The last portage had carried them across several small streams. They
were in the heart of the forest. All night Brother Jacques sat at the
side of the women, guarding with watchful eyes. How the spirit and the
flesh of this man warred! And all the while his face in the filtered
moonlight was marbled and set of expression. He was made of iron,
constitutionally; his resolution, tempered steel.
Anne slept, but not so madame. She listened and listened: to the stir
of the leaves, to the dim murmur of running water, to the sighs of the
night wind, to the crackling of a dry twig when Anne turned uneasily in
her sleep. She listened and listened, but the sound she hungered for
never came.
At Quebec the news of the calamity did not become known till near
midnight. As the wind-drifted pleasure-boat told its grim story,
desolation fell upon the hearts of four men, each being conscious in
his own way that some part of the world had shifted from under his
feet. The governor recommended patience; he was always recommending
that attribute; he was always practising it, and fatally at times. The
four men shook their heads.
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