ding no direful significance in the clank of its iron, so Pierre
travelled down with a handful of Indians through the hard fastnesses of
that country, and, at last, alone, came upon the bay of Belle Amour.

There was in him some antique touch of refinement and temperament which,
in all his evil days and deeds and moments of shy nobility, could find
its way into the souls of men with whom the world had had an awkward
hour. He was a man of little speech, but he had that rare persuasive
penetration which unlocked the doors of trouble, despair, and tragedy.
Men who would never have confessed to a priest confessed to him. In
his every fibre was the granite of the Indian nature, which looked upon
punishment with stoic satisfaction.

In the heart of Labrador he had heard of Gaspard, and had travelled to
that point in the compass where he could find him. One day when the sun
was fighting hard to make a pathway of light in front of Gaspard's
hut, Pierre rounded a corner of the cliff and fronted Gaspard as he sat
there, his eyes idling gloomily with the sea. They said little to each
other--in new lands hospitality has not need of speech. When Gaspard
and Pierre looked each other in the eyes they knew that one word between
them was as a hundred with other men. The heart knows its confessor,
and the confessor knows the shadowed eye that broods upon some ghostly
secret; and when these are face to face there comes a merciless
concision of understanding.

"From where away?" said Gaspard, as he handed some tobacco to Pierre.

"From Hudson's Bay, down the Red Wolf Plains, along the hills, across
the coast country, here."

"Why?" Gaspard eyed Pierre's small kit with curiosity; then flung up a
piercing, furtive look. Pierre shrugged his shoulders.

"Adventure, adventure," he answered. "The land"--he pointed north, west,
and east--"is all mine. I am the citizen of every village and every camp
of the great north."

The old man turned his head towards a spot up the shore of Belle Amour,
before he turned to Pierre again, with a strange look, and said: "Where
do you go?"

Pierre followed his gaze to that point in the shore, felt the
undercurrent of vague meaning in his voice, guessed what was his cue,
and said: "Somewhere, sometime; but now only Belle Amour. I have had
a long travel. I have found an open door. I will stay--if you
please--hein? If you please?"

Gaspard brooded. "It is lonely," he replied. "This day it is all bright;