"I love you, and I will go with you."
"But, girl, don't you realize what it means? This is the third night since I left the camp of Jacques——" The girl interrupted him with a laugh:
"And I, too, have been gone three nights; have struck straight through the forest, and because the river makes a great bend of many miles I came to this place before you, and have waited for you here a night and a day.
"And now I'm hungry. I will eat first, and then we will sleep, and to-morrow we will start together for the land of the white men."
The man's mind worked rapidly as he watched in silence while the girl removed some bacon and bannock from his pack-sack and set the coffee-pot upon the coals. When she had finished her meal he spoke, slowly but firmly.
"Jeanne, you have waited here a night and a day; you are rested, you have eaten. I will now make up the pack, and we will take the trail."
"To-night?"
"Yes, to-night—now. The back trail for the lodge of Jacques." The girl regarded him in amazement, and then smiled sadly, as a mother smiles on an erring child.
"We cannot return," she said, speaking softly. "Wa-ha-ta-na-ta would kill me. She thinks we came away together. Wa-ha-ta-na-ta was married; we are not married; we cannot go back." The man rolled the blankets and buckled the straps of his pack-sack. He was about to swing it to his shoulders when the girl grasped his arm.
"I love you," she repeated, "and I will go with you."