The Englishman had felt the revulsion, and he showed no resentment of my heat.  He heaved himself up in the hot, horrible sunshine and rubbed his hands as if washing them free.

“We are curs,” he said quietly.

I could not say nay.  “We must eat,” I cautioned; “we must eat, and keep ourselves sane.  If we can get through this day without murder or worse, we shall have work to do from now on that will serve to keep our heads clear.  Pierre will be coming soon now.”

Starling was regarding me keenly.  “You lose your temper, and therefore you should be easy to read,” he said reflectively.  “But you are not.  You evidently married my cousin for convenience.  I can understand the situation.  But you stand by your bargain well.  You have the honor of your name somewhat sensitively at heart.  But if you had not married her——­ If there were no compulsion, no outside reason—­tell me, would you marry her now?”

But that I left unanswered.

CHAPTER XXI

THE PIVOT

Pierre came at five o’clock.  He was keen for the approaching supper hour and came jovially.

I was sick with haste, and deep sunk in my own grief, so I was cruel and a fool; I plumped the facts at him without a softening word.  And so I frustrated my own ends.  The great, slow creature cowered and grew dumb under my story.  Then he went, great-eyed and hanging-lipped, from cabin to cabin.  I had locked up his springs of word and thought.

But one thing my sword and my words prodded out of him.  He had come by the portage path from the east, and had seen no marks of passage that were less than a week old.  Our star led west.

I baled what provision and ammunition we needed, loaded the canoes, and cached the furs and the balance of the stores at the edge of the forest.  At six o’clock we were afloat.  I led the way, and Pierre followed with the Englishman.  This gave me space to think in silence.

The sun sank red and clear, and we paddled from a colored dusk to a clear starlight.  I knew this dimly, as the lost in the inferno know the barred joys above them.  Unless we found Pemaou within the next few hours I should never be one with the loveliness of nature again.

I held my way due west to the Malhominis.  I could secure their cooperation, if nothing more.  Pierre followed at a canoe length, and we traveled unbrokenly.  It was an hour short of midnight when we saw the west shore.  I could take no bearings in the dim light, so we nosed along, uncertain whether to go north or south to find the mouth of the Wild Rice River where the Malhominis had their home.  We held a short colloquy and started northward.  Suddenly Pierre shot his canoe beside my own.

“A camp!” he breathed in a giant whisper.

I suspended my paddle.  On the shore to the north of us were lights.  It could not be the Malhominis, for they lived inland; it was not Pemaou, for the camp was many times larger than his would be.  It was probably a hunting party.  All the western tribes were friendly; more, they were my allies.  I saw no necessity for caution.  I raised a long halloo, and our canoes raced toward the lights.