"I did not listen to him." Her fingers sought the cross on her
neck. She seemed to threaten a prayer which might stop her ears to
Saint-Castin.

"He meant no discourtesy. If you knew his good heart, you would like
him."

"I do not like men." She made a calm statement of her peculiar tastes.

"Why?" inquired Saint-Castin.

Madockawando's daughter summoned her reasons from distant vistas of
the woods, with meditative dark eyes. Evidently her dislike of men had
no element of fear or of sentimental avoidance.

"I cannot like them," she apologized, declining to set forth her
reasons. "I wish they would always stay away from me."

"Your father and the priest are men."

"I know it," admitted the girl, with a deep breath like commiseration.
"They cannot help it; and our Etchemin's husband, who keeps the lodge
supplied with meat, he cannot help it, either, any more than he can
his deformity. But there is grace for men," she added. "They may,
by repenting of their sins and living holy lives, finally save their
souls."

Saint-Castin repented of his sins that moment, and tried to look
contrite.