"If Aleck escapes from the island and arrests Peter, or reports the affair to headquarters, it means the penitentiary," he said as if speaking to himself rather than to Mona. "And that is what will happen—if Curry has his way. He hates Peter. He would like to see Donald McRae hung, and Peter in prison, and you——" A tigerish gleam was in his eyes as he faced her. "Why didn't Peter kill him when he had the chance?" he cried, as for a single moment his self-control broke its leash. "As a boy he was a brute and a bully, and as a man his soul is that of a monster—even though now he is a part of the law. He wanted you—always. I know it and could see it even when you were children. And for what he wants he would wreck the world. Why didn't Peter kill him? Why—with these two hands——" He reached out his long arms and his fingers closed like talons of steel. Then he checked his passion. His arms dropped again. "But it is best he didn't," he finished. "It is best—even though a snake has a better right to live than Aleck Curry!"
He continued his pacing across the floor, and with each step his stern face grew harder until at last it seemed to have no emotion at all—the hard, set, fighting face which Simon McQuarrie always turned upon his enemies. For a few moments he seemed to forget Mona. Then he asked: "What is Peter going to do? What does he plan to do?"
The question was so sharp it sent a little shiver through her, and Simon's eyes were looking at her with the steely coldness of ice.
"I don't know. Peter doesn't know—except that he means to keep Aleck Curry on the island until his father is well and can get safely away."
Simon grunted. "You mean the rock with nothing on it—two miles straight out from the beaver pond?"
"Yes."
The fingers of Simon's hands were twisting again.
"Constable Carter dropped in on us late this afternoon," he said shortly. "He told Pierre and Dominique he was on his way into the Georgian Bay country and would rest here for a few days. He lied. He's working with Aleck Curry, and if Aleck doesn't show up soon—if he starts smoke signals going out on the island, and Carter sees them——"
"Aleck hasn't any matches," Mona interrupted him quickly. "Peter took them away from him."
Simon's face was lightened for an instant by a flash of exultation. "Peter is improving," he conceded. "If he had only used as good judgment at the beaver pond, when he could have rid us of this snake forever——"