"But, you cannot return to her! She is the wife of another! Over and over again you said it, in the voice of the fever-spirit." "No," replied the man softly. "To her I cannot return. But, listen; I start to-morrow for the white man's country. To find the man for whom I work, and tell him of the bird's-eye. "Soon I shall come again into the woods. I cannot marry you, for only evil would come of it. I will bring you many presents, and always we shall be friends--and more than friends, for you shall be to me a sister and I shall be your brother, and shall keep you from harm. "To-morrow I go, and you shall promise me that whenever you are in trouble of whatsoever kind you will send for me--and I shall come to you--be it far or near, in the night-time or in the daytime, I will come--Jeanne, look into my eyes--will you promise?" The girl looked up, and a ray of hope lightened the pain in her eyes. "You will surely return into the North?" "I will surely return." "I will promise," she whispered, and, side by side, in the silence of the twilight, they left the clearing. CHAPTER XXXII THE ONE GOOD WHITE MAN The following morning Bill parted from his friends. As he was about to step into the canoe Jeanne appeared at the water's edge bearing the mackinaw which he had worn when they drew him from the river. Without meeting his glance she extended it toward him, speaking in a low, tense voice. "In the lining I have sewed them--the papers that fell dripping from your pocket--and the picture. Many times I have looked upon the face of this woman, who has caused you pain. And I have hated! Oh, how I have hated! So that I could have torn her in pieces. "And many times I would have burned them, that you might forget. But, instead, I sewed them from sight in the lining of the coat--and here is the coat." Bill tossed the mackinaw into the bottom of the canoe. "Thank you, Jeanne," he said. "And until we meet again, good-by!" With a push of the paddle he shot the light canoe far out into the current of the stream. Bill paddled leisurely, camping early and sitting late over his camp-fire smoking many pipefuls of tobacco. And, as he smoked, his thoughts drifted over the events of the past year, and the people who comprised his little world. Appleton, who had offered him the chance to make good; whole-hearted Fallon; devoted old Daddy Dunnigan; Stromberg, in whom was much to admire; Creed, the craven tool of Moncrossen; the boss himself, crooked, brutal, vicious; Blood River Jack, his friend; Wa-ha-ta-na-ta, the sinister old squaw, who believed all white men to be bad; and Jeanne, the beautiful, half-wild girl, within whose breast a great soul fluttered against the restraint of her environment. To this girl he owed his life, and he had repaid the debt by trampling roughshod upon her heart. Bitterly he reproached himself for not seeing how things were going. For not until the day she told him in the clearing had he guessed that she loved him.