"You are a brave man, monsieur," I said inconsequently. "I know that you will bear your share to-night."
He laid his hand on the door, and searched me with his sad eyes. "One last word," he said, "and then I shall bury this for aye. Monsieur, if I bring you misfortune, I ask you to remember—to remember from now on—that you took me against my will."
For all my impatience, I had some effort not to smile. He would be a
burden, he might be a nuisance, but he could hardly be a misfortune.
He had a weighty sense of his importance, to use so large a term. But
I would not ridicule him. "I promise," I said.
He held out his hand. "Say that again with your hand in mine. Promise me that, whatever disaster I bring you, you will remember that I came against my will."
Somehow that sobered me. "I promise," I repeated, and touching his hand, and again bidding him be on the watch, I went away.
I had no plans. My mind was cloudy as muddy water, and I sauntered around the camp looking important and weighty with calculation, but feeling resourceless and slow. Then I bethought me of Singing Arrow.
I shouldered my way to her lodge with speed that made me a target for scantily hidden laughter. But I could not find her. Lodge and fire were alike deserted. I asked questions, but was met by shrugs. My eagerness had been unwise. I had sought too openly and brusquely, and the Ottawas suspected my zeal of being official rather than personal. I saw myself in their eyes as an officer of the law, and knew that I had closed one door in my own face. I told myself contemptuously that I had made so many blunders in that one day that I must, by this time, have exhausted the list, and that I would soon stumble on the right road as the only one left.
And so it proved. For I went to my canoes, and there, perched bird-wise on my cargo, and flinging jests and laughter at Pierre and the men, sat Singing Arrow.
It was what I most wanted, and so relieved was I at finding it, that I could not forbear a word of reproof.
"I told you to keep away from Singing Arrow!" I stormed at Pierre, like the mother who stops to shake her recovered child before she cries over it.