“Go wherever you please and I’ll return to the camp with this fallen sapling.”

A third growl, now ingratiating.

“It’s a cold night, with fire and shelter the chief needs, and you and I wouldn’t think of fighting.”

A fourth growl which clearly disclosed the note of friendship and understanding.

“We’re in agreement, I see.  Good night, I wish you well.”

A fifth growl, which had the tone of benevolent farewell, and the bear, dropping on all fours, disappeared in the brush.  Robert, whose fancy had been alive and leaping, returned to the camp rather pleased with himself, despite the fact that about three hundred pounds of excellent food had walked away undisturbed.

“I ran upon a big bear,” he said to the hunter and the Onondaga.

“I heard no shot,” said Willet.

“No, I didn’t fire.  Neither my impulse nor my will told me to do so.  The bear looked at me in such brotherly fashion that I could never have sent a bullet into him.  I’d rather go hungry.”

Neither Willet nor Tayoga had any rebuke for him.

“Doubtless the soul of a good warrior had gone into the bear and looked out at you,” said the Onondaga with perfect sincerity.  “It is sometimes so.  It is well that you did not fire upon him or the face of Areskoui would have remained turned from us too long.”

“That’s just the way I felt about it,” said Robert, who had great tolerance for Iroquois beliefs.  “His eyes seemed fully human to me, and, although I had my pistol in my belt and my hand when I first saw him flew to its butt, I made no attempt to draw it.  I have no regrets because I let him go.”

“Nor have we,” said Willet.  “Now I think we can afford to rest again.  We can build our wall six feet high if we want to and have wood enough left over to feed a fire for several days.”

The two lads, the white and the red, crouched once more in the lee of the cliff, while the hunter put two fresh sticks on the coals.  But little of the snow reached them where they lay, wrapped well in their blankets, and all care disappeared from Robert’s mind.  Inured to the wilderness he ignored what would have been discomfort to others.  The trails they had left in the snow when they hunted wood would soon be covered up by the continued fall, and for the night, at least, there would be no danger from the warriors.  He felt an immense comfort and security, and by-and-by fell asleep again.  Tayoga soon followed him to slumberland, and Willet once more watched alone.

Tayoga relieved Willet about two o’clock in the morning, but they did not awaken Robert at all in the course of the night.  They knew that he would upbraid them for not summoning him to do his share, but there would be abundant chance for him to serve later on as a sentinel.

The Onondaga did not arouse his comrades until long past daylight, and then they opened their eyes to a white world, clear and cold.  The snow had ceased falling, but it lay several inches deep on the ground, and all the leaves had been stripped from the trees, on the high point where they lay.  The coals still glowed, and they heated over them the last of their venison and bear meat, which they ate with keen appetite, and then considered what they must do, concluding at last to descend into the lower country and hunt game.