Jack clutched the old man by the arm. An idea was dawning in his mind. “Who? Who?” he chattered. “Not—not——”
“She’s the gal you was lookin’ for—the gal that Tecumseh brought up. Alagwa means ‘the star,’ an’ they tell me her right name, Estelle, means star, too. I dunno why she fooled you. Women is durned curious critters an’——”
The old man babbled on, but Jack did not hear him. The explanation of many things had rushed upon him. But the main fact stood overwhelming and clarifying out.
Bob was Alagwa, the girl of whom he was in search, the daughter of M. Delaroche. And she was his wife. Once he knew the truth he could not understand why he had not guessed long before.
In truth, however, his dullness was not strange. No doubt, if he had known from the first that his little comrade was a girl he would have quickly guessed that she was the girl of whom he was in search. But so long as he thought her a boy he could not guess; and since he had known her sex his thoughts had been engrossed with other matters.
When his thoughts came back to earth, Rogers was still talking. “Peter was mighty sorry she’d left you,” he said. “He reckoned she’d gone back to Tecumseh. And he says for you to see his friend, Jean Beaubien, at Frenchtown, and——”
“At Frenchtown? That’s here!”
“Yes. An’ I’ve seen Beaubien! He knows all about Miss Bob. She’s living at Amherstburg, with white people. Tecumseh’s having her taught things.”
“At Amherstburg!” Jack gasped. “Why! that’s at Fort Malden, only fifteen miles away, across the river!” He turned to Cato. “Cato,” he directed, “you stay here with Rogers till I get back. If I don’t come back——”
“Hold your horses!” The old hunter fairly shouted the words. “You ain’t plumb crazy, are you. You can’t go to Fort Malden ’less’n you want to lose your hair. There’s seven thousand Indians there.”