She threw the knitting down and flung her hands up. "I have no husband.

I have no child. Take your life. Take it. I will go and find his body,"

she said, and she moved swiftly towards the door. "He has gone down the river--I will find him!"

"He has gone up the river," he exclaimed. "Up the river, I say!"

She stopped short and looked at him blankly. Then his meaning became clear to her.

"You did not kill him?" she asked scarce above a whisper.

"I let him go," he replied.

"You did not fight him--why?" There was scorn in her tone.

"And if I had killed him that way?" he asked with terrible logic, as he thought.

"There was little chance of that," she replied scornfully, and steadied herself against a chair; for, now that the suspense was over, she felt as though she had been pa.s.sed between stones which ground the strength out of her.

A flush of fierce resentment crossed over his face. "It is not everything to be big," he rejoined. "The greatest men in the world have been small like me, but they have brought the giant things to their feet."

She waved a hand disdainfully. "What are you going to do now?" she asked.

He drew himself up. He seemed to rearrange the motions of his mind with a little of the old vanity, which was at once grotesque and piteous.

"I am going to forgive you and to try to put things right," he said. "I have had my faults. You were not to blame altogether. I have left you too much alone. I did not understand everything all through. I had never studied women. If I had I should have done the right thing always. I must begin to study women." The drawn look was going a little from his face, the ghastly pain was fading from his eyes; his heart was speaking for her, while his vain intellect hunted the solution of his problem.

She could scarcely believe her ears. No Spaniard would ever have acted as this man was doing. She had come from a land of No Forgiveness.

Carvillho Gonzales would have killed her, if she had been untrue to him; and she would have expected it and understood it.

But Jean Jacques was going to forgive her--going to study women, and so understand her and understand women, as he understood philosophy! This was too fantastic for human reason. She stared at him, unable to say a word, and the distracted look in her face did not lessen. Forgiveness did not solve her problem.

"I am going to take you to Montreal--and then out to Winnipeg, when I've got the cheese-factory going," he said with a wise look in his face, and with tenderness even coming into his eyes. "I know what mistakes I've made"--had not George Ma.s.son the despoiler told him of them?--"and I know what a scoundrel that fellow is, and what tricks of the tongue he has. Also he is as sleek to look at as a bull, and so he got a hold on you. I grasp things now. Soon we will start away together again as we did at Gaspe."

He came close to her. "Carmen!" he said, and made as though he would embrace her.

"Wait--wait a little. Give me time to think," she said with dry lips, her heart beating hard. Then she added with a flattery which she knew would tell, "I cannot think quick as you do. I am slow. I must have time. I want to work it all out. Wait till to-night," she urged. "Then we can--"

"Good, we will make it all up to-night," he said, and he patted her shoulder as one would that of a child. It had the slight flavour of the superior and the paternal.

She almost shrank from his touch. If he had kissed her she would have felt that she must push him away; and yet she also knew how good a man he was.

CHAPTER XI. THE CLERK OF THE COURT KEEPS A PROMISE

"Well, what is it, M'sieu' Fille? What do you want with me? I've got a lot to do before sundown, and it isn't far off. Out with it."

George Ma.s.son was in no good humour; from the look on the face of the little Clerk of the Court he had no idea that he would disclose any good news. It was probably some stupid business about "money not being paid into the Court," which had been left over from cases tried and lost; and he had had a number of cases that summer. His head was not so clear to-day as usual, but he had had little difficulties with M'sieu' Fille before, and he was sure that there was something wrong now.

"Do you want to make me a present?" he added with humorous impatience, for though he was not in a good temper, he liked the Clerk of the Court, who was such a figure at Vilray.

The opening for his purpose did not escape M. Fille. He had been at a loss to begin, but here was a natural opportunity for him.

"Well, good advice is not always a present, but I should like mine to be taken as such, monsieur," he said a little oracularly.

"Oh, advice--to give me advice--that's why you've brought me in here, when I've so much to do I can't breathe! Time is money with me, old 'un."

"Mine is advice which may be money in your pocket, monsieur," remarked the Clerk of the Court with meaning. "Money saved is money earned."

"How do you mean to save me money--by getting the Judge to give decisions in my favour? That would be money in my pocket for sure. The Court has been running against my interests this year. When I think I was never so right in my life--bang goes the judgment of the Court against me, and into my pocket goes my hand. I don't only need to save money, I need to make it; so if you can help me in that way I'm your man, M'sieu' la Fillette?"

The little man bristled at the misuse of his name, and he flushed slightly also; but there was always something engaging in the pleasure-loving master-carpenter. He had such an eloquent and warm temperament, the atmosphere of his personality was so genial, that his impertinence was insulated. Certainly the master-carpenter was not unpopular, and people could not easily resist the grip of his physical influence, while mentally he was far indeed from being deficient. He looked as little like a villain as a man could, and yet--and yet--a nature like that of George Ma.s.son (even the little Clerk could see that) was not capable of being true beyond the minute in which he took his oath of fidelity. While the fit of willingness was on him he would be true; yet in reality there was no truth at all--only self-indulgence unmarked by duty or honour.

"Give me a judgment for defamation of character. Give me a thousand dollars or so for that, m'sieu', and you'll do a good turn to a deserving fellow-citizen and admirer--one little thousand, that's all, m'sieu'. Then I'll dance at your wedding and weep at your tomb--so there!"

How easy he made the way for the little Clerk of the Court! "Defamation of character"--could there possibly be a better opening for what he had promised Judge Carca.s.son he would say!

"Ah, Monsieur Ma.s.son," very officially and decorously replied M. Fille, "but is it defamation of character? If the thing is true, then what is the judgment? It goes against you--so there!" There was irony in the last words.

"If what thing is true?" sharply asked the mastercarpenter, catching at the fringe of the idea in M. Fille's mind. "What thing?"

"Ah, but it is true, for I saw it! Yes, alas! I saw it with my own eyes. By accident of course; but there it was--absolute, uncompromising, deadly and complete."

It was a happy moment for the little Clerk of the Court when he could, in such an impromptu way, coin a phrase, or a set of adjectives, which would bear inspection of purists of the language. He loved to talk, though he did not talk a great deal, but he made innumerable conversations in his mind, and that gave him facility when he did speak. He had made conversations with George Ma.s.son in his mind since yesterday, when he gave his promise to Judge Carca.s.son; but none of them was like the real conversation now taking place. It was all the impression of the moment, while the phrases in his mind had been wonderfully logical things which, from an intellectual standpoint, would have delighted the man whose cause he was now engaged in defending.

"You saw what, M'sieu' la Fillette? Out with it, and don't use such big adjectives. I'm only a carpenter. 'Absolute, uncompromising, deadly, complete'--that's a mouthful of grammar, my lords! Come, my sprig of jurisprudence, tell us what you saw." There was an apparent nervousness in Ma.s.son's manner now. Indeed he showed more agitation than when, a few hours before, Jean Jacques had stood with his hand on the lever of the gates of the flume, and the life of the master-carpenter at his feet, to be kicked into eternity.

"Four days ago at five o'clock in the afternoon"--in a voice formal and exact, the little Clerk of the Court seemed to be reading from a paper, since he kept his eyes fixed on the blotter before him, as he did in Court--"I was coming down the hill behind the Manor Cartier, when my attention--by accident--was drawn to a scene below me in the Manor. I stopped short, of course, and--"

"Diable! You stopped short 'of course' before what you saw! Spit it out--what did you see?" George Ma.s.son had had a trying day, and there was danger of losing control of himself. There was a whiteness growing round the eyes, and eating up the warmth of the cheek; his admirably smooth brow was contracted into heavy wrinkles, and a foot shifted uneasily on the floor with a sc.r.a.ping sole. This drew the attention of M. Fille, who raised his head reprovingly--he could not get rid of the feeling that he was in court, and that a case was being tried; and the severity of a Judge is naught compared with the severity of a Clerk of the Court, particularly if he is small and unmarried, and has no one to beat him into manageable humanity.

M. Fille's voice was almost querulous.

"If you will but be patient, monsieur! I saw a man with a woman in his arms, and I fear that I must mention the name of the man. It is not necessary to give the name of the woman, but I have it written here"--he tapped the paper--"and there is no mistake in the ident.i.ty. The man's name is George Ma.s.son, master-carpenter, of the town of Laplatte in the province of Quebec."

George Ma.s.son was as one hit between the eyes. He made a motion as though to ward off a blow. "Name of Peter, old c.o.c.k!" he exclaimed abruptly. "You saw enough certainly, if you saw that, and you needn't mention the lady's name, as you say. The evidence is not merely circ.u.mstantial. You saw it with your own eyes, and you are an official of the Court, and have the ear of the Judge, and you look like a saint to a jury. Well for sure, I can't prove defamation of character, as you say. But what then--what do you want?"

"What I want I hope you may be able to grant without demur, monsieur.

I want you to give your pledge on the Book"--he laid his hand on a Testament lying on the table--"that you will hold no further communication with the lady."

"Where do you come inhere? What's your standing in the business?"

Ma.s.son jerked out his words now. The Clerk of the Court made a reproving gesture. "Knowing what I did, what I had seen, it was clear that I must approach one or other of the parties concerned. Out of regard for the lady I could not approach her husband, and so betray her; out of regard for the husband I could not approach himself and destroy his peace; out of regard for all concerned I could not approach the lady's father, for then--"

Ma.s.son interrupted with an oath.

"That old reprobate of Cadiz--well no, bagosh!

"And so you whisked me into your office with the talk of urgent business and--"

"Is not the business urgent, monsieur?"