Marianson | Page 2

cave. Knife in hand, he waited for a horned, glittering-eyed face to stoop or an arrow or hatchet to glance under that low rim, the horizon of his darkness. His chagrin at having taken to a trap and drawn danger on a woman was poignant; the candle had caught him like a moth, and a Sioux would keenly follow. Still, no lightest step betrayed the Sioux's knowledge of his whereabouts. A long time passed before he relaxed to an easy posture and turned to the interior of the cave.
The drip of a veiled water-vein at the rear made him conscious of thirst, but the sleeping woman was in the way of his creeping to take a drink. Wrapped in a fur robe, she lay breathing like an infant, white-skinned, full-throated, and vigorous, a woman older than himself.
[Illustration: She lay breathing like an infant 026]
The consequences of her waking did not threaten him as perilous. Without reasoning, he was convinced that a woman who lay down to sleep beside a burning candle in this wild place would make no outcry when she awoke and found the light had drawn instead of kept away possible cave-inhabitants. Day grew beyond the low sill and thinned obscurity around him, showing the swerve of the roof to a sloping shelf. Perspiration cooled upon him and he shivered. A fire and a breakfast would have been good things, which he had often enjoyed in danger. Rowing all night, and landing cannon at the end of it, and running a league or more for life, exhausted a man.
The woman stirred, and the young voyageur thought of dropping his knife back into its sheath. At the slight click she sat up, drawing in her breath.
He whispered: "Do not be afraid. I have not come in here to hurt you."
She was staring at him, probably taking him for some monster of the dark.
"Have you anything here to eat?"
The woman resumed her suspended breath, and answered in the same guarded way, and in French like his: "Yes. I come to this part of the island so of ten that I have put bread and meat and candles in the cave. How did you find it? No one but myself knew about it."
"I saw the candle-light."
"The candle was to keep off evil spirits. It has been blown out. Where did you come from?"
"From St. Joseph Island last night with the English. They have taken the island by surprise."
She unexpectedly laughed in a repressed gurgle, as a faun or other woods creature might have laughed at the predicaments of men.
"I am thinking of the stupid American soldiers--to lie asleep and let the British creep in upon them. But have you seen my cow? I searched everywhere, until the moon went down and I was tired to death, for my cow."
"No, I saw no cow. I had the Sioux to watch."
"What Sioux?"
"The Indian our commandant sent after me. Speak low. He may be listening outside."
They themselves listened.
"If Indians have come on the island they will kill all the cattle."
"There are the women and children and men--even poor voyageurs--for them to kill first."
She gasped, "Is it war?"
"Yes, it is war."
"I never have seen war. Why did you come here?"
"I did not want to, mademoiselle, and I deserted. That is why the Indian was sent after me."
"Do not call me mademoiselle. I am Marianson Bruelle, the widow of André Chenier. Our houses will be burned, and our gardens trampled, and our boats stolen."
"Not if the fort surrenders."
Again they harkened to the outside world in suspense. The deserter had expected to hear cannon before sunlight so slowly crept under the cave's lip. It was as if they sat within a colossal skull, broad between the ears but narrowing towards the top, with light coming through the parted mouth. Accustomed to the soft twilight, the two could see each other, and the woman covertly put her dress in order while she talked.
More than fearlessness, even a kind of maternal passion, moved her. She searched in the back of the cave and handed her strange guest food, and gathered him a birch cup of water from the dripping rock. The touch of his fingers sent a new vital thrill through her. Two may talk together under the same roof for many years, yet never really meet; and two others at first speech are old friends. She did not know this young voyageur, yet she began to claim him.
He was so tired that the tan of his cheek turned leaden in the cave gloom. She rose from her bearskin and spread it for him, when he finished eating.
"You cannot go out now," he whispered, when he saw her intention. "The Sioux is somewhere in the woods watching for me. The Indians came on this island for scalps. You will