"I don't mean a thing but that you can come right along if you think that way."
The smile that accompanied Steve's words was gently disarming. There was no equivocation. It was impossible for the boy to misread what he said. The capitulation had not waited for the passionate challenge Marcel had been prepared to make.
"You—mean that, Uncle?"
"Surely. If you're yearning to take a hand, boy, I don't figger to get in your way." Steve closed up the books on his desk and dropped them back in the drawer from which he had taken them. Then he thrust back his chair and prepared to join the other in a smoke. "I've got just two feelings on this thing, Marcel," he went on, as he filled his pipe. "I'm glad you feel that way, but I'm kind of sorry to think you're going along with me. You see, I kind of think of you as my son. I've done all I know in fourteen years to teach you my notion of what a man needs to be. I've done the best I know that way. And I'd have hated to find you short of the grit I reckon this enterprise is going to need." He laughed. "If you'd have turned out a sort of 'Squaw-man' I guess I'd have hated you like a nigger. But there wasn't a chance of it, with a father and mother like you had. No." He lit his pipe, and settled himself in his chair. "The way you've learned to beat the summer trail, your woodcraft. You're a 'great hunter and brave,' as An-ina says, and you've got every Indian I've ever known left cold behind you. You've grown to all I've hoped, and I'm glad. And now—now this great last enterprise is coming along, why, it just leaves me proud thinking that you couldn't listen to the yarn of it, even, without reckoning to be on the outfit yourself. I'm glad—just glad."
Marcel's eyes shone. Steve's approval, unqualified, was something he had not hoped for. He had been prepared to battle for his rights as a man, and now—now the wonder of it. He was admitted to the task confronting them without question; with only cordial agreement. He remembered with regret his outburst to An-ina, when he had been waiting for Steve's return from Seal Bay.
"You see," he burst out with impulsive frankness, "I was scared you'd hold me to the fort, Uncle, the same as it's been every winter. I was just getting mad thinking I was only fit for the open summer trail, chasing up pelts with a bunch of these doper neches. Oh, yes. It set me mad. And I told An-ina. I'm not a kid, Uncle. Guess I'm all the man I'll ever be, and I just want to get busy on a man's work. I can't stand for seeing you doing these things for me. You don't get younger. And I—I'm bursting with health and muscle, and my spirit's just crying out against being nursed like a kid. I came here to kick, Uncle, I did—sure. To kick hard—if you'd refused me. But I needn't have thought that way—with you. And I'm sore now that I did. By Gee! It's just great! That hill, those fires! We'll start to fix the whole thing. And we'll get right out in the fall."
"Sure." Steve nodded. His eyes were very tender, and their smile was the smile he always held for the boy who had now become a man. "It'll be fall—early fall. We can't start out too early, but it mustn't be till the dopers are asleep. You see, we've got to leave An-ina behind—without a soul to protect her."
"Yes." Marcel's happy eyes shadowed. But they brightened at once. "Couldn't we leave Julyman? There'd still be the three of us."
"I s'pose we could."
Steve seemed to consider for a moment, his serious eyes turned on the stove. Marcel watched him anxiously. Presently the elder man looked up. To the other it seemed that all doubt had passed out of his mind.