Pierrot stood without moving.  He watched them as they disappeared into the edge of the forest, Nepeese still a few steps ahead of McTaggart.  Out of his breast rose a sharp breath.

“Par les milles cornes du diable!” he swore softly.  “Is it possible—­that she smiles from her heart at that beast?  Non!  It is impossible.  And yet—­if it is so—­”

One of his brown hands tightened convulsively about the handle of the knife in his belt, and slowly he began to follow them.

McTaggart did not hurry to overtake Nepeese.  She was following the narrow path deeper into the forest, and he was glad of that.  They would be alone—­away from Pierrot.  He was ten steps behind her, and again the Willow smiled at him over her shoulder.  Her body moved sinuously and swiftly.  She was keeping accurate measurement of the distance between them—­but McTaggart did not guess that this was why she looked back every now and then.  He was satisfied to let her go on.  When she turned from the narrow trail into a side path that scarcely bore the mark of travel, his heart gave an exultant jump.  If she kept on, he would very soon have her alone—­a good distance from the cabin.  The blood ran hot in his face.  He did not speak to her, through fear that she would stop.  Ahead of them he heard the rumble of water.  It was the creek running through the chasm.

Nepeese was making straight for that sound.  With a little laugh she started to run, and when she stood at the edge of the chasm, McTaggart was fully fifty yards behind her.  Twenty feet sheer down there was a deep pool between the rock walls, a pool so deep that the water was the color of blue ink.  She turned to face the factor from Lac Bain.  He had never looked more like a red beast to her.  Until this moment she had been unafraid.  But now—­in an instant—­he terrified her.  Before she could speak what she had planned to say, he was at her side, and had taken her face between his two great hands, his coarse fingers twining in the silken strands of her thick braids where they fell over her shoulders at the neck.

“Ka sakahet!” he cried passionately.  “Pierrot said you would have an answer for me.  But I need no answer now.  You are mine!  Mine!”

She gave a cry.  It was a gasping, broken cry.  His arms were about her like bands of iron, crushing her slender body, shutting off her breath, turning the world almost black before her eyes.  She could neither struggle nor cry out.  She felt the hot passion of his lips on her face, heard his voice—­and then came a moment’s freedom, and air into her strangled lungs.  Pierrot was calling!  He had come to the fork in the trail, and he was calling the Willow’s name!

McTaggart’s hot hand came over her mouth.

“Don’t answer,” she heard him say.

Strength—­anger—­hatred flared up in her, and fiercely she struck the hand down.  Something in her wonderful eyes held McTaggart.  They blazed into his very soul.