A Daughter of the Forest

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A DAUGHTER OF THE FOREST

by

EVELYN RAYMOND

Author of "A Yankee Girl" etc.

Illustrated by Ida Waugh

The Penn Publishing Company Philadelphia MCMII

Copyright 1902 by The Penn Publishing Company

Published August 15, 1902

A Daughter of the Forest

[Illustration: THE GIRL KNELT, INDIAN FASHION]

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I THE STORM 5

II SPIRIT OR MORTAL 15

III AN ESTRAY FROM CIVILIZATION 27

IV WHAT WAS IN THE NAME 40

V IN ALADDIN LAND 53

VI A ONE-SIDED STORY 67

VII A WOODLAND MENAGERIE 78

VIII KING MADOC 84

IX PERPLEXITIES 96

X DEPARTURE 109

XI A DISCLOSURE 120

XII CARRYING 134

XIII A DEAD WATER TRAGEDY 146

XIV SHOOTING THE RAPIDS 157

XV SCIENCE AND SUPERSTITION 172

XVI DIVERGING ROADS 188

XVII IN THE HOUR OF DARKNESS 201

XVIII THE LETTER 212

XIX A QUESTION OF APPAREL 226

XX COMING AND GOING 241

XXI IN THE GREAT RAILWAY STATION 259

XXII NUMBER 526 272

XXIII FATHER AND SON 283

XXIV A HIDDEN SAFE DEPOSIT 302

XXV THE MELODY AND MYSTERY OF LIFE 319

A Daughter of the Forest

CHAPTER I

THE STORM

"Margot! Margot!"

Mother Angelique's anxious call rang out over the water, once, twice, many times. But, though she shaded her brows with her hands and strained her keen ears to listen, there was no one visible and no response came back to her. So she climbed the hill again and, reëntering the cabin, began to stir with almost vicious energy the contents of a pot swinging in the wide fireplace. As she toiled she muttered and wagged her gray head with sage misgivings.

"For my soul! There is the ver' bad hoorican' a-comin', and the child so heedless. But the signs, the omens! This same day I did fall asleep at the knitting and waked a-smother. True, 'twas Meroude, the cat, crouched on my breast; yet what sent her save for a warning?"

Though even in her scolding the woman smiled, recalling how Margot had jeered at her superstition; and that when she had dropped her bit of looking-glass the girl had merrily congratulated her on the fact; since by so doing she had secured "two mirrors in which to behold such loveliness!"

"No, no, not so. Death lurks in a broken glass; or, at the best, must follow seven full years of bad luck and sorrow."

On which had come the instant reproof:

"Silly Angelique! When there is no such thing as luck but all is of the will of God."

The old nurse had frowned. The maid was too wise for her years. She talked too much with the master. It was not good for womenkind to listen to grave speech or plague their heads with graver books. Books, indeed, were for priests and doctors; and, maybe, now and then, for men who could not live without them, like Master Hugh. She, Angelique, had never read a book in all her life. She never meant to do so. She had not even learned a single letter printed in their foolish pages. Not she. Yet was not she a most excellent cook and seamstress? Was there any cabin in all that northland as tidy as that she ruled? Would matters have been the better had she bothered her poor brain with books? She knew her duty and she did it. What more could mortal?

This argument had been early in the day. A day on which the master had gone away to the mainland and the house-mistress had improved by giving the house an extra cleaning. To escape the soapsuds and the loneliness, Margot had, also, gone, alone and unquestioned; taking with her a luncheon of brown bread and cold fowl, her book and microscope. Angelique had watched the little canoe push off from shore, without regret, since now she could work unhindered at clearing the room of the "rubbishy specimen" which the others had brought in to mess the place.