Chapter XXVI: Elise’s Story

Both children were alive. When Walter and Neil tried to separate them, they aroused Max. The little fellow was stupid with cold and heavy sleep, but seemed otherwise to be all right. Walter carried Elise nearer, but not too near, to the fire. Kneeling beside her, he rubbed her ice-cold feet, legs, and arms to restore circulation. The rubbing brought her back to consciousness, dazed and wondering, to find her big brother—as she called Walter—bending over her. As soon as the daze of her first awakening passed, she asked for her father. Assuring her that Louis was looking after him, Walter made her stay near the fire and drink some of the strong, scalding tea.

Restoring Mr. Perier to consciousness was more difficult. Louis’ unceasing efforts aroused him at last, but his mind seemed confused and bewildered. He struggled with Louis as if he thought the boy was trying to do him some injury. He stared blankly at Walter and did not appear to recognize him.

Throwing off the blanket Walter had wrapped around her, Elise went to her father and put her arms about his neck. “Father, Father, it is all right,” she cried. “Walter found us, and we are all safe.”

The wild look left Mr. Perier’s eyes and he ceased struggling. When Walter brought him a cup of strong tea, he drank it obediently. The hot drink seemed to clear his brain. After more rubbing, he was able to sit up, nearer the fire. Elise and Max wrapped him in most of the blankets. Attracted by the heat, the tired dogs snuggled close to the children and added their animal warmth.

Louis was anxious to find a less exposed spot in which to spend the night. “Stay here and keep the fire going,” he ordered his comrades. “I will find a better camping place.”

In a few minutes he was back with word that he had found a much better camping ground, a dry gully protected from the bitter wind. “You and I, Neil,” he said, “will go over there and prepare a place, while Walter keeps the fire burning here. Then we will come back and move our camp.”

Elise and Max were now wide awake and ready to talk, but Mr. Perier seemed inert and drowsy. After Walter had cut more wood and fed the fire, he crouched at Elise’s side and began to question her.

“How did you come to be here all alone?” he asked. “Why did you leave Fort Douglas?”

“We were on the way to Pembina,” she replied. “A man with a sled was taking us. It was warm when we started. Max and I rode on the sled, but we didn’t like riding because the man abused the dogs and we were sorry for them. Father tried to make him stop being so cruel, but he just laughed. When Father tried to reason with him, the man grew so angry and ugly that Father didn’t dare say anything more. We stopped once and had pemmican and tea, then we came on again. It was hard for Father to keep up, he had no snowshoes. He dropped behind. At sunset we stopped again, and the man made a fire. Father caught up with us, and we had some more tea.

“After that it turned cold. Max and I were very cold riding on the sled. We wanted to walk a while to warm up, but the man wouldn’t let us. He said we were too slow. We got so cold we were afraid we should freeze, and Father told our guide we must stop and get warm. Father had promised him his watch——”

“His watch?” interrupted Walter.

“Yes. We have very little money left, and the man didn’t want money anyway. He said he would take us to Pembina for the watch.”

Walter grunted wrathfully, and Elise went on. “When Father said we must stop and make a fire, we weren’t far from the woods. Our guide said we could go down to the river bank and camp, but that would delay us. It would take longer to reach Pembina, and he would have to have more pay. He wanted the chain as well as the watch. Father agreed and we came into the woods and stopped. Max and I ran around and tried to get warm. Our eyes hurt and Father was almost blind. The man made Father give him the watch and chain at once. He put them in the pouch where he carried his tobacco and flint and steel. Then he whipped the dogs and jumped on the sled, and they ran away and left us.”

“The miserable brute!” cried Walter.

“He ran away and left us,” Elise repeated, “without any food or snowshoes. Everything we owned, except the blankets Max and I had been wrapped in when we were riding, was on the sled. It was a cruel way to treat us.”

“Cruel? Why even the meanest Indian——” Walter’s wrath choked him.

“He is an Indian. They call him a _bois brulé_, but he looks just like an Indian. No one but a savage could be so cruel.”

“He’s worse than a savage. He must be a fiend. Why did Kolbach let you come with such a fellow?”

“Monsieur Kolbach didn’t know we were coming,” Elise explained. “The Indian said he was a friend of Monsieur Kolbach’s brother.”

“Fritz? That’s not much of a recommendation.”

“Do you know Monsieur Fritz? Has he been at Pembina? I have never seen him.”

“I think I have seen him, and I have heard about him. He and his brother aren’t very friendly, are they?” Walter questioned. “I have been told that they weren’t.”

Elise shook her head. “I know nothing about that. Monsieur Kolbach has never said. He is not a man who talks much anyway. Monsieur Fritz has been away from Fort Douglas most of the winter. He has been trading with the Indians.”

A sudden thought struck Walter, an unpleasant thought that made him shudder. “What was that fellow’s name, the one who deserted you?” he demanded.

“He has an English name,” Elise replied. “I’m not sure I understood it right. Mauray or something like that.”

“Murray? Elise, he is the very man I wrote you about, the one who was steersman of our boat when we came from Fort York. It was the Black Murray himself, the fiend! If ever I——”

The voice of little Max interrupted. “I’m cold,” he complained.

Walter had forgotten the fire. He sprang up to replenish it. He found Mr. Perier dozing, roused him, and warned him against dropping off to sleep. Then he heaped on fuel until the blaze was so hot the others were forced to move back from it. As for Walter himself, he was so boiling with anger against the inhuman Murray that he gave no heed to cold. He wielded the ax savagely, and sent the chips flying far and wide.

In a surprisingly short time Louis returned to guide the rest of the party to the camping place. Mr. Perier was unable to walk, so he was placed on the sled, warmly wrapped. The dogs protested piteously at being aroused and harnessed. Even Askimé refused to pull until Louis took hold also. Elise and Max bravely asserted that they were able to walk, and Walter knew it would be better for them to do so if they could. He gave his snowshoes to Elise,—she had learned during the winter to use snowshoes,—and helped Max when the little fellow broke through the crust.

The gully was only a short distance away. They soon reached the camping place, to find Neil tending a blazing fire. Between the fire and a steep, bare, clay slope that reflected the heat, beds were made with bales of pelts, blankets, and robes. The toboggan, turned on its side, furnished additional shelter. There the Periers could sleep safely and comfortably. The boys had no intention of sleeping at all. Their task was to keep the fire going until daylight, which was not far away.

There was a little tea left, but no food. At dawn Neil went down to the river, chopped a hole in the ice, and with a hook baited with a bit of rawhide, caught two small fish. The little fish made a scanty breakfast for Elise and Max. Mr. Perier and the boys refused to touch them. Their meal consisted of tea alone, and they used the last of that.

Both of Mr. Perier’s feet had been badly frozen and were swollen and very painful. He was placed on the sled again, and Elise and Max took turns riding with him. To make room for the passengers, part of the furs were taken off and made into packs, which the boys carried on their backs. Even then, the load on the sled was a heavy one for two tired, hungry dogs. One, and sometimes two, of the boys had to help pull.

By way of the gully they left the river bank and went up to the prairie. There they found and followed a well defined trail, the usual route between Pembina and Fort Douglas. More than one dog train had traveled that way since the last fall of snow. The morning was cold and the crust firm, but the party had to make the best possible speed before the sun softened the surface. With one or the other of the children walking, it was not possible to go very fast. Cold though the wind was, even the beaten track grew soft under the direct rays of the sun, as the day advanced.

With soaked moccasins, and red, swollen eyes, the tired, half-starved travelers reached Pembina some time after noon. Mr. Perier was the only one with dry feet. He was not suffering so much from snow blindness either as the others, for he had been able to keep his eyes covered. But his feet and right hand and arm were paining him severely.

The arrival caused much excitement in the little settlement, but the boys did not linger to explain how it happened that they returned from their hunting trip bringing three strangers. They went at once to Louis’ home. His mother received the Periers with almost as warm a welcome as she gave her own son. The little cabin would be crowded indeed, but that did not disturb her in the least. There was always room for travelers in distress, and Elise and Max, cold, weary, hungry, and motherless, appealed to her motherly heart.

Mrs. Brabant and her younger children were thin, much thinner than when Walter had seen them last. Food had been scarce in Pembina for weeks, but they did not hesitate to share what little they had with the newcomers. Kinder, more generous people never lived, thought the Swiss boy, as he remembered all they had done for him and saw how eager they were to share their last bite with his friends. He could never do enough to repay their kindness. That they neither expected nor wanted repayment, he knew well. Their hospitality was a matter of course with them.