She was content to run a hand along its length, to feel the
caress of its softness.
Yet even as she touched it she thought of the pretty creature which had
worn it first, the slim-legged doe bounding in the forest depth, and a
little sigh lifted her breast.
But this had been the quick and merciful death of the bullet, the
legitimate death. That she could understand.
More quick and merciful than that which would come in the natural life
of the forest. Therefore this pelt held no such repugnance as those
stacked on the river bank.
Suddenly, as she bent above the bed, she felt the presence of another,
the peculiar power of eyes, upon her, and, turning quickly, she saw a
black head, black as her own and running with curls, that dipped from
the window.
There was no little head in all the post like that save one, and it
belonged to little Francette, the pretty maid who had run by the
factor's side that day of the meeting of Bois DesCaut by the river.
With the drop of that head from the sill there passed over Maren a
strange feeling, a prescience of evil, a thrill of fear in a heart that
had never known fear.
She left the tiny room with the gift of the factor still outspread, and
joined Marie in the outer space, where yawned a wide fireplace with its
dogs on the hearth, its swinging crane made from a rod of iron, its bed
and its hand-made table.
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