Show jat isih 1 t t i l i lm 4 T alie h 1 anns of abraham by james oliver curwood curtwood 1 by doubleday doran co inc service 4 k ka fra 4 17 l t fr i THE STORY CHAPTER I 1 with his hid english wife catherine and twelve year old son jaems henri bblain franch rench fc nottley lit in canada in 1749 cultivates a fertile arall farm adJa adjacent vent to the euille As the th story opens the bblain family Is I 1 on mi tta its way horns home from a visit to the Ton catherines catherine wandering brother Hepa iliah meta them CHAP ll 11 Hep albah an aa la is his hl custom has brought presents for his hl sister and her family to jeems he h div gives ve a a splendid piece of crimson velvet laughingly telling the boy it to 1 to be a present from jeems to tobnette Tol nett nette Tont eur small daughter of the set asi kneur Hep albah also gives jaenis a pistol bidding biddiex him perfect klingele klin gelf in marksmanship tor for the people of the th frontier are const constantly constanel antl in tear fear of raids raid by indian war parfitt par part laa adlle of the english CHAPTER CHAP TEIl III Hepa iuan teara fears tor for the safety of the bullins Liu bu lalni lains in their isolated position but henri laughs at the idea of bangor jaems presents tn the velvet to Tol tobnette nette her cousin paul tache a few years yeara older than geeron earns oon contrives trives to throw the parcel awa away altans jeems beema resents the action and attacks 1 paul aul but the latter chive the smaller bov iNI APTER tv IV next day ipema J ferns feeling he ha was wrong in brawling before tonnette Tot ToI nette natte goes to her homo home to offer his apologies lie hears bears madame kontour refer to him film as a little english hoaas but makes his apolo gleit and fops es home tal ving evilly anh ng of 0 what he had overheard takes his hl ipar turu ine Tuni euis go BO to quebec where Toli I 1 to be educated after tour four years yeara during which boeme practically aIly reaches reached manhood man nood th the ton toil tours return war between britain and france franca flames and french settlers nett lerr hasten to join dieskau french commander and jeems remain at home absent one day on a hunting trip jeems sets sees from roin a distance his bin home in birnes flames lir nes CHAPTER V he finds his batner and ana mother dead and the house bouse and barn ola blazing zing A hatchet of english Un kIlli make ak left on the scene convinces him the slaughter Is the work of mohawk indians english allies the sound of 0 gunfire has come to him tram from the ton i leur ur seigne urfe and at dawn fearins fearing tor for tobnette Tol nette ha be hastens hastena there ton tour and his servants are dead A shot wounds jeems believing Bellev lne him an enemy tobnette Tol nette from a hiding place in fit the mill has tired fired on him hi to the mill where the girl denounces him as an englishman and tries to kill him fainting inting ta before she ran can carry out her design CHAPTER VI Recover recovering ins consciousness ni ness iol Tol notte continues to tauni alln jeems with the work of lila his english friends after burying buryin g in a shallow gruve grave jeems beema returns to his murdered p pi arents rents the girl irl follows him the sight of henrt henri bulale and cath erine dead convinces her she has haa beer been wrong in her suspicions uspicio ns of the bu lain family je jeems ma buries his parent and I 1 with tobnette Tol nette goes to an aban boned house hoube in hiding they wacl the mohawk war party pass dass CHAPTER VII tollett Tol nett tells tella learn how she escaped the slaughter her mother Is in quebec deema la Is convinced Keps hepsibah ibah Is dead he plans te tc take the girl to friends on th the way jeems flights fights with and kills a whitt renegade who had been with the mohawk raiders the renegade had fired a shot before jeems kills him and fearing the indians indans will hear bear and return the fugitives seek a hiding place lace they are discovered by a band a of seneca indians CHAPTER vm VIII tiaona Tta oga chief of party spar spares esthe the fugitives and agree to allow them to accompany his band on their journey to theli their destination it if toinette Tot nette can endure thi the march the girls bravery appeals to him and in the indian fashion hf 11 adopts her bar as his daug daughter lter CHAPTER VIII continued for the first time I 1 have discovered my uncle to be a great liar he said ills ankle Is as as mine it Is for the little fawn he has bas pretended a hurt and here for meat she Is safe he will not mot kill her when depins translated this tobnette Tol nette bowed her head and cried softly tiaona saw her crumpled on the ground with teems jeems arm around her she looked like silver heels with her long black blach braid falling over hershour her shoulder no one was conscious cons cloua of the strain at his heart as he came toward her warriors wide eyed saw that bedad not knip and in hla attitude was waa a defiance of what they might think ile he paused before the girl and dropped hla his beav erskIn blanket at her feet tobnette Tol nette looked up through tears teara and smiled again as a strange softness stole over the savage face ile he gazed at lier her steadily as if he were seeing a spirit rit and said the tha soul of sol van tan mahlum has come to abide in you yon ill 1 I 1 sol yan was silver heels beels tiaona turned away and his bis warriors knew that his decision had been made there would be no haste after this in the direction ot of hidden town on a couch mafle ot of the beaver and of balsam boughs which teems jeems had carried from the creek bottom tobnette Tol nette rested while the indians prepared for the evening feast she smoothed and her hair as she watched them and although every bone in her body seemed to have on an ache of its own she felt a sensa senera aton of complete relaxation stealing over her tor the first time since the tragedy at manor the mental ease which came to soften her environment viron ment embraced her in such a stealthy way that she was unconscious of the moment when her eyes closed in complete surrender to the exhaustion which was claiming her jeems returned from one of the fires bearing ft a stick on which a dozen of the cooked pigeons were spitted ile he did not noi awaken tobnette Tol nette but after he had finished his meal he broiled another dozen of the pigeons until they were as brown as chestnuts and stored them away with a roasted illy root and a few artichokes for two hours the cooking continued and when it visas was finished with the tha nights kill ready for future use warriors wrapped themselves in their blankets and lay down to steep the camp was soon in silence and for a long time jeems sat meditating upon the changes which had come into his bis life within the space of two days and nights that every thing was gone and that he and tol riette nette were the only ones left of those thosa W who ho had so recently made up their world seemed a monstrous exaggeration of fact tobnette Tol nette sleeping quietly forced the truth upon him and from the racking visions of his thoughts he turned to her with yearning to hold her closely ta lia his arms lier her face was of childlike loveliness in the glow of the stars so complete was her fatigue that dark dreams did not mar the solace of bf her unconsciousness when the night was half gone he made a pillow of balsams and before he fell asleep lie drew hand to him gently and pressed his lips against it dawn another day then night again the journey was no longer impossible for tobnette Tol nette when she neared exhaustion exhaust iou camp was made and when she awoke the march was resumed culled called her sol yan SIa kwun and the warriors regarded lier her with kin kindlier diler eyes As the days continued and they witnessed her courage ou rage their hearts grew warm toward her and at times their glances revealed I 1 an admiration and friendliness which were never la in these duys days served also its ii the hr across which deenis and aind were passing into a future that was all their wn own aud and the poignancy of the alie loss less chey had suffered was vw mellowed nuH owed by these newer aspects so fo vital to themselves the world they had known was a fabric which lind crushed crashed in ili ruin about thein a desolation out of which another existence was building itself As the deeper solitudes of the wilderness claimed them this feeling became a bond which nothing could break wherever they went and whatever happened they would belong to each other for death might separate but it could not fiot destroy on oil the fourteenth day sent a messenger ahead that evening he sot sat on the ground near tobnette Tol nette and teems beems translated what be said tomorrow they would reach hidden town and his people would be expecting them there would be great rejoicing because they had taken many scalps and had not lost a man they would honor her and jeems accepting them as flesh of their flesh and bone of their bone would live as his daughter sliver silver heels heart would live in her song she would be of the forests forever that was the word he had sent ahead to was coming with his daughter he stalked into darkness and for a time line jeems and tobnette Tol nette were afraid to to speak the thought which was choking at their h hearts earls your children and your childrens children that night toinette Tol notte nette lay staring at the sky with sleepless eyes CHAPTER IX guarded like a precious jewel ox all sides a hidden town literally as well as in name was one of the greatest of the strange social centers of the indians to which prisoners with white shing were brought to be adopted by their captors that such places existed was a fact which had but recently gained credence in both the english and french colonies not until 1704 was colonel boquet to free the white population in the first of these mystery villages and then the deliverance which he brought about resulted in less of happiness than of tragedy for the life and associations ciati clat ions ons which he disrupted in the name and claim of the colonies had their roots as far back as the third and fourth generations hearts and homes were broken as well as prisoners shackles was the rome of a wide domain in in that period of its ita history when jeems and tobnette Tol nette cams alib tiaona and his warriors in it were three hundred people a and nd at full strength it num numbered berea sixty fighting men it nestled at the edge of a large 1 meadow which the river embraced in a horseshoe curve and its center was st a stronghold with long houses st storage 0 rage buildings cabins nod and tepees sufficient for the entire population in times of stress the had vineyards and fine orchards of apples cherries and plums and they also grew tobacco ft and potatoes on a considerable scale in the cornfields and growing from tho the game hills were pumpkins and beans and everywhere were sunflowers sun flowers of a dwarfish kind grown for the oil which was extracted from their seeds when the season was good lived in comfort during the long winter months the gra granaries narles were full large quantities of dried fruits were in the storehouses and underground cellars were stocked with apples pumpkins potatoes and squashes when the season was bad drew a belt tightly about its stomach for five months of the year for three of these months it starved this was a bad season spring frosts had killed the early vegetation and had blackened the buds of apples and plums the corn was so poor that after roasting time only enough was left for the next years planting and beans and potatoes had suffered until there was less than a third of a crop but the people of wore no appearance of gloom on the day when tiaona and his triumphant warriors were to arrive from the east cast messenger had brought the news that not a man had been lost in i their dinv inv invasion aslon of the territory of their enemies this was unusual and it put fresh courage into the hearts of those who had seen the year go against them homecoming with the spoils of war was an augury which more than discounted empty cellars and gra granaries narles As a part of these spoils they knew tiaona was bringing a daughter to take the place of silver heels this convinced them that fortune was bound to smile on them again they had loved sol yan with her death had come bad times now the spirits would give them an easy winter and next year would see the earth flowering with good thin thing gil ii made ready for the feast there were still plenty of earthy things and a supply of late green corn packed away in husks and kept for this bocc occasion as I 1 0 n the last day was long for tobnette Tol nette it had begun at dawn and though tiaona halted his men at later intervals vals to let her rest it had not ended with dusk darkness came before they reached a plain on the far side of which was a hill beyond this hill was they could see sec the glow of a great fire lighting the sky toinette Tol nette forgot her exhaustion at this sign of the end of their journey she observed that some one book took from jeems the scalp of the man he had killed which he had tried to conceal from her eyes under a flap of buckskin then she saw all of the scalps taken by the fastened like dangling ash to a slender pole which was carried on the shoulders of two men the ba hair ir or of one of these scalps reaching almost to the ground with the scalp carriers ili t the lead they came to the lilllan lill hill lat ut the edge of the plain and looked down on the alie valley of at command the men bearing the scalp laden pole had bad gone attend ahead and now followed with his men in single tile file tobnette Tol nette and jeems were midway in the line wide slave collars of buckskin had been placed about their necks and jeems was stripped of ills his weapons the warriors did not hurry their step was slow and steady and not a man broke the silence with a whisper or a word A sea of torches advanced it rolled in and out of hollows like a flood then came to a level place and formed two streaming lines of fire the scalp bearers reached these it a hundred yards ahead of tiaona and his men robnette Tol rol nette could see them enter the light of the torches and in n these moments the voices of the savages rose to the heavens paused and not until the scalp bearers had paraded their grisly burden the entire length of the gauntlet of flame did he proceed again tobnette Tol nette felt stealing over her a strange faintness of body and limb stories which slie she had forgotten stories she had biad heard of the indians from childhood stories that had sent shivers through the hearts of a thousand homes along the frontiers all crowded upon her at once wild tales of appalling torture and vengeance of stake and fire and human suffering buffering she had listened to them from her fathers lips from passing voyageurs voya geurs had heard them in the gossip of the and she remembered by name this ordeal which awaited them it was le cheman de fen the road of fire through which they must pass others had died in it roasted by pitch filled tore torches fies blinded killed by inches so she had been told tinola and his warriors moved slowly they were like bronze men without flesh or emotions their heads were high their bedl doddea a straight their jaws set hard as they stalked at a death march pace between the columns of their people teems fell into this rhythmic movement as the mouth of the tha torch monster began to swallow them and then with eyes eye that became flame lit pools of fear and exhaustion ha ba tobnette Tol nette saw that not a hand gave a sign of rising against them the torches coughed and flared but not a spark touched their skins in passing no eyes gleamed hatred at them no fingers clenched no band bad was raised the things she had bad heard in the land of her people were lies the |