Once more he had recourse to the jar of water. A wide piece of doe skin was steeped in the boiling water first, and then, having been wrung out, was made the receptacle for the brown paste already prepared. The skin was then folded round, screwed up at the ends, and again plunged into the water, and left there for a couple of minutes.
"It is ready," said the chief. "Squeeze the mass dry, and bring the skin to me."
Up to that moment the wound had been smarting, particularly that portion where the Indian had made use of his knife. But a minute later, after the hot brown paste had been applied and covered by a pad of the fleecy material, the pain disappeared, and Steve felt huge relief. He was carefully bound up with long strips of doe skin, his shirt replaced, and in a little while he was lying back on the couch, expressing thanks to the Indians.
"Here is the food, and you look as if you could enjoy it," said the sergeant, entering a little later. "Come, drink this stuff. It is hot and steaming, and will put warmth into your body."
The kind-hearted fellow sat down and watched his prisoner eat and drink. Then he propped his head up on the couch, drew the rug well over him, and sat staring thoughtfully at his figure till Steve's eyes closed and he slept.
"A fine lad, and one who fights stoutly for a lost cause," murmured the sergeant, as he watched the sleeper. "To look at him as he lies there, one could take him for one of our country, though he is bigger and stouter than we are built. And he speaks French, too. Yes, I remember that. It struck me as strange when I heard him answer this Jules Lapon. Can it be that he is partly French, his mother perhaps being one of our land? There have been many such marriages, and often they have turned out well."
For a little while he lapsed into silence again, till his eye caught the gleam of a long, thin streak of light which was pushing its way through a chink in the roughly fashioned door. It was dawn, the hour for the firing party, and the sergeant rose at once to his feet.
"We shall see," he said aloud, as he moved towards the door, but still kept an eye on Steve. "This lad is a brave one, and I am taken with him. That is strange now, for up to this an Englishman has been to me, as to all my comrades, just an Englishman, fit to be slain if need be. I have pitied them often, to be sure, for it is hard to see them given over to these braves. But it is necessary to keep the Indians in good temper, and, therefore, what is necessary should not be grumbled at. Why is it that this young Hawk has gained my goodwill?"
He was of a reflective turn of mind, this French sergeant, and stood again with his hand on the latch of the door, staring hard at Steve and thinking aloud.
"Peste take it! Why is this? Ah! It must be this Jules Lapon. I have hated him ever since he came to us, and more so now that he is our commandant in the absence of the colonel. He is a hard man, or else he would never order the execution of a white prisoner without some sort of trial. I doubt that he has the power. The colonel could intervene, if only he were not chained to his bed with a broken thigh. Mon Dieu!"