Perhaps,--perhaps, even, some swift forest-runner among them, far on
his quest of the home of the caribou or with news of some friendly
tribe, had come upon a man, an old man rugged of frame and face, with
blue eyes like lakes in his swarthy darkness, and muscles that bespoke
the forge and hammer.
Who knew?
Maren's strongly modelled chin twitched a bit while the little flame of
tenderness that flickered ever behind the graveness of her eyes leaped
up. She longed for their speech that she might go among them and ask.
A little way along the stockade wall to the north there lay a great
rock, flat and smooth of surface, and here the girl drew apart from the
women and sat herself down thereon, hands clasping her knees and the
level sun in her eyes. Her thoughts were soon faraway on the misty
trail they had worn for themselves in the many years they had traversed
the wilderness in search of what it held, and the eyes between the
narrowed lids became blank with introspection. And as she sat thus, a
little way withdrawn from the scurrying activity of the scene, there
came a, step on the soft green sod and a slim form in buckskins halted
beside her.
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