Never in the northland had there come a spring more beautiful than this of the year in which McKay and his dog went through the deep wilds to Pashkokogon Lake.  In a few hours, it seemed, the last chill died out of the air and there came the soft whispers of those bridal-weeks between May and Summer, a month ahead of their time.  But Jolly Roger, for the first time in his life, failed to respond to the wonder and beauty of the earth’s rejoicing.  The first flowers did not fill him with the old joy.  He no longer stood up straight, with expanding chest, to drink in the rare sweetness of air weighted with the tonic of balsams and cedar spruce.  Vainly he tried to lift up his soul with the song and bustle of mating things.  There was no longer music for him in the flood-time rushing of spring waters.  An utter loneliness filled the cry of the loon.  And all about him was a vast emptiness from which the spirit of life had fled for him.

Thus he came at last to a stream in the Burntwood country which ran into Pashkokogon Lake; and it was this day, in the mellow sunlight of late afternoon, that they heard coming to them from out of the dense forest the chopping of an axe.

Toward this they made their way, with caution and no sound, until in a little clearing in a bend of the stream they saw a cabin.  It was a newly built cabin, and smoke was rising from the chimney.

But the chopping was nearer them, in the heart of a thick cover of evergreen and birch.  Into this Jolly Roger and Peter made their way and came within a dozen steps of the man who was wielding the axe.  It was then that Jolly Roger rose up with a cry on his lips, for the man was Father John the Missioner.

In spite of the tragedy through which he had passed the little gray man seemed younger than in that month long ago when Jolly Roger had fled to the north.  He dropped his axe now and stood as if only half believing, a look of joy shining in his face as he realized the truth of what had happened.  “McKay,” he cried, reaching out his hands.  “McKay, my boy!”

A look of pity mellowed the gladness in his eyes as he noted the change in Jolly Roger’s face, and the despair that had set its mark upon it.

They stood for a moment with clasped hands, questioning and answering with the silence of their eyes.  And then the Missioner said: 

“You have heard?  Someone has told you?”

“No,” said Jolly Roger, his head dropping a little.  “No one has told me,” and he was thinking of Nada, and her death.

Father John’s fingers tightened.

“It is strange how the ways of God bring themselves about,” he spoke in a low voice.  “Roger, you did not kill Jed Hawkins!”

Dumbly, his lips dried of words, Jolly Roger stared at him.

“No, you didn’t kill him,” repeated Father John.  “On that same night of the storm when you thought you left him dead in the trail, he stumbled back to his cabin, alive.  But God’s vengeance came soon.