“You have won,” I said, and I laughed a little,—­a mean, harsh laugh, my ears told me, not the laugh of a gentleman.  “Mademoiselle, you have won.  We start toward Montreal tomorrow.  Then marry—­whom you will.”

She looked into my eyes.  “Wait a moment;” she stopped.  “Monsieur, how much time have you spent in learning the Indian dialects and preparing for this expedition?”

“Two years.”

“And next year will indeed be too late?”

I shrugged my shoulders.  “We waste good hours,” I suggested.  “Mademoiselle, may I say ’good-night’?”

She stepped toward me.  “Monsieur, do not spoil your courtesy,” she begged.  “I asked you a question.”

I smiled at her.  “The answer has lost pith and meaning.  Yes, mademoiselle, next year will indeed be too late.”

She put her hands before her eyes.  “Then I will change my answer.  Monsieur, I will marry you when we reach Father Nouvel.”

But I would not reply.  I walked to the beach where there were dark and stars.  I ground my heel into the pebbles, and I did not hear her moccasined step behind me.  She had to touch my arm.

“I meant it, monsieur,” she whispered.

I raised her fingers, and laid them back against her side.  “Why tempt me?” I said rudely.  “Happily for you my word is a man’s word.  We start toward Montreal to-morrow.”

“Monsieur, I beg you.  Go west to-morrow.”

“No, mademoiselle.”

“Then—­then—­monsieur, I give you warning.  If we start toward Montreal to-morrow I shall escape you at the first opportunity, and try my fortune alone in the woods.”

“You threaten me?”

She stood in front of me.  “I would bring you to reason.  Yes, I threaten you, in that I shall do what I say.  Come, monsieur, I will follow you westward.  Your years of preparation, your great opportunity, shall not be wasted because of me.”

I took her hand.  “You are a strange woman.  A sage and a child; a woman and a warrior.  But I will not marry you, mademoiselle.”

“Why not, monsieur?”

“Because I will not hoodwink you.  So long as I took you blindly against your will, I felt no shame at going about my own ends.  But now that you have turned the tables on me and come without force, I cannot let you be a tool.  I would not take you without telling you my plans,—­and then you would not come.”

“I know your plans, monsieur.”

“You know that I hunt beaver.”

“I know that you hunt men.  Monsieur, are all the women of your nation puppets, that you should think me blind?  Listen.  You plan a coalition of the western tribes.  La Salle’s plan—­with changes.  You hope to make yourself a dictator, chief of a league of red men that shall control this western water-way.  Is not this so, monsieur?”

“I——­ Yes, mademoiselle.”

“You intend to form your league this summer and advance upon the Iroquois in the autumn before the ice locks the lakes.  You are in haste, for if you delay another twelvemonth you are convinced that the Iroquois will make a treaty with the Hurons at Michillimackinac, massacre your garrison there, cow the western tribes, and so wrest this country from the French.  Is not this so, monsieur?”