Part 9

"Oh, pardon me, Madame Tabeau," said Jean, politely. "I was seeing nothing, hearing nothing. Of late I have become absent-minded, I think."

"Quite natural," said Mere Tabeau. "The very young are absent-minded, and the very old, but also those who are immersed in affairs and those who are in love. They are most absorbing, those affairs of the heart. I remember well my last case, now many years ago. Some day I will tell you the story. Perhaps you could listen to it now."

"But no, Madame, I am in haste this evening. Another time, if you please. You had something else to say, had you not?"

"Not at all, Monseigneur. The poor old woman has nothing to say--nothing. Another time, when his lordship has a few minutes to spare for such trifles--his own affairs, moreover--I will wait upon him."

"Oh, Madame, do not be angry. I will listen, to be sure, all the afternoon, if I can be of service to you."

"Service to yourself, my friend. But no matter. I accept your apologies. I am well disposed, as you will see, and I wish to help you out of your troubles."

"My troubles?" said Jean, with a puzzled frown. "I do not understand. You speak in mysterious language, it seems. All of us have our little troubles, I suppose."

"Monsieur does not understand--will not, rather. Mysterious? Not at all. Does not everybody know that Monsieur Giroux would effect an alliance with one of the most prominent families in the parish? Is it possible that he has not yet heard what is common report?"

"Madame Tabeau, if that is all I had better go. I am really very busy."

"But, but, Monsieur, these affairs can be arranged, no matter how complicated, involved, entangled. I have charms, herbs, love potions, and all that, and there are other means still more efficacious. Besides, my charges are very moderate, a little commission, a mere bagatelle when compared with a dowry so magnificent, a connection so advantageous. If Mademoiselle----"

"Madame, that will do. The neighbours may gossip, if they please, but I will not. Allow me to leave you at this time."

"Go then, stupid! _Sacree tete de mouton_! The fool will not listen. Well, he will suffer, he will pay; and I will offer my services to some one else. His lordship is not the only eligible young man in the parish of St. Placide."

"If that is all, Madame, I bid you good evening."

"No, there is something else. My friend, do not mind the ravings of an old woman, an old, old woman, poor and infirm. Old people like to talk, as you know, and say more than they should, at times. But it is their only pleasure. When one talks to a good listener like yourself one forgets. It is good to forget, Jean, to extinguish the fires of memory, if only for a moment. It is like a cup of cold water to a soul in purgatory."

"Madame."

"Yes, yes, I know. You are sorry for me, but not as I am sorry for myself. When I think of what I might have been and what I am, I could cry--and curse. But let us change the subject. You remember my nephew, Pamphile Lareau, do you not? A playmate of yours, I believe, some years ago."

"Remember Pamphile? Certainly. But I did not know that he was your nephew."

"You do not know everything, Jean, wise as you are. Pamphile is my nephew, as I have said, although I have never seen him. His mother thought herself more respectable than I. Can you believe it? After her death I came to St. Placide. For what purpose? Ah, that is my affair. You do not know that either, Monsieur the scholar. There is a lot of useful information that you do not obtain from books, I assure you. But Pamphile is coming to see me this very day. Do you see that little cloud of dust down the road? It is he, I am sure. Wait a moment and you will see him."

"That will be interesting," said Jean. "He has changed much, no doubt, in all these years."

"No doubt. He also has become a great lord, evidently. See, he comes in great style, in a carriage, all the way from Quebec. It will cost at least five dollars, that equipage, for so long a drive. Where the deuce did my nephew get all that money? He never sent me any of it. He will give some to his poor old aunt before he leaves, let us hope. There, he arrives. _Dieu_, what a dash! What grandeur! Speak to him, Jean, I cannot."

"_Bonjour_, Madame. _Bonjour_, Monsieur," said an imposing personage, as the carriage pulled up suddenly in a cloud of dust. "It is here, is it not, that Madame Tabeau lives? They told me, there below, that I should find the place at the crossroads."

"It is here, Monsieur," said Madame Tabeau, quite humbly. "If Monsieur will be so kind as to alight."

"With the greatest pleasure, Madame. How good it is to come to the end of a drive of four hours! Yes, four hours and ten minutes, by the watch. It is now four o'clock, is it not, Monsieur?"

"By the sun I should call it six o'clock, at least," said Jean. "You see, Monsieur the stranger, that we do not carry gold watches in St. Placide."

"No, to be sure. I had forgotten. A primitive place, truly. Is it possible that I spent my early years in St. Placide? But six o'clock? Surely not. Ah, I have it. Ha! Ha! How curious! It is that I have not set my watch since I left Elko, and there is a difference of two hours--or is it three?"

"Two hours," said Jean, with confidence. "You have mountain time there, I believe, and here we have eastern time. Yes, two hours."

The stranger's eyes narrowed as he looked sharply at Jean.

"Eh, what? You know that? What the deuce? Who is this? The little priest, as I live! Monseigneur! And as learned as ever, always wishing to teach one something, always casting away pearls of knowledge. Well met, my ancient friend, after all these years. This is too much pleasure. Your hand, my brave one, for the sake of old times."

The stranger extended a long, slender hand that closed about Jean's fingers like a vice of steel; but Jean understood the trick of the thumb as well as he, and it was Pamphile's hand that was the first to relax.

"Enough, enough, my brave one. It is the same Jean Baptiste that I see and feel. _Dieu_, but you have a loving clasp of the hand. It brings tears to the eyes. Well, my friend the cabby, you seem impatient. What can I do for you?"

"My fare, if you please, Monsieur--the little five dollars that we spoke of."

"Ah, yes, assuredly," said Pamphile, drawing out of his pocket a roll of bills, not one of a lower denomination than twenty dollars. "You can change American money, no doubt."

"Certainly, Monsieur. Anything less than twenty dollars."

"Not twenty dollars, cabby? What a country! We are not in Nevada, evidently. Well, my friend, this is unfortunate. What are we to do?"

"I will take the twenty dollars, Monsieur."

"You will take it all, my friend? How good of you! _Sacre_! I have a mind to give it to you as a reward of merit. It is seldom that one meets a cabby so obliging, so resourceful. You will go far, my Jehu. Yes, I am thinking of giving you the twenty dollars. Do you still feel that you could accept it?"

"No, no, Monsieur," broke in Mere Tabeau. "_Mon Dieu_, what would you do? Give him twenty dollars? Two dollars and fifty cents would have been quite enough if only you had made a bargain. What can we do? Let us think. I could perhaps find the money. Yes, Monsieur Giroux, I have a little store laid by, even I, for my funeral. Wait a moment. I will get it at once."

In her excitement Mere Tabeau forgot both rheumatism and stick, as one who had been cured at the shrine of Bonne Ste. Anne, ran into the house and presently returned with a little leathern bag, out of which she counted silver and copper coins until the cabby had a handful of small change equal to the amount of his fare.

"That is a bad penny, Madame," said the cabby, returning a much-worn coin.

"But no, it is perfectly good, perfectly good," said the old woman, angrily. "It goes, I tell you. I received it, did I not? Well, you shall take it in your turn, and if you don't like it you may pass it on. No, not another _sou_. You are a shark, a robber!"

"Let him have another, Madame," drawled Pamphile with a grand air. "Give him his five dollars in full and a quarter for drink. The twenty-dollar bill? Oh, it is back in my pocket. To-morrow we will arrange all that. And you are Madame Tabeau, no doubt, the aunt whom I have never seen until this blessed moment. Well, my aunt, it is a pleasure to meet you. But where is the little priest who was here a moment since?"

"He is gone, Monsieur Lareau. His lordship has marched away. He would not wait the pleasure of any man. Rich habitants, notaries, priests, bishops, American millionaires--they are all the same to him. It is a great lord, that. One cannot but admire him for his strength, his capacity, but I should like, I should like to slap him in the face."

"And I," drawled Pamphile, "I should like to meet him in Elko, Nevada, in the middle of the street, at twenty paces, or forty, even. Cric! Crac! Jean Baptiste falls in the dust, and there is one monseigneur less in the world. But that would not do in St. Placide, perhaps."

"For the love of God, Monsieur, do not speak so loud. Come into the house, if you please, where we can talk. Enter, Monsieur. It is not a palace, nor is it a hovel, altogether. See, all is very proper--the dining-room and kitchen in one, the sleeping apartment of Monsieur over there in the corner, and my own little boudoir in the attic. No, Monsieur, do not fear to be alone with an old woman like me. There was a time--but let us not speak of it. It is past, the golden age, and now there is nothing but rheumatism, broken bones, and the hobble to the grave.

"But before that one may have some pleasure still. One may gossip with the neighbours as they pass, frighten the women and the children, tell a few lies now and then, and, best of all, one may have revenge. Yes, life is worth living yet. We will live for that, you and I. You also have your little scores to pay, it would seem. How glad I am that you have come! What luck! But how did it happen that you left Nevada, Monsieur my nephew?"

"Oh, a little unpleasantness," said Pamphile, evasively. "One cannot stay always in the same place. One outlives one's usefulness. So it occurred to me that I might visit the scenes of my childhood, and when your letter came I decided to take a change and a rest, for the good of my health."

"And a little adventure as well," said Mere Tabeau, significantly. "A little expedition in search of gold, perhaps."

"Possibly," said Pamphile, with a smile, "if it could easily be done and without danger."

"Monsieur my nephew, listen to me. Directly east from this spot, through the forest and beyond the mountain, ten miles as the crow flies but twenty by the road, lies the village of Chateau Richer, where I was born many years ago--yes, more than sixty years. It was there that I passed my early years, and when I arrived at the age of love I was there still, in my little house by the shore, where I could see the bateaux pass up the river with the rising tide and pass down again with the ebb.

"Did the sailors stop sometimes on the way? Possibly. At least the smugglers came to see my brother Ovide. They were brave people, those smugglers, and rich as well. There were two who had a great treasure, obtained from the trade, in part, but chiefly from a wreck. They were wreckers too, of course. When the good God sends a storm, when a ship runs on the rocks, when all on board are drowned, does not the wreck belong to those who find it? Assuredly. So Michel Gamache and Toussaint Giroux found the wreck and the treasure on Anticosti, there below. They burned the wreck, brought the treasure home to the island, and hid it in a cave in the side of the hill by the long marsh.

"How do I know? Did I not see it on that night when Michel rowed me across the river at high tide when the moon was full. What a night it was! How bright the moon shone in the sky and in the still water beneath! How the grass rustled under the keel of the boat as we ran up into the little cove! I can hear it still. How dark it was in that cave, but how the gold coins glistened! Yes, gold coins, Napoleons, sovereigns, hundreds of them, in an iron box. Heavy? I could not lift it. Of what value? How should I know? Ten, twenty, thirty thousand pounds, perhaps. Oh, a great treasure. See, there is one of those coins, a love token which he gave me, he, Michel Gamache, and which I keep until the day of reckoning. I have a grudge against him? Yes, a little grudge, a slight affair of the heart which I have nourished for some forty years, for which I would kill him if I could be sure that he would go to the place of eternal fire."

"Well, my aunt," said Pamphile, with a yawn, "it is a fine story, but to what purpose? Was it to tell me this that you brought me from Elko?"

"But no, my nephew. Do you not know that Michel Gamache lives in this parish?"

"No."

"And the treasure, I tell you, those Napoleons and sovereigns, all that gold, is here in St. Placide, in the same iron box, of a weight more than you could lift, my strong nephew. No, you could do it, with some assistance, and that is why I have asked you to come. Eh, Pamphile, would not an adventure like this be as good as gambling in Nevada? Not so amusing, perhaps, but quite as profitable."

"Quite so, my aunt. And where, if I may ask, is this wonderful treasure to be found?"

"All in good time, my nephew, when everything is arranged. You will help me, will you not? We will divide the spoils. You shall have two-thirds of the treasure. I shall have the rest, and my revenge. Are the terms satisfactory?"

"More than satisfactory, my dear aunt. And the little priest, what of him?"

"Oh, that will explain itself. You will get even with him very soon, never fear. It is my little secret for the present. Yes, a fine little secret. It will reveal itself before long. If not, I will tell you."

"My aunt," said Pamphile, impatiently, "I don't give a hoot for your little secret. Keep it to yourself as long as you like, but give me something to eat."

"Well! well! Such are men--always eating. Nothing can satisfy them, neither gold, nor love, nor revenge--only meat, potatoes, soup and all that. Well, my nephew, I was expecting you, and presently we shall have a little repast together--soup of peas, fried trout, strawberries, cream, tea. How will that do? Ah, Pamphile, what a fine, tall man you are! What arms, shoulders, legs! More than a match for that Jean Baptiste, surely."

"No, my aunt; he is a giant, that little priest. My fingers tingle still from that grip of his. No, but I shall punish him all the same. There are other ways."

"Ha! Ha!" cackled the old crone, in glee. "There are other ways. Yes, indeed. Ah, my little secret, my dear little secret."

*CHAPTER XIV*

*THE TRIUMPH OF PAMPHILE*

It was on a Saturday evening that Pamphile arrived in St. Placide, and before Mass on the following morning all the parish knew that the exile had returned, not in poverty and rags, like the prodigal son, but with fine clothes on his back, money in his pocket, and driving in a carriage like a great lord. Some of the neighbours had merely heard of his arrival; others had seen him as he drove by; while a very few, highly favoured, had actually spoken to him; but on the way to Mass all the details were pieced together, the knowledge of each became the common property of all, and a story of adventure and romance was woven that grew more wonderful and variegated with the telling.

The youth had left the parish eight years before without a _sou_. Zotique Bedard himself had taken him down to Beauport as an act of charity; and Elzear Buchon, the grocer's boy, had taken him the rest of the way to Quebec. From that place he had made his way, by walking, by getting a lift now and then, by riding in and under freight cars, to Chicago, and finally to the Far West, where for many years he had wandered about from one mining camp to another seeking for gold, now finding a glittering vein that promised a fortune, now losing all at a single blast. At last he had found it, a mine of fabulous riches, and now he was a capitalist, a millionaire, living on rents and royalties, travelling for pleasure all over the world, yet coming back, like a good patriot, to the home of his ancestors.

As to his wealth there could be no doubt whatever. One had but to look at the fine frock coat of grey cloth, the embroidered waistcoat, the striped trousers, the shiny buttoned shoes, and the jaunty grey hat of soft felt with the silken cord and tassel. Such style St. Placide had never seen before, and Quebec, even, could not approach it. The housewives marvelled at the whiteness of his shirt-bosom; the young men talked of the glittering diamond stud and the gold watch with its wonderful hunting-case and the little gong within that chimed the hours; while the young ladies raved over his drooping moustache and the black, glossy mane that came down almost to his shoulders.

Altogether, the verdict was highly favourable. Pamphile was a desirable young man, a credit to the parish. What a pity that he had not come back to stay! But it was not to be expected that he could be content to settle down in St. Placide, he who had travelled over the world and had attained such eminence among his fellow-men. No, but it might well be that he had returned to seek a bride among the fair maidens of the parish. Riches might be acquired abroad, but more loving companions, more faithful wives or better housekeepers than the Canadian girls were not to be found in foreign lands. Vive la Canadienne!

True, Pamphile had not left behind a perfect reputation when he went away, but one should not be too severe in judging the pranks and peccadilloes of youth. The worst boys often become the best men. In fact, some of the most respectable habitants had been sad rogues in their younger days. No, a boy without capacity for evil had little capacity for good. It is not enough to be good; one must be good for something.

Of the relatives of Pamphile little was known. His mother had been the sister of Mere Tabeau, but was now dead. His father had been a lumberman on the Gatineau, but was drowned on the drive. Of the dead one should say nothing but good. The family was by no means distinguished, but that was all the more to the credit of Pamphile, who had been able to rise so far above them. And Mere Tabeau? Well, after all she was a harmless creature, despite her bitter tongue. Certainly, she had a gift of language truly remarkable. If only she had a silk dress, a black cloak, and a bonnet tied with ribbons under her chin, she would look quite respectable. Indeed, the wives of some of the habitants had a loud voice and an offensive manner. One must not be unjust to people merely because they are poor.

So the neighbours, as they drove to Church, praised the achievements of Pamphile and said many charitable things of Mere Tabeau. More than one stopped at the cabin to invite the old woman and her distinguished nephew to drive to Church with them. The first to come was Bonhomme Gagnon, who, after some delay, captured the lion and the lioness and bore them away in triumph. It was indeed a triumph for Bonhomme Gagnon, and fully repaid him for the gifts of trout, game, berries, potatoes, black puddings and what not, the blackmail extorted for years by Mere Tabeau because of a slight indiscretion in the days of his youth. Even Madame Gagnon, who cordially hated the old woman, condescended to sit with her in the back seat for the pleasure of escorting the American millionaire and mining king to church.

It was a great day for Pamphile. Seated beside the eminently respectable cultivator, Bonhomme Gagnon, he found himself at the head of a long procession of neighbours, assembled, it would seem, to do him honour. He thoroughly enjoyed the attention he was receiving, he who had been so unimportant in his younger days that the neighbours could hardly remember his faults, much less his good points, such as they were. But now the insignificant past was obliterated, the way of virtue and honour lay before him, and the rising sun of popular favour shone upon him. The heart of Pamphile expanded in the genial warmth of the morning sun, and he chatted in a very friendly way with the worthy habitant by his side.

"Well, Monsieur Gagnon," he said, in a tone of appreciation, "this is without doubt a very fine day."

The good habitant beamed upon Pamphile.

"I am delighted to hear you say so, Monsieur Lareau. You find our weather pleasant? That is good. Yes, we have fine weather at times, not like that of the West, of course, but still quite satisfactory. Good for the hay, certainly."

"Ah, Monsieur Gagnon, my friend, not only is the day very fine, but the scenery, I will say, is charming. Not like that of Nevada, but equally pleasing in its way."

"Can it be?" exclaimed Bonhomme Gagnon, delighted. "It is a pleasure to hear you say so, Monsieur. The weather and the scenery--both equal to Nevada in their way. But that is gratifying. Do you hear that, Marie? The gentleman has seen the world, and he knows. What a wonderful thing is travel! To go to Beauport, that is interesting; to visit Quebec, that is very fine; but to sail up to Montreal, to explore the sources of the great river, to see Chicago, Nevada and all that--what a privilege! Ah, Monsieur Lareau, I envy you."

"Yes, it is interesting," said Pamphile, reflectively. "But it is interesting, also, to return. St. Placide has changed much in the past eight years. Those good neighbours back there have an air of prosperity. Almost every one has a covered buggy. Formerly they had carts only, and many walked to Church, five, six, seven miles, even. Yes, St. Placide must be a pretty good place."

"Not so bad, Monsieur Lareau," said Bonhomme Gagnon, with pride. "There are no millionaires in our parish, but neither are there any paupers. Yes, we have our cows and pigs, our horses and spring-carts, our houses and barns, and our money in the bank. It is the dairy business, you know, that has made the change of which you speak. I myself, for example, have my little five hundred dollars laid away."

"That is interesting," said Pamphile, with a keen glance at the simple habitant. "Very interesting indeed. And you are contented I am sure, as though you owned a gold mine."

"Contented? Yes. No. A gold mine? _Mon Dieu_, if I had that I should be a prince. Marie, do not talk all the time. Listen to Monsieur Lareau, who will tell us, perhaps, about the gold of Nevada. Tell us, Monsieur, if you please. Is it true that one finds a mine, now and then, with more than a million dollars in gold, pure gold?"

"Certainly, Monsieur Gagnon. Have I not seen with my own eyes that great mine, the Comstock, whence they have taken millions and millions of gold and silver, besides lead, copper, and many other metals of great value? Ah, that was a mine! Yes, there is gold in Nevada--quantities of it. Come with me, Monsieur Gagnon, on my return, and I will show you. My own little mine, for example, would be worth a visit. I could show you places on the wall of the tunnel where you could pick off pieces of gold as large as a pea--yes, as large as a marble. Native gold, pure, twenty dollars to the ounce."