“Ah-ta-tah-ke-bou-tis-in [Big man of the fight], the great Manitou is pleased. What are your orders?” The others looked at Jules curiously. Verbaux sat thinking, pondering, when one of the sentries came up hurriedly.
“Somme vone dey comme h’alon’!” he said. As he spoke a rapping was heard on the reinforced gates.
A small Canadian ran in, panting. He stopped when he saw the dead piled near the gate, and his eyes widened at the sight of the burned building and the bandaged men.
“Ah comme so queeck Ah can for to tell dat you goin’ be h’attack h’aga’n von taime dam’ ver’ soon; Ah see vone hunder’ mans yes’day by Lac Plat. Ah sneeek an’ leesten; dey say dey comme ici!” He sat down wearily; a long silence ensued; every one looked at Jules. Morning Star puffed on stoically.
The faint night breeze swung the smoke here and there, wafting it across the men’s faces, that shone ruddy in the light. The lulling death-song of the squaws floated on the wind; the sniffing and querulous bickerings of the dogs came harshly on the night stillness. Bright spark-eyes from the coals hastened to their end in the cooling atmosphere, and beyond in the deep timber the trees sighed and their branches rubbed sibilantly together. Verbaux was silent; the rest waited.
“Étoile du Matin, vat you say to dees?” he asked, in a few minutes.
Morning Star rose, and looking at the heavens that sparkled with the diamond lights of the stars, he answered in a sing-song voice:
“Ah-ta-tah-ke-bou-tis-in, your words are heard by the Manitou; you ask, he answers through me: do as you would do for the best”; and Morning Star relapsed into silence again and smoked on.
Then sharply over the soothing quiet sounded the yelping bark of a fox. Once, twice, thrice, the piercing note thrilled and echoed, then quiet, with its suggestiveness of peace, fell over everything.
And Verbaux thought deeply: on one hand, his heart’s desire and his cravings; on the other, his duty as he saw it. “Ah t’ink dat h’all mus’ go ’way, partir, f’om dees place; dere ees no de facteur, ve can no stand h’off autre h’attack; Ah no desire stay ici; an’ Ah say, den, dat to-mor’, v’en de sonne comme h’ovaire de tree, dat ve brûler dis poste, dat vous h’all go, partez, to Maison du Lac, an’ dat moi, Ah go to Reliance!”