on his own troubles, it had never struck him that this gentle, serenely obedient man had been famishing for something to fondle; something to take care of. Tempest remembered now how Depache had begged for the broken-legged dog, and how he had gone away by himself when Tempest had refused him. For all the rigid laws and the strenuous man-life to which they had submitted themselves, there was yet something strangely young and uneradicable in these lives under his hand. Dick and Myers wanted their boy-games, though their eyes and the lines round their mouths could tell how much they knew of men. The soft, melancholy Depache, who was stronger than Tempest himself, wanted some little helpless thing to pet and kiss. Of what Tempest himself wanted he did not care to think. He went back to camp, and wrote up his diary.
Along the Thelon River old cut trees told where Esquimaux camps had been. For the Indians never stray so far from the western fur-trading posts, and the Esquimaux make no permanent homes in the woods. The open country where the snow packs hard beneath the dog-trains and the caribou run in their endless herds are dearer to them by far.
There were fish and deer and musk-ox in plenty where the following winter chased the little patrol east and ever east into Hudson Bay. Sweeps of utterly barren country were interspersed with heavy timber; deserted camps showed nakedly among the spruces; and the thickly-crossed spores of little and big fur animals were everywhere. Under sail they crossed Beverley Lake at the foot of the Thelon River, and saw that the far end of it a large Esquimaux camp where men came down to greet them among the barking huskies and the women and children.
Dick knelt without moving in the stern of his canoe while Tempest called a welcome, and the answers came in unusually good English. He was wondering why that husky man, who was broader and taller than any on the beach, had gone suddenly into a half-hidden tepee and dropped the skin flap behind him. And yet, in his own heart, he did not really wonder. He swung his canoe alongside Tempest's and spoke to him, very low.
"Can't we make camp here?" he said. "For I believe I have just seen Ducane."
