Man Size Part 41

Before they left, the travelers discovered that he knew two more words of English. One was rum, the other tobacco. He begged for both. They left him a half-foot of tobacco. The scant supply of whiskey they had brought was for an emergency.

Just before night fell, Morse shot two ptarmigan in the woods. These made a welcome addition to their usual fare.

Though both the men were experienced in the use of snowshoes, their feet were raw from the chafing of the thongs. Before the camp-fire they greased the sore places with tallow. In a few days the irritation due to the webs would disappear and the leg muscles brought into service by this new and steady shuffle would harden and grow fit.

They had built a wind-break of brush beside the sled and covered the ground with spruce boughs after clearing away the snow. Here they rested after supper, drying socks, duffles, and moccasins, which were wet with perspiration, before the popping fire.

Beresford pulled out his English briar pipe and Tom one picked from the Company stock. Smoke wreathed their heads while they lounged indolently on the spruce bed and occasionally exchanged a remark. They knew each other well enough for long silences. When they talked, it was because they had something to say.

The Canadian looked at his friend's new gun-case and remarked with a gleam in his eye:

"I spoke for that first, Tom. Had miners on it, I thought."

The American laughed sardonically. "It was a present for a good boy,"

he explained. "I've a notion somebody was glad I was mus.h.i.+n' with you on this trip. Maybe you can guess why. Anyhow, I drew a present out of it."

"I see you did," Beresford answered, grinning.

"I'm to look after you proper an' see you're tucked up."

"Oh, that's it?"

"That's just it."

The constable looked at him queerly, started to say something, then changed his mind.

CHAPTER x.x.xII

A PICTURE IN A LOCKET

It was characteristic of McRae that he had insisted on bringing Whaley to his own home to recuperate. "It's nursin' you need, man, an' guid food. Ye'll get baith at the hoose."

The trader protested, and was overruled. His Cree wife was not just now able to look after him. McRae's wife and daughter made good his promise, and the wounded man thrived under their care.

On an afternoon Whaley lay on the bed in his room smoking. Beside him sat Lemoine, also puffing at a pipe. The trapper had brought to the ex-gambler a strange tale of a locket and a ring he had seen bought by a half-breed from a Blackfoot squaw who claimed to have had it eighteen years. He had just finished telling of it when Jessie knocked at the door and came into the room with a bowl of caribou broth.

Whaley pretended to resent this solicitude, but his objection was a fraud. He liked this girl fussing over him. His att.i.tude toward her was wholly changed. Thinking of her as a white girl, he looked at her with respect.

"No more slops," he said. "Bring me a good caribou steak and I'll say thank you."

"You're to eat what Mother sends," she told him.

Lemoine had risen from the chair on which he had been sitting. He stared at her, a queer look of puzzled astonishment in his eyes.

Jessie became aware of his gaze and flashed on him a look of annoyance.

"Have you seen a ghost, Mr. Lemoine?" she asked.

"By gar, maybeso, Miss Jessie. The picture in the locket, it jus' lak you--same hair, same eyes, same smile."

"What picture in what locket?"

"The locket I see at Whoop-Up, the one Pierre Roubideaux buy from old Makoye-kin's squaw."

"A picture of a Blackfoot?"

"No-o. Maybe French--maybe from the 'Merican country. I do not know."

Whaley took the pipe from his mouth and sat up, the chill eyes in his white face fixed and intent. "Go back to Whoop-Up, Lemoine. Buy that locket and that ring for me from Pierre Roubideaux. See Makoye-kin--and his squaw. Find out where she got it--and when. Run down the whole story."

The trapper took off a fur cap and scratched his curly poll.

"Mais--pourquois? All that will take money, is it not so?"

"I'll let you have the money. Spend what you need, but account for it to me afterward."

Jessie felt the irregular beat of a hammer inside her bosom. "What is it you think, Mr. Whaley?" she cried softly.

"I don't know what I think. Probably nothing to it. But there's a locket. We know that. With a picture that looks like you, Lemoine here thinks. We'd better find out whose picture it is, hadn't we?"

"Yes, but--Do you mean that maybe it has something to do with me? How can it? The sister of Stokimatis was my mother. Onistah is my cousin.

Ask Stokimatis. She knows. What could this woman of the picture be to me?"

Jessie could not understand the fluttering pulse in her throat. She had not doubted that her mother was a Blackfoot. All the romance of her clouded birth centered around the unknown father who had died when she was a baby. Stokimatis had not been very clear about that. She had never met the man, according to the story she had told Sleeping Dawn.

Neither she nor those of her tribal group knew anything of him. Was there a mystery about his life? In her childish dreams Jessie had woven one. He was to her everything desirable, for he was the tie that bound her to all the higher standards of life she craved.

"I don't know. Likely it's all a mare's nest. Find Stokimatis, Lemoine, and bring her back with you. Well see what she can tell us.

And get the locket and the ring, with the story back of them."

Again Lemoine referred to the cost. He would have to take his dog-train to Whoop-Up, and from there out to the creek where Pierre Roubideaux was living. Makoye-kin and his family might be wintering anywhere within a radius of a hundred miles. Was there any use in going out on such a wild-hare chase?

Whaley thought there was and said so with finality. He did not give his real reason, which was that he wanted to pay back to McRae and his daughter the debt he owed. They had undoubtedly saved his life after he had treated her outrageously. There was already one score to his credit, of course. He had saved her from West. But he felt the balance still tipped heavily against him. And he was a man who paid his debts.

It was this factor of his make-up--the obligation of old a.s.sociations laid upon him--that had taken him out to West with money, supplies, and a dog-train to help his escape.

Jessie went out to find her father. Her eagerness to see him outflew her steps. This was not a subject she could discuss with Matapi-Koma.

The Cree woman would not understand what a tremendous difference it made if she could prove her blood was wholly of the superior race. Nor could Jessie with tact raise such a point. It involved not only the standing of Matapi-Koma herself, but also of her sons.

The girl found McRae in the storeroom looking over a bundle of a.s.sorted pelts--marten, fox, mink, and beaver. The news tumbled from her lips in excited exclamations.

"Oh, Father, guess! Mr. Lemoine saw a picture--a Blackfoot woman had it--old Makoye-kin's wife--and she sold it. And he says it was like me--exactly. Maybe it was my aunt--or some one. My father's sister!

Don't you think?"

"I'll ken what I think better gin ye'll just quiet doon an' tell me a'

aboot it, la.s.s."