第57章 KASKASKIA(5)

At length the cocks crowing for day proclaimed the morning, and while yet the blue shadow of the bluff was on the town, Colonel Clark sallied out of the gate and walked abroad.Strange it seemed that war had come to this village, so peaceful and remote.And even stranger it seemed to me to see these Arcadian homes in the midst of the fierce wilderness.The little houses with their sloping roofs and wide porches, the gardens ablaze with color, the neat palings,--all were a restful sight for our weary eyes.And now I scarcely knew our commander.

For we had not gone far ere, timidly, a door opened and a mild-visaged man, in the simple workaday smock that the French wore, stood, hesitating, on the steps.The odd thing was that he should have bowed to Clark, who was dressed no differently from Bowman and Harrod and Duff; and the man's voice trembled piteously as he spoke.

It needed not John Duff to tell us that he was pleading for the lives of his family.

``He will sell himself as a slave if your Excellency will spare them,'' said Duff, translating.

But Clark stared at the man sternly.

``I will tell them my plans at the proper time,'' he said and when Duff had translated this the man turned and went silently into his house again, closing the door behind him.And before we had traversed the village the same thing had happened many times.We gained the fort again, I wondering greatly why he had not reassured these simple people.It was Bowman who asked this question, he being closer to Clark than any of the other captains.

Clark said nothing then, and began to give out directions for the day.But presently he called the Captain aside.

``Bowman,'' I heard him say, ``we have one hundred and fifty men to hold a province bigger than the whole of France, and filled with treacherous tribes in the King's pay.I must work out the problem for myself.''

Bowman was silent.Clark, with that touch which made men love him and die for him, laid his hand on the Captain's shoulder.

``Have the men called in by detachments,'' he said, ``and fed.God knows they must be hungry,--and you.''

Suddenly I remembered that he himself had had nothing.Running around the commandant's house to the kitchen door, I came unexpectedly upon Swein Poulsson, who was face to face with the linsey-woolsey-clad figure of Monsieur Rocheblave's negro cook.The early sun cast long shadows of them on the ground.

``By tam,'' my friend was saying, ``so I vill eat.I am choost like an ox for three days, und chew grass.Prairie grass, is it?''

``Mo pas capab', Michie,'' said the cook, with a terrified roll of his white eyes.

``Herr Gott!'' cried Swein Poulsson, ``I am red face.

Aber Herr Gott, I thank thee I am not a nigger.Und my hair is bristles, yes.Davy'' (spying me), ``I thank Herr Gott it is not vool.Let us in the kitchen go.''

``I am come to get something for the Colonel's breakfast,'' said I, pushing past the slave, through the open doorway.Swein Poulsson followed, and here I struck another contradiction in his strange nature.He helped me light the fire in the great stone chimney-place, and we soon had a pot of hominy on the crane, and turning on the spit a piece of buffalo steak which we found in the larder.Nor did a mouthful pass his lips until I had sped away with a steaming portion to find the Colonel.By this time the men had broken into the storehouse, and the open place was dotted with their breakfast fires.Clark was standing alone by the flagstaff, his face careworn.But he smiled as he saw me coming.

``What's this?'' says he.

``Your breakfast, sir,'' I answered.I set down the plate and the pot before him and pressed the pewter spoon into his hand.

``Davy,'' said he.

``Sir?'' said I.

``What did you have for your breakfast?''

My lip trembled, for I was very hungry, and the rich steam from the hominy was as much as I could stand.Then the Colonel took me by the arms, as gently as a woman might, set me down on the ground beside him, and taking a spoonful of the hominy forced it between my lips.Iwas near to fainting at the taste of it.Then he took a bit himself, and divided the buffalo steak with his own hands.And when from the camp-fires they perceived the Colonel and the drummer boy eating together in plain sight of all, they gave a rousing cheer.

``Swein Poulsson helped get your breakfast, sir, and would eat nothing either,'' I ventured.

``Davy,'' said Colonel Clark, gravely, ``I hope you will be younger when you are twenty.''

``I hope I shall be bigger, sir,'' I answered gravely.