THE BOWMEN

Robert looked back and saw the roofs and spires of Quebec sitting on its mighty rock, and he remembered how much had happened during their short stay there.  He could recall the whole time, hour by hour, and he knew that he would never forget any part of it.  The town was intense, glowing, vivid in the clear northern sunlight, and he had seen it, as he so often had longed to do.  A quality in his nature had responded to it, but at the last his heart had turned against it.  The splendor of that city into which he had enjoyed such a remarkable introduction had in it something hot and feverish.

“You’re thinking a farewell to Quebec, Robert,” said the hunter.  “It looks grand and strong up there, but I’ve an idea there’ll be a day when we’ll come again.”

“Americans and English have besieged it before,” said Robert, “but they’ve never taken it.”

“Which proves nothing, but we’ll turn our minds now to our journey into the south.  It’s good to breathe this clean air again, and the sooner we reach the deep woods the better I’ll like it.  What say you, Tayoga?”

The nostrils of the Onondaga expanded, as he inhaled the odors of leaf and grass, borne on the gentle wind.

“I have lived in the white man’s house in Albany,” he said, “and in our own log house in the vale of Onondaga, and I know the English and the French have many things that the nations of the Hodenosaunee have not, but we can do without most of them.  If the great chiefs were to drink and dance all night as Bigot and his friends do, then indeed would we cease to be the mighty League of the Hodenosaunee.”

They traveled all that day on foot, but at a great pace, showing their safe conduct twice to French soldiers, and so thin was the line of settlements along the St. Lawrence that when night came they were beyond the cultivated fields and had entered the deep woods.  The three, in addition to their weapons, carried on their backs packs containing blankets and food, and as Willet and Tayoga put them down they drew long breaths of relief like those of prisoners escaped.

“Home, Tayoga!  Home!” said the hunter, joyfully.  “I’ve nothing against cities in general, but I breathed some pretty foul air in Quebec, and it’s sweet and clean here.  There comes a time when you are glad no house crosses your view and you are with the world as it was made in the beginning.  Don’t these trees look splendid!  Did you ever see a finer lot of tender young leaves?  And the night sky you see up there has been washed and scrubbed until it’s nothing but clean blue!”

“Why, you’re only a boy, Dave, the youngest of us three,” laughed Robert.  “Here you are singing songs about leaves and trees just as if you were not the most terrible swordsman in the world.”

A shadow crossed Willet’s face, but it was quick in passing.