Vassall was not a particularly sympathetic figure to Jack, but the sight of the white men stewing while the Indian loafed was too much for his Anglo-Saxon sense of the fitness of things. His choler promptly rose, and, drawing Vassall aside, he said:
"Look here, why do you let that beggar impose on you like this? You'll never be able to manage him if you knuckle down now."
Vassall was a typical A.D.C. from the provinces, much better fitted to a waxed floor than the field. The hero of a hundred drawing-rooms made rather a pathetic figure in his shapeless, many-pocketed "sporting" suit. His much-admired manner of indiscriminate, enthusiastic amiability seemed to have lost its potency up here.
"What can I do?" he said helplessly. "He says he can't work himself, or he won't be able to boss the Indians that are coming."
"Rubbish!" said Jack. "Everybody has to work on the trail. I'll put him to work for you. Show me how the tents go."
Vassall gratefully explained the arrangement. There was a square tent in the centre, with three smaller A-tents opening off. Jack measured the ground and drove the stakes. Then spreading the canvas on the ground, preparatory to raising it, he called cheerfully:
"Lend a hand here, Jean Paul. You hold up the poles while I pull the ropes."
The half-breed looked at him with cool, slow insolence, and dropping his eyes to his pipe, pressed the tobacco in the bowl with a delicate finger. He caught his hands around his knee, and leaned back with the expression of one enjoying a recondite joke.
Jack's face reddened. Promptly dropping the canvas, he strode toward the half-breed, his hands clenching as he went.
"Look here, you damned redskin!" he said, not too loud. "If you can't hear a civil request, I've a fist to back it up, understand? You get to work, quick, or I'll knock your head off!"