" The old man arose. His feeble fingers still
clasped his black book; his soft white hair clung about his forehead
like that of an Apostle; his eyes lost their peering, crafty
expression; his bent shoulders resumed the dignity of a minister
of the living God; he was the picture of what the trader called
him--"St. Paul."
"Good-night, son," he said.
"Good-night, uncle, and thank you for bringing me to myself."
They were the last words I ever heard uttered by either that old
arch-fiend or his weak, miserable kinsman. Father Paul turned and
left the room. I watched his withered hand--the hand I had so often
felt resting on my head in holy benedictions--clasp the door-knob,
turn it slowly, then, with bowed head and his pale face wrapped in
thought, he left the room--left it with the mad venom of my hate
pursuing him like the very Evil One he taught me of.
What were his years of kindness and care now? What did I care for
his God, his heaven, his hell? He had robbed me of my native faith,
of my parents, of my people, of this last, this life of love that
would have made a great, good woman of me. God! how I hated him!
I crept to the closet in my dark little room. I felt for the bundle
I had not looked at for years--yes, it was there, the buckskin dress
I had worn as a little child when they brought me to the mission.
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