CHAPTER VIII
Red Smears Donald's Dream
Donald Norton took little note of the agitation of his fellow-workers over the methods of the new district manager. His thoughts were elsewhere. His heart was torn by doubt and hope, by fear and stern resolve. He was aware only that he must return soon to Fort James and that he could not face another long winter of uncertainty.
Just how he should end that uncertainty Donald had not determined. Several times he had been on the verge of speaking to Janet and always fear had prevented him. Love had made him blind to that which otherwise would have been apparent. He felt that if Janet's attitude toward him were still that of the girl at Kenogami he could not spoil it in an effort to assume another role.
Donald also had the lover's usual sense of unworthiness. Janet was so glorious; she might have so much and he could give so little. He was appalled by his presumption and yet driven by his longing. It seemed incredible that she could love him.
It was not that he saw his parentage as a shadow of the bar across his path. He had felt white too long, had been accepted too completely, but he wondered if he had triumphed sufficiently over the disability of his lack of early training. He knew, too, the warmth and gentleness Janet had inherited from her mother and he could not bear to hurt her by asking for what she could not give.
In desperation Donald turned to his earliest friend, and decided to speak to Evelyn, to learn if the question he wished to ask would bring sorrow rather than joy to Janet. In those first years after he had left Pe-tah-bo's wigwam Evelyn had been an unfailing ally. On more than one occasion his boyish heart had been opened to her. She invited and received confidences and her sympathy and understanding had always removed embarrassment.
Yet the moment he asked to see her alone he knew something had happened. Evelyn had been waiting for such a visit. Because she had dreaded it her manner was an unmistakable expression of her attitude. Donald, always sensitive, and responsive to her mood, caught it at once.
For a moment they faced each other. He had come prepared for the warmth and sympathy he had always received and he could not understand this sudden change.
"What have I done?" he demanded incredulously.
"Oh, Donald!" Evelyn cried. "Why did you ask that? Don't you see? Don't you understand? It isn't you. It isn't anything you have done."
"You mean," he demanded hoarsely, "that you——"
In one benumbing flash he understood what had brought that expression of agony to her eyes but he felt no sympathy, because of the appalling wreckage into which his own life had been plunged. Fourteen years of ceaseless effort, progress ever upward, all had ended in defeat.
He felt white. He knew he was white in every instinct and characteristic. Yet this woman, whom he had come to love as a mother, was looking back—not at the last fourteen years but at the first, back to Wen-dah-ban, to Nee-tah-wee-gan, to that smear of red he believed he had wiped clean.
Donald tried to speak. His lips opened and then closed. Evelyn saw his agony and remained motionless and silent, her own agony holding her dumb.
Suddenly he realized that there was nothing for either of them to say, that nothing ever could bridge the gap between them. His mind whirled back to that morning at Kenogami when he had found Nee-tah-wee-gan waiting for him outside the trade shop and she had uttered her sneering prophecy:
"Go to the white man, you fool! In the end he will kick you out. Work hard for him. He may even make you ruler of a post but you will gain nothing. When your back is turned he will grin and say, 'He is a half-breed.'
"If you want a woman you must take an Indian. In the end you must come back to your own people, to the place where you belong."
For a moment the horrible injustice of it overwhelmed him and aroused a savage determination to compel acceptance of his faith in himself. But the cold logic of Nee-tah-wee-gan's words chilled his spirit. Without speaking, he turned and walked out of the room, out of life itself, it seemed, and there was no comfort in the thought that as he departed Evelyn Layard sank to the floor with a sob of anguish.
Blinded and numb and beaten, he walked quickly across the great enclosure of Fort Bruce to "Bachelors' Hall," intent only on finding seclusion in his room. Nicol MacKar was at a table reading but Donald hurried past without a word.
"Corrigal was asking for you," Nicol said as he glanced up from his book. "Told me to send you over to the office if I saw you."
Donald hesitated. At that moment he did not wish to see Corrigal or anyone else.
"He's a driver," Nicol continued. "He's been here only two days and he knows all about the district, where each post stands and all that. Things are going to be a lot different than under old Duncan Mactavish."
There was a rueful note in Nicol's voice that brought a bitter comment to Donald's lips but before he could speak Millington entered.
"Corrigal wants to see you," he said to Donald. "Told me to send you over."
He went on to his room without stopping but there was no mistaking the elation in his voice. Donald took a quick step forward and then Millington halted.
"By the way, Norton," he said, "my brigade starts in the morning. If there is anything special you want to send to your mother you had better get it ready this afternoon."
Donald's anger faded and left him weak. He knew Millington had said this only to taunt him and yet the reference to Nee-tah-wee-gan had served to drive home the part she played in his life, the part she must always play. He turned and walked across to the district office.
Corrigal was sitting at his desk and Donald sensed at once that there was something hard and uncompromising in his manner.
"Norton," he began, "I have just been going over the Fort James records and I find a falling-off in fur receipts during the last year. It's got to stop."
Only the day before Donald had spent an hour with Corrigal, discussing the affairs of the district and of Fort James in particular. There had been nothing brusque in Corrigal's manner then. He seemed to have recognized a kindred spirit in the younger man and he had signified his approval of Donald's views and methods in an unmistakable manner.
That there was only one reason for the change Donald was instantly aware. Millington had talked to Corrigal, had told the district manager of Nee-tah-wee-gan, of those early wigwam days. Now Corrigal looked upon him not as an efficient post manager, not as a man of whom he thoroughly approved, but only as a half-breed.
A half hour earlier Donald had not considered Nee-tah-wee-gan as a factor in his life. He felt white. He believed he had shed the smoke smell completely and for all time. Then, without warning, Evelyn Layard had recoiled in horror from his touch. Now Corrigal was frankly distrustful, even contemptuous. Yet Donald knew he had not changed in any way. His thoughts, his instincts, his character, all were unaltered. He was still the same man to whom they had given their trust and faith.
In that instant he saw the barrier that lay across his trail—a barrier which had always been there but which he now encountered for the first time. But he did not perceive that the barrier was unsurmountable. Youth, desire, courage—all these hurled him at the obstacle, demanded that he tear it from his path. He took a quick step forward, placed his hands on Corrigal's desk, and then suddenly he realized how, in this matter, he was without adequate defense. To answer Corrigal's question he must bring a serious charge against Millington. It would be, for Corrigal, the word of a half-breed against that of a white man, the typically evasive attempt of an Indian to exonerate himself.
Donald had no proof. He had prepared to lay the matter before kind and just old Duncan Mactavish but not a man like Corrigal. Fate, in the old Scotchman's death, had played into Millington's hands. It was Millington who had told Corrigal Donald was a half-breed, Millington who had cut into the Fort James fur receipts with his raids on Donald's territory, Millington who had worked with Corrigal out on the Saskatchewan and who knew his prejudices and was even now working himself into a stronger position at the expense of his rival.
When Donald failed to make any comment after that first brusque statement Corrigal looked up.
"What is the reason?" he demanded.
"It wasn't the Keewatin Company at Fort James," Donald said. "I kept very careful watch and know they fell off a little."
"But you had as many hunters as ever."
"Yes, two more."
"Then why is there less fur?"
Corrigal was relentless and Donald knew he was driven into a corner. He raged at his helplessness and yet he knew he must present a plausible explanation or suffer a cross-examination that would reveal his evasion of the real reason.
"Someone raided the edge of the district late in the winter," he said. "The tripper brought word of it just before the last ice, when there was no chance for me to investigate. None of the hunters would give me definite information when they came in the spring."
"Haven't you any idea who it was?"
"It was confined to the western edge of the territory."
"The Whitefish Lake side?"
"Yes."
"The Keewatin people at Whitefish! Collinge, eh?"
Corrigal looked up sharply as he asked that last question.
"Friend of yours, too, isn't he?" he demanded. "Seems to me someone told me about it. Didn't you go out of your way to visit him last fall?"
"If you think——" Donald began hotly.
"I merely know the Fort James fur receipts have fallen off and that someone from the Whitefish Lake side is getting the fur," Corrigal interrupted.
He paused a moment and then he said crisply: "That has got to stop. Let the Keewatin people or anyone else begin that sort of thing and there'll be no end of it. You should have had more information. If it is Collinge, get after him. Understand? And I expect you to start back to your post to-morrow morning."
He swung around to some papers on his desk to indicate that the interview was closed. Donald, speechless with rage not only against Corrigal and Millington but against his own helplessness, hesitated. The district manager glanced up and saw him standing there.
"Get your requisitions in shape at once," he ordered, irritation with the other's indecision apparent in his manner. "This is important. If Collinge is permitted to make up his Whitefish Lake losses in Fort James territory we don't accomplish much in our fight against the opposition."
Donald turned and went out. After he was gone Corrigal was busy with some reports for a moment. Then he looked up.
"Indian, all right," he muttered. "Sullen and afraid to speak."
Donald went at once in search of his canoemen. After all, he thought, Corrigal's order that he leave immediately offered the best way out of the situation. He could go back to Fort James, back to a long, lonely winter, and there he could fight the battle with himself, effect a reconciliation with the inevitable, accept the fate that had been his from the beginning.
When he had found his Indians and had instructed them to be ready for an early start the next morning he went to "Bachelors' Hall" and packed his belongings. He had no desire to see anyone. After the first flare of revolt his spirit had crumpled, for from the beginning he had accepted as genuine the support that had been so freely given by everyone in the district.
Yet it was not the fact that he was left alone that robbed him of courage. Even though he did not know it, the failure of the Layards to accept him had been like a blow from behind. His affection had grown with his faith and he felt as if he had been deserted by his own father and mother. Bitterness did not take the place of his former attitude, however. There was only a great void. Numbed, beaten, hopeless, he wanted only to get away from Fort Bruce.
With this mood of black despair upon him he saw Janet while going to the district office to make some final corrections in his requisitions for the next year. Even the fact that she was with Millington did not arouse him. He had already abandoned all hope.
Janet called to him from the verandah of the dwelling house and when he halted she ran toward him. He went to meet her and again the thrill of her presence swept over him.
"Donald!" she began breathlessly. "I don't want——"
She halted and stared beseechingly at his averted face.
"I don't want you to think——" she began again, only to have her courage fail her.
He still stared out across the lake. Everything he desired, everything he needed to bring back courage that would scorn Corrigal and Millington and all they might do was there awaiting his acceptance, begging for a glance or a word, and he did not see it.
"I'm starting early in the morning for Fort James," he said in a low voice. "Corrigal has ordered me to return at once."
"Corrigal!" she cried angrily. "You are not letting him, just because he believes——"
She caught herself suddenly on the very brink of the chasm that had opened between them.
"It is not Corrigal," Donald said. "I should get back. And I'll say good-by now for I'll be gone early in the morning."
He forced himself to a faint smile, though he barely glanced at her face, held out his hand, clasped her limp fingers for a moment and then turned and was gone.
He walked quickly to the district office without looking back. He did not see Janet turn and hurry to the dwelling house, passing the waiting Millington without a word. He saw nothing until he reached Corrigal's desk.
"I am leaving early in the morning," he said. "My brigade has gone and everything is in shape. Is there anything else?"
"No," Corrigal answered slowly, for he was evidently puzzled by the young man's brusqueness. "All I ever have to say is, 'Get the fur.'"
"I understand," Donald answered. His head was high and his eyes never turned from Corrigal's. "Then if there is nothing else I'll say good-by now."
He walked out and closed the door without waiting for a reply.