"Tell us, tell us!" cried Carcajou. "One would think Wiesahkechack had come back from his Spirit Home where the Northern Lights grow."
"François has come!" declared the Jay, in an even, dramatic voice.
The silence of consternation settled over the group.
"François and The Boy!" added Jack.
"What's a Boy?" asked Lynx.
"I know," asserted Mooswa. "When I was a calf in the Company's corral at Fort Resolution, I played with a Boy, the Factor's Man-Cub. Great Horns! he was nice. Many a time he gave me to eat the queer grass things that grew in the Factor's garden."
"Where is François?" queried the King.
"At Red Stone Brook--he and The Boy. I had breakfast with them."
"Renegade!" sneered Carcajou.
"And François says they will stay here all Winter and kill fur. There are three big Bear Traps in the outfit--I saw them, Muskwa; what think you? Great steel jaws to them, with hungry teeth. They would crack the leg of a Moose, even a Buffalo; and there are Number Four Traps for Umisk and Nekik; and smaller ones for you, Mister Marten--many of them. Oh, my! but it's nice to have an eight-dollar coat. All the Thief-trappers in the land covet it.