But Steve missed these things. He was amazed. He was wondering--searching.

"White girl? Keeko?" he exclaimed sharply. "What crazy story--Tell me!"

he commanded. "Tell me quick!"

He flung aside his cap, and the furs which encased his st.u.r.dy body. Then he caught up a bench, and set it beside the stove. He sat down, and held out his strong hands to the warmth with that habit which belongs to the North.

An-ina remained standing. It was her way to stand before him. She would tell her story thus. Was she not in the presence of the man whose smile was her greatest joy on earth?

CHAPTER XVIII

THE VIGIL

Marcel flung the fuel upon the fire, and gravely watched the flames lick about the fresh-hewn timber, and the pillar of smoke rolling heavily upwards on the breath of an almost imperceptible breeze.

It was cold--beyond the reach of the great fire--bitterly cold. For all April was near its close the signs of thaw had again given way to an Arctic temperature. It was only another example of the freakishness of the Northland seasons. His journey had been accomplished at a speed that was an expression of his desire. He had taken risks, he had dared chances amidst the rotting, melting snows, only to find at the river, where the old moose head stood guard, that Nature's opening channels had sealed again under a breath that carried with it a return to the depth of winter.

He had not been unprepared. He knew the Northland moods all too well.

Besides, his practised eyes had sought in vain the real signs of the pa.s.sing of winter. The migratory creatures of the feathered world had given no sign. The geese and ducks were still waiting in the shelter of warmer climates. Those wonderful flights, moving like clouds across the sky, had put in no appearance, while the furry world still hugged the shelter and spa.r.s.e feeding grounds of the aged woods.

His disappointment was none the less at the sight of the solid, ice-bound river, lying in the depths of the earth's foundations. It was impossible as yet for the girl with the smiling blue eyes, who had given him that message of her love at the moment of her going, to approach the tryst, and he was left with the negative consolation that when she arrived she would find him awaiting her.

His purpose, however, was simple. He was at the appointed spot, and he intended to remain there until Keeko came to him. It was a matter of no significance at all if he had to wait till the summer came and pa.s.sed, or if he must set out to search the ends of the earth for her. His persistent, dogged mood was an expression of the pa.s.sionate youth in him. He loved as only early youth knows how to love, and nothing else mattered. He was there alone with Nature in her wildest mood, a fit setting for the primal pa.s.sions sweeping through his soul.

So, in the time of waiting, he had lit a great fire. It was a beacon fire. And in his simple fancy it was sending out a message which the voiceless old moose was powerless to convey. It was a message carrying with it the story of the love burning deep in his heart. And he hoped that distant, searching eyes might see and interpret his signs. The thought of it all pleased him mightily.

For ten days he had carried on his giant's work of feeding the insatiable thing he had created. He laboured throughout the daylight hours. At night he sat about, where his dogs were secured, gazing deep into its ruddy heart, dreaming his dreams till bodily weariness overcame him, and he sank into slumbers that yielded him still more precious visions.

It was all so simple. It was all so real and human. The cares of life left Marcel untouched. The bitter conditions of the outlands pa.s.sed him by without one thought to mar his enjoyment of being. Life was a perfect thing that held no shadows, and for him it was lit by the sunshine of eyes the thought of which sent the hot blood surging through his veins till the madness of his longing found him yearning to embrace the whole wide world in his powerful arms.

It was with all these undimmed feelings stirring that he took up his customary position before his great signal fire at the close of a laborious day. He had eaten. He had fed his vicious trail dogs and left them for the night. His blankets and his sleeping-bag lay spread out ready to receive him. And the old, sightless moose gazed out in its silent, never-ceasing vigil.

Night shut down with a stillness that must have been maddening to a less preoccupied mind. The perfect night sky shone coldly with the burnish of its million stars. The blazing northern lights plodded their ghostly measure with the sedateness of the ages through which they had endured, while the youth sat on unstirring, smoking his pipe of perfect peace.

They were moments such as Marcel would never know again. For all the waiting his happiness was well-nigh perfect.

His pipe went out. It was re-lit in the contemplative fashion of habit.

A whimper from the slumbering dogs left him indifferent. Only when the flames of his fire grew less did he bestir himself. A great replenishment and his final task was completed.

Again he returned to his seat. But it was not for long. Tired nature was making herself felt. She was claiming him in the drooping eyelids, in the nodding head. And her final demand came in the fall of his pipe from the grip of his powerful jaws. He pa.s.sed across to his blankets.

A thunderous crash from the depths below and Marcel was wide awake again. He was sitting up in the shelter of his fur bag with eyes alight with question. He was alert, with the ready wakefulness which is the habit of the trail. That crash! It was----

But he quickly returned to his rest. It was the splitting of the solid bed of ice into which the river that came up out of the south had been transformed.

But somehow he did not readily sleep again. He was weary enough. His mind was at rest. But sleep--sleep was reluctant, and the old thread of his waking dreams came again as he gazed across at the beacon fire.

Hours pa.s.sed. He had no idea of time. He had no care. He lay there watching the dancing firelight, building for the hundredth time those priceless castles of the night which the daylight loves to shatter.

Never were they more resplendent. Never was their lure more irresistible.

But a drowsy fancy began to distort them. He had no knowledge of it. He never realized the change. He pa.s.sed to the realms of sleep like a tired child, striving to follow the course of the flying sparks from the fire till his final memory was of a hundred pairs of blazing eyes peering at him out of the darkness.

He awoke with the grey of dawn. And as his eyes opened he heard a voice, a gentle, low voice in which rang a world of gladness and tender feeling.

"Why I just knew no one but Marcel could have lit that fire."

"Keeko!"

Every joyous emotion was thrilling in the man's exclamation. He leapt from his blankets, and stood staring, in utter and complete amazement, at the vision of the girl's smiling beauty.

Neither knew how it came about. It simply happened. Neither questioned, or had thought to question. The long months of parting had completed that which the summer had brought about. It was the spontaneous confession of all that which had lain deep in the heart of each.

It was the girl who sought release from those caressing moments. Her arms reaching up, clasped about the boy's muscular shoulders, parted, and her warm woman's body stirred under the crushing embrace holding her. Her lips were withdrawn from his, and, gazing up into the pa.s.sionate eyes above her, she spoke the desperate fears of her woman's heart which had been submerged in the pa.s.sion of the moment.

"But there's no time to lose!" she cried urgently. "Oh, Marcel, I came because I just didn't dare to wait. It's you--you and those you love.

They mean to murder you. You--and those others. And so I came to bring you warning."

The ardent light in the man's eyes changed. But the change seemed slow, as though with difficulty only he was able to return to the things which lay outside their love. But with the change came a look of incredulous amazement that was almost derision.

"Murder?"

He echoed the word blankly. Then he laughed. It was the laugh of reckless confidence engendered of the wild happiness of holding the girl of his dreams in his arms, and feeling the soft, warm pressure of her lips upon his.

For all Keeko's urgency Marcel refused to be robbed of his joy at their reunion. His embrace relaxed in response to her movement, but he took possession of her hands. Deliberately he moved towards the fallen tree-trunk where the lichen-covered cache of their token lay. He sat himself down, and drew her down beside him.

"Tell me," he said smilingly. "Tell it me all. You came to hand me warning. They guess they're going to murder me, and Uncle Steve, and An-ina. Tell me how you came, and all that happened. And the things that happened to you, I reckon, interest me a heap more than this talk of murder."

The easy a.s.surance of Marcel's manner sobered the girl's alarm. She yielded herself at his bidding, and sat beside him with her clasped hand resting in one of his.

Just for a moment she turned wistful eyes upon the ice of the river below them, and her gaze wandered on southwards.

"Oh, it's a bad story," she cried. "I guess it's as bad as I ever feared--worse. Maybe I best tell it you all. But, oh, Marcel, just don't figger it's nothing. I know you. There's nothing I can say to scare you.

We've just got to get right away to your home, and hand the warning, and pa.s.s them our help."

The girl's appeal had a different effect from that she hoped. The man's eyes lit afresh. He drew a sharp breath. His arm tightened about her body, and the hand clasping hers crushed them with unconscious force.

"You'll come right back with me to our home?" he cried in a thrilling tone. "You?" Then in a moment the great joy of it all broke forth. "Say, I could just thank G.o.d for these--murderers."

But the woman in Keeko left her unsharing in his mood. She turned. And her eyes were startled.

"You could--! Say," she cried with a sudden vehemence in sharp contrast to her appealing manner. "Do you think I made trail from Fort Duggan for a fancy, after months of winter to Seal Bay and back, on the day I'd just made home? Do you think I wouldn't have waited for the river? Do you think I'd have done this if it wasn't all--real? Oh, man, man," she cried in protest, "I'm no fool girl to see things that just aren't. I guess David Nicol has located your post, and he's right on his way there now--for murder. There's----"

"On his way there now?" Marcel broke in sharply, fiercely. "How? How d'you mean? He's located--Who's--this David Nicol? G.o.d! An-ina alone!