ispered
pointedly as he passed and children often shrank from him in terror as
from one defiled. But Marcel had been prepared for the effect of the
tale of the Lelacs upon the mercurial red men, in the memories of many
of whom still lurked the ghosts of deeds of their own whose ghastly
details the ears of no man would ever hear.

Since his return he had not once met the Lelacs face to face. Always
they had hastily avoided him when he appeared on the way to his canoe or
the trade-house. Jean had been strictly ordered by Gillies under no
circumstances to seek trouble with his accusers or their friends, so he
ignored them. And their disinclination to encounter the son of the
famous Andre Marcel had not gone unmarked by the keen eyes of more than
one old hunter. Many a red man and half-breed, friends of the father,
who respected the son, had frankly expressed to him their disbelief in
the charges of the Lelacs, accepting his story which Gillies had
published to the Crees, that Beaulieu had been stabbed by Joe Piquet
while Marcel was absent and Piquet killed later by the dog. Strongly
they had urged him to make the Lelacs eat their lies, promising their
support; but Jean had explained that it was necessary to wait; later his
day would come.

Occasionally when Marcel crossed the post clearing, pulsing with the
varied life of the spring trade, to descend the cliff trail to his
canoe, there marched by his side one whose name, also, was anathema with
many of the Crees. That comrade was Fleur. The story of Piquet's death
as told by Jean at the trade-house, though scouted by the Lelacs, had,
nevertheless, left a deep impression; and the great dog, now called the
"man-killer," who towered above the scrub huskies of the Indians as a
mastiff over a poodle, was given a wide berth. But to avoid trouble
with the Cree dogs, Jean kept Fleur for the most part in the Mission
stockade. There Gillies and McCain and Jules had come to admire the bulk
and bone of the husky they had last seen as a lumbering puppy, now in
size and beauty far surpassing the Ungavas bought by the Company of the
Esquimos. There, Crees, still friendly to Jean, lingered to gossip of
the winter's hardships and stare in admiration at his dog. There, too,
Julie romped with Fleur, grown somewhat dignified with the gravity of
her approaching responsibilities. For, to the delight of Jean, Fleur was
soon to present him with the dog-team of his dreams.

Then when the umiaks