The priest's cry had waked the garrison, and the officers came running. Cadillac, stout as he was, was in the lead. I knew, from the press of his arms about me, that he had thought me dead. "Is Madame de Montlivet safe? Are the Senecas here?" I clamored at him. A babel of affirmatives arose. Yes, madame was there. The Senecas were there. So the English prisoner had proved to be a woman. Had I known it at the time? I was a sly dog. All tongues talked at once, while I fought for a hearing. We turned toward the commandant's. The door of the nearest cabin opened and Starling came out. He did not look toward us, and he walked the other way. The woman walked beside him. A hush clapped down on us as if our very breathing were strangled. A lane opened in front of me. I took one step in it, then stopped. There was the woman. I had followed her through wounds and hardship. Through the long nights I had watched the stars and planned for our meeting. But when I would have gone to her my feet were manacled, for this was not the woman of my dreams. This woman wore trailing silk, and her hair was coifed. And she was walking away from me; no instinct told her that I was near. She was walking away, and Starling walked beside her. I did not remember that I was wounded and a sorry figure; I did not remember that I was dressed in skins. I remembered that I had married this woman by force, and that she had once wished of her own accord to marry Starling. And now she walked with him; she wore a gown he must have brought; she had forgiven him. A hot spark ran from my heart to my brain. I turned and started toward the beach. I heard a breath from the throats around me and a stretching of cramped limbs. Cadillac's arm dropped round my shoulders, and I felt the pressure of his fingers. "Come to my quarters," he said. "You have mail waiting. And we will find you something to wear. Dubisson is near your size." And so I let him lead me away. I pressed him for news of the Indian situation, but he only shrugged and said, "Wait. Matters are quiescent enough on the surface. We will talk later." It was strange. I bathed and dressed quite as I had done many times before, when I had come in from months in camp; quite as if there were no woman, and as if massacre were not knocking at the window. But I carried a black weight that made my tongue leaden, and I excused myself from table on the plea of going through my mail. The news the letters brought was good but unimportant. In the Montreal packet was a sealed line in a woman's hand. "I have tracked my miniature," it read. "I mourned its disappearance; I should welcome its return. Can you find excuses for the man who took it from me? If you can, I beg that you let me hear them. He was once my friend, and I am loath to think of him hardly." The note bore no signature. It was dated at the governor's house at Montreal, and directed to me at Michillimackinac.