The Indian rose, and selecting a knoll where spruces grew thickly, kindled a fire. Wrapping the two partridges tightly in wet grass and several folds of green birch bark, he waited until there were embers, on which he placed them, and heaped fresh fuel. Asking Maggie to keep up the fire, he left and was away for some time. When he came back he had the bear’s pelt and several slices of steak, which he proceeded to broil. On lifting the partridges, their bodies came out clean from their covering of feathers, and on tearing them apart the entrails, dried and shrivelled, were easily drawn. Maggie had eaten many a partridge, but a sweeter bite than the breast of one so cooked she had never tasted, and with a piece of the bread in her pocket, she made a light but refreshing dinner. The bear-steak she could not look upon, but like qualms did not interfere with Hemlock’s appetite, who ate them with greater relish because part of his late enemy and the slayer of his dog. He had filled his flask with water from a spring near by, and Maggie remarked, if she “only had a pinch o’ saut, she couldna have asked for a better dinner.” Trimming and scraping the bear’s hide, to make it light as possible, Hemlock wrapped it into a bundle, and strapped it on his back. Then looking to the priming of his rifle, he told Maggie he was ready. “But the puir dowg; will ye no bury him?” “I have buried him,” answered Hemlock, “and poisoned the carcase of the bear that it may sicken the wolves that eat of it.” The tongue of Hemlock was now free, and as they trudged on, he kept up a constant conversation, surprising Maggie by the extent of his information and the shrewdness of his judgment. Becoming conscious that the sun was descending, she expressed a fear that she could not reach home that night. “No, you cannot, and I do not mean you should, but you will rest safe before sunset. I am taking you to the fort at Coteau-du-lac.” “That is oot o’ oor way, Hemlock.” “Not very far; it is necessary I see Colonel Scott as to how to save Morton.” Maggie said no more, for that was reason enough to go a hundred miles out of the way, though she thought with pain of the anxiety her absence for another night would give her parents. “Father will think I did not find Hemlock at Oka and that I am looking for him,” she concluded at last, “and will not borrow trouble about me.” CHAPTER VII.