THE MARK OF THE BREED
Deep in the night, Marcel waked cold. Lifting his head from the
blankets, his face met an icy draft driving through the open door of the
shack which framed a patch of sky swarming with frozen stars.
Wondering why the door was open, he rose to close it, when the starlight
fell on Piquet's empty bunk.
"Ah-hah! Joe he steal some more, maybe!" he muttered, hastily drawing on
his moccasins.
Then stepping into the thongs of his snow-shoes which stood in the snow
beside the door, he hurried to the cache.
Beneath the food scaffold crouched a dark form.
"So you steal my share of de meat and hide eet, before I go, eh? You
t'ief!"
Caught in the act, Piquet rose from the provision bags as Marcel reached
him, to take full in the face a blow backed by the concentrated fury of
the Frenchman. Reeling back against a spruce support to the cache, the
dazed half-breed sank to his snow-shoes, then, slowly struggling to his
knees, lunged wildly with his knife at the man sneering down at him.
Missing, Piquet's thrust carried him head-first into the snow, his arms
buried to the shoulders. In a flash, Marcel fell on the prostrate breed
with his full weight, driving both knees hard into Piquet's back. With a
smothered grunt the half-breed lay limp in the snow.
"Get up, Antoine!" called Marcel, returning to the shack with Fleur, who
had left her bed under a spruce, "you fin' a cache-robber, widout fur on
heem, out dere. I tak' my grub an' go."
"W'ere ees Joe?" asked the confused Beaulieu, rubbing his eyes.
"Joe, he got w'at t'ieves deserve. Go an' see."
Antoine appeared shortly, followed by the muttering Piquet.
"Ah, bo'-jo', M'sieu Carcajou! You have wake up," Jean jeered.
One of Piquet's beady eyes was swollen shut, but the other snapped
evilly as he limped to his bunk.
Taking his share of the food, Marcel loaded his sled, hitched Fleur,
then looked into the shack, where he found the two men arguing
excitedly.
"A'voir, Antoine! Better hide your grub or M'sieu Wolverine weel steal
eet w'ile you sleep."
With an oath, Piquet was on his feet with his knife, but Beaulieu hurled
him back on his bunk and held him, as he cursed the man who stood
coolly in the doorway, sneering at the helpless breed blocked in his
attempt at revenge.
"A'voir, Antoine!" Jean repeated, as the troubled face of Beaulieu
turned to the old partner he respected, "don' let de carcajou keel you
for de grub." And ignoring the proffered hand of the hunter who followed
him out to the sled, took the trail north.
As dawn broke blue over the bald ridges to the east, Marcel raised his
set-lines and net at the lake and pushed on toward the silent hills of
the Salmon headwaters.