hen to to-morrow's work," I said briskly. "Now I am to bed. I must
rise early."

Cadillac went with me to the door, his arm on my well shoulder. I saw
by the delay in his walk that he had more to say. It came slowly.

"Monsieur, one word. If you do not care to see madame,--if it is
awkward---- Well, I can arrange it without gossip. You need not see
her again, and no one need know. Leave that to me."

Not see her again! I do not know what savage, insane thing sprang to
life in me. I struck down Cadillac's arm.

"You take liberties. You meddle insufferably. She is my wife. I will
see her when I please."

I like to think that I was not responsible, that it was the cry of a
baited animal that could stand no more. Yet all the torture Cadillac
had been giving me had been unconscious. He stepped back and looked at
me.

"My God! You fool!"

Oh, I could have knelt to him for shame! My tongue began apology, but
my face told a better tale. Cadillac held up his hand.

"Stop. Montlivet, you love the Englishwoman? Why, I thought---- I
beg your pardon. I was the fool."

I went stumblingly toward the door before I could face him. Then I
turned and held out my hand. "There is no monopoly in fools.
Monsieur, if to love a woman, to love her against her will and your own
judgment, to love her hopelessly,--if that is folly, well, I am the
worst of fools, the most incurable. I am glad for you to know this.
Will you forget that I was a madman, monsieur?"

CHAPTER XXVI

FROM HOUR TO HOUR

It was well that I slept alone that night, for more than once before
day dawned I found myself with my feet on the floor and my free arm
searching for a knife. I had flouted at imagination, but now every
howling dog became an Indian raising the death cry. I asked Cadillac
to double the guard before the woman's quarters, but even then I slept
with an ear pricked for trouble. And I was abroad early.

There are no straight roads in the wilderness; all trails are devious.
So with an Indian's mind. I sat in Longuant's skin-roofed lodge and
filled hours with talk of Singing Arrow. The girl was to wed Pierre at
noon the next day. The marriage was to be solemnized in the chapel the
next afternoon, and the whites were to attend. The affair was perhaps
worth some talk, if Longuant and I had been squaws yawning over our
basket-work. But we were men with knives, and Fear was whispering at
our shoulders.

The sun c