For a moment he gazed into An-ina's face in helpless silence. For the moment the tragedy of the whole thing left him groping. He knew this woman had come to him seeking guidance. In that moment of disaster he felt that the destiny of little Marcel and his devoted nurse had been flung into his hands.
"Come," he said with swift decision. "We'll get right back—to her."
Steve was at the bedside. He was bending low over the still, calm figure, so straight, so rigid under the blanket covering. He was reading for himself, and in his own way, the brief account of those last moments when her spirit had yielded before those other overwhelming powers it had been impossible to resist.
Every disfiguring line of suffering had passed out of the beautiful, youthful face. For all the marble coldness which had taken possession of it Steve realized something of the splendid, smiling, courageous womanhood which had struggled so recklessly in support of the man for whom she had given up her life. And the full force of the tragedy of it all found a deep echo of pitying admiration in his heart. It seemed to him that the hand of Providence had fallen hard, and, in his human understanding, with more than questionable justice.
His examination completed he turned to the dusky creature at his side.
"I guess her sufferings are over—sure. Her poor soul's gone to join her man, and the boy's just—alone."
The squaw's dark eyes were soft with that velvet look so peculiar to the Indian woman in moments of deep emotion.
"Maybe it best so," she said, in a manner which bespoke long association with white folk. "Him good woman. Him suffer much—so much. Poor—poor Missis. It not him fault. Oh, no. Him think all the time for her man, an' little Marcel. Oh, yes. Not think nothing else all time. This devil man come. Him kill her man. She not know. Poor Missis. She not think. Only so she please her man. So this devil man kill her man. So."
"What d'you mean?"