Within the first pine covert three Hurons were waiting, evidently Massawippa’s escort. She now walked beside Dollier de Casson and they stalked ahead, threading a silent way through the darkness. Spruce and white birch were all the trees that stood out distinctly to the senses, others massing anonymously in the void of night and their spring nakedness. The evergreen with prickling fingers brushed the passers’ faces; while the white birches in flecked shrouds crowded rank on rank like many lofty ghosts diverse of girth, and by their whiteness threw a gleam upon the eyeball. Following the head Huron, Dollier de Casson’s company trod straight over soft logs where the foot sunk in half-rotten moss, and over that rustling, elastic cushion of dead leaves, histories of uncounted summers which padded the floor of the forests. Through roofing limbs the rain found it less easy to pelt them. They wound about rocks and climbed ascents, until Annahotaha’s camp-fire suddenly blinked beneath them and they could stand overlooking it. He had pitched his bark tent in a small amphitheater sloping down to a tributary of the St. Lawrence. The camp-fire, hissing as slant lines of the shower struck it, threw light over the little river’s stung surface, on low shrubs and rocks, on the oblong lodge,[3] and the figures of some three dozen Indians squatting blanketed beside it, or walking about throwing long shadows over the brightened area. Étienne Annahotaha sat just within the shelter of his lodge, and here he received the priest, standing almost as tall as Dollier de Casson, who bent his head to avoid the tent. This shelter was, indeed, altogether for Massawippa; the chief preferred lying on the ground with his braves; but she was child of a mother long used to roofs, and was, besides, a being whom he would set up and guard as a sacred image. There was no woman in the camp. When Dollier de Casson and Annahotaha sat silently down together, Massawippa crept up behind her father and rested her cheek against his back. He allowed this mute caress and gazed with stern gravity at the fire. His soul was in labor, and the priest good-humoredly waited until it should bring forth its care. No religious instruction could be imparted to the camp while Annahotaha held his speech unspoken. Rain hissed softly through listening trees, paused to let damp boughs drip, and renewed itself with a rush. Evident vapor arose from the Indians beside the fire.