He had a new set of sensations which filled him with a novel confidence in his own powers. He was reacting, like all the others, to the intimate touch of a communicative confidence. He passed thoughtfully through the general office, noting as he closed the door that on a bench near Clark's door sat Fisette, a French halfbreed whom he knew. He remarked also that Fisette's pockets were bulging, it seemed, with rocks.
A moment later Fisette was summoned. He went in, treading lightly on the balls of his feet, and leaning forward as though under a load on a portage. Clark's office always frightened him a little. The rumble of the adjoining power house, the great bulk of the buildings just outside, the masses of documents,—all of this spoke of an external power that puzzled and, in a way, worried him. He halted suddenly in front of the desk.
"Well?" said Clark, without offering him a seat, for Fisette was more at ease when he stood.
The half breed felt in his pockets. The other unrolled a duplicate of the map he had shown Baudette and held out his hand, in which Fisette placed some pieces of rock.
At the weight and chill of them, Clark experienced a peculiar thrill, then, under a magnifying glass he examined each with extreme care, turning them so that the light fell fair on edge and fracture. One after another he scrutinized, while the breed stood motionless.
"Where do they come from?" he said shortly.
The breed made a little noise in his throat, and his dark eyes rested luminously on the keen face. After a little he gathered the samples and disposed them on the map, laying each in that corner of the wilderness from which it had been broken. He did this with the deliberation of one who knew beyond all question. He had brought months of hardship and exposure in his pocket. By swamp and hill, valley and lake and rapid he had journeyed alone in search of the gray, heavy, shiny rock of which Clark had, months before, given him a fragment, with curt orders to seek the like. The small, angular pieces were all arranged, and his chief stared at them with profound geological interest. Fisette did not move. He had looked forward to this moment.
"They're no good," came the level voice, after a pause, "but you're in the right country. Go back for another two months. You'll get it yet. It should be near this," he picked up a sample. "Take what men you want, or no, don't take any. I want you to do this yourself, and don't talk. Good morning."
Fisette nodded dumbly. The moment had come and gone and he felt a little paralyzed.
"Here, have a cigar."