CHAPTER XXI
THE PIVOT
Pierre came at five o'clock. He was keen for the approaching supper
hour and came jovially.
I was sick with haste, and deep sunk in my own grief, so I was cruel
and a fool; I plumped the facts at him without a softening word. And
so I frustrated my own ends. The great, slow creature cowered and grew
dumb under my story. Then he went, great-eyed and hanging-lipped, from
cabin to cabin. I had locked up his springs of word and thought.
But one thing my sword and my words prodded out of him. He had come by
the portage path from the east, and had seen no marks of passage that
were less than a week old. Our star led west.
I baled what provision and ammunition we needed, loaded the canoes, and
cached the furs and the balance of the stores at the edge of the
forest. At six o'clock we were afloat. I led the way, and Pierre
followed with the Englishman. This gave me space to think in silence.
The sun sank red and clear, and we paddled from a colored dusk to a
clear starlight. I knew this dimly, as the lost in the inferno know
the barred joys above them. Unless we found Pemaou within the next few
hours I should never be one with the loveliness of nature again.
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