nine canoes
lay bottom up upon the pebbly shore, to the great dark wall of the
forest shouldering near on three sides. To him ran little Francette,
light on her moccasined feet as the wind in the tender pine-tops,
her eloquent small hands outstretched and clutching at his sleeve
audaciously.

None other in all the post would have dared as much, for this smiling
young man with the blue eyes was the Law at Fort de Seviere, factor of
the Company and governor of the handful of humanity lost in the vast
region of the Assiniboine. But to Francette he was Power and Help, and
she thought of naught else, as it is not likely she would have done even
at another time.

"Oh, M'sieu!" she cried, gasping from her run, "come at once beyond the
great gate! Bois DesCaut,--Oh, brute of the world!--whips that great
grey husky leader of his team, because it did but snap at his heel
beneath an idle prod! Hasten, M'sieu! He drags it, glaring, along the
shore to where lie those clubs brought for the kettles!"

In the dark eyes upraised to him there swam a mist of tears and the
heart of the little maid tore at her breast in anguish.

The smile slipped swiftly from the factor's face, leaving it grave.

"Where, little one?" he asked.

"Beyond the palisade. But hurry, M'sieu,--for the love of God!"

At the great gate in the eastern wall he paused and looked either way.
To the southward all was peaceful. An aged Indian of the Assiniboines
squatted at the water's edge mending the broken bottom of a skin canoe,
and two voyageurs, gay in the matter of sash and crimson cap, lay lazily
beneath a drowsing tree.

To the northward there flashed into McElroy's vision one of those
pictures a man sees but few times and never forgets, a picture startling
in its clear-cut strength.

Against the mellow background of the weather-beaten stockade that
surrounded the post there stood two figures, a man and a woman, and
between the two there crouched with snarling lips and flaming eyes a
huge grey dog.

Tall he was, that man, tall and broad of shoulder, but the head of the
woman, shining like blue-black satin in the morning sun, was level with
his brows.

She leaned a trifle forward and her eyes held fast to his
passion-flooded face. It was evident that she had but just reached the
spot from the fact that the club, arrested in its upward swing, still
was poised in the air.

They faced each other and the factor stopped in his tracks.

"Quick, M'sieu