"Wot food?"
Interest in such a subject superceded all interest in the sunset. Little Marcel's eyes were eagerly enquiring as they gazed up into those of his new found friend.
"Why, there's some frozen black-tail deer. Maybe there's a jack rabbit or so. Then I guess there's biscuit, and coffee, and tea, and maybe even sugar."
The boy nodded appreciatively.
"I likes 'em," he said. Then after a moment. "I likes plenty sugar. There's sugar at the store. My Mummy, hers keep it for me cos I likes 'em."
Steve understood. He interpreted the announcement in his own fashion. He knew that stores were running short, and that those others, those two devoted women, were hoarding the last remains of their sugar for the little life that needed it.
He turned abruptly towards the horizon again. Perhaps he did not desire the eyes of the child to witness the feeling he had stirred.
He need have had no fear. At that moment the boy's treble shrilled with excitement.
"Look, Uncle Steve!" he cried pointing. "Him's Oolak. Wiv dogs, an' sled, an' food, an' everything. Him's coming down—"
But he waited for no more. He waited for no reply. He waited for no guiding mandate. He raced off across the frozen surface of the snow as fast as his jolly little legs could carry him. It seemed as if he considered anything or anyone belonging to "Uncle Steve" to be also part of his small life, and was entitled to all the welcome he could give.
Steve watched the little fellow with a tender smile. He was so small, so full of happy life and engaging simplicity. Then he had such a wonderful picture face, with its fringe of curling hair which thrust its way out from under the thick, arctic helmet of fur which was part of his outer clothing. For a moment, as he bundled over the snow like a brown woolly ball, Steve wondered how he managed it, so encased was his small figure in seal-skin. But he did, and his high-pitched greeting to the man with the dog train floated back upon the still, cold air as he floundered farther and farther away.
"Hello!—hello!—hello!"
The greeting came back at intervals. And Steve wondered at the feelings of the silent Oolak when he heard that voice, and saw that baby figure sprinting and wobbling over the snow towards him.
"Missis gone—dead."
"Gone—dead!"
Steve turned with a start. He was looking into the handsome face of the squaw, An-ina, whose words he had echoed.
"Missis all gone—dead!" the squaw repeated with a solemn inclination of the head.
But the re-affirmation was unneeded. Full confirmation was in her wide dark eyes, which were full of every grievous emotion short of tears. Tears were something of which her stoic Indian nature was incapable. But Steve knew well enough the weight of grief which lay behind the stricken expression which looked out of the enveloping hood of the woman's tunic of seal.
For a moment he gazed into An-ina's face in helpless silence. For the moment the tragedy of the whole thing left him groping. He knew this woman had come to him seeking guidance. In that moment of disaster he felt that the destiny of little Marcel and his devoted nurse had been flung into his hands.
"Come," he said with swift decision. "We'll get right back—to her."
Steve was at the bedside. He was bending low over the still, calm figure, so straight, so rigid under the blanket covering. He was reading for himself, and in his own way, the brief account of those last moments when her spirit had yielded before those other overwhelming powers it had been impossible to resist.
Every disfiguring line of suffering had passed out of the beautiful, youthful face. For all the marble coldness which had taken possession of it Steve realized something of the splendid, smiling, courageous womanhood which had struggled so recklessly in support of the man for whom she had given up her life. And the full force of the tragedy of it all found a deep echo of pitying admiration in his heart. It seemed to him that the hand of Providence had fallen hard, and, in his human understanding, with more than questionable justice.
His examination completed he turned to the dusky creature at his side.
"I guess her sufferings are over—sure. Her poor soul's gone to join her man, and the boy's just—alone."
The squaw's dark eyes were soft with that velvet look so peculiar to the Indian woman in moments of deep emotion.
"Maybe it best so," she said, in a manner which bespoke long association with white folk. "Him good woman. Him suffer much—so much. Poor—poor Missis. It not him fault. Oh, no. Him think all the time for her man, an' little Marcel. Oh, yes. Not think nothing else all time. This devil man come. Him kill her man. She not know. Poor Missis. She not think. Only so she please her man. So this devil man kill her man. So."
"What d'you mean?"
The man's gaze was compelling. Its steady light searched the soft eyes of the squaw. The woman withstood his gaze unflinchingly. Then she suddenly bent across, and drew the coverlet up, and tenderly hid the face of the dead. Then she looked up again into Steve's face.
"Come," she said quietly. "I tell you."
Without waiting for reply she led the way out of the room into the store beyond, with its bare counter, and shelves, and bins so meagrely supplied. Steve followed without a word. He had suddenly realized that as yet he knew only a part of the story of these people. There was more to be told.
The store displayed much the same purpose and care which everything else about the work of Marcel Brand revealed. The completeness of it all must have been surprising, had not Steve understood that the chemist had come here to carry his life's work to its logical completion. There were signs everywhere of capacity, and unstinted expenditure of money. But the haulage of it all. The thought was always in Steve's mind. The great stove in the corner of the long, low room. The carpentered shelvings, and drawers, and cupboards. The counter, too, no makeshift barrier set up for the purposes of traffic, but with every sign of skilled workmanship about it. He felt certain that all these things must have been borne up the slopes of the great table-land, hauled overland, or by water, from the workshops of civilization.
Habit was strong and An-ina moved at once to the great stove radiating its pleasant warmth. Steve took up his position opposite her.
The squaw began at once. She had nothing to conceal from this man who represented the law of the white men. Besides, was she not thinking of the boy who had stolen so closely into her mother heart?
"An-ina not say to Missis all," she said, in her simple way. "Oh, no. Missis much afraid. Much suffer. Him sick—much sick. No man—then all gone. She 'fraid. She all break up her heart. Marcel not come. Why? Why? An-ina know. She hear from Indian man. All Indian man know. Marcel him all killed dead. Indian man not kill him. Oh, no. Cy Allshore him kill him. Marcel him kill Cy too. Both kill each one. Oh, yes. Cy devil man. Cy think him kill up Marcel. Then him have Missis—have all things. Oh, yes. Indian man know. Indian man find both, all killed dead. Indian man tell An-ina. An-ina say no tell Missis. Maybe she all kill dead—too. Yes? An-ina love Missis. Love her much. She no hurt Missis. So she not say. Oh, no."
The searching eyes of Steve never left the woman's dusky face for a moment. They were boring their way to pierce the unemotional exterior for the truth that lay behind.
"Say, just stop right there," he commanded. "I need to get this right. You reckon this feller Cy—Cy Allshore was out for plunder—murder. You guess he kind of loved your Missis, and she didn't know. He reckoned to kill Marcel, and steal all this, and—his wife. That so?"
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