"What do you know about these logs--and of what I was thinking?" She answered him with a curious, baffling smile, and, ignoring his question, continued: "You need help. I am but a girl and know naught of logs nor why these logs did not go down the river with the others. But in your face as you pondered from day to day I have read it. Is it not that you would prevent Moncrossen from taking these logs? But you know not how to do it, for the logs must go down the river and Moncrossen must come up the river?" "You are a wonder!" he exclaimed in admiration. "That's exactly what's been bothering me." She blushed furiously under his gaze and, with lowering eyes, continued: "I do not know how it can be managed, but Jacques will know. You may trust Jacques as you trust me. For we are your friends, and his hatred of Moncrossen is a real hatred." She raised her eyes to his. "Do you know why Jacques hates Moncrossen, and why Wa-ha-ta-na-ta hates all white men?" she asked. Bill shook his head and listened as the girl, with blazing eyes, told him of the death of Pierre, and then, of the horror of that night on Broken Knee. At her words Bill Carmody's face darkened, and his great fists clenched until the nails bit deep into his palms. The steel-gray eyes narrowed to slits and, as the girl finished, he arose and gently lifted one of the little hands between his own. "I, too, could kill Moncrossen for _that_," he said, and the tone of his voice was low, and soft, with a tense, even softness that sounded in the ears of the girl more terrible than a thousand loud hurled threats. She looked up quickly into the face of the glinting eyes, her tiny hand trembled in his, and a sudden flush deepened the warm color of her neck. "For me?" she faltered. "_Me?_" And, with a half-smothered, frightened gasp, tore her hand free and fled swiftly into the forest. Bill stared a long time at the place where she disappeared, and, smiling, stooped and picked up her needlework where it had fallen at his feet. He examined it idly for a moment and then more closely as a puzzled look crept into his eyes. The garment he held in his hand was never designed for a covering for the girl's own lithe body, nor was it small enough even for Jacques. "She's worked on it every day for a month," he murmured, as he glanced from the intricate embroidered design to his own shirt of ragged flannel, and again he smiled--bitterly. "She's a queer kid," he said softly, as he recovered his crutch; "and a mighty good kid, too." CHAPTER XXX CREED That night the four sat late about the campfire. Old Wa-ha-ta-na-ta, silent and forbidding, as usual, but with a sharp ear for all that was said, listened as they laid their plans. At their conclusion the others sought their blankets, while Jacques took the trail for the camp of old Wabishke whose help was needed in the undertaking which was to involve no small amount of labor.