Part 11 (1/2)

So the day passed until ns of the celebration and locked Miki in his cage It was fortunate she was ahead of tie of the clearing, and with hie of the Barrens farther north Durant had sent his outfit on to Port O' God by an Indian, and had struck south and ith two dogs and a sledge to visit a cousin for a day or two He was on his way to the Post when he came upon Le Beau on his trapline

Thus much Le Beau told Nanette, and Nanette looked at Durant with startled eyes They were a good pair, Jacques and his guest, only that Durant was older She had become somewhat accustoht that Durant was a lad when they went fro to kill your POOS as easily as your lead-whelp killed that rabbit to-day, m'sieu,” exulted Jacques

”I have told you but you have not seen!”

And he took with hier fresh out of the jungles Miki responded to the club and the whip to-day, until Durant hihast, and exclaimed under his breath: ”MON DIEU! he is a devil!”

Fro, and out of her rose a cry of anguish Sudden as a burst of fire there arose in her--triu which for years The Brute had crushed back: her womanhood resurrected! Her soul broken free of its shackles! Her faith, her strength, her courage! She turned from theand ran to the door, and out over the snow to the cage; and for the first time in her life she struck at Le Beau, and beat fiercely at the ar the club

”You beast!” she cried ”I tell you, you SHALL NOT! Do you hear? You SHALL NOT!”

Paralyzed with amazement, The Brute stood still Was this Nanette, his slave? This wonderful creature with eyes that were glowing fire and defiance, and a look in her face that he had never seen in any woe rose in hi her back so that she fell to the earth With a wild curse he lifted the bar of the cage door

”I will kill him, noill KILL him!” he almost shrieked ”And it is YOU--YOU--you she-devil! who shall eat his heart alive! I will force it down your throat: I will--”

He was dragging Miki forth by the chain The club rose as Miki's head cah In another instant it would have beaten his head to a pulp--but Nanette was between it and the dog like a flash, and the bloild It ith his fist that Le Beau struck out now, and the blow caught Nanette on the shoulder and sent her frail body doith a crash The Brute sprang upon her His fingers gripped in her thick, soft hair

And then--

Froray streak of vengeance and retribution, Miki was at the end of his chain and at Le Beau's throat Nanette HEARD! Through dazed eyes she SAW! She reached out gropingly and struggled to her feet, and looked just once down upon the snow Then, with a terrible cry, she staggered toward the cabin

When Durant gathered courage to drag Le Beau out of Miki's reach Miki ain, perhaps, it was the Beneficent Spirit that told hi there on his belly looked forth at Durant

And Durant, looking at the blood-stained snow and the dead body of The Brute, whispered to hiain:

”MON DIEU! he is a devil!”

In the cabin, Nanette was upon her knees before the crucifix

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

There are tirief And so it ith Nanette Le Beau With her own eyes she had looked upon the terrible fate of her husband, and it was not in her gentle soul to weep or wish hiain At last there had overtaken him what LE BON DIEU had intended him to receive some day: justice And for the baby's sake more than her own Nanette was not sorry Durant, whose soul was only a little less wicked than the dead man's, had not even waited for a prayer--had not asked her what to do He had chopped a hole in the frozen earth and had buried Le Beau almost before his body was cold

And Nanette was not sorry for that The Brute was gone He was gone for ever He would never strike her again And because of the baby she offered up a prayer of gratitude to God

In his prison-cage of sapling bars Miki cringed on his belly at the end of his chain He had scarcely moved since those terrible moments in which he had torn the life out of the rowled at Durant when he dragged the body away Upon hi oppression He was not thinking of his own brutal beatings, or of the death which Le Beau had been about to inflict upon him with the club; he did not feel the presence of pain in his bruised and battered body, nor in his bleeding jaws and whip-lashed eyes He was thinking of Nanette, the woman Why had she run aith that terrible cry when he killed the man-beast? Was it not the man-beast who had struck her down, and whose hands were at her white throat when he sprang the length of his chain and tore out his jugular? Then as it that she ran away, and did not come back?

He whione, and the early gloo thickly over the forests In that gloom the dark face of Durant appeared at the bars of Miki's prison

Instinctively Miki had hated this foxhunter froe of the Barrens, just as he had hated Le Beau, for in their brutish faces as well as in their hearts they were like brothers Yet he did not growl at Durant as he peered through He did not even move