Joseph did not answer, but he allowed her to seat herself where she pleased and with one strong movement sent his big birch a long distance over the water.
Margot had never made the passage so swiftly, but the motion suited her exactly, and she leaped ashore almost before it was reached, to speed up the hill and call out to Angelique wherever she might be:
“All is well! All will now be well—Joseph has come.”
The Indian reached the house but just behind her and acknowledged Angelique’s greeting with a sort of grunt; yet he paused not at all to ask the way or if he might enter the master’s room, passing directly into it as if by right.
Margot followed him, cautioning, with finger on lip, anxious lest her patient should be shocked and harmed by the too sudden appearance of the visitor.
Then and only then, when her beloved child was safely out of sight did Angelique throw her apron over her head and give her own despairing tears free vent. She was spent and very weary; but help had come; and in the revulsion of that relief nature gave way. Her tears ceased, her breath came heavily, and the poor woman slept, the first refreshing slumber of an unmeasured time.
When she waked at length, Joseph was crossing the room. The fire had died out, twilight was falling, she was conscious of duties left undone. Yet there was light enough left for her to scan the Indian’s impassive face with keen intensity, and though he turned neither to the right nor left but went out with no word or gesture to satisfy her craving, she felt that she had had her answer:
“Unless a miracle is wrought my master is doomed.”