Badinage flew fast after that.  Ambrose observed that Nesis herself never addressed him, but circulated slyly from one to another, making a cup of her hand at each ear.

Becoming emboldened, they gradually drew closer to the window.  They made outrageous faces.  Still the poker-players affected not to be aware of them.  As men and hunters they disdained to notice such foolishness.

Suddenly Nesis, as if to prove her superior boldness, darted forward to the very window.  Ambrose, startled by the unexpected move, fell back a step.  Nesis put her hands on the sill and shrieked an unintelligible jibe into the room.

The other girls hugged themselves with horrified delight.  This was too much for the jailers.  They sprang up and with threatening voice and gestures drove the girls away.  They scampered down-hill, shrieking with affected terror.

When Nesis placed her hands on the sill a thin package slipped out of her sleeve and thudded upon the floor.  Ambrose’s heart jumped.

As the girls ran away, under cover of leaning out and calling after them, he pushed her gift under the table with his foot.  One of the jailers, coming to the window and glancing about the room, found him unconcernedly lighting his pipe.

When the poker game was resumed Ambrose retired with his prize to the farthest corner of the shack.  It proved to be the knife he had asked for, a keen, strong blade.

She had wrapped it in a piece of moose hide to keep it from clattering on the floor.  Ambrose’s heart warmed toward her anew.  “She’s as plucky and clever as she is friendly,” he thought.  He stuffed the knife in his bed and resigned himself as best he could to wait for darkness.

Fortunately for his store of patience, the days were rapidly growing shorter.  His supper was brought him at six, and when he had finished eating it was dark enough to begin work.

Outside the moon’s first quarter was filling the bowl of the hills with a delicate radiance, but moonlight outside only made the interior of the shack darker to one looking in.

Ambrose squatted in the corner at the foot of his bed, and set to work as quietly as a mouse in the pantry.

He had finished his hole in the flooring and was commencing to dig in the earth, when a soft scratching on the wall gave notice of Nesis’s presence outside.

“Angleysman, you there?” she whispered through the chink.

“Here!” said Ambrose.

“The boat is ready,” she said.  “I got grub and blanket and gun.”

“Ah, fine!” whispered Ambrose.

“You almost out?” she asked.

He explained his situation.

“I dig this side, too,” she said.  “We dig together.  Mak’ no noise!”

Since the shack was innocent of foundation it was no great matter to dig under the wall.  With knife and hands Ambrose worked on his side until he had got deep enough to dig under.