

  "That is the Acadien historian you have spoken of?"

  "Yes; and when you read him you will understand my joy at the venerableletter you showed me. You will see why we blame the guilty Lawrence andhis colleagues, and not England herself, for the wickedness wrought herFrench children."

  Vesper smoked out his cigar in silence. They had left the village streetsome distance behind them, and were now walking along a flat, narrowroad, having a thick, hedge-like border of tangled bushes and wildflowers that were agitated by a gentle breeze, and waved out a sweet,faint perfume on the night air. On either side of them were low, grassymarshes, screened by clumps of green.

  "We are arrived at last," said Agapit, pausing on a rustic bridge thatspanned the road; "and down there," he went on, in a choking voice, "iswhere the bones of my countrymen lie."

  Vesper leaned over the railing. What a sluggish, silent, stealthy river!He could perceive no flow in its reluctant waters. A few willows,natives, not French ones, swayed above it, and close to its edge grewthe tall grasses, rustling and whispering together as if impartingguilty secrets concerning the waters below.

  "Which way does it go?" murmured Vesper; but Agapit did not hear him,for he was eagerly muttering: "A hateful river,--I never see a birddrink from it, there are no fishes in it, the lilies will not grow here,and the children fall in and are drowned; and, though it has often beensounded, they can find no bottom to it."

  Vesper stared below in silence, only making an involuntary movement whenhis companion's cap fell off and struck the face of the dull blackmirror presented to them.

  "Let it go," exclaimed Agapit, with a shudder. "Poor as I am, I wouldnot wear it now. It is tainted," and flinging back the dark locks fromhis forehead, he turned his face towards the shore.

  "No, I will talk no more about the Acadiens," he said, when Vesper triedto get him to enter upon his favorite theme, "for, though you arepolite, I fear I shall weary you; we will speak of other things."

  The night was a perfect one, and for an hour the two young men walked upand down the quiet road before the inn, talking at first of the fishingthat was over, and the hunting that would in a few weeks begin.

  Vesper would have enjoyed seeking big game in the backwoods, if hishealth had permitted, and he listened with suppressed eagerness toAgapit's account of a moose hunt. The world of sport disposed of, theirconversation drifted to literature, to science and art in general,--towomen and love affairs, and Agapit rambled on excitedly and delightedly,while Vesper, contenting himself with the briefest of rejoinders,extracted an acute and amused interest from the entirely novel andout-of-the-way opinions presented to him.

  "Ah! but I enjoy this," said Agapit, at last; "it is the fault of mycountrymen that they do not read enough and study,--their sole fault. Imeet with so few who will discuss, yet I must not detain you. Come in,come in, and I will give you my 'Richard.' Begin not to read himto-night, for you could not sleep. I believe," and he raised his brown,flushed face to the stars above, "that he has done justice to theAcadien people; but remember, we do not complain now. We are faithful toour sovereign and to our country,--as faithful as you are to your Union.The smart of the past is over. We ask only that the world may believethat the Acadiens were loyal and consistent, and that we do not wish forreparation from England except, perhaps--" and he hesitated and lookeddown at the shabby sleeve of his coat, while tears filled his eyes."_Mon Dieu!_ I will not speak of the pitiful economies that I am obligedto practise to educate myself. And there are other young men more poor.If the colonial government would give us some help, I would go tocollege; for now I hesitate lest I should save my money for my family.If the good lands that were taken from us were now ours, we should berich--"

  Vesper liked the young Acadien best in his quiet moods. "Don't worry,"he said, consolingly; "something will turn up. Get me that book, willyou?"

  Vesper paused for an instant when he entered his room. On a table by hisbed was placed a tray, covered by a napkin. Lifting the napkin, hediscovered a wing of cold chicken with jelly, thin slices of bread andbutter, and a covered pitcher of chocolate.

  He poured himself out a cup of the chocolate, and murmuring, "Here's tothe Lady of the Sleeping Water Inn," seized one of the two volumes thatAgapit had given him, and, throwing himself into an easy chair, began toread.

  One by one the hours slipped away, but he did not move in his chair,except to put out a hand at regular intervals and turn a leaf. Shortlybefore daybreak a chill wind blew up the Bay, and came floating in thewindow. He threw down the book, rose slowly to his feet, and lookedabout him in a dreamy way. He had been transported to a previous centuryand to another atmosphere than this peaceful one.

  He shivered sensitively, and, going to the window, closed it, and stoodgazing at the faint flush in the sky. "O God! it is true," he muttered,drearily, "we are sent into this world to enact hell. Goethe understoodthat. And what a hell of long years was enacted on these shores!"

  "The devils," he went on, in youthful, generous indignation; "they hadno pity, not even after years of suffering on the part of theirvictims."

  His eyes smarted, his head ached. He put his hand to his eyes, and, whenit came away wet, he curled his lip. He had not shed tears since he wasa boy.

  Then he threw himself on his bed, and thoughts of his father mingledwith those of the Acadiens. An invincible melancholy took possession ofhim, and burying his face in his arms, he lay for a long time with
hiswhole frame quivering in emotion.