James Oliver Curwood

“ Out of that spirit had risen a new sort of man—the fighting man. He had seen a new fire in Jean's eyes and face; he had caught new meaning in his words, Jean was no longer the passive Jean—waiting, watching, guarding. Out in the forest something had happened to rouse in him what a word from Josephine would set flaming in the savage breasts of her dogs. And the excitement in Philip's blood was the thrill of exultation—the joy of knowing that action was close at hand, for deep in him had grown the belief that only through action could Josephine be freed for him. ”

“ At Adare House lay the cause of their hopelessness, of Josephine's grief, and of the gloom under which the half-breed had fallen so completely that night. Until they reached Adare House he could guess at nothing. And there—what would he find?
In spite of himself he felt creeping slowly over him a shuddering fear that he had not acknowledged before. The darkness deepening as the fire died away, the stillness of the night, the low wailing of a wind growing out of the north roused in him the unrest and doubt that sunshine and day had dispelled. ”

“ But you have won, M'sieur. Josephine loves you. I have faith in you. And do you know why? It is because you have fought the fight of a strong man. It does not take great soul in a man to match knife against knife, or bullet against bullet. Not to keep one's word, to play a hopeless part in the dark, to leap when the numma wapew is over the eyes and you are blind—that takes a man. And now, when Jean Jacques Croisset says for the first time that there is a ray of hope for you, where a few hours ago no hope existed, will you give me again your promise to play the part you have been asked to play? ”

“ The birch had turned to red and gold. From out of the rocks rose trees that were great crimson splashes of mountain-ash berries framed against the dark lustre of balsam and cedar and spruce.
Without reason, Philip was listening again to the quiet lifeless words of Jasper, the factor over at Fond du Lac, as he described the day when he and his young wife first came up through the wonderland of the North. "No country is God's Country without a woman!" He found the words running in an unpleasant monotone through his brain. ”

“ Now and then they caught the ghostly flutter of owls in the gloom, like floating spirits; back in the forest saplings snapped and brush crashed underfoot as caribou or moose caught the man-scent; they heard once the panting, sniffing inquiry of a bear close at hand, and Philip reached forward for his rifle. For an instant Josephine's hand fluttered to his own, and held it back, and the dark glow of her eyes said: "Don't kill." Here there were no big-eyed moose-birds, none of the mellow throat sounds of the brush sparrow, no harsh janglings of the gaudily coloured jays. ”

“ She guessed why Jean had started his chant—to give her courage. She KNEW why Philip had responded. And now Jean swept up beside them, a smile on his thin, dark face.
"The Good Virgin preserve us, M'sieur, but our voices are like those of two beasts," he cried.
"Great, true, fighting beasts," whispered Josephine under her breath. "How I would hate almost—"
She had suddenly flushed to the roots of her hair.
"What?" asked Philip.
"To hear men sing like women," she finished.
As swiftly as he had come up Jean and his canoe had sped on ahead of them. ”

“ Out in the clear light Philip drew a deep breath. He had never seen anything like this pack. They crowded shoulder to shoulder, body to body, in the open trail. Most of them were the tawny dun and gray and yellow of the wolf. There were a few blacks, and a few pure whites, but none that wore the mongrel spots of the soft-footed and softer-throated dogs from the south.
He shivered as he measured the pent-up power, the destructive possibilities of the whining, snapping, living sea of sinew and fang ahead of them. And they were Josephine's! They were her slaves! ”

“ It was the edge of a great open, a bit of the Barren that reached down like a solitary finger from the North: treeless, shrubless, the playground of the foxes and the storm winds. Here Jean fell back beside Philip for a moment.
"You are not tiring, M'sieur?"
"I am getting stronger every mile," declared Philip. "I feel no effects of the blow now, Jean. How far did you say it was to the place where our people are to meet?"
"Eight miles. We have come four. In this darkness we could make it faster without the dogs, but they are carrying a hundred pounds of tepee, guns, and food." ”

“ As if she had been a little child John Adare had taken his wife up in his arms and sat her high on the trunk of a fallen tree that was still held four or five feet above the ground by a crippled spruce. Philip heard him laugh. He saw the wife lean over, still clinging for safety to her husband's shoulders.
"It is beautiful," he said.
Josephine spoke as if she had not heard him.
"I do not believe there is another man in the world quite like my father. I cannot understand how a woman could cease to love such a man as he even for a day—an hour. ”

“ She is different than her mother. Miriam has been always like a flower—a timid wood violet, loving this big world, yet playing no part in it away from my side. Sometimes Josephine frightens me. She will travel a hundred miles by sledge to nurse a sick child, and only last winter she buried herself in a shack filled with smallpox and brought six souls out of it alive! For two weeks she was buried in that hell. That is Mignonne, whom Indian, breed, and white man call L'Ange. Miriam they call La Fleurette. We are two fortunate men, my son! ”

“ Every fibre in his body was strung with a splendid strength. His brain was as clear as the unpolluted air that drifted over the cedar and spruce. And now to these tremendous forces had come the added strength of the most wonderful thing in the world: love of a woman. In spite of all that Josephine and Jean had said, in spite of all the odds that might be against him, he was confident of winning whatever fight might be ahead of him. ”

“ He was leader now, and Philip saw Father George close at his side, clutching his arm, talking. In Jean's face there was a great fear. He spoke low to Philip.
"If he meets Lang, if he fights face to face with Thoreau, or if they call upon us to parley, all is lost! M'sieur, for the love of God, hold your fire for those two! We must kill them. If a parley is granted, they will come to us. We will kill them—even as they come toward us with a white flag, if we must!"
"No truce will be granted!" cried Philip.
As if John Adare himself had heard his words, he stopped and faced those behind him. ”

“ Miriam's lips trembled in a smile as she gazed up at her husband. In her eyes shone a responsive gentleness; and then Philip turned to find Josephine looking at him from the door, her lips drawn in a straight, tense line, her face as white as the bit of lace at her throat. He hurried to her. Behind him rumbled the deep, joyous voice of the master of Adare House, and passing through the door he glanced behind and saw them following, Adare's arm about his wife's waist. Josephine caught Philip's arm, and whispered in a low voice:
"They are always like that, always lovers. ”

“ He heard the whimpering, babyish-like complaint of the porcupine that had made the sound, and still chuckling over his nervousness he seated himself on a white drift-log that had lain bleaching for half a century in the sand.
The moon had fallen behind the western forests; the stars were becoming fainter in the sky, and about him the darkness was drawing in like a curtain. He loved this hour that bridged the northern night with the northern day, and he sat motionless and still, covering the glow of fire in his pipe bowl with the palm of his hand. ”

“ Philip drew himself head and shoulders over his log as he watched. He forgot himself in this moment when he was looking upon men running into the face of death. In another moment came the crash of rifles muffled behind log walls. He could hear the whine of bullets, the ZIP, ZIP, ZIP of them back in the spruce and cedar.
Another hundred yards beyond Jean, he saw John Adare break from his cover like a great lion, his men spreading out like a pack of wolves. Swiftly Philip turned and looked to the left. Kaskisoon and his braves were advancing upon the Nest with the elusiveness of foxes. ”

“ It was a campfire.
"It is a fire at the Forks," spoke Jean above the wind. "Mon Dieu, M'sieur—is it not something to have friends like that!"
He led the way a short distance along the face of the ridge, and then they plunged down the valley of deeper gloom. The forest was thick and low, and Philip guessed that they were passing through a swamp. When they came out of it the fire was almost in their faces. The howling of dogs greeted them. As they dashed into the light half a dozen men had risen and were facing them, their rifles in the crooks of their arms. ”

“ The stream was swelling out into a narrow, finger-like lake that stretched for a mile or more ahead of them, and she turned to nod her head at the spruce and cedar shores with their colourings of red and gold, where birch, and poplar, and ash splashed vividly against the darker background.
"From now on it is all like that." she said. "Lake after lake, most of them as narrow as this, clear to the doors of Adare House. It is a wonderful lake country, and one may easily lose one's self—hundreds of lakes, I guess, running through the forests like Venetian canals." ”

“ In this little clearing a slim dark figure of a man was straightening out the tangled traces of a sledge-team.
Philip could not see his face, but he knew that it was Jean. It was Jean's figure, Jean's movement, his low, sharp voice as he spoke to the dogs. Man and huskies were not twenty steps from him. With a tense breath Philip replaced his pistol in its holster. He did not want to kill, and he possessed a proper respect for the hair-trigger mechanism of his automatic. In the fight he anticipated with Jean the weapon would be safer in its holster than in his hand. ”

“ For many seconds Janesse did not lower his hand; and then, still unheard by the others, there came slowly out of the gloom a file of dusky-faced, silent, shadowy forms. They were within the circle of light before Jean or his companions had moved, and at their head was Kaskisoon, the Cree: tall, slender as a spruce sapling, and with eyes that went searchingly from face to face with the uneasy glitter of an ermine's. They fell upon Jean, and with a satisfied "Ugh!" and a hunch of his shoulders he turned to his followers. There were seven. Six of them carried rifles. ”

“ The soft glow in her eyes faded away. A look of fear leapt into them and her face went suddenly white. He drew her nearer, until her hands were against his breast.
"Don't look like that," he whispered. "Nothing can hurt you. Nothing in the world. See—I must do this to bring your colour back, or they will guess something is wrong!"
He bent and kissed her on the lips.
Adare's voice burst out happily:
"Good boy, Philip! Don't be bashful when we're around. That's the first time I've seen you kiss your wife!"
There was none of the white betrayal in Josephine's cheeks now. ”

“ There was neither threat nor excitement in his voice, but in his eyes was the thing that Philip understood. Silently he reached out and gripped the half-breed's hand, For an instant they stood, their faces close, looking into each other's eyes. And as men see men where the fires of the earth burn low, so they read each other's souls, and their fingers tightened in a clasp of understanding. ”

“ If she belonged to some other man she would not have asked him to play the part of a husband. Her freedom and his right to fight for her was the one consuming fact of significance to him just now. Beside that all others were trivial and unimportant, and every drop of blood in his veins was stirred by a strange exultation.
He found himself whistling again as he refolded his blankets and straightened out his tent. When he had finished this last task he turned to find Jean standing close behind him, his dark eyes watching him closely. As he greeted the half-breed, Philip looked for Josephine. ”

“ She left him to run into the tent, reappearing quickly with a thick rabbit-skin blanket and two canoe pillows.
"These make my nest—when I'm not working," she said, thrusting them into Philip's arms. "I have a paddle, too. Jean says that I am as good as an Indian woman with it."
"Better, M'sieur," exclaimed Jean, who had come out of the tent. "It makes you work harder to see her. She is—what you call it—gwan-auch-ewin—so splendid! Out of the Cree you cannot speak it."
A tender glow filled Josephine's eyes as Jean began pulling up the pegs of the tent. ”

“ In the gray gloom of dawn they were only a sea of shifting shadows.
"Men, there is to be no mercy this day!" he said, and his voice rumbled like an echo through the aisles of the forest. "We are not on the trail of men, but of beasts and murderers. The Law that is three hundred miles away has let them live in our midst. It has let them kill. It said nothing when they stole Red Fawn from her father's tepee and ravaged her to death. It has said: 'Give us proof that Thoreau killed Reville, and that his wife did not die a natural death.' We are our own law. In these forests we are masters. ”

“ Something in the stillness and the gloom held them silent. The canoes slipped along like shadows, and sometimes they bent their heads to escape the low-hanging boughs. Josephine's face shone whitely in the dusk. She was alert and listening. When she spoke it was in a voice strangely subdued.
"I love this stream," she whispered. "It is full of life. On all sides of us, in the forest, there is life. The Indians do not come here, because they have a superstitious dread of this eternal gloom and quiet. They call it the Spirit Stream. Even Jean is a little oppressed by it. ”

“ With dark, tense faces and eyes that burned with slumbering fires they heard Jean. There were the grim and silent Foutelles, father and son, from the Caribou Swamp. Tall and ghostlike in the firelight, more like spectre than man, was Janesse, a white beard falling almost to his waist, a thick marten skin cap shrouding his head, and armed with a long barrelled smooth-bore that shot powder and ball. From the fox grounds out on the Barren had come "Mad" Joe Horn behind eight huge malemutes that pulled with the strength of oxen. ”

“ Almost roughly he caught him by the shoulder.
"See here, Jean Croisset," he cried impatiently, "you're a man. What are you afraid of?"
"God," replied Jean so quietly that Philip dropped his hand from his shoulder in astonishment. "Nothing else in the world am I afraid of, M'sieur!"
"Then why—why in the name of that God do you look like this?" demanded Philip. "You saw her go into the tent. She is disheartened, hopeless because of something that I can't guess at, cold and shivering and white because of a FEAR of something. She is a woman. You are a man. Are YOU afraid?" ”

“ Never in his life had his blood leaped more quickly through his body than it did now. It was not merely excitement—the knowledge that he had been close to death, and had escaped. From out of the darkness Jean Croisset had shot at him like a coward. He did not feel the burn of the scratch on his arm as he jumped to his feet. Once more he ran swiftly through the hall. At the end door he looked back. Apparently the shot had not alarmed the occupants of Josephine's room, to whom the report of a rifle—even at night—held no special significance.
Another moment and Philip was outside. ”

“ One by one John Adare was unlocking for him hallowed pictures in which Jean had told him he could never share possession. His desire to see Josephine again was almost feverish, and filled him with a restlessness which he knew he must hide from Adare. So when Adare's eyes rested upon him in a moment's silence, he said:
"Last night Jean and I were standing beside her grave. It seemed then as though he would have been happier if he had lain near her—under the cross."
"You are wrong," said Adare quickly. "Death is beautiful when there is a perfect love. ”

“ It must be because—she thinks I'm a MAN!"
"That is it, M'sieur," replied Jean, as quietly as before. "That, and because you have come from two years in the North. I have been there. I know that it breeds men. And our Josephine knows. I could swear that there is not one man in a million she would trust as she has put faith in you. Into your hands she has given herself, and what you do means for her life or death. And for you—"
The fires in his eyes were nearer the surface now.
"What?" asked Philip tensely.
"Death—unless you play your part as a man," answered Jean. ”

“ Josephine came a little later and said that she could not sleep. Miriam went with her."
"It must have been the baby," comforted Philip, placing a hand on Adare's arm. "We can stand it, Mon Pere. We are men. With them it is different. We must bear up under our grief. It is necessary for us to have strength for them as well as ourselves."
"Do you think it is that?" cried Adare with sudden eagerness. "If it is, I am ashamed of myself, Philip! I have been brooding too much over the strange change in Miriam. But I see now. It must have been the baby. It has been a tremendous strain. ”