"Only that the expedition he was to lead against Albany has turned back and that he has gone to Canada to fight under the banner of Montcalm, when he comes with the great leaders, De Levis, Bourlamaque and the others."
"I thought I might meet him."
"Not here, with Charles Langlade."
The priest spent the night with them and in the morning, after giving them his blessing, captors and captive alike, he departed on his long and solitary journey to Montreal.
"A good man," said Robert, as he watched his tall, thin figure disappear in the surrounding forest.
"Truly spoken," said the Owl. "I am little of a churchman myself, the forest and the war trail please me better, but the priests are a great prop to France in the New World. They carry with them the authority of His Majesty, King Louis."
A week later they reached a small Indian village on Lake Ontario where the Owl at present made his abode, and in the largest lodge of which his patient spouse, the Dove, was awaiting him. She was young, much taller than the average Indian woman, and, in her barbaric fashion, quite handsome. But her face was one of the keenest and most alert Robert had ever seen. All the trained observation of countless ancestors seemed stored in her and now he understood why Langlade had boasted so often and so warmly of her skill as a guard. She regarded him with a cold eye as she listened attentively to her husband's instructions, and, for the remainder of that winter and afterward, she obeyed them with a thoroughness beyond criticism.
The village included perhaps four hundred souls, of whom about a hundred were warriors. Langlade was king and Madame Langlade, otherwise the Dove, was queen, the two ruling with absolute sovereignty, their authority due to their superior intelligence and will and to the service they rendered to the little state, because a state it was, organized completely in all its parts, although composed of only a few hundred human beings. In the bitter weather that came again, Langlade directed the hunting in the adjacent forest and the fishing conducted on the great lake. He also made presents from time to time of gorgeous beads or of huge red or yellow blankets that had been sent from Montreal. Robert could not keep from admiring his diplomacy and tact, and now he understood more thoroughly than ever how the French partisans made themselves such favorites with the wild Indians.
His own position in the village was tentative. Langlade still seemed uncertain what to do with him, and held him meanwhile for a possible reward of great value. He was never allowed to leave the cluster of tepees for the forest, except with the warriors, but he took part in the fishing on the lake, being a willing worker there, because idleness grew terribly irksome, and, when he had nothing to do, he chafed over his long captivity. He slept in a small tepee built against that of Monsieur and Madame Langlade, and from which there was no egress save through theirs.
He was enclosed only within walls of skin, and he believed that he might have broken a way through them, but he felt that the eyes of the Dove were always on him. He even had the impression that she was watching him while he slept, and sometimes he dreamed that she was fanged and clawed like a tigress.