With a look of disgust but retaining his self-control, Jean answered: "Eet was a ver' hard winter. De Cree were starve' and knew we camp up de Ghost. Dey might come tru de bush for grub any tam. Eef I keel heem would I wait till spring to hide him under stones, as Lelac say?"
"Um!" The face of Inspector Wallace assumed a judicial expression. "The circumstantial evidence is against you. Of course, you have something in your favor, but if I were on a jury I'd have to convict you," Wallace said with an air of finality.
"One moment, Mr. Wallace," growled Gillies. "How about the previous reputation of Marcel and the character of the whole Lelac tribe? Hasn't that got any weight with you? I believe this boy because I've always found him honest and straight, as his father was. We thought a lot of his father on this coast. I don't believe the Lelacs because they always were liars. But you've missed the real point of the whole matter."
"What do you mean? The case is clear as a bell to me, Gillies." The Inspector colored, frowning on the stiff-necked factor.
"Why, putting the previous reputation, here, of Marcel aside, if he had killed Beaulieu, would he have told us that Beaulieu was stabbed? Clearly not! He would have said that Antoine died of starvation and was not stabbed, for as soon as he heard they had not turned in the fur, he knew he had the Lelacs in his power and could prove them thieves and liars, and we all would have believed him. The story of the Lelacs as to the man having been murdered would not have held water a minute after the hearing proves them thieves.
"Furthermore, he knew they could not prove their tale by the body of Beaulieu, either, left to rot on the shore there in the spring freshets. There would be no evidence for a canoe from the post to find." The Scotchman rose and pounded the slab table as he drove home his final point.
"Why, Jean Marcel had it in his power, if he had been guilty, to have walked out of this trouble by simply giving the Lelacs the lie. But what did he do? He told his tale to Père Breton, here, before he learned what the Lelacs had said.
"He freely admitted that Beaulieu had been stabbed when he might have denied it and got off scot free. Does that look like a guilty man? Answer me that!" thundered Gillies to his superior officer.
The force of Gillies' argument was not lost on the unreceptive Wallace.
The stone-hard features of Marcel reflected no emotion but deep in his heart smoldered a hatred of this Inspector of the Company, who, not satisfied with taking Julie Breton from him, now flouted his honor as a Marcel and a man.