For a moment neither Godefroy nor I spoke. Then the sinews, cutting deep, wakened consciousness.
"Are they gone?" asked Godefroy hoarsely.
"Yes," said I, glancing to the valley.
"Can't you break through the thongs and get a hand free?"
"My back is to the tree. We'll have to face it, Godefroy—don't break down, man! We must face it!"
"Face what?" he shuddered out. "Is anything there? Face what?" he half screamed.
"The end!"
He strained at the thongs till he had strength to strain no more. Then he broke out in a volley of maledictions at Jack Battle and me for interfering with the massacre, to which I could answer never a word; for the motives that merit greatest applause when they succeed, win bitterest curses when they fail.
The northern lights swung low. Once those lights seemed censers of flame to an invisible God. Now they shot across the steel sky like fiery serpents, and the rustling of their fire was as the hiss when a fang strikes. A shooting star blazed into light against the blue, then dropped into the eternal darkness.
"Godefroy," I asked, "how long will this last?"