"Why didn't you knock?" she demanded. "We'll say I did and that you didn't hear me," he answered suavely. "What's it matter among friends anyhow?" "What do you want?" By sheer will power she kept her voice low. "Your mother's over at the house. I dropped in to say she'll probably stay all night." "Is your wife worse?" He lifted the black brows that contrasted so sharply with the pallor of the face. "Really you get ahead of me, my dear. I don't recall ever getting married." "That's a hateful thing to say," she flamed, and bit her lower lip with small white teeth to keep from telling the squaw-man what she thought of him. The Cree girl he had taken to wife was going down into the Valley of the Shadow to bear him a child while he callously repudiated her. He opened his fur coat and came to the fireplace. "I can say nicer things--to the right girl," he said, and looked meaningly at her. "I'll have to go get Susie Lemoine to stay with me," Jessie said hurriedly. "I didn't know Mother wasn't coming home." She made a move toward a fur lying across the back of a chair. He laid a hand upon her arm. "What's your rush? What are you dodgin' for, girl? I'm good as Susie to keep the goblins from gettin you." "Don't touch me." Her eyes sparked fire. "You're mighty high-heeled for a nitchie. I reckon you forget you're Sleeping Dawn, daughter of a Blackfoot squaw." "I'm Jessie McRae, daughter of Angus, and if you insult me, you'll have to settle with him." He gave a short snort of laughter. "Wake up, girl. What's the use of foolin' yourself? You're a breed. McRae's tried to forget it and so have you. But all the time you know damn well you're half Injun." Jessie looked at him with angry contempt, then wheeled for the door. Whaley had anticipated that and was there before her. His narrowed, covetous eyes held her while one hand behind his back slid the bolt into place. "Let me out!" she cried. "Be reasonable. I'm not aimin' to hurt you." "Stand aside and let me through." He managed another insinuating laugh. "Have some sense. Quit ridin' that high horse and listen while I talk to you." But she was frightened by this time as much as she was incensed. A drum of dread was beating in her panicky heart. She saw in his eyes what she had never before seen on a face that looked into hers--though she was to note it often in the dreadful days that followed--the ruthless appetite of a wild beast crouching for its kill." "Let me go! Let me go!" Her voice was shrilly out of control. "Unbar the door, I tell you!" "I'm a big man in this country. Before I'm through. I'll be head chief among the trappers for hundreds of miles. I'm offerin' you the chance of a lifetime. Throw in with me and you'll ride in your coach at Winnipeg some day." Voice and words were soft and smooth, but back of them Jessie felt the panther couched for its spring. She could only repeat her demand, in a cry that reached its ictus in a sob.