Marcel nodded with a ready smile.
"Any old thing you fancy," he cried. "What'll I tell you? About the darn outfit, the pelts we got? The woods? The rivers? The skitters? The——"
An-ina shook her head. His mood was what she desired.
"No. Marcel say the thing that please him. An-ina listen."
Marcel laughed. He had come home with the treasure hugged tight to his bosom. He had promised himself that this was his secret, to be imparted to no one—not even to Uncle Steve. An-ina had demanded that he should speak as he desired, and he knew that his one desire was to talk of Keeko. Now, he asked himself, why—why, for all his resolve, should he withhold the story of this greatest of all joys from the woman who was his second mother?
His laugh was his yielding.
"Oh, yes," he cried impulsively. "I'll tell you the thing that pleases me. I'll tell you the reason I was held up. And—it's the greatest ever!"
An-ina rose quickly from her seat.
"You tell An-ina—sure. It long. Oh, yes. An-ina say this thing—'the greatest ever.'"
She was gone and had returned again before Marcel had dragged himself back from his contemplation of the things which he desired to talk of. It was a gentle hint from An-ina that roused him.