Nesis, still leading Ambrose, pattered ahead as if every twig in the bush was familiar to her. She did not strike down to the river until they had gone a good way around the side of the hill.

This brought them to the water's edge at a point a third of a mile or more below the teepees. Ambrose distinguished a bark canoe drawn up beneath the willows. In it lay the outfit she had provided.

He put it in the water, and Job hopped into his accustomed place in the bow.

"You love that dog ver' moch," Nesis murmured jealously.

"He's all I've got," said Ambrose.

Her hand swiftly sought his.

"Tell me how I should go," said Ambrose hastily, fearing a demonstration.

Nesis drew a long sigh. "I tell you," she said sadly. "They say it is four sleeps to the big falls. Two sleeps by quiet water. Many bad rapids after that. You mus' land by every rapid to look. They say the falls mak' no noise before they catch you. Ah! tak' care!"

"I know rivers," said Ambrose.

"They say under the water is a cave with white bones pile up!" she faltered. "They say my fat'er is there. I 'fraid for you to go!"

"I'll be careful," he said lightly. "Don't you worry!"

"At the falls," she went on sadly, "you mus' land on the side away from the sun, and carry your canoe on your back. There is pretty good trail. Three miles. After that one more sleep to the big lake. A Company fort is there."

Like an honest man he dreaded the mere formulas of thanks at such a moment, but neither could an honest man forego them. "How can I ever repay you!" he mumbled.

She clapped a warm hand over his mouth.

As he was about to step in the canoe Ambrose saw a bundle lying on the ground to one side that he had not remarked before. "What is that?" he asked.

"Nothing for you," she said quickly.

The evasive note made him insist upon knowing.

For a long time she would not tell, thus increasing his determination to find out. Finally she said very low: "I jus' foolish. I think maybe--maybe you want tak' me too!"

Ambrose's heart was wrung. His arm went around her with a right good will. "You poor baby!" he murmured. "I can't!"

She struggled to release herself. "All right," she said stiffly. "I not think you tak' me. Only maybe."

"By G.o.d!" swore Ambrose. "If I live through my troubles I'll find a way of getting you out of yours!"

"Ah, come back!" she murmured, clinging to his arm.

"Good-by," he said.

"Wait!" she said, clinging to him. She lifted her face. "Kiss me once, lak' white people kiss!"

He kissed her fairly.

"Goo'-by," she whispered. "I always be think of you. Goo'-by, Angleysman!"

CHAPTER x.x.x.

FREE!

Ambrose put off with a heart big with compa.s.sion for the piteous little figure he was leaving behind him. His impotence to aid her poisoned the joy of his escape.

The worst of it was that it was impossible for him to return the feeling she had for him--even though Colina were lost to him forever.

Her unlucky pa.s.sion almost forbade him to be the one to aid her.

Yet he had profited by that pa.s.sion to make his escape. He must find some way.

As he drove his paddle into the breast of the dark river, and put one point of willows after another between him and danger, it must be confessed that his spirits rose steadily.

Never had his nostrils tasted anything sweeter than the smell of warm river water on the chill air, nor his eyes beheld a friendlier sight than the cheery stars. The one who fares forth does not repine.

After all he had only known Nesis for two days; she was fine and plucky--but he could not love her, and that was all there was to it.

He had matters nearer his heart than the sad fate of an Indian maiden.

Master of his actions once more it was time for him to consider what to do to get out of the coil he was in. Nesis pa.s.sed into the back of his mind.

No desire for sleep hampered him. He had had enough of sleeping the past two weeks. His arms had ached for this exercise. There was a fair current, and the willows moved by at a respectable rate.

He estimated that he could put forty miles between him and the Kakisa village by morning. The pleasant taste of freedom was heightened by the spice of heading into the unknown, and by night.

Night returns a rare sympathy to those who cultivate her. Ambrose, so far as he knew, was the first white man ever to travel this way. This river had no voice. The night was so still one could almost fancy one heard the stars.

Sometimes the looming shapes of islands confused him as to his course, but if he held his paddle the canoe would of itself choose the main current.

He had no apprehension as to what each bend in the stream would reveal, for with the experienced riverman's intuition he looked for a change in the character of the sh.o.r.es to warn him of any interruption of the current's smooth flow.

"Like old times, old fel'!" he said to his dumb partner.

Job's tail thumped on the gunwale. Ambrose contended that at night Job purposely turned stern formost to the most convenient hard object that his signals might be audible.

"To-night is ours anyway, old fel'," said Ambrose. "Let's enjoy it while we can. The worst is yet to come!"

It was many a day since Job had heard this jocular note in his master's voice. He wriggled a little and whined in his eagerness to reach him.

Job knew better than to attempt to move much in the bark canoe.

In due course the miracle of dawn was enacted on the river. The world stole out of the dark like a woman wan with watching. First the line of tree-tops on either bank became blackly silhouetted against the graying sky, then little by little the ma.s.ses of trees and bushes resolved into individuals.

Perspective came into being, afterward atmosphere, and finally color.

The scene was as cool and delicate as that presented to a diver on the floor of the sea. As the light increased it was as if he mounted into shallower water toward the sun.

The first distinctive note of color was the astonishing green of the goosegra.s.s springing in the mud left by the falling water; then the current itself became a rich, brown with creamy flakes of foam sailing down like little vessels. While Ambrose looked, the world blossomed from a pale nun into a ruddy matron.