"Him Louis Creal," he said pointing. Then he swung his arm away to the right. "Him Indian lodge. Much teepee. Much dog." He paused. "Charley him finish—yes?" he added almost regretfully.
Kars promptly led the way back to the cover of the woods.
"Guess we'll sit around," he said, in a low voice. "I'll hand out the talk."
Under the deep hush of night the village of the Bell River terror slumbered. The raw-pelt teepees, their doors laced fast, stood up like shadowy mausoleums with rigid arms stretched high above their sharp crowns, as though in appeal to the frowning night heavens. In vain glory an occasional log hut, with flattened reed roof, stood out surrounded by its complement of teepees to mark the petty chieftainship of its owner. Otherwise there was nothing to vary the infinite squalor of the life of a northern race. Squalor and filth, and almost bestial existence, made up the life of aboriginal man in a land where glacier and forest vied with each other as the dominating interpretation of Nature.
Nor was there need for optical demonstration of the conditions. It was there to faculties of scent. It was there in the swarms of night flies. It was there in the howl of the scavenging camp dogs, seeking, in their prowling pack, that which the daylight denied them. Savage as a starving wolf pack these creatures wallowed in the refuse of the camp, and fought for offal as for a coveted delicacy. And so the women and men laced tight their doors that the fly-tormented pappooses might sleep in security. In daylight these foraging beasts were curs who labored under the shadow of the club, at night they were feared even by their masters.
Kars, and those with him, understood the conditions. The night hid no secrets from them with regard to the village which sheltered their enemy. They had learned it all in years of the long trail, and accepted it as a matter of course. But, for the present, the village was not their concern. It was the yellow patch of light shining in the darkness that held them and inspired their council.
The light was widely apart from the village. It was on a rising ground which overlooked the surroundings. It was one of the many eyes of a low, large, rambling building, half store, half mere dwelling, which searched the movements of the degraded tribe which yielded something approaching slavery to the bastard white mind which lurked behind them.
The silence of the place was intense. There was no yap of angry cur here. There was no sign of life anywhere, beyond that yellow patch of light. The place was large and stoutly constructed. The heavy dovetailed logs suggested the handicraft of the white. The dimly outlined roof pitches had nothing of the Indian about them. But in other respects it was lacking. There were no fortifications. It was open to approach on all sides. And its immediate neighborhood reeked with the native odors of the Indian encampment. It suggested, for all its aloofness, intimate relations with the aboriginal life about it. It suggested the impossibility of escape for its owner from the taint of his colored forebears.
Though no sound broke the stillness about this habitation shadows were moving under its outer walls. Gliding shadows moving warily, stealing as though searching out its form, and measuring its vulnerability. They hovered for moments at darkened window openings. The closed doors afforded attraction for them. For half an hour the silent inspection went on.
These movements seemed to have system. No doorway or window escaped attention. No angle but was closely searched. Yet for all the movement, it was ghostly in its completeness of silence. Finally the lighted window drew their whole attention, and, for many minutes, nothing further interested them.