lips, and his heart was sick again with dread. Was it possible--

She turned on him, her eyes shining, her voice trembling.

"Remember, Nootawe--you must send him to me for his answer," she cried
quickly, and she darted into the cabin. With a cold, gray face Pierrot
faced Bush McTaggart.

CHAPTER 13

From the window, her face screened by the folds of the curtain which
she had made for it, the Willow could see what happened outside. She
was not smiling now. She was breathing quickly, and her body was tense.
Bush McTaggart paused not a dozen feet from the window and shook hands
with Pierrot, her father. She heard McTaggart's coarse voice, his
boisterous greeting, and then she saw him showing Pierrot what he
carried under his arm. There came to her distinctly his explanation of
how he had caught his captive in a rabbit snare. He unwrapped the
blanket. Nepeese gave a cry of amazement. In an instant she was out
beside them. She did not look at McTaggart's red face, blazing in its
joy and exultation.

"It is Baree!" she cried.

She took the bundle from McTaggart and turned to Pierrot.

"Tell him that Baree belongs to me," she said.

She hurried into the cabin. McTaggart looked after her, stunned and
amazed. Then he looked at Pierrot. A man half blind could have seen
that Pierrot was as amazed as he.

Nepeese had not spoken to him--the factor of Lac Bain! She had not
LOOKED at him! And she had taken the dog from him with as little
concern as though he had been a wooden man. The red in his face
deepened as he stared from Pierrot to the door through which she had
gone, and which she had closed behind her.

On the floor of the cabin Nepeese dropped on her knees and finished
unwrapping the blanket. She was not afraid of Baree. She had forgotten
McTaggart. And then, as Baree rolled in a limp heap on the floor, she
saw his half-closed eyes and the dry blood on his jaws, and the light
left her face as swiftly as the sun is shadowed by a cloud. "Baree,"
she cried softly. "Baree--Baree!"

She partly lifted him in her two hands. Baree's head sagged. His body
was numbed until he was powerless to move. His legs were without
feeling. He could scarcely see. But he heard her voice! It was the same
voice that had come to him that day he had felt the sting of the
bullet, the voice that had pleaded with him under the rock!

The voice of the Willow thrilled Baree. It seemed to stir the sluggish
blood in his veins, and he open