A Cry in the WildernessWaller, Mary E. (Mary Ella)
General
A Cry in the Wilderness
Waller, Mary E. (Mary Ella)
New York (N.Y.) -- Fiction; Québec (Province) -- Fiction
With the dip of the paddles I heard, as an undertone, old André's
little song he used to sing to us in camp, the little French song that
Jamie incorporated in his "André's Odyssey":
"I am going over there, over there,
To search for the City of God.
If I find over there, over there,
What I seek--oh afar, oh afar!--
I will sing, when I'm home from afar,
Of the wonders and glory of God."
XXIX
Never, never so long as memory lasts, can I forget the separate stages
of that return journey. On the first day we had dull overcast skies
that threatened rain; the chill wind roughened the lakes and river, and
made dismal crossings of the portages at one of which we bade goodby to
André's son. We arrived the next afternoon at Roberval in a veritable
deluge, the rain having set in while we were crossing Lake St. John.
We left by train that evening for Chicoutimi. I remember our late
arrival there, the rain still falling in torrents, and, at last, our
fleeing the next morning for shelter to the great Saguenay steamer.
On that third day we made the voyage down the Saguenay. It seemed to
me as if I were embarking on some Stygian flood, for we looked into a
rain-swept impenetrable perspective. The dark waters were beaten into
quiescence, except for the current, by the weight of falling raindrops.
That was all we saw at first. Despite the Doctor's assumed
cheerfulness and his brave attempts to cheer us, we felt depressed. At
last came the cessation of rain; the heavy clouds rolled upwards; the
perspective cleared and showed the mighty river narrowed to a gorge
with the dark outposts of Capes East and West looming vast, desolate,
repellent before us.
And always there continued that darkness around, above, beneath us,
till, farther down, we swept into the deeper shadow of Capes Trinity
and Eternity. In passing them, the pall of some impending calamity
fell upon my spirit. I could not emerge from it, try as I might.
Was anything about to happen to the man I loved, to him who was waiting
there in the wilderness to entertain Death as his next guest? Should
we four friends, who were making this journey, ever be together in the
future?
The Doctor kept a watchful eye on me. When the steamer drew to the
landing at Tadoussac, I saw him and Jamie remove their hats and stand
so, bareheaded, till the boat moved away. Mrs. Macleod and I, watching
them, said to each other that they were thinking of André and his
voyage of seventeen years ago, when he set out from Tadoussac to see
the "New Jerusalem" by that far western lake.
We were glad to take the Montreal express at Quebec which we saw under
lowering skies and in a bitter northeast wind. Jamie had telegraphed
to Cale from Roberval; he and little Pete were at the junction to meet
us. His joy at our return was unmistakable, but his welcome was unique.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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