"But not when he's going to his funeral, M'seur."
"If I were one of your blessed saints I'd hit you over the head with a thunderbolt, Croisset. Good Lord, what sort of a heart have you got inside of your jacket, man? Up there where we're going is the sweetest little girl in the whole world. I love her. She loves me. Why shouldn't I be happy, now that I know I'm going to see her again very soon--and take her back into the South with me?"
"The devil!" grunted Jean.
"Perhaps you're jealous, Croisset," suggested Howland. "Great Scott, I hadn't thought of that!"
"I've got one of my own to love, M'seur; and I wouldn't trade her for all else in the world."
"Damned if I can understand you," swore the engineer. "You appear to be half human; you say you're in love, and yet you'd rather risk your life than help out Meleese and me. What the deuce does it mean?"
"That's what I'm doing, M'seur--helping Meleese. I would have done her a greater service if I had killed you back there on the trail and stripped your body for those things that would be foul enough to eat it. I have told you a dozen times that it is God's justice that you die. And you are going to die--very soon, M'seur."
"No, I'm not going to die, Jean. I'm going to see Meleese, and she's going back into the South with me. And if you're real good you may have the pleasure of driving us back to the Wekusko, Croisset, and you can be my best man at the wedding. What do you say to that?"
"That you are mad--or a fool," retorted Jean, cracking his whip viciously.
The dogs swung sharply from the trail, heading from their southerly course into the northwest.