her hands. What would women of that sort do? They were both of a kind.
They got into each other's arms. After that there was nothing for us men
but to wait. All women are the same, and Hilton's wife was like the rest.
She must get the secret first; then the men should know. We had to wait
an hour. Then Hilton's wife beckoned to us. We went inside. The girl was
asleep. There was something in the touch of Hilton's wife like sleep
itself--like music. It was her voice--that touch. She could not speak
with her tongue, but her hands and face were words and music. Bien, there
was the girl asleep, all clear of dust and stain; and that fine hand it
lay loose on her breast, so quiet, so quiet. Enfin, the real story--for
how she slept there does not matter--but it was good to see when we knew
the story."

The Trapper was laughing silently to himself to hear Pierre in this
romantic mood. A woman's hand--it was the game for a boy, not an
adventurer; for the Trapper's only creed was that women, like deer, were
spoils for the hunter. Pierre's keen eye noted this, but he was above
petty anger. He merely said: "If a man have an eye to see behind the
face, he understands the foolish laugh of a man, or the hand of a good
woman, and that is much. Hilton's wife told us all. She had rode two
hundred miles from the south-west, and was making for Fort Micah, sixty
miles farther north. For what? She had loved a man against the will of
her people. There had been a feud, and Garrison--that was the lover's
name--was the last on his own side. There was trouble at a Company's
post, and Garrison shot a half-breed. Men say he was right to shoot him,
for a woman's name must be safe up here. Besides, the half-breed drew
first. Well, Garrison was tried, and must go to jail for a year. At the
end of that time he would be free. The girl Janie knew the day. Word had
come to her. She made everything ready. She knew her brothers were
watching--her three brothers and two other men who had tried to get her