shouldn't the other?"

Macavoy made a helpless motion with his lumbering hand. "Mother o'
saints," he said, "has it come to that, after all these years? Is
she--tell me where she is, me frind, and you'll niver want an arm to
fight for ye, an' the half av a blanket, while I have wan!"

"But you'll run as you did before, if I tell you, an' there'll be no
fighting to-night, accordin' to the word you've given."

"No fightin', did ye say? an' run away, is it? Then this in your eye,
that if ye'll bring an army, I'll fight till the skin is in rags on me
bones, whin it's only men that's before me; but woman--and that wan!
Faith, I'd run, I'm thinkin', as I did, you know when--Don't tell me that
she's here, man; arrah, don't say that!"

There was something pitiful and childlike in the big man's voice, so much
so that Pierre, calculating gamester as he was, and working upon him as
he had been for many weeks, felt a sudden pity, and dropping his fingers
on the other's arm, said: "No, Macavoy, my friend, she is not here; but
she is at Fort Ste. Anne--or was when I left there."

Macavoy groaned. "Does she know that I'm here?" he asked.

"I think not. Fort Ste. Anne is far away, and she may not hear."

"What--what is she doing?"

"Keeping your memory and Mr. Whelan's green." Then Pierre told him
somewhat bluntly what he knew of Mrs. Macavoy.