“He professed it, monsieur.”

I shook my head.  “You are very bitter.  You need not be.  He was insane that night.  I have known the sight of Indian butchery to turn good men into whimpering animals.  He was not responsible.  I know that he is lavishing time and fortune and strength to find you now.”

I thought she winced.  “You know this, monsieur?”

It was my turn to look away.  “I know something of a man’s heart,” I answered deliberately.  “If I loved you, mademoiselle, and lost you—­lost you, and played the craven,—­I should find you.  The wilderness would not matter.  I should find you.  I should find you, and retrieve myself—­some way.  Lord Starling has wit and daring, else he would not be an exile, else you would not have promised to marry him.  Be assured that he is following you, and is probably not far behind.  Do you want him to find you, mademoiselle?”

I turned with the last word, and looked her full in the face.  It was a stupid trick, but it served.  I had her answer.

“There!” I cried, and I laughed a little jerkily.  “Never mind.  Don’t answer.  We have talked enough, mademoiselle.  We will be married at noon to-day.  Ah, you never loved him, else, no matter what he had done, you could never look as you look now.  Wherever he is, or whatever kind of man he may be, I do him no wrong in giving you my name to-day.”  I took the pictured birch bark from my pocket, and tore it in fine strips.  “A useless map,” I said in explanation.  “Mademoiselle, may I have your finger to measure?”

She gave me her hand, and I circled her finger with a grass blade, and warned her that the ring that I should give her would be almost as crude.  She was trying to keep herself from asking questions, and was going to succeed.  I liked that.  It was useless to terrify her with fables of prowling Indians, and profiles on bark.  And then, what was there to tell?  I knew at once too much and too little.  I took some bent gold wire from my pocket, and showed it to her.

“I am going to plait it into a braid for the ring,” I said.  “I think that I can file the ends, and make it serve.  It is all I have.  I wear no jewelry, and would not give you one of the brass rings we use in trade.  This is at least gold.”

She watched me straighten the kinks in the wire.  “You took that from something you valued,” she said.  “I will wear the brass ring.  Surely you can replace this wire where it belongs.”

I shook my head.  “It was a filigree frame,” I volunteered.

I had spoken with as little thought as a dog barks, and quite as witlessly.  I knew that as soon as I heard my words.  I looked at the woman.  But she was not going to question me.

“If it was a frame, it held a miniature,” she said quietly.  “Please twist the wire around it again.  I prefer the brass ring.”

“Because?”

“I would not rob any one.  If you have carried the picture all these leagues, it is a token from some one you love; some one who loves you.  I have no part in that.”