CHAPTER III
The process of mental induction occasionally does not pause to reasonits way, but leaps to an immediate and startling finality, which, byreason of its very suddenness, is for a space like the shock of asudden blow. After that one gasp of amazement Philip made no sound. Hespoke no word to Pierre. In a sudden lull of the wind sweeping over thecabin the ticking of his watch was like the beating of a tiny drum.Then, slowly, his eyes rose from the silken thread in his fingers andmet Pierre's. Each knew what the other was thinking. If the hair hadbeen black. If it had been brown. Even had it been of the coarse red ofthe blond Eskimo of the upper Mackenzie! But it was gold--shimmeringgold.
Still without speaking, Philip drew a knife from his pocket and cut theshining thread above the second knot, and worked at the finely wroughtweaving of the silken filaments until a tress of hair, crinkled andwaving, lay on the table before them. If he had possessed a doubt, itwas gone now. He could not remember where he had ever seen just thatcolored gold in a woman's hair. Probably he had, at one time oranother. It was not red gold. It possessed no coppery shades and lightsas it rippled there in the lamp glow. It was flaxen, and like spunsilk--so fine that, as he looked at it, he marveled at the patiencethat had woven it into a snare. Again he looked at Pierre. The samequestion was in their eyes.
"It must be--that Bram has a woman with him," said Pierre.
"It must be," said Philip. "Or--"
That final word, its voiceless significance, the inflection whichPhilip gave to it as he gazed at Pierre, stood for the one tremendousquestion which, for a space, possessed the mind of each. Pierreshrugged his shoulders. He could not answer it. And as he shrugged hisshoulders he shivered, and at a sudden blast of the wind against thecabin door he turned quickly, as though he thought the blow might havebeen struck by a human hand.
"Diable!" he cried, recovering himself, his white teeth flashing asmile at Philip. "It has made me nervous--what I saw there in the lightof the campfire, M'sieu. Bram, and his wolves, and THAT!"
He nodded at the shimmering strands.
"You have never seen hair the color of this, Pierre?"
"Non. In all my life--not once."
"And yet you have seen white women at Fort Churchill, at York Factory,at Lac la Biche, at Cumberland House, and Norway House, and at FortAlbany?"
"Ah-h-h, and at many other places, M'sieu. At God's Lake, at Lac Seul,and over on the Mackenzie--and never have I seen hair on a woman likethat."
"And Bram has never been out of the northland, never farther south thanFort Chippewyan that we know of," said Philip. "It makes one shiver,eh, Pierre? It makes one think of--WHAT? Can't you answer? Isn't it inyour mind?"
French and Cree were mixed half and half in Pierre's blood. The pupilsof his eyes dilated as he met Philip's steady gaze.
"It makes one think," he replied uneasily, "of the chasse-galere andthe loup-garou, and--and--almost makes one believe. I am notsuperstitious, M'sieu--non--non--I am not superstitious," he criedstill more uneasily. "But many strange things are told about Bram andhis wolves;--that he has sold his soul to the devil, and can travelthrough the air, and that he can change himself into the form of a wolfat will. There are those who have heard him singing the Chanson deVoyageur to the howling of his wolves away up in the sky. I have seenthem, and talked with them, and over on the McLeod I saw a whole tribemaking incantation because they had seen Bram and his wolves buildingthemselves a conjuror's house in the heart of a thunder-cloud. So--isit strange that he should snare rabbits with, a woman's hair?"
"And change black into the color of the sun?" added Philip, fallingpurposely into the other's humor.
"If the rest is true--"
Pierre did not finish. He caught himself, swallowing hard, as though alump had risen in his throat, and for a moment or two Philip saw himfighting with himself, struggling with the age-old superstitions whichhad flared up for an instant like a powder-flash. His jaws tightened,and he threw back his head.
"But those stories are NOT true, M'sieu," he added in a repressedvoice. "That is why I showed you the snare. Bram Johnson is not dead.He is alive. And there is a woman with him, or--"
"Or--"
The same thought was in their eyes again. And again neither gave voiceto it. Carefully Philip was gathering up the strands of hair, windingthem about his forefinger, and placing them afterward in a leatherwallet which he took from his pocket. Then, quite casually, he loadedhis pipe and lighted it. He went to the door, opened it, and for a fewmoments stood listening to the screech of the wind over the Barren.Pierre, still seated at the table, watched him attentively. Philip'smind was made up when he closed the door and faced the half-breed again.
"It is three hundred miles from here to Fort Churchill," he said. "Halfway, at the lower end of Jesuche Lake, MacVeigh and his patrol havemade their headquarters. If I go after Bram, Pierre, I must first makecertain of getting a message to MacVeigh, and he will see that it getsto Fort Churchill. Can you leave your foxes and poison-baits and yourdeadfalls long enough for that?"
A moment Pierre hesitated.
Then he said:
"I will take the message."
Until late that night Philip sat up writing his report. He had startedout to run down a band of Indian thieves. More important business hadcrossed his trail, and he explained the whole matter to SuperintendentFitzgerald, commanding "M" Division at Fort Churchill. He told PierreBreault's story as he had heard it. He gave his reasons for believingit, and that Bram Johnson, three times a murderer, was alive. He askedthat another man be sent after the Indians, and explained, as nearly ashe could, the direction he would take in his pursuit of Bram.
When the report was finished and sealed he had omitted just one thing.
Not a word had he written about the rabbit snare woven from a woman'shair.