When Maren awoke the sun was straight overhead and some one had been calling from a distance for a very long time.

“Come, come, asthore!  Opin yer eyes!  That’s it!  A little more, now.  Wake up, for love av Heaven, or we’ll all be overtaken be th’ Injuns!”

Ah!  Indians!  At that she opened her eyes and looked into the pretty blue ones she remembered last.

The little woman was kneeling beside her with an arm about her shoulder, trying to lift her heavy head and falling short in the endeavour.

Maren was too much in her muscled height for the bird-like creature.  She sat up at once and looked around.  The canoes were in the water, all the miscellaneous luggage had been put aboard, and every one was ready for a new start.  Only herself, the blanket bed, and the little woman were unready.

Just below, her own canoe, with Brilliers, Wilson, Frith, McDonald, and Alloybeau in place, waited her presence.  She could see, from the elevation of the shore, the stretched form of McElroy in the bottom, a bright blanket beneath him and his fair head pillowed on a roll of leaves.  A shelter of boughs hid his face, and for one moment her heart stopped while the river and the woods, the people and the boats whirled together in a senseless blur.

She sprang to her feet.

“Is he—­” she faltered thickly, “is he—­”

“No, no, dearie!  He is like he was, only they have fixed him a bit av a shelther from th’ sun.  Do ye dhrink this now,” she coaxed in her pretty voice; “dhrink it, asthore,—­ye’ll nade it f’r th’ thrip.”

She held up a bowl of broth, steaming and sweet as the flesh-pots of Egypt, and Maren took it from her.

“But—­did M’sieu—­Oh, I have slept when I should have tended him!”

“Ye poor girl.  Dhrink,—­he has been fed like a babe be me own hands.  There!”

There were tears in the little woman’s eyes, and Maren took the bowl and drained it clear.

“You are good, Madame,” she said, with a long breath.  “Merci!  How good to those in need!  But now am I right as a trivet and shamed that I must fail at the last.  Are you ready?”

She picked up the blankets, smiled at the tall man who came for them, and walked with them down to the canoes.

“In th’ big boat, lass, wid th’ women,” said the leader; “’tis more roomy-like.”

“I thank you, M’sieu, but I have my place.  I cannot leave it.”  And she stepped in her own canoe.

“Did ye iver behold such a shmile, Terence?” cried the little woman, when the flotilla had strung into shape and the green summer shores were slipping past. “‘Tis like the look av th’ Virgin in th’ little Chapel av St. Joseph beyant Belknap’s skirts,—­so sad and yet as fair as light!”

And so began with the slipping green shores, the airy summer sky laced with its vanity of fleecy clouds, the backward journey to safety and De Seviere.

The large party travelled at forced time, short camps and long pulls, for, as the little woman told Maren at the next stop, they were hurrying south to Quebec.