Page:GB Lancaster--law-bringer.djvu/420

418 in the morning. I wish we had some to spare at the Mission. But if there are any in Fort Vermilion be assured that you shall have them if possible."

Dick watched him go, idly wondering what power could bring such a man to waste himself among the breeds and Indians of this Canadian outpost. Religion seemed to him such a weak answer. For Dick looked on religion still as many men look on it, as a refuge when life has little left to offer. And Père Melisand's eyes told that such a reason was untrue here.

"But it may occasionally be a refuge when life has too much to offer," he told himself, and throughout the simple dinner he watched Père Melisand in that interpretation.

The man could talk. He showed deep and wise interest in many things, and more than once his eyes lit to a fire that accorded ill with the meek tonsure. He did not smoke; but he gave Dick a good cigar, and he brought out a bottle of wine which gave a rakish air of conviviality to the evening which appealed to Dick's humour. It was over the walnuts which Père Melisand cracked with an old-fashioned silver crackers that Dick broached the business which had brought him to Vermilion through the wet dangerous drifts where the early Chinooks blew warm, and Père Melisand leaned back, caressing his chin.

"Ah, that I cannot tell you," he said. "Soeur Narcisse and Soeur Madeleine came in while I was at Battle River. There was no girl answering to your description in Vermilion when I came back. She must have gone further."

"Then might I be allowed the honour of a few minutes' conversation with one of the ladies you mention?"

"Assuredly." Père Melisand's fine lips drew into a smile. "And why not?"

"If you have no reason I shall certainly not supply one," Dick smiled back. "It is very necessary for me to find her," he explained. "I'm a wanderer until I do."

"May I ask what she is wanted for?"

"Murder in the first degree. And—as an anti-climax—perjury."

"Ah!" Père Melisand shuddered. "Poor thing. And yours is a hard life, my friend, when it sends you out on such errands."