Soon the Boundaries were silent, for full-stomached animals sleep well.
While there was feasting in the Boundaries there was much desolation in the Shack. François and The Boy had returned late to their wrecked home, and the Trapper's speech when he saw the débris, was something of wondrous entanglement, for an excited French Half-breed has a vocabulary all his own, and our friend was excited in the superlative degree. He knew it was Carcajou who had robbed him, for there were plaster casts of his brazen foot all over the mortar-like floor.
"We can't go to de new trap-place dis way," the Half-breed said; "we don' got no grub, de dis' he's gone, an' de poison, an' it jes' look like de Debil he's put bad Medicine on us himself. You stay here one week alone if I go me de Lan'ing?" he asked Rod. "I mus' get de flour, more bacon, some trap, an' de strykeen. I take me de dog-train for bring de grub stake. You jes' stop on de S'ack, an' when I come back we go down to Hay Riber."
It was late enough when François fell into a fitful troubled slumber, for the occasion demanded much recrimination against animals in general, and Carcajou in particular.
Whatever chance François might have had of discovering Carcajou's cache next morning, was that night utterly destroyed by a fall of snow.
PISEW STEALS THE BOY'S FOOD
In the morning, François, taking his loaded snake-whip, hammered the Huskie dogs into a submission sufficient to permit of their being harnessed; put a meagre ration for four days in the carryall, tied on his snow-shoes, and said to Roderick: "I go for pull out now, Boy; I s'pose t'ree day I make me de Lan'ing. I stop dere one day, hit de back-trail den, an' come de S'ack here wid de grub stake in fo'r more. You got grub lef for dat long, soor. Bes' not go far from de S'ack; de Blue Wolf he migh' come roun' dis side wit' hes Pack--bes' stick close de S'ack."
"I GO FOR PULL OUT NOW, BOY."
Then he slipped down the long-terraced river-bank with his train, and started up the avenue of its broad bosom toward The Landing.