第44章

The left-hand branch of the river, cleft by the rocky point of the island, dropped at once into a tumult of yellow foam and raved downward along the northern shore.The right-hand branch swerved away to the east, running with swift, silent fury.On the lower edge of this desperate race of brown billows, a huge whirlpool formed and dissolved every two or three minutes, now eddying round in a wide backwater into a rocky bay on the end of the island, now swept away by the rush of waves into the white rage of the rapids below.

There was the secret pathway.The trick was, to dart across the right-hand current at the proper moment, catch the rim of the whirlpool as it swung backward, and let it sweep you around to the end of the island.It was easy enough at low water.But now?

The smooth waves went crowding and shouldering down the slope as if they were running to a fight.The river rose and swelled with quick, uneven passion.The whirlpool was in its place one minute;the next, it was blotted out; everything rushed madly downward--and below was hell.

Jean checked the boat for a moment, quivering in the strong current, waiting for the TOURNIQUET to form again.Five seconds--ten seconds--"Now!" he cried.

The canoe shot obliquely into the stream, driven by strong, quick strokes of the paddles.It seemed almost to leap from wave to wave.

All was going well.The edge of the whirlpool was near.Then came the crest of a larger wave,--slap--into the boat.Alden shrank involuntarily from the cold water, and missed his stroke.An eddy caught the bow and shoved it out.The whirlpool receded, dissolved.

The whole river rushed down upon the canoe and carried it away like a leaf.

Who says that thought is swift and clear in a moment like that? Who talks about the whole of a man's life passing before him in a flash of light? A flash of darkness! Thought is paralyzed, dumb."What a fool!" "Good-bye!" "If--" That is about all it can say.And if the moment is prolonged, it says the same thing over again, stunned, bewildered, impotent.Then?--The rocking waves; the sinking boat;the roar of the fall; the swift overturn; the icy, blinding, strangling water--God!

Jean was flung shoreward.Instinctively he struck out, with the current and half across it, toward a point of rock.His foot touched bottom.He drew himself up and looked back.The canoe was sweeping past, bottom upward, Alden underneath it.

Jean thrust himself out into the stream again, still going with the current, but now away from shore.He gripped the canoe, flinging his arm over the stern.Then he got hold of the thwart and tried to turn it over.Too heavy! Groping underneath he caught Alden by the shoulder and pulled him out.They would have gone down together but for the boat.

"Hold on tight," gasped Jean, "put your arm over the canoe--the other side!"Alden, half dazed, obeyed him.The torrent carried the dancing, slippery bark past another point.Just below it, there was a little eddy.

"Now," cried Jean; "the back-water--strike for the land!"They touched the black, gliddery rocks.They staggered out of the water; waist-deep, knee-deep, ankle-deep; falling and rising again.

They crawled up on the warm moss....

The first thing that Alden noticed was the line of bright red spots on the wing of a cedar-bird fluttering silently through the branches of the tree above him.He lay still and watched it, wondering that he had never before observed those brilliant sparks of colour on the little brown bird.Then he wondered what made his legs ache so.

Then he saw Jean, dripping wet, sitting on a stone and looking down the river.

He got up painfully and went over to him.He put his hand on the man's shoulder.

"Jean, you saved my life--I thank you, Marquis!""M'sieu'," said Jean, springing up, "I beg you not to mention it.

It was nothing.A narrow shave,--but LA BONNE CHANCE! And after all, you were right,--we got to the island! But now how to get off?"II

AN ALLIANCE OF RIVALS

Yes, of course they got off--the next day.At the foot of the island, two miles below, there is a place where the water runs quieter, and a BATEAU can cross from the main shore.Francois was frightened when the others did not come back in the evening.He made his way around to St.Joseph d'Alma, and got a boat to come up and look for their bodies.He found them on the shore, alive and very hungry.But all that has nothing to do with the story.

Nor does it make any difference how Alden spent the rest of his summer in the woods, what kind of fishing he had, or what moved him to leave five hundred dollars with Jean when he went away.That is all padding: leave it out.The first point of interest is what Jean did with the money.A suit of clothes, a new stove, and a set of kitchen utensils for the log house opposite Grosse Ile, a trip to Quebec, a little game of "Blof Americain" in the back room of the Hotel du Nord,--that was the end of the money.

This is not a Sunday-school story.Jean was no saint.Even as a hero he had his weak points.But after his own fashion he was a pretty good kind of a marquis.He took his headache the next morning as a matter of course, and his empty pocket as a trick of fortune.With the nobility, he knew very well, such things often happen; but the nobility do not complain about it.They go ahead, as if it was a bagatelle.

Before the week was out Jean was on his way to a lumber-shanty on the St.Maurice River, to cook for a crew of thirty men all winter.

The cook's position in camp is curious,--half menial, half superior.

It is no place for a feeble man.But a cook who is strong in the back and quick with his fists can make his office much respected.

Wages, forty dollars a month; duties, to keep the pea-soup kettle always hot and the bread-pan always full, to stand the jokes of the camp up to a certain point, and after that to whip two or three of the most active humourists.