George Tracy Marsh

“ And with what was evidently a forced gayety, the girl sought to banish from his mind thoughts of the cloud blackening the future.
“Come, Jean Marcel!” she said with a laugh, speaking as always in French. “Are you not glad to see us that you wear a face so dismal? You have not told me how you like this new muslin gown.” She pirouetted on her shapely moccasined feet, challenging his approval. “Henri says I’m growing thin. Is it not becoming? No? Then I shall eat and grow as fat as big Marie, the Montagnais cook at the Gillies’.”
The sober face of Jean Marcel lighted at her pleasantry. ”

“ Because some half-breeds have brought a story to Whale River which was not true?”
“Well, enough of it is true, Julie, to make the Indians believe, when they hear it, that Jean Marcel killed his partners to save himself from starvation.”
“Not if Père Breton and Monsieur Gillies have any influence with the Crees!”
Marcel smiled indulgently at the girl’s ignorance of Cree psychology.
“The harm is already done,” he said. “No matter what M’sieu Gillies and Père Henri tell them they will believe the man of those three who got out alive is guilty.” ”

“ CHAPTER XVIII. Although it would have been pure suicide for any one to attempt to take Fleur from the stockade against her will, Marcel feared that some dark night those who wished his disgrace might loose their venom in an injury to his dog. So, refusing a room in the mission house, he pitched his tent on the grass inside the spruce pickets where Fleur might lie beside him. ”