"Appearances would indicate," ran a little initialled note at the end of the report, "that Bondaine and Lemarc had been in some way trying to coerce Miss Bellaire and that she had shot her way out of the discussion. It is to be inferred, however, that she made up with her cousin, as he disappeared the same night and (merely rumoured) was seen with her upon the night train out of Baton Rouge."
Throughout the winter Drennen pressed the search as his instinct or some chance hint directed. No small part of his plan was to keep in touch with the movements of Lieutenant Max of the Northwest Mounted. He knew that the young officer was almost as single purposed and determined as himself; he learned that as the winter went by Max had met with no success. From Max himself, encountered in February in Revelstoke, he learned why the law wanted Sefton and Lemarc. There were in all five complaints lodged against them, four of them being the same thing, namely, the obtaining of large sums of money under false pretences. The fourth of these complaints had been lodged by no less a person than big Kootanie George.
"They came to George with a cock and bull story about buried treasure," grunted Max. "A gag as old as the moon and as easy to see on a clear night! It's rather strange," and he set his keen eyes searchingly upon Drennen's impassive face, "that they didn't take a chance on you."
"I'm called Lucky Drennen nowadays," answered Drennen coolly. "Maybe my luck was just beginning then."
The fifth charge lay against Sefton. He had brought an unsavory reputation with him from the States, and there would be other charges against him from that quarter. He had mixed with a bad crowd in Vancouver, had gotten into a gambling concern, "on the right side of the table," and had "slit his own pardner's throat, both figuratively and literally, making away with the boodle."
"Ten years ago they might have got away with this sort of thing," said Max. "It's too late now. The law's come and come to stay. I'm going to get them, and I'm going to do it before snow flies again."
Drennen shrugged. Max wouldn't get them at all; he, David Drennen, was going to see to that. This was just a part of Max's duty; it was the supreme desire of Drennen's life.
Although, during the cold, white months, Drennen was much back and forth along the railroad, he avoided Fort Wayland which was now the headquarters of the western division of the Northwestern Mining Company. Since the late spring day when he had left Lebarge to return to MacLeod's Settlement, he had not seen Marshall Sothern. Once, in the late autumn, he had found a letter from Sothern waiting for him at the bank In Lebarge. He left a brief answer to be forwarded, saying simply:
"I want to see you, but not now. After I have finished the work which I have to do, perhaps when next spring comes, we can take our hunting trip."
When the spring came it brought Drennen with it into the North Woods. He knew that the three whom he sought, the four counting Garcia whom he had not forgotten, might have slipped down across the border and into the States. But he did not believe that they had done so. The law was looking for them there, too, and they would stay here until the law had had time to forget them a little.