Before he had spoken the lad ran toward him, holding out something in his hand.  The question on Philip’s lips changed to an exclamation of joy when he recognized the handkerchief which he had dropped upon the rock a few nights before, or one so near like it that he could not have told them apart.  It was tied into a knot, and he felt the crumpling of paper under the pressure of his fingers.  He almost tore the bit of lace and linen in his eagerness to rescue the paper, which a moment later he held in his fingers.  Three short lines, written in a fine, old-fashioned hand, were all that it held for him.  But they were sufficient to set his heart, beating wildly.

Will Monsieur come to the top of the rock to-night, some time between the hours of nine and ten.

There was no signature to the note, but Philip knew that only Jeanne could have written it, for the letters were almost of miscroscopic smallness, as delicate as the bit of lace in which they had been delivered, and of a quaintness of style which added still more to the bewildering mystery which already surrounded these people.  He read the lines half a dozen times, and then turned to find that the Indian boy was slipping sway through the rocks.

“Here—­you,” he commanded, in English.  “Come back!”

The boy’s white teeth gleamed in a laugh as he waved his hand and leaped farther away.  From Philip his eyes shifted in a quick, searching glance to the top of the cliff.  In a flash Philip followed its direction.  He understood the meaning of the look.  From the cliff Jeanne and Pierre had seen his approach, and their meeting with the Indian boy had made it possible for them to intercept him in this manner.  They were probably looking down upon him now, and in the gladness of the moment Philip laughed up at the bare rocks and waved his cap above his head as a signal of his acceptance of the strange invitation he had received.

Vaguely he wondered why they had set the meeting for that night, when in three or four minutes he could have joined them up there in broad day.  But the central tangle of the mystery that had grown up about him during the past few days was too perplexing to embroider with such a minor detail as this, and he turned back toward Churchill with the feeling that everything was working in his favor.  During the next few hours he would clear up the tangle, and in addition to that he would meet Jeanne and Pierre.  It was the thought of Jeanne, and not of the surprises which he was about to explain, that stirred his blood as he hurried back to the Fort.

It was his intention to return to Eileen and her father.  But he changed this.  He would first hunt up Gregson and begin his work there.  He knew that the artist would be expecting him, and he went directly to the cabin, escaping notice by following along the fringe of the forest.

Gregson was pacing back and forth across the cabin floor when Philip arrived.  His steps were quick and excited.  His hands were thrust deep in his trousers pockets.  The butts of innumerable half-smoked cigarettes lay scattered under his feet.  He ceased his restless movement upon his companion’s interruption, and for a moment or two gazed at Philip in blank silence.