“Divil take the talk!” and Phelim Burke laughed out. “These Burkes will do as I say, Hal Crawford, and ye know my mind already. We’re with ye, if it’s into hell!” “Ay, master!” spoke up the man Dickon, whilst his comrades growled approval. “The horizon be as good one place as another--and we be your men!” Crawford looked at Frontin, his blue eyes all asparkle. “And you, old buccaneer? Wilt go to Nelson and join Serigny? Or wilt go----” Frontin shrugged, but his affected cynicism could not hide the quick glow in his dark countenance. “I? Bah! Don’t be a fool. I go to get some soup over the fire, and advise you to do the same----” A roar of laughter broke the tension. _BOOK III_ THE STAR GOES, THE WOMAN REMAINS CHAPTER I IT DOES NOT PAY TO BE MERCIFUL Now the story passes to a mid-afternoon of spring in the far northwest, where as yet spring was only a name of bitter mockery. Hal Crawford and his men, with the terrified Cree guides who led them, staggered over the snow-crust of a tree-girded valley, along the open space which held a frozen stream hidden beneath its ice and snow. Far in the lead went the Cree trail-breaker. Crawford followed him, and behind Crawford came Frontin. The others, Indians and white men, straggled along as best they could, Sir Phelim Burke bringing up the rear and driving them on. As he wearily followed the Cree on between the lines of dark trees, Crawford began to feel the grip of hopeless despair--and with reason. “Can do no more, lad!” rose the voice of Phelim Burke. “Two men down.” Crawford glanced back to the group of men and halted. “Make camp and a fire,” he called. He met the eyes of Frontin, but neither man spoke. This valley ran from northeast to southwest. Crawford looked back in the direction whence he had come, and in his mind’s eye reviewed all the vast country across which he had struggled during the winter months, working from village to village, from tribe to tribe. Just behind him he saw the country of the Crees; beyond that the villages of the Savanois or plains folk, those of the Monsaunis or swamp tribes, and finally the scattered groups of the Wenebigonhelinis or seashore people, who lived about the edge of Hudson Bay. How far away now seemed that bay, and the dead Moses Deakin!