Adventure, November 1915 — page 107: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Posts of Pillage he left the older Quebec to adventure far- ther northward in the newer Labrador. And though the curve of her hips to the - supple waist and the swell of the bosom above the waist to her nymph-like shoulders betrayed the quick maturity which is the Northwoman’s attribute, she still seemed to them the gipsy child. | Chambonne stared at the curving white neck he had so often encircled with his great, brown fingers, at the wild-rose cheeks he had dimpled, the delicate ears he had pinched, the waving blue-black hair he had smoothed and at the wide, dark eyes full of mysticism and dreaming which had rested on his own as she drank in some wondrous tale of his roamings, and he heaved a great sigh as the fur bale, tilted from his shoulder, thudded on the rocks at Lavergne’s feet. He realized that the child companionship, the child-love was all that he or any of his men might claim. They were not of her day or generation, for their hard-bitten hearts were old in Dubawni’s service and the flame of their youth had burned in an- other day. So he heaved his sigh and drew a big in- take of breath as he turned to slop out again in his saturated moccasins. “Tired, maybe?” ventured Lavergne. Chambonne scowled at him over his shoulder, for the youthful virility of the voyageur smote through his retrospection like a fist in his face, and without a word beckoned for the rest of the brigade to draw in in a body. At his beckoning the rows of paddles along the sides of the great crafts dashed in, and the crafts themselves leaped forward like suddenly launched arrows. “Hold on, there!’ yelled Lavergne, level- ing his rifle at the curling spray. “Don’t come that fast. You can’t rush me. Slow them down or we'll fire.” And Dubawni shot a significant glance at Chambonne. “Slow them down,” he ordered. Chambonne held up his hand. The pad- dles back-watered stiffly. In a huge wash of surf the brigade slowed down and, writhing along for a hundred feet like some giant water-serpent, came lethar- gically to the landing. Their crews jumped out into the lake surf, all red-shirted Frenchmen and uncon- taminated Indians, for Dubawni had a fierce scorn of mongrel races and put his trust in 105 no mixed blood-strain. They were a wild and motley horde, and the sheer brawn of them was such as to smite the senses with delight. Powerful enough, they looked, to force the portage in such a smashing charge as Chambonne had advocated, but bitterly ‘the free-trader understood that even these could not prevail against Lavergne’s band, entrenched as they were behind the rocky ramparts of the lake shore, and bitterly he understood that Helbaud would have much larger reserves at the other end of the por- tage. Helbaud had timed his ultimatum according to his purpose, and he was not the man to be caught lacking force to back that ultimatum. Thus the only outlet at the present mo- ment for all this leaping, quivering, primi- tive brawn was the hurling of the rest of the fur bales ashore, and mightily the hurl- ing was accomplished with many a grimace and curse and threat at the impassive La- vergne. In a monstrous pile Dubawni’s cargo rose upon the rocks, a whole year’s plunder of the wild, gathered at the posts of pillage in the depths of the hinterland. Pelts there were from the Kenogamistuk country, from the Kenogamisi, the Machistan, the hun- dred headwaters of the Kaniapiskau and from all the lakes of the Central Plateau from White Winter east to Attikamagen. “Diable, what a gift!” groaned Cham- bonne, nodding toward the huge heap of prime lynx, wolf, fox, mink, marten, beaver and otter skins as he came wading through the water to Dubawni’s canoe and drew himself up dripping to his former place in the bow. ‘‘What a gift to Helbaud!” “Tt was either that or throw them into the lake,” snarled the free-trader, wounded more than he cared to show at the loss of the spoil that was going over to his enemy. “You know we would never have got back to Dubawni Post with them. Weighted down, we could do nothing; but now the fleet is cleared for flight. And look you, Chambonne—” raising his voice so that Lavergne and every man of Helbaud’s hid- den in the spruce could not fail to hear’ every word—‘“‘if I do not come back across the portage within the hour, you will com- mand in my place and strike north up the Manikuagan for Dubawni Post.” Grimly he held out his palm as a step- ping-stone for Masita’s foot between the Gomicbooks (EO) Bile : mo : Bt ye 2 yy y Mey iy Ve erasth 4 VBA: ie Ala Oe ‘ , oe ert) a ae el ag tony win by Mah a, i ‘. i ‘Te.' 2. wiht,