,
deer, venison and turkey they still had in abundance.

The morning itself was the finest they had encountered so far. Much
snow had fallen in the high mountains, but winter had not touched the
earth here. The deep colors of the leaves, moved by the light wind,
shifted and changed like a prism. The glorious haze of Indian summer
hung over everything like a veil of finest gauze. The air was
surcharged with vitality and life. It was pleasant merely to sit and
breathe at such a time.

"I've always claimed," said Robert, as he passed a beautifully broiled
trout to Tayoga and another to the hunter, "that I can cook fish
better than either of you. Dave, I freely admit, can surpass me in the
matter of venison and Tayoga is a finer hand with bear than I am, but
I'm a specialist with fish, be it salmon, or trout, or salmon trout,
or perch or pickerel or what not."

"Your boast is justified, in very truth, Robert," said Willet. "I've
known none other who can prepare a fish with as much tenderness and
perfection as you. I suppose 'tis born in you, but you have a way of
preserving the juices and savors which defies description and which is
beyond praise. 'Tis worth going hungry a long while to put one's tooth
into so delicate a morsel as this salmon trout, and 'tis a great pity,
too, that our guest, Monsieur Achille Garay, will not join us, when
we've an abundance so great and a variety so rich."

The wretched spy and intermediary could hear every word they said, and
Robert fell silent, but the hunter and the Onondaga talked freely and
with abounding zest.

"'Tis a painful thing," said Willet, "to offer hospitality and to
have it refused. Monsieur Garay knows that he would be welcome at our
board, and yet he will not come. I fear, Robert, that you have cooked
too many of these superlative fish, and that they must even go to
waste, which is a sin. They would make an admirable beginning for our
guest's breakfast, if he would but consent to join us."

"It is told by the wise old sachems of the great League," said Tayoga,
"that warriors have gone many days without food, when plenty of it
was ready for their taking, merely to test their strength of body and
will. Their sufferings were acute and terrible. Their flesh wasted
away, their muscles became limp and weak, their sight failed, pain
stabbed them with a thousand needles, but they would not yield and
touch sustenance before the time appointed."

"I've heard of many such ca