Musq'oosis shrugged.

"Maybe before I love him," she went on pa.s.sionately. "I want be friends. I want help him because he poor. Always I am think how can I help him, not mak' him mad. I buy horses for him. I come here so I feed him good and mak' him strong. W'at he do for me? He shame me!

Twice he shame me before all the people! He throw me away lik' dirt.

Now, all my good feeling is turn bad inside. I hate him!"

Tears poured down her cheeks, and sobs choked her utterance. Fearful that he might misunderstand these evidences, she cried: "I not cry for sorry. I cry for hate!"

Again Musq'oosis waited patiently until she was in a state to hear him.

"Sam gone to Spirit River," he said calmly.

"I don' care!" cried Bela. "He can't go too far from me!"

"Maybe he sorry now," suggested the old man.

"Not sorry him!" cried Bela. "He not care for n.o.body. Got hard heart!"

"If you let me tak' team I lak go see him."

Bela stared at him full of excitement at the idea, but suspicious.

"W'at you want see him for?"

"Maybe I bring him back."

"Don' you tell him I want him back," she said. "I hate him!"

"Can I tak' horses?"

"Yes," she cried suddenly. "Go tell Sam I crazy 'bout Mahooley. Tell him I gone wit' Mahooley. He rich. Give me ev'ryt'ing I want."

"I not tell Sam that kind of stuff," returned Musq'oosis scornfully.

"It is truth," she insisted sullenly. "I goin' all right."

"If Sam come back sorry you feel bad you gone wit' Mahooley."

"No, I glad!" she cried pa.s.sionately. "I hope he want me when it is too late. I want turn him down. That mak' me feel good."

Musq'oosis debated with himself. It was a difficult case to deal with.

"Tak' the team," said Bela. "Tell Sam all I say."

The old man shook his head. "W'at's the use if you goin' wit'

Mahooley, anyway? You wait a while. Maybe I bring him back. Mak' say him sorry."

Bela hesitated. Angry speech failed her, and her eyes became dreamy.

In spite of herself, she was ravished by the picture of Sam at her feet, begging for forgiveness.

"Well, maybe I wait," she said.

Musq'oosis followed up his advantage. "No," he said firmly. "Not lak travel in wagon, me. Mak' my bones moch sore. I am old. I not go wit'out you promise wait."

"Not wait all tam," declared Bela.

"Six days," suggested Musq'oosis.

She hesitated, fighting her pride.

"If you go wit' Mahooley, Sam get a white wife," went on Musq'oosis carelessly. "Maybe him send letter to chicadee woman to come back."

"All right," said Bela with an air of indifference, "I promise wait six days. I don' want go wit' Mahooley before that, anyhow."

They shook hands on it.

CHAPTER XXIV

ON THE SPIRIT RIVER

The sun looked over the hills and laid a commanding finger on Sam's eyelids. He awoke, and arose from under the little windbreak he had made of poplar branches.

Before him rolled a n.o.ble green river with a spruce-clad island in the middle, stemming the current with sharp prow like a battleship. On the other side rose the hills, high and wooded. More hills filled the picture behind him on this side, sweeping up in fantastic gra.s.s-covered knolls and terraces.

The whole valley up and down, bathed in the light of early morning, presented as fair a scene as mortal eyes might hope to behold.

Sam regarded it dully. He looked around him at the natural meadow sloping gently up from the river-bank to the gra.s.sy hills behind, a rich field ready to the farmer's hand and crying for tilth, and he said to himself, "This is my land," but there was no answering thrill.

Life was poisoned at its source.

He had walked for three days borne up by his anger. His sole idea was to put as much distance as possible between him and his fellow-men. He chose to trail to Spirit River, because that was the farthest place he knew of.

Each day he walked until his legs refused to bear him any longer, then lay down where he was in his blankets and slept. The day-long, dogged exercise of his body and the utter weariness it induced drugged his pain.

His gun kept him supplied with grouse and prairie chicken, and he found wild strawberries in the open places and mooseberries in the bush.

Bread he went without until he had the luck to bring down a moose.

Returning to an Indian encampment he had pa.s.sed through, he traded the carca.s.s for a little bag of flour and a tin of baking-powder.

His sufferings were chiefly from thirst, for he was crossing a plateau, and he did not know the location of the springs.

Excepting this party of Indians, he met no soul upon the way. For the most part the rough wagon trail led him through a forest of lofty, slender aspen-trees, with snowy shafts and twinkling, green crowns.

There were glades and meadows, carpeted with rich gra.s.s patterned with flowers, and sometimes the road bordered a spongy, dry muskeg.

All the country was flat, and Sam received the impression that he was journeying on the floor of the world. Consequently, when he came without warning to the edge of a gigantic trough, and saw the river flowing a thousand feet below, the effect was stunning.