Chapter 15: The Lone Château

Despite his courage and the new resolution that he had acquired during his long months on the island, Robert’s heart often sank. They seemed to make no progress with the siege of Quebec. Just so far had they gone and they could go no farther. The fortress of France in the New World appeared impregnable. There it was, cut clear against the sky, the light shining on its stone buildings, proud and defiant, saying with every new day to those who attacked it that it could not be taken, while Montcalm, De Levis, Bougainville, St. Luc, and the others showed all their old skill in defense. They heard too that Bourlamaque after he retreated from Ticonderoga and Crown Point was sitting securely within his lines and entrenchments at Isle-aux-Noix and that the cautious Amherst would delay longer and yet longer.

It was now certain that no help could be expected from Amherst and his strong army that year. The most that he would do would be to keep Bourlamaque and his men from coming to the relief of Quebec. So far as the capital of New France was concerned the issue must be fought out by the forces now gathered there for the defense and the offense, the French and the Indians against the English and the Americans.

Robert realized more keenly every day that the time was short and becoming shorter. Hot summer days were passing, nights came on crisp and cool, the foliage along the king of rivers and its tributaries began to glow with the intense colors of decay, and there was more than a touch of autumn in the air. They must be up and doing before the fierce winter came down on Quebec. Military operations would be impossible then.

In this depressing time, Robert drew much courage from Charteris, who had been a prisoner a long time in Quebec, and who understood even more thoroughly than young Lennox the hollowness of the French power in North America.

“It is upheld by a few brave and skillful men and a small but heroic army,” he said. “In effect, New France has been deserted by the Bourbon monarchy. If it were not for the extraordinary situation of Quebec, adapted so splendidly to purposes of defense, we could crush the Marquis de Montcalm in a short time. The French regulars are as good as any troops in the world and they will fight to the last, but the Canadian militia is not disciplined well and is likely to break under a fierce attack. You know, Lennox, what militiamen always are, no matter to what nation they belong. They may fight and die like heroes at one time, and, at another time, they may run away at the first fire, struck with panic. What we want is a fair chance at the French army in the open. General Wolfe himself, though cursed by much illness, never loses hope. I’ve had occasion to talk with him more than once owing to my knowledge of Quebec and the surrounding country, and there’s a spirit for you, Lennox. It’s in an ugly body but no man was ever animated by a finer temper and courage.”

Robert and Charteris formed a great friendship, a true friendship that lasted all their long lives. But then Robert had a singular faculty for making friends. Charteris interested him vastly. He had a proud, reserved, and somewhat haughty nature. Many people thought him exclusive, but Robert soon learned that his fastidiousness was due to a certain shy quality, and a natural taste for the best in everything. Under his apparent coldness lay a brave and staunch nature and absolute integrity.

Robert’s interest in Charteris was heightened by the delicate cloud of romance that floated about him, a cloud that rose from the hints thrown forth now and then by Zebedee Crane. The young French lady in Quebec who loved him was as beautiful as the dawn and she had the spirit of a queen. Charteris lived in the hope that they might take Quebec and her with it. But Robert was far too fine of feeling ever to allude to such an affair of the heart to Charteris, or in truth to anyone else.

It was a period of waiting and yet it was a period of activity. The partisans were incessant in their ways. Robert heard that his old friend, Langlade, was leading numerous bands against the English, and the evidence of Tandakora’s murderous ferocity multiplied. Nor were the outlying French themselves safe from him. News arrived that he intended an attack upon a château called Chatillard farther up the river but within the English lines. A band of the New England rangers, led by Willet, was sent to drive him off, and to destroy the Ojibway pest, if possible. Robert, Tayoga, and Zeb Crane went with him.

They arrived at the château just before twilight. It was a solid stone building overlooking the St. Lawrence, and the lands about it had a narrow frontage on the river, but it ran back miles after the old French custom in making such grants, so that every estate might have a river landing. Willet’s troops numbered about forty men, and, respecting the aged M. de Chatillard, who was quite ill and in bed, they did not for the present go into the house, eating their own supper on the long, narrow lawn, which was thick with dwarfed and clipped pines and other shrubbery.

But they lighted no fires, and they kept very quiet since they wished for Tandakora to walk into an ambush. The information, most of which had been obtained by Zeb Crane, was to the effect that Tandakora believed a guard of English soldiers was in the house. After his custom, he would swoop down upon them, slaughter them, and then be up and away. It was a trick in which the savage heart of the Ojibway delighted, and he had achieved it more than once.

The August night came down thick and dark. A few lights shone in the Château de Chatillard, but Willet and his rangers stood in black gloom. Almost at their feet, the great St. Lawrence flowed in its mighty channel, a dim blue under the dusky sky. Nothing was visible there save the slow stream, majestic, an incalculable weight of water. Nothing appeared upon its surface, and the far shore was lost in the night. It seemed to Robert, despite the stone walls of the château by their side, that they were back in the wilderness. It was a northern wilderness too. The light wind off the river made him shiver.

The front door of the house opened and a figure outlined against the light appeared. It was an old man in a black robe, tall, thin, and ascetic, and Robert seeing him so clearly in the light of a lamp that he held in his hand recognized him at once. It was Father Philibert Drouillard, the same whom he had defeated in the test of oratory in the vale of Onondaga before the wise sachems when so much depended on victory.

“Father Drouillard!” he exclaimed impulsively, stepping forward out of the shadows.

“Who is it who speaks?” asked the priest, holding the lamp a little higher.

“Father Drouillard, don’t you know me?” exclaimed Robert, advancing within the circle of light.

“Ah, it is young Lennox!” said the priest. “What a meeting! And under what circumstances!”

“And there are others here whom you know,” said Robert. “Look, this is David Willet who commands us, and here also is Tayoga, whom you remember in the vale of Onondaga.”

Father Drouillard saluted them gravely.

“You are the enemies of my country,” he said, “but I will not deny that I am glad to see you here. I understand that the savage, Tandakora, means to attack this house tonight, thinking that it holds a British garrison. Well, it seems that he will not be far wrong in his thought.”

A ghost of a smile flickered over the priest’s pale face.

“A garrison but not the garrison that he expects to destroy,” said Willet. “Tandakora fights nominally under the flag of France, but as you know, Father, he fights chiefly to gratify his own cruel desires.”

“I know it too well. Come inside. M. de Chatillard wishes to see you.”

Willet, Robert, Tayoga, and Zeb Crane went in and were shown into the bedroom where the Seigneur Louis Henri Anatole de Chatillard, past ninety years of age, lay upon his last bed. He was a large, handsome old man, fair like so many of the Northern French, and his dying eyes were full of fire. Two women of middle years, his granddaughters, knelt weeping by each side of his bed, and two servants, tears on their faces, stood at the foot. Willet and his comrades halted respectfully at the door.

“Step closer,” said the old man, “that I may see you well.”

The four entered and stood within the light shed by two tall candles. The old man gazed at them a long time in silence, but finally, he said:

“And so the English have come at last.”

“We’re not English, M. de Chatillard,” said Willet, “we’re Americans, Bostonnais, as you call us.”

“It is the same. You are but the children of the English and you fight together against us. You increase too fast in the south. You thrive in your towns and in the woods, and you send greater and greater numbers against us. But you cannot take Quebec. The capital of New France is inviolate.”

Willet said nothing. How could he argue with a man past ninety who lay upon his dying bed?

“You cannot take Quebec,” repeated M. de Chatillard, rising, strength showing in his voice. “The Bostonnais have come before. It was in Frontenac’s time nearly three-quarters of a century ago, when Phipps and his armada from New England arrived before Quebec. I was but a lad then newly come from France, but the great governor, Frontenac, made ready for them. We had batteries in the Sault-au-Matelot on Palace Hill, on Mount Carmel, before the Jesuits’ college, in the Lower Town, and everywhere. Three-quarters of a century ago did I say? No, it was yesterday! I remember how we fought. Frontenac was a great man as Montcalm is!”

“Peace, M. de Chatillard,” said Father Drouillard soothingly. “You speak of old, old times and old, old things!”

“They were the days of my youth,” said the old man, “and they are not old to me. It was a great siege, but the valor of France and Canada were not to be overcome. The armies and ships of the Bostonnais went back whence they came, and the new invasion of the Bostonnais will have no better fate.”

Willet was still silent. He saw that the old siege of Quebec was much more in M. de Chatillard’s mind than the present one, and if he could pass away in the odor of triumph the hunter would not willingly change it.

“Who is the youth who stands near you?” said M. de Chatillard, looking at Robert.

“He is Robert Lennox of the Province of New York,” replied Father Drouillard, speaking for Willet. “One of the Bostonnais, but a good youth.”

“One of the Bostonnais! Then I do not know him! I thought for a moment that I saw in him the look of someone else, but maybe I was mistaken. An old man cheats himself with fancies. Lad, come thou farther into the light, and let me see thee more clearly.”

The tone of command was strong in his voice, and Robert, obeying it, stepped close to the bed. The old man raised his head a little and looked at him long with hawk’s eyes. Robert felt that intent gaze cutting into him, but he did not move. Then the Seigneur Louis Henri Anatole de Chatillard laughed scornfully and said to Father Drouillard:

“Why do you deceive me, Father? Why do you tell me that is one, Robert Lennox, a youth of the Bostonnais, who stands before me, when my own eyes tell me that it is the Chevalier Raymond Louis de St. Luc, come as befits a soldier of France to say farewell to an old man before he dies.”

Robert felt an extraordinary thrill of emotion. M. de Chatillard, seeing with the eyes of the past, had taken him for the Chevalier. But why?

“It is not the Chevalier de St. Luc,” said Father Drouillard, gently. “It is the lad, Robert Lennox, from the Province of New York.”

“But it is St. Luc!” insisted the old man. “The face is the same, the eyes are the same! Should I not know? I have known the Chevalier, and his father and grandfather before him.”

The priest signed to Robert, and he withdrew into the shadow of the room. Then Father Drouillard whispered into M. de Chatillard’s ear, one of the servants gave him medicine from a glass, and presently he sank into quiet, seeming to be conscious no longer of the presence of the strangers. Willet, Robert, and the others withdrew softly. Robert was still influenced by strong emotions. Did he look like St. Luc? And why? What was the tie between them? The question that had agitated him so often stirred him anew.

“Very old men, when they come to their last hours, have many illusions,” said, Willet.

“It may be so,” said Robert, “but it was strange that he should take me for St. Luc.”

Willet was silent. Robert saw that as usual, the hunter did not wish to make any explanations, but he felt once more that the time for the solution to his problem was not far away. He could afford to wait.

“The Seigneur cannot live to know whether Quebec will fall,” said Tayoga.

“No,” said Willet, “and it’s just as well. His time runs out. His mind at the last will be filled with the old days when Frontenac held the town against the New Englanders.”

The rangers disposed well about the house, and they also watched the landing. Tandakora and his men might come in canoes, stealing along in the shadow of the high cliffs, or they might creep through the fields and forest. Zeb Crane, who could see in the dark like an owl and who had already proved his great qualities as a scout and ranger, watched at the river, and Willet with Robert and Tayoga was on the land side. But they learned there was another château landing less than a quarter of a mile lower down, and Tandakora, coming on the river, might use that, and yet make his immediate approach by land.

Willet stood by a grape arbor with Robert and the Onondaga and watched with eye and ear.

“Tandakora is sure to come,” said the hunter. “It’s just such a night as he loves. Little would he care whether he found English or French in the house; if not the English whom he expects, then the French, and dead men have nothing to say, nor dead women either. It may be, Tayoga, that you will have your chance tonight to settle your score with him.”

“I do not think so, Great Bear,” replied the Onondaga. “The night is so dark that I cannot see Tododaho on his star, but no whisper from him reaches me. I think that when the time comes for the Ojibway and me to see which shall continue to live, Tododaho or the spirits in the air will give warning.”

Robert shivered a little. Tayoga’s tone was cool and matter-of-fact, but his comrades knew that he was in deadly earnest. At the appointed time he and Tandakora would fight their quarrel out, fight it to the death. In the last analysis, Tayoga was an Indian, strong in Indian customs and beliefs.

“Tandakora will come about an hour before midnight,” said the Onondaga, “because it will be very dark then and there will yet be plenty of time for his work. He will expect to find everybody asleep, save perhaps an English sentinel whom he can easily tomahawk in the darkness. He does not know that the old Seigneur lies dying and that they watch by his bed.”

“In that case,” said the hunter with his absolute belief in all that Tayoga said, “we can settle ourselves for quite a wait.”

They relapsed into silence and Robert began to look at the light that shone from the bedroom of M. de Chatillard, the only light in the house now visible. He was an old, old man between ninety and a hundred, and Willett was right in saying that he might well pass on before the fate of Quebec was decided. Robert was sure that it was going to fall, and M. de Chatillard at the end of a long, long life would be spared a great blow. But what a life! What events had been crowded into his three generations of living? He could remember Le Grand Monarque, The Sun King, and the buildings of Versailles. He was approaching middle age when Blenheim was fought. He could remember mighty battles, great changes, and the opening of new worlds, and like Virgil’s hero, he had been a great part of them. That was a life to live, and, if Quebec were going to fall, it was well that M. de Chatillard with his more than ninety years should cease to live, before the sun of France set in North America. Yes, Willet was right.