"But we shall have fighting," I exclaimed. "The Keepers will soon discover us, and no matter how numerous we may be they will fight desperately. They may carry her away to Canada before we reach La Vierge du Bois."
"That is true," he admitted. "And the thought Ta-wan-ne-ars had, brother, was that we might leave to Do-ne-ho-ga-weh and Corlaer the breaking of the Doom Trail whilst you and I with a handful of warriors marched around by the way we escaped, as the white maiden advises in her letter. That way is not guarded, for none has known it, and perhaps we may hide in the Wood of the False Faces and bear off the maiden in the confusion of a surprize attack."
"It sounds reasonable," I said doubtfully. "'Tis preferable to trusting to the main attack."
"There is no other plan," he rejoined with energy. "Moreover, as my brother knows, Ta-wan-ne-ars seeks to save Ga-ha-no, too."
The hint of pain in his voice, which was never absent when he spoke of his lost love, shamed me for the instinctive selfishness which had made me concerned only with my own troubles.
"We will not save one without the other," I cried. "No, Ta-wan-ne-ars, do we not owe our lives as much to her as to Marjory?"
"What you say is true," he replied. "But let us not talk of what we will do until the time comes. I hope that the Great Spirit will be lenient with my Lost Soul, yet it may be her time has not come. If it has come we shall save her. If it has not Ta-wan-ne-ars will try again."
"And so will I."
"My brother is generous, as always," he said simply. "Now we must tell what we have learned to Do-ne-ho-ga-weh, and arrange our plans with him."
The Guardian of the Western Door was the center of an immense mob of warriors who danced around the war-post which had been planted in the Council-Place. Man after man, chanting the deeds he had performed or those he pledged himself to in the future, rushed up and struck the post with his hatchet in token of his intent to participate in the expedition.