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"Ah, I forgot to tell you dat, m'sieu." He pointed towards the southern shore of the lake, where a small tree-covered island stood about half a mile from the shore. "You see zee island, m'sieu. Just opposite dere ees a creek. Zee regular trail comes out to zee lak' just dere, an' it ees dere dat you may look for zee comin' of Chigmok."
He dropped the man by the fire, poured some coffee into a pannikin, and as the new-comer, with a groan, half-raised himself to look round, he held the coffee towards him. "Here, drink this, it'll do you " he interrupted himself sharply, then in a tone of exultation he cried: "Chigmok!" "Oui!" answered the man. "I am Chigmok! And thou?"
Besides it's my duty to get him back to the Post, and they wouldn't welcome him dead. Might think I'd plugged him, you know." Together they lifted the man nearer the fire, and examined the injured shoulder. It had been drilled clean through by a bullet. Anderton nodded with satisfaction. "Nothing there to kill you, Chigmok. We'll bandage you up, and save you for the Law yet?"
A white man, that is all I know. The rest is known to Chigmok alone." Bènard considered the answer for a moment, and entertaining no doubt that it was the true one, wasted no further time in that direction. "Whither has the white maiden been carried?" Chief George waved his hand to the East. "Through the woods to the lake of Little Moose, there to meet the man who pays the price."
"None," answered Stane, and then told him the facts communicated to him by Miskodeed. "Ah! then, m'sieu, dere ees a white man at zee back of things. Dat Chigmok, he ees no good, he what you call a rotter, but he not dare to do this ting heemself." "That is how I feel," answered Stane. "But how we are to get at the truth of the matter, I do not know." "We weel go to zee encampment.
The attack on the cabin, was that man who captured me that man Chigmok was he the inspirer of that?" "I am afraid not!" "Then it was Gerald Ainley who was to pay the price for me that the half-breed told me of, and that is why he collapsed so utterly when Chigmok came along just now?" "Yes," answered Stane, simply. "But why did he shoot down Chigmok's party?"
Stane looked at the island and marked the position of the creek, then an idea struck him. "Would it not be better, Bènard, if we removed our camp to the island? We could then surprise Chigmok when he came." "Non, m'sieu! I tink of dat las' night; but I remember dat we must build a fire, an' zee smoke it tell zee tale; whilst zee odour it ees perceived afar.
He keel Canif and Ligan, and he would me haf keeled to save zee guns and blankets and zee tea and tabac, dog dat he ees!" "Perhaps it was not the price he was saving," said Anderton. "Perhaps he was afraid that the story would be told and that the mounters would seek out his trail, Chigmok?" "By gar! Yees, I never tink of dat," cried the half-breed as if a light had broken on him suddenly.
One of the men found a dead man, who, from the description, I mistook for Stane there, and we also found a wounded Indian, who, with a little persuasion, told us what he knew, which was that a half-breed, of the name of Chigmok, inflamed with love for Miss Yardely, had carried her off, designing to make her his squaw.
"Yes," said Helen thoughtfully. "An idea of that sort had occurred to me from something that Chigmok had said. But how dreadful it is to think that a man can so conspire to to " She broke off without completing her words, and Stane nodded. "There was always a crooked strain in Ainley. But it will go hard with him now, for the half-breed will be merciless.
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