"I want to take it to Captain McTavish, but I want you to write something on it first. You will pardon me if I ask if that was not a letter of farewell?"

"It was."

"Have you a pencil with you?"

"Not here, but there is one in the cabin, among my father's journals.

Shall I get it?" Then she bit her lip with vexation. Instead of dominating this interview, as she had intended, she was submitting herself to the plans of the half-breed.

"I must ask for the letter while you are gone."

After a moment's thought Jean handed it to him, with a promise to return without warning the men at the edge of the woods. A certain curiosity to see this mysterious happening to its conclusion stirred within her. Now that Donald had escaped the shadow of death that had been hovering over him, her spirits rose buoyantly, and she was anxious to further anything that concerned him. She returned presently with the pencil, and asked Seguis what he wished her to do.

"Write him a note of farewell," came the stolid command. "It will be the last message he will ever receive from you."

Instantly her color fled; fear filled her eyes.

"What do you mean? You're not going to kill him?" she burst out.

"No. He is going to leave the country forever."

"Did he tell you so?" she asked.

"No. But I want you to tell him so, in your own handwriting. It is the only thing that will save him. He'll obey you. I'll see that he gets a safe-conduct to the edge of the district. If you don't do this, I can't answer for what'll happen to him."

"Then you will kill him!" she flashed. "I knew it. Look here, Seguis! What's your object in this? You have a motive, and I demand to know what it is."

For an instant, the pa.s.sion of the man leaped to his lips, and trembled there in hot words. But he crushed it down resolutely. He was too wise to ruin his plans now. Later, in a year, in two years, five years perhaps, when the memory of McTavish had dimmed, he would speak. But, now, he must not betray himself.

"I sha'n't kill him," he returned, calmly. "Nothing is further from my mind. But I won't be responsible for what happens to him.

There's only one way of saving his life--to send him out of the country. If he stays, he'll eventually be captured, and what nearly happened to-day will happen then. You wish him to live, don't you?

"Yes, yes," she muttered, between dry lips. "Whatever happens to me, he must live."

"Then, write as I suggest. Make it a command, not an entreaty.

He'll obey you, and his life will be saved."

For a few moments, Jean paused, irresolute, and then, with difficulty, started the message on the back of the pages McTavish had sent to her. There was no struggle now against the inevitable; that had been endured before. This was merely writing a different final chapter to their romance, and she felt glad of the opportunity to give him life, although life without her and without honor were an empty thing to him. Strong in the feeling that upon her words his very existence depended, she made them eager and hopeful, but imperative, appealing to those instincts in him that could not resist her desire. For perhaps ten minutes, she wrote, and then handed the paper to Seguis.

"I must read it," he said, and, at her nod of acquiescence, puzzled out the words that emotion and her awkward position had made unsteady and misshapen. Then, he nodded his head with satisfaction, and tucked the letter away.

"Seguis," said the girl, when he prepared to go, "what is your motive in doing this? You haven't answered my question."

"My motive and my desire in this matter," he replied feelingly, "is to secure your own happiness; nothing else." With that, he turned away, and coasted swiftly down the hill to the edge of the forest whence he had come.

"My own happiness!" repeated the girl to herself, as she saw him disappear. "How strange a thing for him to say! And, yet, if only Donald is alive and safe I shall be happy--in knowing that he can still think of me."

Five minutes later, a wind-driven snow-storm that had threatened all the morning broke with terrible fury, and, scarcely able to stand against the blast, she made her way down to the deserted cabin, just as the returning factor appeared at the edge of the woods.

CHAPTER XXII

SECRETED EVIDENCE

It was an hour before sunset, but so uniform had been the darkness all day that neither Donald nor his two companions realized that night was close upon them. Hour after hour they had struggled onward through the blinding, bewildering storm, shelterless and without food, straining forward to the only place where these things might be obtained--Sturgeon Lake. Now, when the blanketing night was almost fallen, they sighted the charred ruins that had once been the warehouse of the free-traders, with a sigh of relief. A shout from one of Donald's companions brought the five men who had been left out of their tents. A shriveled female form joined them, and with a clutch at his heart the prisoner recognized old Maria.

Fortune, whose plaything he had been all this day, was indeed kind to him at last, he thought. He remembered certain trite observations concerning opportunity knocking at a man's door, and the obvious duty of a man to seize such opportunity, and bend it to his own use. If this were opportunity, he said to himself, he would make the most of it.

During that all-day struggle with the storm, Donald McTavish had come into his own again. The pa.s.sive acceptance of fate that had buoyed him even to the shadow of the gallows, had gone from him now. He was all energy and aggressiveness. He resolved to bring matters to a head within the next few days, or know the reason why.

What motive had moved Charley Seguis to send him to Sturgeon Lake, he did not know, nor did he care. He only remembered that he was at liberty once again, in a certain sense of the word, and that he had a fighting chance. The sight of old Maria recalled to his mind the words of Angus Fitzpatrick in regard to the marriage certificate that existed as proof of his father's youthful indiscretion. On the instant, he vowed that the hag should give up the truth of the matter before she was many hours older.

As the little party entered the camp, the men who had remained there plied them with questions as to the success of the foraging party. When the meager story had been told, they shook their heads dolefully at the lack of information, and set about the work of preparing the evening meal of fish.

McTavish, as he joined the circle with a ravenous appet.i.te, could scarcely credit the desolation he saw on all sides of him. Now that the main loghouse was down, the settlement presented a dreary and hopeless aspect. The one redeeming feature was the huge pile of rescued fur-bales. The quant.i.ty and quality of these impressed him strongly. One of the men, observing his interest in them, remarked:

"If you fellows would get down to business, instead of wasting all winter fussing about us, you might have something like that brought into the fort when spring comes, yourselves."

"Well, you see," returned Donald good-humoredly, "our idea is to have those brought in when spring comes. That's all we're fighting for."

"Deuce of a chance you've got of getting those furs!" retorted the other, contemptuously. "We're sick of the H. B.'s starvation trading, and we've quit for good and all."

"The Hudson Bay may give starvation trading, but I'd like to know where else you'll get as much."

Donald was leading the man on, for here was very valuable information, and this babbler evidently did not know the worth of a tight mouth.

"As much!" the trapper snorted. "Why, these Frenchies'll give us half again as much for a 'beaver' as you chaps ever thought of giving. And there's no use you fellows trying to keep them out, either. This is free territory, you know, even if old Fitz' doesn't think so. I've told Seguis often enough that, if he'd wipe old Fitz' off the map, he'd do the brotherhood more good than any other hundred men."

"I know, my good friend. But when do you suppose these Frenchies will ever connect with you? Maybe never and--"

The other burst into derisive laughter.

"Why, you poor fool!" he cried. "If it hadn't been for this blizzard to-day, we'd have been bargaining with 'em here to-night. Ten big trains of supplies are within thirty miles of us--and you ask me if they'll ever connect! That's good!" And he roared with laughter.

McTavish bridled, but kept his temper, for it was evident who was the fool. He continued pressing the subject for some little time further, but elicited no more really valuable information. Judging his man, he came to the conclusion that the fellow knew nothing more.

Being ignorant of the events that had occurred in the Hudson Bay camp after his departure, Donald was unaware of the desperate pursuit that was going on through the howling storm, but it was no surprise that none of Seguis's party returned to the camp.

"Can't travel in this weather," said one man, dolefully. "If this keeps up long, we won't see 'em till it's over. Honest, after this winter, I'll be surprised if I don't sprout fins, I've eaten so much fish."

The camp was about to turn in early when a faint cry sounded outside the circle of tents. Immediately, every one turned out, hoping it was the foragers back. Rushing in the direction of the sound, the men returned, accompanying a bedraggled old man with a gray beard, after whom limped a train of spiritless, wolfish dogs attached to a battered sledge.

"Thought I was done for in that storm, boys," said the aged _voyageur_ wagging his head, "but I remembered this cove around the headland, and made for it. Got anything to eat?"

According to the unwritten law of Northern hospitality, Bill Thompson, for so he gave his name, was taken in, and given what the camp afforded. He seemed to be a harmless old vagrant, whose point of departure and intended point of arrival on this journey were difficult to ascertain. He talked unceasingly of nothing in particular, and delivered endless narratives of adventures that had befallen him in his lurid and distant youth.

All that night, the storm continued unabated, and the next morning when the camp aroused itself, Bill Thompson gave out the dictum that it would continue for two days more at least. McTavish and his companions congratulated themselves that they had made the camp the night before, for in such weather traveling was almost an impossibility.