“The print is fresh, not ancient, and none of the men from my camp have come this way.”
He strode forward, across the narrow open space, and disappeared into the fringe of trees bordering the edge of the bluff. It would have been easy for me to depart, to escape to the security of the tent below, but curiosity held me motionless. I knew what he would discover, and preferred to face the consequences where I was free to answer him face to face. I wished him to be suspicious, to feel that he had a rival; I would fan his jealousy to the very danger point. Nor had I long to wait. Forth from the shade of the trees he burst, and came toward me, his face white, his eyes blazing.
“Tis the fellow I thought,” he burst forth, “and he went down the face of the bluff yonder. So you dared to have tryst with him?”
“With whom, Monsieur?”
“De Artigny, the young fool! Do you think me blind? Did I not know you were together in Quebec? What are you laughing at?”
“I was not laughing, Monsieur. Your ridiculous charge does not amuse me. I am a woman; you insult 161 me; I am your wife; you charge me with indiscretion. If you think to win me with such cowardly insinuations you know little of my nature. I will not talk with you, nor discuss the matter. I return to the camp.”
His hands clinched as though he had the throat of an enemy between them, but angry as he was, some vague doubt restrained him.
“Mon Dieu! I’ll fight the dog!”
“De Artigny, you mean? Tis his trade, I hear, and he is good at it.”
“Bah! a bungler of the woods. I doubt if he ever crossed blades with a swordsman. But mark you this, Madame, the lad feels my steel if ever you so much as speak to him again.”