"
I took her by the shoulders. "You strange, double woman!" I cried,
with my voice unsteady. "You command me to do something, the while you
are trembling from head to foot for fear I will obey. Will you always
play the martyr to your spirit? Mary, I shall not lead the tribes."
"But your unfinished work!"
"What was worth doing has been done. This crisis is past. The west
will be safe from the Iroquois for some time. There is other work for
me. We will go to France. I have business there. Then I would show
the world my wife."
Yet she held me away a moment longer. "You can do this without regret?"
I folded her to me. "It is the only path I see before me," I answered
her.
And then, for the first time, she sobbed as she lay in my arms.
A little later we stood together in the tent door. The sunset was lost
in the woods behind and the shadows were long and cool. The camp was
gay. All memory of death and conquest was put aside, and the men were
living in the moment. French and Indians were feasting, and there were
song and talk and the movement of lithe bodies, gayly clad. The water
babbled strange songs upon the shore, and the forest was full of quiet
and mystery.
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