Part 30 (1/2)

”I will let you go when you tell me the truth. Remember, your men pa.s.sed me this morning.”

”I tell you, I came alone.”

”Where are your Indians that Cadillac sent with you?”

”I sprained my ankle and they left me.”

”Where did they go?”

”How should I know? I tell you they left me.”

”Was Pemaou, the Huron, one of them?”

”He was guide. Monsieur, what do you mean?”

I could not answer. My throat was dry as if I breathed a furnace blast. I looked at the canoe under my hands. It was not seaworthy.

”Will your canoe carry two?” I cried.

He nodded. His great rough face was sickly with suspense. ”Monsieur, what does this mean?”

I swore at him and at the hour he had made me lose. ”Men pa.s.sed me in a fog. They have been hiding here for a day at least. Show me your canoe. We must get to camp. Yes, come with me. Come, show me your canoe.”

CHAPTER XX

WHAT I FOUND

Once in the canoe I bade Lord Starling crouch low, and I paddled fiercely. I breathed hard not from exertion, but like a swimmer fighting for his breath. I was submerged in waves of terror, yet I had no name for what I feared. I learned then that there is but one real terror in the world,--fear of the unseen. The man who feels terror of an open foe must be a strange craven.

Lord Starling respected my mood and was silent. He sat warily, s.h.i.+fting his weight to suit the plunging canoe.

”The fog chokes me,” he said at length. ”How large a camp have you?

Whom did you leave on guard?”

I told him.

”That should be sufficient.”

”Not for a concerted attack.”

”But who would make a concerted attack?”

I lengthened my stroke till the canoe quivered. ”I am not sure. I have been shadowed. I thought it was by your order. I cannot talk and paddle, monsieur.”

But I could paddle and think. And always I saw the meadow as we had found it that first day with drifts of white b.u.t.terflies over the flowers, and the woods warm and beckoning. How would the meadow look now?

But when we came to it I thought it looked unchanged, save that the fog made all things sinister. We crashed through the guarding reeds, and I let the canoe drive hard upon the sand. No one was in sight, and a wolf was whining at the edge of the timber. I leaped to the sh.o.r.e.

I think that I called as I stumbled forward. I saw the ashes of a dead fire, and a cask that had held rum lying with the sides and end knocked in. Then I saw a dead body.