It required some pressure to persuade the Frenchman, but at last he consented; and as the afternoon drew to a close the little steamboat came squattering and wheezing up to the bar where Runnion had built his fire that morning, and a long, shrill blast summoned him from the point above. When he did not appear the priest took Poleon and his round-faced, silent crew of two and went up the bank, but they found no sign of the crippled man, only a few rags, a trampled patch of brush at the forest's edge, and—that was all. The springy moss showed no trail; the thicket gave no answer to their cries, although they spent an hour in a scattered search and sounded the steamboat's whistle again and again.
"He's try for walk it back to camp," said Doret. "Mebbe he ain' hurt so much, after all."
"You must be right," said Father Barnum. "We will keep the steamer close to this shore, so that he can hail us when we overtake him."
And so they resumed their toilsome trip; but mile after mile fell behind them, and still no voice came from the woods, no figure hailed them. Doret, inscrutable and silent, lounged against the pilot-house smoking innumerable cigarettes, which he rolled from squares of newspaper, his keen eyes apparently scanning every foot of their slow way; but when night fell, at last, and the bank faded from sight, he tossed the last butt overboard, smiled grimly into the darkness, and went below.
CHAPTER XVIII
RUNNION FINDS THE SINGING PEOPLE
"No Creek" Lee came into the trading-post on the following morning, and found Gale attending store as if nothing unusual had occurred.
"Say! What's this about you and Stark? I hear you had a horrible run-in, and that you split him up the back like a quail."
"We had a row," admitted the trader. "It's been a long time working out, and last night it came to a head."