“Do you fully and absolutely credit this tale?”
Without a shadow of hesitation or delay, the priest answered:
“I do, absolutely and fully. In the story I bring you I have not a doubt that you have heard the truth, so far as it goes. You know how the death of the man you thought murdered actually occurred.”
To Trafford’s mind there was left no ground for doubt.
“I accept your story,” he said, “as the story of what actually occurred. Where is the man who told it to you?”
The priest smiled and raised his hand in a sweep of the northern horizon:
“I cannot track the wilderness. If you want him, you must ask the woods to give him up.”
“There is a lad in the gang at the first rapids,” Trafford said, “who came with Victor Vignon from Beauce. Victor, who was his cousin, was to take him back before the Feast of St. John. He relies absolutely on this, and would not believe Victor dead. His name is Étienne Vignon and he needs comfort and help.”
“I will go to him,” said the priest. “The thought is a kind one.”
If the priest dreamed that he was thus finished with the detective, it was because he did not know the nature of the creature.