“Great Bear speaks the truth, as he always does.  No white man can stand it.  If he tried it his sufferings would be beyond anything of which he might dream.”

A groan burst suddenly from the wretched Garay.  The hunter and the Onondaga looked at each other and their eyes expressed astonishment.

“Did you hear a sound in the thicket?” asked Willet.

“I think it came from the boughs overhead,” said Tayoga.

“I could have sworn ’twas the growl of a bear.”

“To me it sounded like the croak of a crow.”

“After all, we may have heard nothing.  Imagination plays strange tricks with us.”

“It is true, Great Bear.  We hear queer sounds when there are no sounds at all.  The air is full of spirits, and now and then they have sport with us.”

A second groan burst from Garay, now more wretched than ever.

“I heard it again!” exclaimed the hunter. “’Tis surely the growl of a bear in the bush!  The sound was like that of an angry wild animal!  But, we’ll let it go.  The sun tells meet’s half past eight o’clock and I go to ask our guest the usual question.”

“Enough!” exclaimed Garay.  “I yield!  I cannot bear this any longer!”

“Your papers, please!”

“Unbind me and give me food!”

“Your papers first, our fish next.”

As he spoke the hunter leaned over, and with his keen hunting knife severed Garay’s bonds.  The man sat up, rubbed his wrists and ankles and breathed deeply.

“Your papers!” repeated Willet.

“Bring me my pistol, the one that the Indian filched from me while I slept,” said Garay.

“Your pistol!” exclaimed the hunter, in surprise.  “Now I’d certainly be foolish to hand you a deadly and loaded weapon!”

But Robert’s quick intellect comprehended at once.  He snatched the heavy pistol from the Onondaga’s belt, drew forth the bullet and then drew the charge behind it, not powder at all, but a small, tightly folded paper of tough tissue, which he held aloft triumphantly.

“Very clever! very clever!” said Willet in admiration.  “The pistol was loaded, but ’twould never be fired, and nobody would have thought of searching its barrel.  Tayoga, give Monsieur Garay the two spare fish and anything else he wants, but see that he eats sparingly because a gorge will go ill with a famished man, and then we’ll have a look at his precious document.”

The Onondaga treated Garay as the honored guest they had been calling him, giving him the whole variety of their breakfast, but, at guarded intervals, which allowed him to relish to the full all the savors and juices that had been taunting him so long.  Willet opened the letter, smoothed it out carefully on his knee, and holding it up to the light until the words stood out clearly, read: 

“To Hendrik Martinus At Albany.