“I have not made you learn from books; for books are things of the white men.  In books men have written many things; but in no book is anything written that will put warmer clothes upon your backs, or more meat in your caches.  The white kloochman came among you with books.  Her heart is good and she is a friend of the Indians, but all her life has she lived in the land of the white men.  And from books, the white men learn to gather their meat and their clothing.  Therefore, she thought that the Indians also should learn from books.

“But the white kloochman has learned now the needs of the North.  At first I feared she would not learn that it is the work of the hands that counts.  When I knew she had learned I sent you to her, for there are many things she can teach you, and especially your women and children, of which I know nothing.

“The white kloochman, your good friend, has fallen into the hands of Lapierre.  We are men, and we must take her from Lapierre.  And now the time has come to fight!  You are fighting men and the children of fighting men!  When this fight is over there will be peace in the Northland!  It will be the last fight for many of us—­for many of us must die!  Lapierre’s men are well armed.  They will fight hard, for they know it is their last stand.  Kill them as long as they continue to fight, but do not kill Lapierre!”

His eyes flashed dangerously as he paused to glance into the faces of his fighters.

“No man shall kill Lapierre!” he repeated.  “He is mine!  With my own hands will I settle the score; and now listen well to the final word: 

“Drag the ladders to the edge of the clearing, scatter along the whole front in the shelter of the trees, and at the call of the hoot-owl you shall commence firing.  Shoot whenever one of Lapierre’s men shows himself.  But remain well concealed, for the men of Lapierre will be entrenched behind the loop-holes.  At the call of the loon you shall cease firing.”

MacNair rapidly tolled out twenty who were to man the ladders.

“At the call of the wolf, rush to the stockade with the ladders, and those who have guns shall follow.  Then up the ladders and over the walls!  After that, fight, every man for himself, but mind you well, that you take Lapierre alive, for Lapierre is mine!”

The laddermen stationed themselves at the edge of the timber, and the men who carried guns scattered along the whole width of the clearing.  Then from the depths of the forest suddenly boomed the cry of the hoot-owl.  Heads appeared over the edge of Lapierre’s stockade, and from the shelter of the black spruce swamp came the crash of rifles.  The heads disappeared, and of Lapierre’s men many tumbled backward into the snow, while others crouched upon the firing ledge which Lapierre had constructed near the top of his log stockade and answered the volley, shooting at random into the timber.  But only as a man’s head appeared, or as his body showed between the spaces of the logs, were their shots returned.  MacNair’s Indians were biding their time.