"I can't imagine how a girl would look with golden hair; can you, Jan?" Before he could answer she added mischievously: "Did you see any fairies at Churchill or York Factory?"
"None that could compare with you, Mélisse."
"Thank you again, brother mine! I believe you DO still love me a little."
"More than ever in my life," replied Jan quickly, though he tried to hold his tongue.
As they went on to Ledoq's, he found that the joyousness of the morning was giving way again to the old gloom and heartache. Brother Jan, Brother Jan, Brother Jan! The words pounded themselves incessantly in his brain until they seemed to keep time with his steps beside the sledge. They drove him back into his thoughts of the preceding night, and he felt a sense of relief when they reached the trapper's.
Ledoq was stripping the hair-fat from a fox-skin when the team pulled up in front of his cabin. When he saw the daughter of the factor at Lac Bain with Jan, he jumped briskly to his feet, flung his cap through the door of the shack, and began bowing and scraping to her with all his might. It was well known in the province of Lac Bain that many years before Jean de Gravois had lost a little brother, who had disappeared one day in the woods; and there were those who hinted that Ledoq was that brother, for Jean and he were as like as two peas in the ready use of their tongues, and were of the same build and the same briskness.
Mélisse laughed merrily as Ledoq continued to bow before her, rattling away in a delighted torrent of French.
"Ah, thes ees wan gr-r-reat compleeman, M'selle Mélisse," he finished at last, breaking for an instant into English. He straightened like a spring and turned, to Jan. "Did you meet the strange team?"
"We met no team."
Ledoq looked puzzled. Half a mile away, the top of a snow-covered ridge was visible from the cabin. He pointed to it.