The following morning the voyageurs left the little cove. The south wind was strong enough to make crossing the lake dangerous, but they could go on along shore with little difficulty. They could at least reach the island which Nangotook said lay off a bay at the southern end of Minong. From there the Ojibwa intended, as soon as the weather would permit, to steer directly for the lake shore.
The travelers had rounded the end of Minong, when they came in sight of a canoe at some distance across the water. It held only one man, and they were too far away to make out anything about him, except that he did not wear the scarlet cap of the Canadian voyageur. Was it the Windigo? The boys felt a thrill of excitement, not unmingled with dread. Whether he had seen them or not they could not tell, but they followed as rapidly as they could make the canoe fly over the water. The lone traveler was making for some islands ahead. He passed into a channel between two of them and disappeared.
Without any orders from Nangotook in the bow, Ronald, who was in the stem, steered in the same direction. He wanted to find out if the man ahead was really the Cree murderer. He suspected that Nangotook was ready to kill the Windigo on sight That was the Indian way with such outlaws. Certainly the boy was not inclined to show any mercy to an Indian who had killed and eaten a white man. If he had merely killed the Frenchman,—well, Le Forgeron probably deserved death, and a private quarrel between him and his companion was the business of no one else, Ronald thought, but the evidence seemed to prove that the Cree had treacherously stabbed the white man in the back, for the purpose of eating him. For such hideous crime there could be no excuse, not even starvation, and no mercy for the criminal. That was the code of the Indian, the voyageur and the forest runner.
The pursuers passed through the channel between the two islands, and came out in view of others, large and small. Instantly Nangotook’s keen eyes caught sight of something on one of the little islands that caused him to utter a short grunt, raise his paddle from the water, and gaze intently. Noting his apparent surprise, the boys’ eyes followed the direction of his gaze. From a bare tree on that little island something white was fluttering. It was not a gull roosting. It was too large, and too white, and it fluttered and waved in the wind. It was a white rag, a signal of some kind, a flag of distress.
“Some one is on that island,” cried Jean in great excitement. “He is wrecked or hurt or starving, and he has tied that white thing to the tree to attract attention. We must go there at once. He may be a white man. We must rescue him.”
“Go slow, little brother,” cautioned Nangotook gravely. “Maybe, as you say, there is a man there wrecked and starving, but what if that white thing be only a trap? Where is the canoe we have been following? The Windigo may be trying to get us ashore, so he may murder and eat us.”
“If he is, he will be getting the worst of it,” declared Ronald emphatically. “We are three to one, and the only thing we need be fearing is a gun. If he is decoying us ashore, he will not be firing on us until we have landed, and even then he will try, I think, to use fair words and treachery rather than force. In that we are a match for him, now we are forewarned not to trust him.”
“You speak truly, my brother,” Nangotook answered. “I meant not to go by that island, but to be cautious. It may be that the signal is a true one. We must find out. But we must watch that we are not taken unawares by the evil Windigo. Now that I have warned you, steer for that island, and if the Cree is there, let him look to himself.”
As they approached the place, the three watched eagerly for some indication of what they were to find there. Like most of the islands off Minong, it was rocky, but bore a patch of trees and bushes on its highest part. There seemed nothing unusual about it, but the white rag fluttering from a bare limbed birch tree. Not until they were close in, did Nangotook catch sight of a canoe drawn up on a bit of shelving pebble beach between two great rocks. Silently he pointed it out to the boys. They ran their own canoe upon the same beach and stepped out, the Ojibwa with one hand on his bowstring, an arrow in the other, and his eyes searching the rocks and woods for signs of ambush. He did not relax his vigilance when he heard Jean, behind him, utter a low-voiced exclamation.
The two boys had carried the canoe up the beach, and Jean had turned to look at the other craft that lay there. “Our own canoe,” he whispered to Jean. “It was the Cree for sure.”