She dropped the moccasins, took a couple of steps forward, and stopping, kissed Joy’s warm cheek. “My dear,” she said, “you must not worry. Time will unravel this dreadful tangle, and after all you are young yet.”
Joy looked up at her trying bravely to smile, but there was the gleam of unshed tears in her eyes. She was about to speak, when the servant George announced that supper was ready, and she contented herself with a glance that was full of love and gratitude.
The next morning, just before they broke camp the younger Indian, who had been out inspecting the trail, returned with news. He had been a little way up the river and had encountered a strange Indian in the act of taking a marten from a trap. He had talked with this man, and when the latter had heard who his mistress was he had betrayed considerable excitement, and had asked him to wait for him a little time, as he might have a message for his mistress. He had gone away, and a little later had returned and had then told Jim that his master—a white man—was lying sick in a cabin on a creek a little way up the river, and that he earnestly desired that Miss Gargrave would go and speak with him.
“Did he give his master’s name?” asked Joy, as a quick hope awoke within her.
“No, Miss, but he hav’ yours; he say you know him. And I wonder if he is the man we seek.”
Joy also wondered, wondered and hoped, and after consideration she nodded her head. “Yes, I will go and see this man. He may be Corporal Bracknell, or he may have seen him recently. In any case it is a Christian charity to visit any stricken white man in this desolate bush, and it will mean only a short delay. Where is the creek, Jim?”
“Up the river a little way, miss. The man he waits at the point where it joins the river.”
“Then Miss La Farge and I will go on ahead, and you can come on behind, and if you do not overtake us, you can await us at the mouth of the creek.”
The two girls started off, and presently reached the creek, where stamping his feet in the snow, Dick Bracknell’s man, Joe, awaited them. Both of them glanced at him keenly, but he was a stranger to them, and then Joy addressed him.
“Your master, where is he?”