when the man in him grew tired of strife, and turned boyishly to the boyish equivalent for birds'-nesting and chasing cats; and together they sought these equivalents now; trolling for the great red trout at foot of the rapids; whipping the water for grayling; hunting caribou when fresh meat was needed; and chasing the cat (which was Depache) when opportunity occurred.
No power on earth could ruffle Depache's gentle melancholy into a storm. When Dick and Myers cursed the flies and the damp heat along the ragged streams and boulders that broke the portages, and yet would not allow canoe- work; when they swore at the windy nights; at the infinitely desolate hills where only the moss and a few handfuls of grass in the bottoms offered fuel; when, rising to giddy peaks of profanity, they vowed that they would feed no more biscuit to the stomachs that desired bread—bread, and could make no fire wherewith to bake it; then Depache would look at them, sad-eyed, and interested.
"But I could never think of all those words, moi," he would say, and drift off to sing his little songs contentedly.
By the nature of things Tempest stood somewhat alone throughout his patrol. Birth and position placed him apart, and his temper just now kept him there. He did his work accurately, both in the physical and mental branches; and what he thought about he kept to himself. Once Dick saw him handling his revolver with rather unnecessary interest, and he walked past noisily, meaning to make Tempest look up. Tempest did not look up. He put the revolver back in its case and snapped it shut. But Dick carried the memory of that little scene away with him, and he did not forget it.
In Tempest's place he would have used the revolver on the other man. He knew that if Tempest used it he would use it on himself, and that thought kept his mind busy, even through the keen disappointment when the patch of spruce wood promised by an early survey map as growing on the shores of Sifton Lake turned out, after much searching, to be soft ground spruce, of hardly greater value than the moss. Over that spruce Myers lost his temper fully for the first time. He flung himself on it, tearing it up by the stringy roots, and consigning it to hotter flames
