“Can yez not shpake, ye haythen?”
Whereat a canoe glided from the back shadows and the voice of Bois DesCaut came in its broken English,
“A boat,—M'sieu,—we seek a boat that but now escaped from camp with a murderer aboard,—one who killed in cold blood the chief Negansahima back at the post of De Seviere. My brothers travel to the Pays d'en Haut that justice may be done. We only seek the murderer.”
The tall man stood in silence a moment and glared at the scene, at the excited faces, the gleaming eyes, the shifting glance of the spokesman.
“A likely sthory!” he said presently. “An' who, may I make bould to ask, is this murderer?”
DesCaut squirmed a moment in silence.
“Who,—did ye say?”
“A man, M'sieu,—a-a-trapper.”
“One lone man? Troth I commend his valour in evadin' such a rabble o' hell-spawn! An' what from did he escape,—th' sthake an' th' stretchline?”
“Justice, M'sieu,—his life for the chief's.”